After 7 months I am back. I dont know why but I just knew today I am writing a post and I knew which one too. This post is about birthday, age, life and other reflections which pop up under what are called 'Similar topics'. The idea of this post has been in my head for over an year now. I thought I would write something on my 22nd birthday and compare it to what I wrote on my 20th here. I shot past the birthday mark and then by the time I could write it my life has changed so what was a post of one idea became two and of course by the way this started you know its going to be a big one. Get your coffee mugs or thinking hats and sit down. Cos I have quite a bit to say.
It is quite remarkable how life changes within some fleeting moments and more remarkable how it remains the same far too painfully long. I can accept the changes as I believe in the theory that we are a sum of all those things we have been exposed to right from our childhood and some small things could be revelations as they uncover and unite a bunch of emotions and thoughts which were subconscious and discrete. But what I cant understand is how many people let their lives remain the same for decades together. When there is no novelty, where is the rush of thought and action? Where is the joy of life when you arent learning anything new today? How can you live in the same zip code all your life?
Sometimes though you are learning a lot, life remains static and enters a pattern and we feel like that stunt biker in a cage in the circus who circles around pretty fast. We too go on doing those sequence of actions pretty well but we forget how to slow down and go to the bottom of cage so that you can leave it. You feel this is exhilirating enough, I dont need new rushes in life. That is Death or atleast its half brother called Coma.
Why I am talking about changes in life is because as you keep living and keep changing you incorporate newer stuff into you and grow into a better and wiser person everyday. It is true what they say, experience is quite a teacher and pretty important too. But look for experience in variety and not in monotony. The reason I am saying all this is because in the last birthday post called 20 and me, I had talked about how significant 20's are and how I was not ready to take up the tag and I was going to skip being 20 and turn up 21 one fine day. I missed that too. I was stuck being 19 till I was almost 23.
Age is just a number they say. They say it is all in the mind. True. But for majority of the people Age is a fairly good approximation of where or what they are. At 16, you pass 10th; at 18, you are joining graduation. At 21 or 22 you either take up a job or do your post graduation. At 25 or 27 you are married and by 30 you are a father and so on. So I wont deride age for being irrelevant. Why said I was stuck at 19 till I was almost 23 was because of what I was doing. At 19 I was in my second year of engineering and had a set of activities and they were the same ones which I had carried on till I finally got a job in June this year. Though I was aging in time and though learning new stuff, I hadnt seen any significant change which made me feel any different from what I felt I was at 19. It was the same loafing around, spending time with friends, watching tons of movies and TV shows etc. When I did get a job the dynamics changed, I knew immediately that I stopped being 19 and suddenly became almost 23. Since then this post has been lingering in my head. I finally turned 23 exactly two weeks ago and about time I wrote this.
This post could have been titled '23 and me' as a sequel to '20 and Me' but there is this genetic testing tool of the same name which was titled 'Invention of the year' in 2008. But I dint want to have a knock off title which dint have an appropriate tip of the hat. Just like I keep to my writings and titles original, I dont want to be a knock off in my life too. I somehow feel 99.9% of us end up being so. We do our graduations and if you are hyderabad and even litttle smart, I bet you with 50:1 odds you are an engineer. Then we either have to take up cushy jobs in an IT giant or go do an MS OR MBA and join a cushier firm. Thats it. In someway we are all knockoffs and in a definitely traceable way our societies just want us to be. Mera pappu bahut intelligent hai, hum use engineer ya doctor banayenge. Not an artist, not a mathematician, an accountant, a lawyer never a teacher and seldom a sportsman. Maybe a cricketer if the school coach thinks he is good and they have already given up on his chances of an IIT by 6th standard. Why do we take this crap? We are made to believe that is really we want. I am pretty sure the odds are some of us really want it but I know most of us 'engineers' dont know what we were doing there though we entered the damn colleges thinking we will conquer the world.
Why cant we ask the question? What would I truly want to do? I did. I got some answers. Those answers have changed twice in 3 years and 4 times in 8 years. People call me confused, fickle minded and lot other things but I see the changes in what I want to do as a form of evolution, shedding things which I thought/was told were right but dint fit and growing wings which I know will take me to great heights or atleast happy heights. Too much fantasy they might say, but I already had made my intentions clear when I said "I dream, therefore I am"
What if you fail? Thats alright. Though it might be painful and exceedingly tough it is worth going through as by taking the first step itself I have done what many couldnt. I dont want to wake up one day when I am 40 and realize I havent done anything worthwhile in my life. I want to write, I want to consume tons of media and maybe control making some of it. I want to travel the world, live in great cities and I want to change skins every few years. I want to atleast try. I dont want to die a thousand deaths of compromise.
Well I have covered age, my life and a whole lot of me and that finally brings us to birthdays. I didnot celebrate my birthday this year. I didnt have the mood to do so. I I have been busy and turning 23 was ominous enough. I wanted to go away somewhere and reflect on it in solitude but that dint happen. So on top of that I did not want 200 people calling, texting, leaving wall posts and scraps reminding me about it. Atleast not this year. I do like the idea of a party. Lavish gifts for myself and huge celebration with everyone I know just because a number flipped but I dont know why I would do that if
- I am not happy.
- I havent accomplished anything offlate.
- I dont have the money to blow.
So no birthday for me this year but hopefully next year I want one. A birthday filled with happiness, accomplishement, joy of living life on my own terms and being rich doing so. So I end this wishing for a happy 24th.
p.s: Another reason I turn of birthday notification is to see how many people actually remember my birthday. I advise you not to do it if you cant stomach the bitter results. Well if you are still studying and have peers around it is a different thing, they all wait for it get a chance to kick you.
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