When you have nothing to lose

         Rocky Balboa. Everyone knows him, yes? The Rocky movies show us one simple truth: When you have nothing to lose, you give it your all. And when the odds are stacked against you, you take a shot, putting everything on the line.

        Till a few weeks ago, I thought these were empty words which I couldn't relate to. But, it all changed. I've always been one to make my own way, education or career. I didn't make my decisions because everyone else was doing it or because it seemed the simplest thing. I did so because I really wanted to do that. All my decisions till now have been the same. But, I did not achieve the success I believed I was due, and I gave up on myself. I was contemplating a workaday job and a life in which I'd have no interest. Just because nothing was going my way. No other reason. I can't take so much emotional abuse nonstop from the whole world. If I put in effort, I need results or what is it all worth?

        Solid reasoning, flawless logic, thought I. But, there was someone who could one-up my self sufficient rationalization. My father, a man whom I'll never be able to be grateful enough to. I'd just returned from working in Delhi for a year, with nothing to get into for my next career step. All my life, I'd advocated competition and a fair system of 'if you want it, earn it.', but what I had to realize was that I myself never followed it. I'd become the sort of person whom I despise the most: a hypocrite. But, my father sat me down and explained that even though things don't go your way, you don't give up. Because if you do, that's the end of your journey right there. The time we have on this world is limited as it is, why would you want to cut it short? 

        Turns out, all those years of dependence and skirting by took away the part of myself which was my source of confidence and security. I was paranoid about how I'd feel if I failed one more time and was using it as an excuse to stay away from competition. My father realized what I'd need: a reset. On life, on my career, on how I think and do things, on everything. And that was exactly what he suggested: an exam. Not just any exam, one of the toughest exams out there. If I would give it my all, I'd get a fresh start on my career, I'd start believing myself again and above all, I'd be moving forward in life. I put myself on 'pause' a few years ago and this would be the reset.

         I did just that. I picked myself up and fought just another round. I committed myself fully to the task at hand, after a long long time and gave it my all. I do not wish to divulge the results but I will say this; Hard work and Persistence give results. No matter how long you have to work, and no matter how hard, as long as you do not give up, things will fall into place. Why? Because they have to. That's the order of things. It just is, much like how you don't get jack if you don't work.

        Hell, if I can score well enough in a math based exam, anyone can achieve anything.All those clichés about how you can tunnel through even mountains if you keep digging, they're unequivocally true. I realized the most important lesson of my life because of two reasons: One- I accepted that I wanted to. Two- I tried my best.

        I will leave you guys with just this: As long as you don't stop working hard, good things will come your way. Make of that what you will.

It is my blog, afterall!

        The past thursday, I had my birthday. A lot of family and friends wished me good health and happiness that day, making me feel really loved. A few of them gave me good life advice even and I'm thankful for that. Every year on my birthday, I take time off to remember all the people I've met that have said or done something that I vividly remember, both good and bad. And this year, I'm happy to say that list of people has gotten really long!

        Throughout my life, I've had people, not even friends, just people, tell me a lot of things about myself. They called me crazy, eccentric, egotistical, overly emotional, loyal to a fault, stupidly sensitive, pointlessly honest and more than all, hopelessly idealistic. I will keep it short and tell everyone just one thing. I might be all of those things but above all, I'm me. I've always been wary of being socially acceptable but a few years ago I made a friend who taught me that above all, I should be myself. That the only person I am answerable to is myself. So, I would like to tell everyone who's ever been judgmental of me to keep doing what they do, because I honestly don't care what you do with your time. I have myself to improve and impress, and don't wish to waste my time on someone who thinks they're above and beyond reproach.

        There are things people are good at and bad at. And it is entirely fine to take pride in what you do. And what is worth doing is worthy of being done well! So, if you think I'm egoistic to claim there's things I can do better than my contemporaries, think away. That is all it will be, a stray thought in a stranger's mind. Each one of us is like a plant in a storm called life. How we react to it is what shapes us. We should worry about being the best we can be, not about what the society sees us as.

        I am a bit judgmental towards people who don't do things right because I believe that things should be done in a certain way. And if someone does a half-assed job and demands recognition for it, I will be disappointed. Not for the person but for the set of beautiful events that would've come to be if the person had the guts to push himself and accept his excellence.But I will never criticize and berate such circumstances. And I don't think anyone should,even, unless they stand to lose something from it. Accepting people for who they are is a wonderful notion!

         We all love watching it rain., don't we? But some think, "Damn, I can't go out now" and some "Wow, that is a lot of water to play in". Everyone has a different way of doing and seeing things. Accept it and appreciate it. We're not here to be critical of each other but of ourselves. What we do with our time here is our business, after all. But don't you think its a waste of time, not pursuing a better self? 

         Finally, I will say this. You are your own yardstick. Don't let people define you. Be the best you can be and if anyone can't accept that, it isn't something you can change. You're already at your best, aren't you? Bend, and not break? Or break and start afresh? Decide your path yourself!

A world where madness makes most sense!

        I do not know how many of you have watched the original Mad Max Trilogy. Don't worry, this isn't about me being all fanboy-y about them. But I would definitely say to any movie lover, watch them. And once you've watched them, watch the new Mad Max: Fury Road. Without batting an eyelid.

        I'm not one for subtlety, but I'm also not one to blow things out of proportion or to take them over the top. I stick to this because things normally don't make sense once they start to not consider where they should stop. But sometimes, there are exceptions. Some wonderful wonderful exceptions, which make you wonder "where was the line, anyway?" Mad Max Fury Road was one of such experiences for me.

        The movie, is simple. A bunch of people trying to hold on to their last dregs of humanity and start afresh in a world where everything is out of control and is just too cruel. The titular character is Max, a former patrolman who roams about the endless desert the movie is set it in, trying to live with his demons. And then there is the primary protagonist, Imperator Furiosa, who's trying to make good by helping a few innocent girls escape from captivity. But my favorite character in the movie would Nux, who starts off as someone chasing the good guys to bring them back into his boss' domain.

          Max, plagued by hallucinations of his murdered daughter. Furiosa, leading some strangers who she believed deserved to live better. Nux, who has been led to believe in lies all his life and has now seen through the illusion. All these people chased through ginormous sandstorms by people standing atop poles on cars being driven at breakneck speeds. If we do not think about who wins and who loses for a moment, we can appreciate the raw untamed vision of the director, George Miller. 

         I for one, was not even a little bit psyched when I saw the trailer for Fury Road. I went to the movie simply because I had nothing much to do that weekend and it was the only proper movie around I could watch. After the initial moments of the movie, I was pretty much let down, thinking "Hey!! This is not Mel Gibson's Max. He's more Mad than he is Max! Wait, that makes sense given the situations he's been through". As I sat through the rest of the movie, I enjoyed each and every frame of it immensely to the tiniest detail. Each and every scene was as grandiose as they would get, with all of them making sense to me. 

         Not even once during the movie did I think that something was blown out of proportion just for the sake of it. In this movie, everything makes absolute and complete sense! The people believing in an old man's word of "entering Valhalla", of death being the absolute glory, of them being their boss' property, that the women who were on the run "belonged" to their boss, everything! 

         The entire movie is one gigantic car chase, through raging sandstorms, flying bullets, chasing cars, exploding rock gorges, everything. At the end of the chase, the good guys reach their destination but only to find that it too had deteriorated with the rest of the world. And as anyone would, after that exhausting a chase, they break. Imperator Furiosa who in spite of being an amputee never once shows a shred of weakness through everything falls to her knees, realizing they have nowhere left to run to. But when Max shows her that there is still a tiny chance of survival, she regains her spirit. And not one bit of all this seems corny!

           In my view, the movie is one of the complete movies I've ever seen in my life. I was glad it was as insanely fun as it was. Oh, and did I mention there is a blind guy too in the movie? He is suspended off of ropes every frame of the chase, while playing a guitar that breathes fire. There is a scene in the movie where Nux looks a sandstorm big enough to engulf an entire city and probably more and says with content and genuine wonder "What a lovely day". Yes, this is how blown out of proportion this movie is. And yet, it all makes perfect sense. A perfect example of unrestricted imagination meets wonderful execution.

          This is me, sharing with you guys the spectacle that Mad Max Fury Road was. If you get the chance to watch it, do not miss even a frame of the movie.

"A world where madness makes most sense is, even if only a little bit, interesting" -Me.

What are friends for?

        If an eccentric were to explain the world, he would say its like one solution where there are particles attracted to and repelled from each other. Effective charge, valency, what have you. I, think that is indeed the best way to describe it. Circumstances define us, choices make us, experiences build us, and friends help us. 

          Today's world has turned almost everyone into a philosopher. People always have something to say. And an extension of this would be the attitude some people have towards others, be it warm and welcoming or cold and distancing. It is a given that today's world moves forward through networking. Get friends at the right places and push yourself forward through them. This, in my opinion, is both correct and wrong, as circumstances would have it. But, one has to wonder from time to time; "What if I didn't have these many friends? What if I was one of those 'I can't talk to him, he's a stranger' person?" To all those people, I will say this; your friends will find you always, even if you don't know where to look for them.

           Ever since I was a kid, I've never been able to make friends by myself. I always had something to say about the people around me, to keep myself distanced from them. If I were asked to recall the first time I went up and talked to someone all by myself, I wouldn't be able to remember such an instance. I really wouldn't. I've just made friends through the circumstances and through my friends' welcoming personalities but not through my personal efforts.

          On the very first day of my undergrad, I saw someone sitting over my desk. I instantly got ticked off and stormed up to him to give what for. Ironically, this encounter was something I would later recall as me making friends with someone. A Mr. Sebastian, who was my good classmate during 4 years of undergraduate study and a truly thick friend through the years. If I had just ignored him instead of going up to him and telling him off, I never would have gotten such a wonderful friend. 

           And thanks to him, I met a whole other bunch of people who's names if included here will turn into a long list. These guys taught me what it actually means to be the part of something. Amongst this bunch of merry maniacs, there's every kind of awesome person you'd expect to meet. I, for one, didn't think they would keep in touch after our undergrad, but truth be told, I got to know them even better after we all left college. I regret not being a better friend during our college years. Only when I was leaving college did I realize how much I would miss them all. And it was this feeling that made me realize that I finally had true friends. 

          Friends are the family you choose, as a friend told me. I for one, never gave importance to any of my friends till I reached my undergrad because I believed I could live all by myself. I thought you need reasons to be around people. I thought you had to explain to yourself why you were spending time with someone. But my friends made me realize something important. Being self sufficient is a respectable notion indeed, but there is nothing as fun as sharing your time with good people. To all the introverts and egoists like me out there who think they don't need anyone, you're wrong. You don't have friends because you need them. You have friends because they're people who can appreciate you. 

         Sebastian, Raghavendra, Rupesh, Rushika, Shravan, Siddharth, Shruti and Shruti, Shreya, Supro and Doha, I cannot express how much you guys mean to me. I wish you guys nothing but the best. I'm grateful for how you guys were so welcoming towards this kid and have been such a treasure to me.

Identify yourself, oh modern man!

Identity. The modern man’s deficiency. The most important yet ignored entity. Most of us today, if asked to identify someone we pass through on our way to our seat at work, cannot do so. There’s two reasons to this; One, we don’t care about others. Two, there is nothing noteworthy about said person to describe. He/She is just another ‘body’ that exists. To elaborate, that person has no identity in our eyes. And here is a thought: maybe we are the same in someone else’s eyes. Just a somebody. A normal workaday busy body.

            Once upon a time, each person had his own identity. One was known for singing, one for dancing. One for mime, one for being able to mimic. People were known by their interests and pursuits apart from their names. And today, it is their employment, financial position and social status which form their identity. Such a bland way to be known, isn’t it? So superficial, such things. It is a person's choice, indeed, as to what he may choose to be known by. But, there is always a better way of doing things, isn't there?
              I like to think that when the very first sentient man came to be, he was at a point of complete and total peace. The same which we all pursue. Sure, there are a lot of names to it. Success, Respect, Recognition, Popularity, what have you. But, take a moment and think; What changed? Did he decide to evolve even more? Did he just slowly come down from his throne, step by step, just so that he may experience the joy of the climb once again? I like to think it is the latter. Why? Because that is what someone who's experienced true success would do. Relive the experience. The satisfaction of the kill is in the thrill of the hunt. 
               My father always tells me " It is about the journey. We know the destination as it is, why be so psyched about it?" When I was a kid, my mother once asked me if I would learn Classical Indian music. I really did not know what that question meant but I was appointed a wonderful teacher and taught vocal for 6 years. And then, I was made to stop because of medical reasons. When I was in high school, my father suggested I learn swimming, since it is a good exercise for the body. I declined and requested to let me learn skating since it seemed more fun, but swimming it was to be. I learnt swimming for a few months and then once again, medical reasons got in the way. During my last years of high school, my dad made me join Tae-Kwon-Do classes. I was initially reluctant but once I started getting good at it, I really had fun. Then, my schooling got to a really serious point and I stopped going. 
             Today, if you ask me to sing, I'll happily pick up one of my favorites and do it, however the rendition might turn out to be. If you ask me to join you in the pool for a few laps, I will gladly do so. If you show me a punching bag, I'll be more than happy to kick it. I do all these not because I'm good at them, but because I enjoy doing all those things. I write a lot of short stories and poems in more than one language. Recently, I've been even working on a full fledged 3-part novel of which I'm about halfway done with the 2nd part. I draw at times and if I'm with my mother, I try to learn how to paint. My mother is an awesome artist in her own right, by the way. If I'm home, I try to help dad out with the various electrical repairs he does around the house. All this, because I enjoy doing a lot of things. It makes life interesting. It spices things up, so to speak.
                One may have a lot of things he finds doing fun, but he will always give his heart out to one and only one thing. And for me, that thing is this right here. English writing. One day I want to be an author. I want to be able to write in any and every kind of genre. I want kids to talk about me as I've talked about J.R.R.Tolkein or George R.R.Martin or J.K.Rowling. I want not fame, but satisfaction. I want to tell myself "You did good" in my last moments. I don't want to think back and recollect"Damn, I worked too much". I don't believe in regrets, because at one moment it was exactly what you wanted. But guilt, is a worrisome thing. It kills us from the inside out.
                I write so much from my life in everything not because I like talking about myself, but because I'm the one person I know best and I believe if you don't take time to know yourself, no one else will care to. One should not have to hear, ever, from anyone else as to how he should live his life. But suggestions are free, aren't they? So, here's mine. Explore. Live. Travel. Fail. Learn. Love. and above all, know what you love about this world and pursue it with all your being. People will automatically look up to you. If we aren't pillars for the future, what are we?                 

Just what you thought you could't do.

             Your thoughts reflect you and your actions influence everything in your life. The human brain is faster and can perform more tasks than any supercomputer ever created. To understand what the universe offers, you have to be able understand your own thought process first. What a bunch of clichés! What obvious statements! Judge as we may, these are true. Simple, obvious truths which help us realize and accept wholly what we can be.

            Imagination leads to creation. Without visualizing anything, you cannot create it. If an architect cannot form a mental picture of what his next design should resemble, he will not be able to create a draft of it. If a writer cannot imagine what his characters are, his story will never take life. If a movie maker cannot imagine a storyline, his movie will never be born. Likewise, no action is taken without thought.

            Everything in this world, is born of imagination. Imagination is not something one can, or rather should, tame. Imagination shows its true potential the more you let it run free. One of the finest examples of unadulterated imaginative creations is the Lord of The Rings universe. Middle Earth. J. R. R. Tolkein did not write a story about a kid who’s thrown into a grandiose scheme of things. He created an entire universe, all by himself. He did not stop by just creating different kingdoms and races. He gave each race a language. And the language a script. And the usage, grammar.

            The characters Tolkein introduces us to are’nt just some run of the mill characters. They have a family. Their ancestors’ names, their roots, what their forefathers were known for. How they first came to be, how they came to live in their current predicament, everything. Even the villain gets a totally complete back story. Everything about Tolkein’s world is complete and undeniably original. He now, was a man who let his imagination lead the way, instead of trying to control it. The story of the Lord of The Rings is not about kings or wars or about some grandiose scheme to purge the world off of evil. It is about the little things that make up life. It is about the little things that make life worth fighting for and breathtakingly beautiful.

            Man has always been wary of the powerful and the untamed. Imagination too is such a thing. Nothing compares to the power of imagining something. Within a blink, one can traverse the whole world, explore the great seas and conquer the entire universe. What imagination offers us isn’t power it isn’t stature it isn’t wisdom. It is something far more fundamental and noble. Freedom. Freedom to dream, freedom from everything else, freedom to think what we want. Freedom to be what we want. Such a thing truly is the most beautiful.

            Today’s world, I believe, is moving further and further away from dreaming. Imagination is the stuff of dreams! Today, kids in schools aren’t taught to learn the subject, they’re taught to score marks in an exam. Today’s teenagers aren’t told to pursue their dreams, they’re demanded to decide among a set of options. Today’s professionals aren’t let follow their interests, they’re given a job and badgered into doing it. Today’s youngsters aren’t allowed to believe in their convictions, they’re cornered into accepting their position in the rat race. Today’s kids are tomorrow’s elders, realize it!

Imagine a balloon. Or rather a balloon yet to be inflated. Someone gives you a small box and says, this is the space allowed for your balloon, blow it as huge as you can! The irony of this situation is that it is happening all over again and again. Everywhere and to everyone. It is not that it is an unavoidable situation. It is because people are starting to think ‘this is my limit’. We are our biggest obstacle. The only person we have to outshine is the ‘us’ of a year ago, a month ago, a day ago, a second ago. As long as we keep moving forward with an open mind and a raging ambition, what the world will offer us is limitless. And to accept what all the world has in store for our awesome selves, all we need is to let our imagination run free like a wild stallion on the evergreen meadow that is our mind.

A friend of mine once said that as long as you’re positive towards what you’ve received, you will be complimentary to success in more than one way. All I say is this. Let yourself dream. Dream big. Dream huge. Dream ginormous! And work towards it continuously, unrelentingly and unforgivingly. And when you’re given your reward, reap it whole heartedly with your imagination!