I stood by the humongous glass window of the 30th floor of my employer’s office and looked through.. I felt like jumping off – not to kill myself, I had died enough! This time in the wakefulness, I felt like losing control. At times I give it a thought, what bungee jumping or skydiving would feel like. A freedom from thoughts, a freedom from the known and unknown, a freedom from the scars and the ghosts of guilt.. what a beautiful jump it would be!
Most part of our lives we live rushing through the goals. At the age of 14, on an afternoon, I asked my dad “why do we have this life and what’s the purpose?”. I don’t remember his exact answer now but what he implied was that aim is to go through the journey as anyway it’s a continuous travel from one life to another. His understanding was probably borrowed from his life experiences, his curiosity for Godliness and his eagerness to read Hindu epic writings.
I was back then diagnosed with a medical condition and although it wasn’t that easy to deal with it on emotional front, now when I look back, I feel that it was one of the most important events in my life. I continued to face the deteriorating conditions of my health with frequent doctor consultations. I even wondered if anything in life was ever going to make sense – shouldn’t it be best to die maybe?!
I was angry. I was sad. But I was becoming sharp and fast as all this happened. For unjustifiable reasons I felt that I might end up killing myself someday and hence every day I have got until that dooms day is important. I wanted to make most out of each day. I rushed through my text books and practiced my badminton shots well. I was not interested in spending time on learning anything second time unless I thought it was worth second chance. I would ensure focusing enough that one attempt was sufficient to remember the information & directions. It was tough but I wanted to do it that way. Life was harsh but I was choosing to be a badass in return. I knew I was doing great and I wasn’t willing to stop.
This isn’t about boasting myself and in self-gratification. It’s about how one small thought that I might kill myself changed the entire game. I am nowhere close to a bigshot in any field but I feel that one of the life’s biggest achievement would be to fall in love with yourself. And I certainly feel that I fell in love with me a decade after. Every failure that came along – be it failed relationships, lost friendships, broken career paths or in general I being just too ugly for people to accept me as I am – they all made me ask one question – was the attention that I gave it well deserved?
When the ripples on waters would settle, in that stillness, I often found that all the emotional chaos wasn’t worth the drain. Life is accelerating at an exponential pace, it’s time we stop and watch it for a while before we get swirled in its convolution.
I sometimes forced things to happen, tried way too hard to make things work. I am glad that I did that. They were essential to help me realize the burden it brings and the freedom it bestows when one lets it go. What my father says might be true but I don’t want to embrace his answer and carry along. Instead every day, I am getting a chance to reckon if what my dad quoted is true or not. I often hear people saying life is a blessing and you should cherish it. One caveat to this is that you wouldn’t cherish it unless you experience that life is a blessing. We rush through the life, we drive through the relays of personal & professional targets by following how others are mastering it smartly avoiding the pitfalls. We often miss the point while copying others that we have it all already, it’s about exploring our own potential and offer it to the world.
In two and a half decade of my life, I realized that each one of us can turn their life downside up or the other way round if we decide to stick a finger in the face of our insecurities and keep going – sometimes embracing the downfalls and sometimes by falling into the nothingness.
I am certain it would be the most beautiful jump embracing absolute freedom…