Continuing to break free...

And yet again, I return to what I perhaps like doing the most. Make a correction - something that I just love doing - pouring out my soul on paper, a screen in this case.
As I said earlier, I will be dwelling on the theme of "Breaking Free..." from the previous post. Of course, most of what you see here esentially springs from personal experience, so you might not identify or agree with it to the fullest extent, and that's perfectly fine with me. :)
In the last post, I mentioned about the mental flab that prevents us from taking on the challenges of life head-on. In addition to that, I feel there's one more factor that comes into play - self-doubt. This again is a very tricky thing to handle, just because many a times, it does not manifest itself as what it really is. Let me explain - more often than not, when we think ourselves incapable of doing something, we don't really stop at that. What we actually end up doing is that we find a rationale, suitably interpreting the situation to fit into our "understanding" about why we are better off not taking a particular risk because it's too dangerous/unjustified to do so and not because it's our own reluctance or insecurity that's the culprit. Trust me, it takes a herculean effort to just accept this fact, leave alone actually doing something about it. That's because we don't like to have a mirror held up to us - it can be a very painful experience to come face to face with one's deepest fears. It's almost like being made to stand trial by your own self. So, we tend to take the easy way out. The best way to solve a problem is to deny it's existence. So, why bother ourselves with all the effort? Why not just let things be as they are, afterall who's gonna question us? No one, except our own conscience, which we have anyways given a royal cold shoulder.
In this way, we end up taking the easier way out, not realising that by doing so, all we have managed to do is to weaken our willpower. When faced with the long & hard route to success, we have chopped off our feet in order to convince ourselves that the journey is not worth it and beyond us. Fortunately, the will is an animal with tremendous powers of regeneration. All it needs to get back in action is what I call as the "moment of truth" - that one moment when reality hits you so hard in the face that you can no longer run and hide behind the facile excuses that you have been putting forth till now. I faced my moment of truth a long time back and it has changed me so much - it was almost like being born again - and equally traumatic, complete with the tears and suffering. But in the end, it was worth it, and considering how well it has paid off, it's something which I would want everybody to go through atleast once in their lives.
I know I have gone on a tangent here. I started off talking about breaking free and wandered into the kingdom of the mind...By the way, that gives me a pointer as to what I am going to write about next. This theme of "Breaking Free..." takes a breather here, unless I come up with something really noteworthy.
Hopefully, Soul Country should see me back in action very soon... :)

Breaking free...

So, what brings me back to the keyboard for purposes other than typing out lines and lines of code? Honestly speaking, I don't know. It just seems that I have sort of rediscovered the joy of writing, the bliss of creation, the satisfaction of an urge well-fulfilled. The uneasiness of germinating ideas bristling in the mindspace was always there to savour, but nowadays I am enjoying the process even more than before. Hope it continues to be like that always...
Having said that, let me come to what I had intended to put forth. Today's post takes off from the conversation I had with Mizfit yesterday wherein we talked about breaking free from our self-imposed barriers and purposefully striving to bring about a change for the better in our lives. She was telling me about her plans for the future where she wanted to bring out some major changes in her life. To be honest, hearing this gladdened me no end. Having gone through the process of making potentially life-altering (and hence, "risky") decisions and putting them into action, I can say I have a fair idea of how one's mind works and what one goes through in such circumstances - which is why I am happy that she's finally decided to take the plunge (No, she is not getting married ;))
Typically, when one thinks about making major changes to one's life, either personal or professional, the biggest hurdle we face is our own reluctance to change of any sort. I feel that when we start our lives as kids, we are almost untouched by fear and are willing to try out anything and everything. Over the years, we tend to put on mental flab in the form of fears, complexes and opinions (either experienced by self or perceived). Just like physical flab makes us lethargic and unfit, this mental flab slowly but surely kills the "can-do-will-do" verve that we possess in so much abundance as kids. In such a situation, when we get the opportunity to shape our life the way we want it to be we tend to look at this opportunity as a moment of crisis and make all possible efforts to avoid it. We can (and do) find 1001 reasons not to take that one step which will make the entire difference between a winner and an also-ran. What's needed in times like this is asking just one simple question - What's the worst that can happen? - and honestly answering it. Then suddenly, more often than not, we will find that things are not as bad as we are making them out to be. After this, all that's needed is that little extra to make the ordinary life into an extraordinary one. And then, we can finally break free from our own shackles and truly walk free.

P.S: This subject is really close to my heart and I will surely return soon to dwell on it in further detail.
@ Mizfit~ Thanks for igniting the spark :)

Back to soul country!!!

After a pretty cheery (not to mention, heart-gladdening) post about friendship, yours truly now returns to the labyrinths of the soul. This post is a result of all the churning amd upheaval that has been occuring within me for the last 2 days. What all this soul-searching has achieved, I don't know, but it sure made me take a fresh look at the way I deal (and should be dealing) with those I come across in the course of this walk through life.
So, what's this all about? It's about how I do something for the people I consider as my "friends" in their hour of need and when they are suitably high and dry, end up getting a royal cold shoulder. Now I don't claim to be a messiah or a godsend who dramatically alters or improves the lives of people around me but the fact remains that when somebody whom I know needs help, my first instinct is to try and see if I can help in any way. I don't really expect them to reciprocate in kind (that's the situation nowadays, previously I did use to harbour such expectations, to be honest). But an absolute disregard for what they have got is certainly not what I would expect to happen. Put plainly, it's simply not done. Inspite of many such incidences, my faith in the correctness of what I am doing remains unshaken. But one recent incident, in particular, has forced me to take a fresh look at this policy of mine. I won't mention it over here, because mud-slinging, either direct or indirect, is not something I would indulge in, but it did set the wheels of thought in motion.
When faced with the question as to why somebody would be so "ungrateful" (It's a harsh word - I know, but I mean it), my first instinct was to think that perhaps I made mistakes in choosing the right set of people. But then, some introspection told me that if I would not have done something for them, someone else would have helped them out anyway. Hence, I definitely did not do the wrong thing. Now the question was - if I am doing the right thing, why I am getting this in return? I concluded that since I have done what I could have done, and since I anyways did it with little expectations of getting anything back, I had the satisfaction of having done something positive with me. This satisfaction, I felt was its own reward, and that I need not feel so gloomy about why the other person responded in the manner they did. If they fail to recognise or acknowledge the good that was done to them, they are the losers, not me. Then I was talking to my friend Reuben who put it in as many words. "I would say you did the right thing. Don't worry dude. LIFE will pay the debt. It will come back in some other way, when you least expect it." was what he said, I totally agree.
This sentence of his set me thinking further. On deeper thought, I realised that what he had said was indeed true. If life has handed me such idiots, it has also blessed me with a precious set of friends who have enriched my life in such a way that it can't be really put in words. As he said, it's about fulfilling your part of the bargain and moving on. So, that's just what I have decided to do - do your part and move on. Life will give you what you deserve, and in many ways, too.
So, here's looking forward to a new life, with a new vision.
Cheers!!!