Turn Right

We’ve all done it; Looked down the road not taken and wondered what lay at the end of it. And we’ve closed our eyes and tried to imagine what might have been…how life might have been different…how we might have been different.

Sure, we’re making choices all the time, but there are some, which mark the turning points in our lives. These are the choices that eventually define us...that make us who we are. Only, we don’t know it at that time. 

Bangalore, for me, is that road not taken, and the turning point in my life. I return to visit though, and every once in a while, indulge in imagining the alternate destiny I must have forfeited the day I had eloped with my freedom, from the city that was once to have been home. I had turned my back on what my family had planned and thought best for me, along with a future filled with possibilities…one that may have turned out very different from what I know now.

However, when we run away from something, we are also running toward something else, though at that time, the ‘something else’ had been clouded with ambiguity and uncertainty, save for the fact that it felt right somehow; that it would have to be better than what I was leaving behind. But I’m a believing is seeing kind of person, and the path I had paved for myself two decades ago, has brought me to this time and place, with the immensely satisfying awareness that trading those possibilities then, seems insignificant in the light of what I have now, and that life couldn’t have turned out better. 

“Funny...I guess destiny is not the path given to us, but the path we choose for ourselves.” And I agree with Megamind on this, because the future isn’t set in stone. We are constantly changing it through our choices…through both, the paths we take, and those we don’t. And somewhere in those spaces between what we know and what we don’t, between what we can control and what we can’t, lies faith...Faith that things will eventually be okay, and that we will be happier, for having had the courage to listen to our heart.

Fragmented

Saying goodbye wasn’t easy

Knowing that

I didn’t want to leave,

And that you didn’t want me to...

But also knowing that

I couldn’t stay...

Shouldn’t stay any longer.

I kept the moments

And let you keep the memories...

So that if you should ever wonder

If I’ll come back,

You know, that

In these memories, I will...

Whenever you think

Of me.

Truth and Dare

“Our idea of happiness can prevent us from actually being happy. We fail to see the opportunity for joy that is right in front of us when we are caught in a belief that happiness should take a particular form.”

- Thich Nhat Hanh, ‘Teachings on Love’

The notion of a soulmate has always fascinated, yet repeatedly failed to convince me. Maybe it’s the cynic in me that surfaces more often than not, which persuades me to believe that people who are waiting for one, are simply living in some kind of fool’s paradise where spring blossoms eternal and the rain brings forth arched colours, not the mud that stains or the acid that corrodes.

So what is it about a soulmate that charms us to such a vast extent? I wonder, for I am yet to see a real person match the enchantment of the illusion.

Perhaps the idea arises from the superficially nonchalant yet inwardly desperate craving for happy endings. And maybe, its strength lies in the enigmatic unknown. Then again, maybe it’s quite simply the result of the culmination of all our secret yearnings, projected onto that one person, who we know, with the unwavering faith of a believer, will be everything we’ve ever wanted, to make us feel complete. Who will, in effect, grant us our ‘happily ever after’.

What then of happiness...that ephemeral, elusive butterfly that seems to flutter awhile in thoughtful circles before it finally alights on our shoulder, only to fly away faster than we can reach out and touch it? Why do we seem so naturally predisposed to linking our happiness to the discovery of this equally elusive person...the one we label soulmate? And how can happiness such as this, that is so contingent on another person, find a way to stay?

So maybe I don’t believe in the idea of an ‘other half’ to one’s soul, and maybe I prefer the idea of two people who enhance, rather than complement, or even complete each other. Maybe I'd rather acknowledge that happiness lies more in our own conviction that we are loved, and wanted for who we are, by someone, by anyone, rather than in laying and risking the burden of this feeling on one person’s fragile shoulders and calling them our soulmate.

I, however, lend my heart to the undying optimism of those who believe in finding their twin soul, because I think that it is this, their unshaken belief in the veiled but definite presence of their very own someone, that keeps people going, long after all the reasons why they should, have ended.

And maybe it is this conviction...of a soulmate, waiting for us somewhere down time and space, which sustains us and gives us reason for hope in our perfectly imperfect lives.

No Strings Attached

Choices...

We're making them every day. We choose our friends, the situations we want to be a part of, the things we want to do, and the places we want to go to. Some small choices, and some big ones...some easy to make, others difficult. But we believe that our choices are what make us who we are and take us where we want to eventually be. We make them with the unspoken belief that they will ultimately make us happy. Time rolls on and we realise that though we've hit the jackpot with some of the choices we've made, others couldn't have been worse! But ah, well...that's life. They were our choices anyways. And we're responsible for them.

And then, there's Destiny.

So how d'you explain that?

I've grown up with the faith that God has plans for each of us. That He has scripted our lives, and everything that happens in it, was meant to happen precisely that way. There are no coincidences. Everything that takes place, no matter how insignificant, is how the universe has willed it. And yes, everything happens for a reason...blah blah.

So I ask...where's my choice in all this? Did I even have one? ever? And free will...does it exist? Or does destiny/ fate/ chance/ divine intervention - whatever you call it - rule?

Are we all, simply being played?