The House & The Smoke

Don’t believe your situation is genuinely bad – no one can make you do that. Is there smoke in the house? If it’s not suffocating, I will stay indoors; if it proves too much, I’ll leave. Always remember – the door is open. – Marcus Aurelius

We go around blaming situations, people, our inabilities and the like for the misfortune or the uncomfortable conditions that we find ourselves in. However, we conveniently forget the fact that it is only a temporary situation or condition and it is not going to last forever. Time will eventually reconcile it for you, and you will regain your posture for sure. It is just a matter of time and we must give time some time. I, however, agree that the traces or scars that these mishaps or misfortunes will leave behind will remain there. But it is up to you whether you want to allow the wound to heal or keep on scratching it time and again and keep it paining forever.

What happens, generally in our lives is that we find ourselves in a condition where we must choose between options and people and then someone will certainly be unhappy with the decision that we have made. We also fear losing things or opportunities or people and we end up making decisions which are almost devastating for not only ourselves, but for others around us as well. We are not going to look at how to make better decisions, but we are to talk about how to deal with the consequences of a bad decision.

As I have stated earlier that fate is the empress of the world. You just can’t escape what she has planned for you. But as Marcus Aurelius has said You have the power over your mind – not outside events. Realize this, and you will find strength. In Gujarati, we have a nickname for our mind: a monkey. A monkey will keep you busy if you won’t keep it busy. And we have a proverb showing a scaffold to a monkey. When you are stressed over something or worried about something or someone or some event – real or imaginary, you are showing a scaffold to the monkey called your mind. And the monkey will keep on climbing up and down all the time and ultimately getting tired like anything and ultimately, you are the one who is exhausted of things, opportunities, peace of mind, time and whatever positive thing you may have at that time.

The problem is if the monkey finds something which is destructive – like a rod of steel, or in a worst-case scenario: a sword or a weapon – you are doomed. I have seen people committing suicides. Why? Just because the monkey in their mind found something destructive and the monkey went on to use it, for it is a monkey. However, does the suicide solve any problem? No, it doesn’t, right? it just leads to other problems for the loved ones that we have. For example, what if you are the only child that your parents have, and you end your life. What about the future of your parents when they’ll get old? Who would take care of them? And that comes later, what reason for living, your parents are left with when your idiocy has left them alone?

I do agree that we find ourselves in conditions where we are left directionless or in a condition where we start to question our own existence. Many times, such condition is created by someone who care or love the most. I have pointed out one such example in the above paragraph. We are ditched or dumped by our partners in relationships, we fail in school or college, fail to get promoted, can’t crack an important interview and the like. But does it mean that the world has come to an end? Such events aren’t a synonym of what they call Armageddon in the Bible. Armageddon is the end of the Earth in the Bible. Yes, we do feel sad or depressed or to have lost direction for the time being. It does feel like your existence in this world means nothing to anyone. But that does not at all mean that there won’t be a new sunrise tomorrow. The sun will certainly rise, the birds will chirp, the flowers will bloom, and the evening will bring its pleasant breezes with the night bringing you the shroud studded with stars. And it all means that your events aren’t as permanent as the other forces of nature are. And, nature is always constructive and positive. Yes, I do agree with the fact that the nature is the most devastating force on this planet as well. But remember, without destruction, construction is not at all possible. As the American band Red Hot Chili Peppers have sung destruction leads to a very rough road but it also breeds creation, and earthquakes are to a girl’s guitar as just another good vibration.

So how do we overcome the roadblock ahead of us? The trick is simple. Just avoid looking at the things which are destroyed or appears to be paining or pinching or bugging you and turn your head towards the opportunities that you have. Recently, an amazing movie came up in Hollywood – Alpha. It is an imaginary story about a female wolf befriending a boy who has been left behind in the wild by his tribe. The story dates to a period around twenty thousand years ago. The movie has one of the best taglines that I have come across: Rise your head. And your eyes follow.

Meaning, if you are afraid of looking above, and you are unable to rise your eyes, just rise your head and your eyes will certainly rise with your head. Another meaning is that, once you focus on improvement – professional, personal, relationship, family, friends… anywhere. Your mindset will join you and help you to achieve what you want. If you look at your problems, you will have more of them. And if you focus on the solutions, you will certainly find one after another.

Of course, forcing yourself, stop thinking and giving up on memories and the like is not as easy as it seems. However, it is always wise to make a decision and to start following it instead of a decision being forced upon you. For example, you are going through a storm in your personal life and it starts affecting your professional life, your colleagues will certainly try to lend you a helping hand. However, it would be very limited in nature. And if you still do not overcome the overlapping of personal live over professional life, your colleagues will start withdrawing themselves from you and rumors in the office will certainly hamper your image. Worst-case scenario? You lose your job.

I was reading something where the author was talking about breaking distance for various modes of transportation. A car has a breaking distance according to the speed at which it is travelling. An aircraft doesn’t have breaking distance but has to force g forces and vessels, ships have breaking distances of kilometers. A breaking distance is the distance that a vehicle would cover from the starting point of you hitting the breaks and the end point where the vehicle actually stops. The same logic is there in our lives. You know that you haven’t made through the interview. Or you couldn’t secure a seat in the degree that you wanted to study. Or you have been dumped by your relationship partner. Now the moment you realize that shit has happened and the moment you actually start recovering from the shit, whatever you do is can be called your breaking distance. The breaking distance in your case is the time you need to recollect the pieces of your self that have shattered and glue them back.

I agree to your argument that you won’t be the same once you’ve glued all your pieces back together. And in my humble opinion, that’s an interesting part of the process. Now you have the power to recreate yourself in the way you want. You can give up on some addiction. You may start working out and have better health or physique. You may make a turn around in your financials and end up having better savings. It is all about how you compare your self prior to breaking down and the one where you made radical changes and redesigned and re engineered yourself. Trust me, if you do this gluing-back-together stuff correctly and with minimal quotient of emotions, you will actually find it as a kind of blessing for yourself that you went through this metamorphosis. As the scientist community has to opine extinction finds and eliminates senseless creatures from the face of this planet. So, if you are senseless, you are prone to extinction. If you keep emotions at bay at times, you will survive the day.

Hence, it is perfectly normal to find yourself in conditions where things are not at all something that one would say acceptable in any way. And it is because you do not have any control over the events in this world. However, it does not mean that things are coming to an end. Yes, something has certainly come to an end because of which you ended up in this situation but there must be a triumph, to overcome whatever has happened. If you do not come forward for yourself, who will? If you won’t do it now, when? Remember, it is only me who can change my life. Nobody else can do it for me. For I must fight my battles. Others may help me with appropriate weapons, someone may teach me a strategy and the like, but ultimately, it is me who must face the real battle. And when you are in the battle, look into the eyes of your foe and fight it like the existence of this world depends on your winning this battle. You must give whatever you have in order to defeat the threat and overcome the adversary.

Yes, you have failed. Yes, you are in knee deep in some shit. Yes, you have been shown the door. Yes, you have been cheated. Yes, you have been fired. But… so what? If you keep on cribbing about it, you are actually wasting your time. Your friends will listen to your story and offer some words to solace you. And if you continue the story over days, they will also start avoiding you. An exit from here will turn out to be an entry somewhere else. I know of a guy who happens to be an alumnus of my college. He is a very successful businessman in renewable energy industry across the globe. Once he visited our college and delivered a lecture. While listening to him, we came to know that he failed in seventeen businesses and then the eighteenth business turned out to be a success. Today, Suzlon Wind happens to be the leader in windmills designing and installations. We only make a decision. Was it a good one or a bad one, is in the hands of the fate. Most of the decisions that we make fails, just because we fail to communicate the underlying rationale to the stakeholders. And the moment there is a communication failure, the doors are left unguarded and wide open for disasters to come in.

We also end up making impulsive decisions. Remember, impulses are temporary, the results of your decision are going to be permanent. The scars, the scratches that a bad decision leaves behind, are permanent and not easily concealable. Just because your relationship partner made you a little uncomfortable for some reason doesn’t mean that you run back to your ex who cheated on you. Communication could solve the problem between you two and you wouldn’t have to compromise on your dignity and self-respect. Who is to be blamed here? The one who put you in an uncomfortable condition? No. The one ran back to her ex? No. Hey! How come? Someone must be blamed for some mishap. They told me this in my school. Relax! It is true that there has to be a culprit and it must be found out. But it doesn’t mean that the culprit has to be a person. There are circumstances, attitudes, traditions, rules or laws that can be a culprit too. The attitude of not opening your mouth to discuss certain things is the culprit here. Remember, it is the attitude, not the person who has that attitude, is the culprit. Most of the time, we find someone to blame and we think we have done our duty in finding out the culprit and blaming him or her is the best thing to be done and I have done that. But that is not the case. A wise human who claims to have education, claims to have seen the world and all, doesn’t stop at blaming something. They actually go forward and eliminate the force that contributed the most to the mishap.

At times we find ourselves in conditions where we end up asking endless number of questions and there is no one to answer them. And such situations almost destroy us. We start questioning ourselves. We question our existence. We question if we were right and the like. And we are left without answers. We must live with this uncomfortable fact. But it is alright. It is normal. It happens. Life is supposed to be this way and let’s not oppose to it. The more we oppose to it, the more we will hurt ourselves.

There are times when we must accept life the way it comes to us. Not because you do not have the power to change it or it is not like you can’t do anything about it. But at times you shouldn’t react abruptly. Just relax and let things happen as they want to. Most of the time you will see people screwing up themselves. Be it a choice, be it a decision, be it the way they are heading, be it the wrong priorities that they have set or may be the people that they have chosen to be with. We all have to pay for the decisions that we make, so let us try to make better decisions. We also have to pay for the decisions that avoid making. So, all we can do is to try to minimize the prices that we pay.

Are you studying something? Give it your best. Are you planning a trip with friends? Make sure that you make necessary compromises to have a gala time with your friends. Are you in a relationship? Try to lead it to a betterment. Are you working? Try to elevate the standards that others have set in your organization. And the moment you decide like this, you end up channelizing your energy, efforts and mind to something that will actually repay you and it will repay you with better yields compared to you just going through things. And I am not saying that once you be committed to someone or something, things will happen exactly the same way you want or expect. Shit will still happen for it is a rule. You will still fail the subject you studied hard. Or the trip with friends will still end up as a disaster as a some of your friend will end up complaining about the hotel food. Your partner will ditch you at the very precise moment when you needed him or her and it is alright. You can’t control everything in life, but you can certainly manage whatever comes your way. Remember, when something terrible happens, you must not be in a position where you question your contributions. For that will cause you immense guilt and when you are going through something terrible and if you have a feeling of guilt during that period, you are doomed.

Life is like a hand of cards dealt with you. There are 52 cards in a deck, and you do not know which one are with you at the moment. But if you do not use them wisely, you will lose. If you use them wisely, you may not be the winner, but you will end up as the second or third. And it is perfectly alright. I am not trying to solace you; I am trying to tell you that just do not waste your energy or time on things which are beyond your control. For when you to try to control something and fail, the feeling of helplessness will destroy you like a stone weighing tons has been put on your chest and you can’t breathe. It is better to live with several uncomfortable facts where you couldn’t do shit, than to not to live at all.

Who are you to end your life? Do you own yourself? Not at all. All you own are your reactions to an event – pleasant or unpleasant to you. If you know how to maintain your calm, if you know how to keep your sanity intact and how to take a pause before reacting to anything, you can certainly win many things. There are moments that gives you a chance to decide your fate. And these moments do not come with a prior notice. You have to identify them. And identifying them isn’t something that is described in some standard operating procedure document somewhere. It takes a little experience, observations, and a hypothesis.

Again, I am contradicting my own words where I talked about not to assume and then I am talking about a hypothesis. But there are differences between them. Assumptions are based on your mindset or perceptions. Hypothesis are based on your observations based on the data put before you. Assumptions are long term. Hypothesis are short term. Assumptions fuels your biases or prejudices. Hypothesis tend to influence your decisions for a specific situation or event. Assumptions are generalized in nature. Hypothesis are very case specific. Assumptions end up forcing you to avoid several things or people or situations for your life time. Hypothesis helps you to not to avoid things or people or situations but provides you with tools, techniques and mindsets to deal with such uncomfortable things. Assumptions weaken you; hypothesis helps you. Assumptions have more to do with what you are, hypothesis have to do something with what you are supposed to be. Assumptions reflect what your past experiences have been. Hypothesis indicates what may be coming next and how to deal with it.

Enough of this word game. Let’s get back to the point. Nothing good or bad is happening to you. Whatever is happening at the moment in this world, is just a divine act which has been already written before you were even conceived. So, allow things to happen. Yes, it will be difficult to deal with them, but eventually you will deal with them. Just make sure that your reactions are self-evaluated and self-audited before the situation certifies them to be wrong or idiotic. You cannot control everything, but you can manage whatever is happening. Negative thinking is also required to survive and that’s something evolution has taught us. And nature is not fool. It is alright to blame someone or something for the time being, but in the long run, things do not matter. Just be calm. And value your respect. Respect your dignity. Never be afraid or never hesitate to stand up from the table and leave where respect is no longer served. For a life with dignity and self-respect is more rewarding or fulfilling than a life where you need to beg someone for something – for their help or favor or company or whatever. It is perfectly alright to be an outcast or rejected by some or all.

Just be yourself. Be original. The world is already full of imitation and originality is a rare occurrence nowadays.

Rajkot – 10-Apr-19