Momentary Lapse of Reason!
I never really liked Paolo Coelho's thesis. While his books consisting of succint sentences and short chapters were very enjoyable for a person as lazy as I am (and his lucid style was always an enjoyable read), his over-emphasis on destiny used to piss me off, if I may be permitted to use that phrase! I always thought that destiny played only a minor role in our lives. Each time I read about someone fighting against his fate and winning, I felt happy.
But of late (due to a series of incidents that happened one after another over the past few weeks in my life), I'm compelled to have a re-look at my standpoint and beliefs. I don't know how many people have faced this; but for me, each time I start thinking that my life has some shape or form, everything just collapses on its own. I'm a person who lives inside his shell, one who does not like to open up to others, one who does not like to share his inner feelings with anyone, and prefers to remain a total introvert. And yet I talk a lot. And at the same time, I manage to avoid sharing my personal issues with people. And that often leads to their firm belief that I'm a detached, selfish, nonchalant, hypocritical, arrogant person.
So far so good. But the worst comes when I try to open up, when I take people in confidence, when I start believing in certan things, when I start thinking that maybe all my absolute pessimism was wrong after all! And the moment I do so, life kicks me on my face. Each time, it follows the same style, the same pattern. That pushes me farther inside my shell, where I live lying dorment for a few years, and then I come out again for another round of being kicked on.
Why does it happen? I'm sure, it's not only me to whom such things happen but there must be thousand others who share this same fate. I believe that the main reason for this is that whenever we have to take people in confidence, we have to share things, and that means we make ourselves vulnearable to another person. This is dangerous, because it takes only a very casual effort on the part of one out of the two people to nullify any understanding they had over the years, whreas it needs consant and conscious effort of them both to sustain it.
I think, majority of our relationships -- be it friendship, love, romance, familial connections or anything else -- collapse because we don't put the effort we need to put into it, in order to understand its depth, or its significance. And there is no Users' Manual for that. Each case is a completely new case; each time, it's a new ball game. It is as if some invisible, superior power changed the rules of the game by the time one started vaguely guessing them. We don't understand which of our action(s) could lead to what kind of trauma on the part of the other person(s), or how much mutual understanding is necessary for any kind of human relationship to sustain. And I now think, that's what destiny is all about.
As someone once said, "Each year, we put a noose around our neck once, hand the other end over to our worst enemy and say, "Pull"."(sic) . I feel now that each time we connect to a new person, all we do is that we hand him/her over the other end of one of the nooses that are around our neck. That momentary lapse of reason, that transitory feeling that human beings can understand one another ruins everything for us. Because, as Kundera says, "It's not your enemies who condemn you to solitude; it's your friends."
So I've arrived at my own conclusion now: Life is full of surprises; unfortunately, each new surprise is bound to be more horrible than the previous ones. And yet, we must go on living and facing the suprises life has in store for us. That's our destiny. We are doomed to it!
(Note: Actual date of writing/publishing: 14th November, 2005)
But of late (due to a series of incidents that happened one after another over the past few weeks in my life), I'm compelled to have a re-look at my standpoint and beliefs. I don't know how many people have faced this; but for me, each time I start thinking that my life has some shape or form, everything just collapses on its own. I'm a person who lives inside his shell, one who does not like to open up to others, one who does not like to share his inner feelings with anyone, and prefers to remain a total introvert. And yet I talk a lot. And at the same time, I manage to avoid sharing my personal issues with people. And that often leads to their firm belief that I'm a detached, selfish, nonchalant, hypocritical, arrogant person.
So far so good. But the worst comes when I try to open up, when I take people in confidence, when I start believing in certan things, when I start thinking that maybe all my absolute pessimism was wrong after all! And the moment I do so, life kicks me on my face. Each time, it follows the same style, the same pattern. That pushes me farther inside my shell, where I live lying dorment for a few years, and then I come out again for another round of being kicked on.
Why does it happen? I'm sure, it's not only me to whom such things happen but there must be thousand others who share this same fate. I believe that the main reason for this is that whenever we have to take people in confidence, we have to share things, and that means we make ourselves vulnearable to another person. This is dangerous, because it takes only a very casual effort on the part of one out of the two people to nullify any understanding they had over the years, whreas it needs consant and conscious effort of them both to sustain it.
I think, majority of our relationships -- be it friendship, love, romance, familial connections or anything else -- collapse because we don't put the effort we need to put into it, in order to understand its depth, or its significance. And there is no Users' Manual for that. Each case is a completely new case; each time, it's a new ball game. It is as if some invisible, superior power changed the rules of the game by the time one started vaguely guessing them. We don't understand which of our action(s) could lead to what kind of trauma on the part of the other person(s), or how much mutual understanding is necessary for any kind of human relationship to sustain. And I now think, that's what destiny is all about.
As someone once said, "Each year, we put a noose around our neck once, hand the other end over to our worst enemy and say, "Pull"."(sic) . I feel now that each time we connect to a new person, all we do is that we hand him/her over the other end of one of the nooses that are around our neck. That momentary lapse of reason, that transitory feeling that human beings can understand one another ruins everything for us. Because, as Kundera says, "It's not your enemies who condemn you to solitude; it's your friends."
So I've arrived at my own conclusion now: Life is full of surprises; unfortunately, each new surprise is bound to be more horrible than the previous ones. And yet, we must go on living and facing the suprises life has in store for us. That's our destiny. We are doomed to it!
(Note: Actual date of writing/publishing: 14th November, 2005)
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home