Careful What You Wish For

The other day I was playing football with my brother in his complex. Right next to where we were playing was sitting a young boy who must have been as old as us. There he was staring at us and at our agile tackles. He was sitting there eying our every move as if he himself was involved in the game. As the rain lashed I saw him rise from his chair next to the coconut vendor. That is when it struck me. He was on crutches.

I have not been able to get that image out of my head since the past few days. I remembered passing through my friend's medical college looking at their state, writhing in pain on their bed-bug infested beds. That is exactly when it dawned upon me. I stood there thinking "I am really lucky to just be normally able". Here I am misusing electricity whereas people around the world have still not got enough resources to have one glowing bulb. I am grateful to whoever has made my life the way it is.

That is exactly why I am content living in a relatively small house, in Mumbai, with resources enough to subsist in a comfort level which is way beyond many people. I don't need a big car, nor do I need the bachelor pad in downtown SoBO (south Bombay). Taking a line from OneRepublic, "All I need is the air I breathe and a place to rest my head".

But I think few things are necessary in anybody's life.

The first one would be HOPE. Hope that someday you will emerge in daylight from the darkness of the tunnel. Hope to crawl up the dirty corporate ladder for that prestigious position. Hope that one day you would be able to provide a much better lifestyle to your children. Hope that someday you will achieve. Anticipation of the silver lining in the proverbial grey clouds of mundane life keeps people going on and on. That is exactly why you may find many rich yet completely depressed people. They have nowhere to turn to.

The second would have to be LOVE. Love is a very powerful emotion. A mother only lives her life to see her child happy. Remember the movie "Blood Diamond". Solomon Vandy lives on in the hope of meeting his family someday. There are many stories in our history books about the love a wife has for her husband and the sacrifices she makes. I'm not saying any less about the men. They too are highly capable of feeling love and they show it just right. They may not show love the way women do, but it's because of them that our life gets better. Also humanly love keeps people going. A hug always makes a person feel better, no matter what his condition. It truly is a "jaadu ki jhappi".

So what I would like to say is, people, be careful what you wish for. If you have everything you ever wanted life would never be worth living. There would not be any pride in achievement. Always be careful what you ask for 'because if you get it all, it might not really make you happy.’ Learning things the hard way is the right way to learn them. So when you feel low, just look to your near and dear ones and how much you mean to them and how much they mean to you.

"There is always a light at the end of the tunnel, but if there were no tunnel, the light would be blinding."

:)