Thursday, May 1, 2008

The Road not taken

This post is the result of the personal dilemma that I am in now. I wonder if everyone is happy with whatever they are doing in their life. By whatever, I mean the work they spend majority of their time in. When someone is young, he has interests in the weirdest, oddest and the stupidest of the things. Ask him what he wants to do in future, he says with the zeal that is only possible for the young ones. But while growing up, one starts to push aside his interests, calls it a hobby and starts working on the so called talents that are very much needed to sustain in a world of harsh realities. From what I could remember, majority of my time during my childhood was spent for this. Of course, it is the main reason that I am like this now for which I am very much contented.

But occasionally I get these pangs of, call it regret and conscience that tells me that this isn’t what I should be doing now, which is pretty common, I guess. I am at vain in understanding the reason for which many toss away their interests and choose a smoother and an easier route that guarantees sustenance. I have already walked a few paces in the comfortable yet insipid path and this failure in understanding makes me hesitant to go back to the fork and choose a tougher route. I am in the same old vicious cycle that everyone else is.

I have met lots of people who had very quirky ideas for life during their childhood but finally retired to the ways and means that is comfortable. To be honest, all these interests are not quirky by themselves, but they now sound unconventional only because of the alternate vapid path they have chosen now. A few of my friends who have a disparate (not actually) array of interests that includes archeology, paleontology, linguistics, movie making, forensic science, sports, finally settled in to a very charming and enticing career in coding and testing software which they do relish; at least that is what they say. Don’t mind the sarcasm; it is mainly due to my personal distaste for the field that I work in now.

I do not want to add to the cliché by re iterating Robert frost’s lines, which I will leave to the reader, but what I like about it is that those lines have a downcast and gloomy feel that says that the other side might lead to a pretentious meadow of lush greenery. I don’t know why, but I hate much prevalent optimistic quote mails that I receive every day as it overlooks the possibility of failure in your quest for ‘success’, for the lack of a better word. And I love these verses for the reason that it doesn’t do so.

For any person who loves any art form, music, movie or books, part of the pleasure lies in identifying good art, appreciating it and searching for more of it. I think that I am very good at a few things that I would love to take up as a career but I am not sure if it is just infatuation. Weighing the pros and cons and giving my justifications as to why I should continue whatever I am doing now, I occasionally feel that I might be one who is blessed with the ability to appreciate something but not create it. But there is this insatiable thirst that might make me go crazy and choose the tougher route one day. I may fail halfway through it or make it up to the meadow to find it is not as green as I had imagined it to be, or reach the meadow to find it as I have perceived it would be. Whatever it might be, I wish I would go nuts soon, stop having second thoughts about a few things and just take the plunge. Wish that day comes very soon.

P.S: I am not as indecisive and mentally unstable as this post may lead you to think, or am I??? :)