76 T20 Cricket matches have been played, my home team the Chennai Super Kings have been crowned champions of IPL 2011, A Grand Slam tournament has finished and the Bull (Rafael Nadal) has decimated my favorite athlete Roger Federer again, Multiple arrests were made by the CBI in connection with the 2G and various other money laundering cases, Common men have come to the fore to fight corruption, in Tamil Nadu a major party was crushed to defeat, the Dallas Mavericks were crowned the NBA champions and a courageous news reporter has been murdered......... All these and more since I last wrote a blog!!!!
Whether it was me being sluggish or the world around me going on the Fast Forward mode, i honestly do not know. It has been a while since i wrote and i have missed writing. And now when i want to write, what do i write on? With so much happening around me and so much influencing me what do i reflect upon through my words? Pretty tough to channelize your thoughts in such a scenario really!
And then i saw a pattern in the multitude of events around me, a single most illuminating factor in all the victories and defeats, in all the pain & anguish and joy and triumphs. It stood out, like a tall strong spine among every incident. "Choice" and "Hope". The underlining dimensions of life. Cleverly hidden, yet hard to miss out, these two traits were tremendously responsible in driving the world around us.
Individuals and the choices they have made have made the world turn around and take note. The supposed secret inside Pandora’s Box, "HOPE" has been responsible in holding the world together and in driving it forward. We have seen protests around the country and we have felt individuals reaching out to us. Elsewhere teams have triumphed and their victory has brought smiles to many of us. Much has happened and much more will.
And through every happening, we as individuals will always have a choice. A choice between choosing what is Easy and what is Right. World over every human being has had this choice and that choice has defined the person. A.R.Rahman chose love over hatred, Osama chose Violence over peace, Anna hazare chose fasting over any other form of protest, Rafael Nadal chose to extinguish ghosts of his injuries and made himself the master of his own game. And such choices have defined them. We have often admired how certain people never give up, never tire, and in such men we understand there always is a choice... to give up. But the fact that acheivers never take the easy way out makes them what they are.
We would have seen giant elephants being tied down to posts with iron chains, which may appear too strong to break for us but which is, in reality, just a strong tug away from breaking, for an elephant. Yet, surprisingly an elephant never tries in normal times to break free. The reason is because when the elephant is just a baby it is tied using similar chains and try hard as it may, it ends up failing in its attempt. This memory stays with the elephant even after it grows up and it never occurs to the adult to try to break free and so it accepts the confinement. The scenario is almost the same with humans. We often fail to explore our skills, choices and capacities and accept defeat. But once we choose to look above such trifles and introspect and choose to become who we really are, even the whole world cannot stop us. Simply put is our choices makes us what we are.
All in all, though around us so much have been changing and evolving and moving on, the core has not changed. The basic underlying brick has retained its place. It is a fact that every human is the architect of his own destiny.. We are truly what we choose to be!
