A BREEZE OF LACED THOUGHTS...

THE TRUTH IN ALL DESIRES-PROLOGUE

I’ve been thinking a lot about those lines that supposedly reflect the realism in life. You know, phrases like ‘life’s not a bed of roses’ and others of the same sort. Firstly, I’m against the very idea of picturing life as something stationary. Come on, life cannot be a bed of anything. I’m more into picturing life as something more moving, portable and mobile.
Life’s a ride, a ride where you pass through different places, which apparently relate to the incidents of life. So in my opinion, we could use a phrase which goes something like ‘life’s a ride full of bumps and uniformity’. It’s a typical journey where you have no choice but to experience the monotony at times and the excitement at other times, the rightfulness at times and the injustice at other times, the bliss at times and the misery at others. But this is just my perspective at looking at what life may be. I have no desire whatsoever in forcing others to accept this depiction of life.

What I want to do now is not sit and ponder about what life is because frankly, I believe it is way beyond my philosophical intellect. I can deliberate about it for years and keep moving in circles-after all, life’s a full circle isn’t it? What I’m trying to do now is contemplate on reasons, or rather one particular reason that I find most important in persuading you forward with life. Different people may have different reasons, different catalysts. As my friend so rightly put-‘it’s all in the priorities’. Yes it is. Priority is that sole word or rather, the sole idea that helps you move ahead with life. Every person is required to prioritize his/her life because this inadvertently provides direction to life. Prioritizing is, in a way, reasoning out your options and cutting down on them and selecting a few apt ones and finally setting them as your goals. And then you work towards fulfilling your goals, rather, those limitations you set for yourself, justifying them as priorities.

Let’s look at something slightly above priorities. I’m talking about ambition. Isn’t ambition the sole idea that helps a person truly persuade himself to live on? What priority can a man without ambition possess? That’s something like knowing the path that leads you forward but having absolutely no idea as to where it’ll lead you-A blind journey. That is certainly not what we want, right? So my first break-ambition is much more important than priority because it is that what leads you. In fact it is the only thing that can show you the path. To take it or leave it, is the priority in question.

So, now in my scale I’ve brought ambition above priority. Limitation was the word I’d used to term the entire process of prioritizing your options. Allow me to justify myself. Depending on one’s personal capacity, his/her ambitions will vary in scale. It will certainly vary in magnanimity. When a person gives his ambition a free hand, I’m very sure his life’s going to take an elevated turn, in the positive direction. He’s going to be able to tread new paths. When he tries to sort out his priorities, what he actually is doing is to limit the wideness in his ambitions, the extent of his ambitions. Why does one want to do that? What harm does ambition bring upon you? Why set restrictions to something which does nothing but urge you to grab further, to advance yourself to greater heights? Once you set yourself priorities, what happens is you think you’re focused, you think you’re decided on what to do in life. But what actually happens is you tread a fixed set of paths within your own personal capacity. You may feel you are discovering new horizons, but then that’s just one of the many illusions that life’s going to show you. In short, you’ve caged yourself. And in the end, what happens to a caged animal? He’s hit by frustration, desperation, a sense of loss etc. When you set no priority, when you leave it all to the free wandering hand of ambition; it is then that you are truly going to discover yourself. Then, you will know no such thing as personal capacity. You will be able to reach out to heights which would’ve earlier instilled fear in your heart. And you know what the best part is - you’ll always find greater things to live for.
The moment you accomplish something, or even before it, there would something else that would’ve been vying for your attention, vying for your fulfillment. It is this continuous process of desiring something, accomplishing a few, letting a few go by and failing in a few that helps make life more eventful and thrilling.

So now in my scale I’ve completely eliminated priority. I feel there is no need for it at all as all it does is give one a false sense of focus and sets a load of restrictions to your aspirations.

I’ve spoken so much about ambition, but I’m yet to use the word ‘dream’. What difference is there between a dream and an ambition? In my scale, I fail to find any difference between them at all. If one notices any difference, it is nothing but a phony charade that is set up by his own thoughts. A friend of mine once put it this way – ‘you can be ambitious up to a certain level, and beyond that it is all a dream….’ Allow me to explain his stance. He says there’s nothing wrong in fuelling your ambitions but then there’s a stage beyond which you need to classify them into dreams. My question is simple – Why do you need to make that classification? Isn’t it a restriction that you’re setting for yourself, willing yourself to believe that beyond that particular stage everything else you wish for is just a dream which may or may not be fulfilled? You yourself are labeling it with the impossible tag. Come on; can there be anything more pessimistic than this? I honestly brand this mode of thought as negative and degrading to your own spirit of perseverance. It reflects nothing but an unsure self, a self that believes you don’t have the stuff to even call it your ambition. Who says all your ambitions have to be fulfilled? There is no hard and fast rule of that sort.
People who differ from this concept of thought have the label of practicality to argue with, and I certainly believe that they are justified in thinking so. After all, who am I to argue if they themselves believe they can’t do something?

Trust me when I say practicality is only a façade behind which people try to hide. Do not get the idea that I’m being insensible when I say this. But all that I’m asking is why you have to differentiate something off as dream and ambition, with the criterion being surety in accomplishment. What is wrong in having an ambition that you may not be able to accomplish? What is wrong in aspiring for something that may seem to be practically difficult? Are all dreams left unaccomplished?

All you ever wish for, all you aspire to be, to do – it can all be termed as your ambition. There need not be any classification between them as dreams, aspirations, desires and goals and so on. It’s all one and the same. For example, I can always desire to be the president of my country. Sensibly thinking I should be able to realize that it has a very high chance of impracticality. But that does not mean I need to totally term it as a simple dream and nothing else. I can always give it a shot and atleast then resign to the fact that I did try for it. It would give a whole lot more of contentment then.
If you do feel that there is something that you desire and it’s got a practicality issue, why strike it off from your list of ambitions? Why not leave it there and nurture it? Why not just keep giving it shots so that it satisfies your thirst for that desire? But the sole requirement for this is the absence of a pessimistic approach.

So now in my scale, I’ve removed all classifications and have termed everything-goals, desires, aspirations, dreams- into one thing-AMBITION. Everything and anything that you desire can be brought under this. Some of it you may accomplish, some of it you may not. But then you can always have the pleasure of having it in your mind, having it there to fuel your fight in life, to push you further, to know no limits, to know that there’s nothing that can stop you but you yourself….
And thus ambition becomes the truth in all desires….