Even when we have NOTHING TO LOSE, do we LOSE SOMETHING?

Even when we have NOTHING TO LOSE, do we LOSE SOMETHING?

Many years ago, when I was still a student, my cousin recommended my name to one of the leading advertising agencies as a trainee copywriter. I had no idea what it meant and what I was expected to do. “ What should I do there. I will get disqualified even before I say ‘hello’.” I had groaned out a reply.

She had given me one of her wise-senior-sibling smiles. “ So what?” She had said, “ You can always go ahead. You have nothing to lose.”

I kept that in mind, drew up courage, went ahead with the test. It was a nice try. And I failed in it, miserably. And somehow that made me sad. My career had not yet begun and I didn’t even know what I wanted to do back then. I still don’t know , for sure. But something did hurt. I had liked the office, the dynamic young workers, the smart man who took my test ( that too matters, you see). Failing the test meant I would never be a part of that ambience. I felt sad. Even though, technically speaking, I had NOTHING to lose.

Over the years, many a crap and failure older, I realise that even when you have nothing to lose, moving on and moving ahead, ain’t that easy, sweetheart.

Gullu, my friend and I often get into these conversations. Moving ahead vs. Staying stuck. And invariably comes up the debatable premise of “ having nothing to lose.” 

Just like god and ghost, Mayawati and Mulayam, Modi and Tata, Trump and clowns, LOSS and GAIN are strung invariably together in the same cord...pull one, and the other one comes up , jingling all the way, following the rule of inevitability, irritating you no end, till you squint your eyes and pay a closer look.

Casting a cursory glance at the newspaper will establish this almost mathematically sound premise.

Here are a few proven points:

Losing EURO = Gaining TORY LEADERSHIP

Losing IGNORANCE= Gaining SADNESS

Losing CONFIDENCE in the Pedagogy of teaching = Gaining a degree in B.ED

Losing AGRICULTURAL LANDs + TATAs = Gaining INDUSTRY + Corporate BUY BUYs

Losing RIVERS= Gaining DAMS (spellcheck, DAMNs)

Losing whatsitsname SECULAR BLOGGERS = Gaining COPYRIGHTS OVER GODS.

The list continues...

Therefore, the conclusion

If, LOSS =GAIN

Then, NOTHING TO LOSE =NOTHING TO GAIN...

I suppose, and I repeat, I suppose, we have something or the other AT STAKE ALL THE TIME. Something that lurks behind every loss and every gain... And that is when Mathematics becomes Literature..and Equations become nothing short of a terrible, charming, inescapable 007 game...called LIFE.

In this world of Free Trade, Discounts and Mega Sales...have we become Emotional Misers?

In this world of Free Trade, Discounts and Mega Sales...have we become Emotional Misers?

Just the other day, we , my friend Gullu and I, were discussing the break-up of a couple we knew were together for quite some time. The woman got an opportunity that ensured a fantastic career growth, and moved abroad. The man , a social worker, who runs a charitable trust, chose to stay back.

“ There was nothing indecent about the split. We realised our priorities and simply moved away. “ The man had told me.

That was a happy , mature statement to make. It would have put me at peace had I not seen how visibly disturbed he was.  He must have sensed my discomfort as he wryly added “ There are certain things which simply won’t happen.”

 True. No disputing that.

A couple of months later, Gullu had received a call from split other-half of this man, the lady, who spoke to her for over a couple of hours. She did not mention him. Instead, she cribbed about the horrible country she was in ( although her apartment was super-posh) and that her team-leader was an a*****e and that it was really cold and how one evening when she absent-mindedly  splashed water on her face ,  the left hand side got frozen and stiff ,and she had to visit a doctor to “thaw” it back to normal!

“ Are you planning to come back?” Gullu had asked her, not capable of taking her pan-Atlantic whining anymore.

“ I can’t. “ she had said. “  A lot of everything is at stake. It’s a fabulous opportunity for me. And the money part of it too. There are certain things which you simply can’t overlook.”

Period! No, disputing that too.

In this “SIMPLY CAN'T/ SIMPLY WON'T” dilemma ,there is only one thing that makes me uncomfortable. The UN-HAPPINESS element of it. It seems to be an uneasy and a difficult choice. Career gives you a lifestyle of your choice and wish, your old age health insurance, an enviable car, a posh apartment.

Relationships give you the manpower and human resources and purpose to return to that apartment. As the shopping mall culture and terribly lopsided economic affluence proliferate and the urban interiors tend to get more and more organised and tidy and picture perfect, the human interiors seem to get chaotic and warped, unable to choose, unable to decide.
NOT FOR EVERYBODY. But for many. I suppose.

Everything is physics, they taught us in schools. And more than that Economics. And Psychology. As the Mammon factor goes up, it exerts its equal and opposite reaction on the Emotional and Relationship quotient. But not quite the reverse.

One of my wise aunts humourously observed the other day ...for most of the divorces and splits, these shopping malls and corporates are to be blamed. They make people want more ,crave for the redundant and the excess . The mega discounts and the bumper sales feed their never-to-be-satisfied craving to hoard more and more...even when there is no need of it.The tight deadlines and the ever-demanding circuit of appraisals and performance boosters tend to keep them preoccupied and re-occupied time and again.

I don’t agree with her completely. However, when I look around myself I feel that she might be a wee bit correct. After all, emotional generosity is inversely proportional to material craving. As the saying goes, when our hearts are empty, we collect things. Perhaps my friend abroad and her former boyfriend would eventually move on, perhaps at one point in time they would stop missing each other and stop complaining.Or stop acting mature, Perhaps the next time they go for a relationship they will be more cautious in dealing with their emotions .They may simply do away with shaggy, loose-ended feelings altogether. Perhaps that’s gonna be our strategy of survival. For getting the impetus to live and love. Certified Emotional Misers, we will know how to strike a perfect balance between the holes in our hearts and holes in our pockets.If we do not know it , already.

Phantom and a child

As a kid I was in love with Phantom, the mysterious costumed crimefighter. I passionately believed in all that he did. I believed that he lived in a Skull Cave in the exotic African country of Bangalla and that he had two rings. One for his friends and proteges and the other one for his sworn enemies.

Often, while returning from school , in the heat and the traffic , I would catch a sudden glimpse of him, riding on his restless stud Hero, followed by his wolf, Devil. Although his mask made his pupils invisible, I knew he was looking at me. When a thief got caught in my locality I knew that the deed was done by my dear Mr. Walker dressed in his city clothes of a fedora, a trench coat and sunglasses. And I was quite obviously always on his side. I waited for him every Saturday as he made his grand appearance on a magazine page and astounded me with his wit, strength and courage.

Phantom was the safety vault of my childhood. He protected me and my imagination and all that makes a child's life magical.He kept me secure in my belief. In my ability to believe.

As I grew older, gradually and unwittingly other realities started claiming me. I could still read Phantom for hours, still gloat over the Ancient Jungle Proverbs, but something went amiss. I could not see him anymore on the roads . He had somehow disappeared, leaving the city in mess. I did not know why.

Perhaps ,I know now.

Superheros have a lot of qualities. They have the ability to defeat the bad (in) people. They have the ability to keep watch. They have the strength to restore order from chaos.

But they do have a limitation. They thrive on belief. For their existence they are dependent on people who believe them and believe in them. When people stop believing in a superhero, they become dysfunctional.

And that highlights one of the maladies of growing up and growing old. As adults we all become victims and patients of trust disorders. We become clinically challenged, unable to take sides with our superheros, unable to trust that they REALLY exist. We erase the roads they once trod on, we snatch away their horses or their web. In short we don't let them be.

Or perhaps, for a while, they just let us be. They let us go our way, lose sight of them, get lost in the process just to understand who we become without our imagination. Who we become without the ability to believe that walls can be scaled and lives can be saved. Who we become without our superheroes.

Every time Phantom was needed, Guran, his loyal friend would send him coded messages ... drum beats echoed around the dense jungles of Bangalla, reverberating the African darkness of ancient baobabs, travelling through the impossible and immense stretch of elephant grasses, the serpentine meandering rivers infested with dangerous fierce reptiles.

I have forgotten what Guran used to say every time he saw Phantom. Perhaps he just said " I believed you would come."

Big Deal ???

Today, my 4 year old nephew accidentally dropped a rasogolla from his bowl, saw all of us looking at him, promptly bent down , cleaned it up and shrugged his shoulders in a way that said "Big Deal"...Well, i guess that's wht it takes to handle unintended mess-ups - be prompt, stoop down a lil , clean 'em up and say ....BIG DEAL !!!

Wisdom and a thought

Perhaps getting wiser (and older) is realizing that all of us live in glasshouses and throwing stones won't really help... :p

Scream to Scare

A few years ago, I had stepped into "Scary House" at Prasads, Hyderabad, an ambiance created especially for the ones who din't mind shelling out a few extra pennies and getting scared...it was kinda cool...u had an artificial 'bhootiya' set up, dimly lit, photos of departed souls with discontented faces and roving eyes...it had suitable haunting background music...A timid "I" had hopped in too and was groping my way in the dark when suddenly a man dressed as a ghost jumped in front of me ...Scaring me was of course his agenda...but, he overachieved his target... I screamed to the best of my ability, with such passion and unexpected intensity that it scared the hell out of my Ghost. He impetuously raised his hand and cried , " Madam, bahar ka raasta udhar hain, aapko koi kuchh nahin karega." Not only that, he nervously yet graciously accompanied me and smiled a grateful smile of relief as I stepped out of the horror zone...

Just wondering whether we can try that in our lives sometimes...In case you r scared ,and most of the times we are, scream your guts out , scare the hell out of all the fears that surround you...one of them is sure to show you the good safe way out :D

LET'S ASSUME

Once upon a time when dinosaurs lived, I used to work for a bank...the trainer had taught me the basic tenets that made a banker what she is...fraud-proof. "Never assume", he had solemnly instructed his over-eager trainee. "Never assume that a customer would pay his bank back. Never take anything at its face value. Keep your information to urself and never assume people are not going to misuse it…It is illogical to assume because...(he had paused dramatically)... WHEN U ASSUME U MAKE AN ASS OUT OF U AND ME." I most certainly refused to be a quadruped ...instead I honed my "bipedal" skills and evolved as Darwin's darling...a smart banker with an impressive bank statement and a zero trust-bank balance.

And then i committed the BLUNDER...I switched over my role, became a teacher...AND THE FUN BEGAN...

Trained not to take things at their face-value…all I could see were faces…faces, keen and naughty…faces eager and distracted, faces mischievous and honest. Faces peering out of the last benches…faces asking a million questions…faces changing every moment with myriad expressions.

Trained to calculate profit and loss and account for every penny, I messed up my balance sheet big time. Credits earned showed much more than debits entered…investments made at the classrooms with students started yielding rewards unthinkable!!!

Trained not to share information, I was doing just that!!! Sharing facts, ideas and the teeny bit of information that I possessed in my li'l kitty.

Trained not to assume…I was assuming that tomorrow would be better than today,that the careful and the cautious often have much at stake, that relationships are the ultimate investments that are more rewarding than gold bonds.

Therefore, although my bank statement is rather depressing now (and will continue that way till Teachers' Judgement Day) I am awfully relieved that my trust-bank balance has been replenished.

Above all, I am glad I have understood that assumptions are NEVER illogical. After all, Mathematics, the most logical of all the subjects begins with a "LET'S ASSUME".