How I wish I am witnessing History in the making…

"Remember Red…Hope is a good thing ... May be the best of things.... and no good thing ever dies..."

These lines from the movie Shawshank Redemption make an instantaneous connect with something at our very core… something pure… something strong… something godly… something magical…. something that everybody has… something that when evoked fills us with a feeling of a quiet excitement…. a feeling of a humbled confidence and it surely is a great feeling. With what we have witnessed within the last year, it wouldn’t be an exaggeration to associate the birth and emergence of the Aam Aadmi Party with a similar feeling. It was somewhere among those multiple protests for the Jan Lokpal Bill, among those visionary talks on Swaraj, among those press conferences on exposing corrupt politicians & black money, among those accusations of trying to run a parallel democracy, among those political stalwarts writing off AAP as premature, among those desperate sting attacks and among those befitting replies from AAP that it won the hearts of millions of Indians. The special part is, the support which AAP enjoys comes not from an expectation to be paid… not from an expectation to be nominated…. not from an expectation of receiving political favors, it comes from people’s respect for themselves…it comes from people’s love for their country…  it comes from people’s wishes for their children to be able to live in a better country. Referring to Maslow’s hierarchy, it's the hunger for self-actualization manifesting itself in the form of support for AAP rather than fulfillment of physiological and safety factors which are the general motivation factors in case of political parties.

Well, whether they succeed or not remains to be seen. If they do, whether they deliver or not also remains to be seen. But we are desperate for a change and would like to see the fairy tale come true. I hope they do well in the upcoming Delhi elections but at the same time not look at it as a do or die situation. If they get Delhi, well and good. If not, doesn’t matter. They have to aim for a victory in the first National Election of the next decade. That’s what we want. That’s what we want.

From Thoughts to Actions....

In the relatively relaxed times, how often does it happen that we reflect on past events and what we learned out of those – very often? yet not often enough to take life-changing decisions. An extremely important factor - the magnitude of the step back of our frame of reference varies - based on our mood, our personality, our experience, our peers and our environment.

Sometimes it’s a small one and we wonder – oh, damn I could have brought this point up in that conversation. Had I planned my time well, I wouldn’t have to miss the game yesterday etc.

We might dive a little deeper and have questions on how we went about our health over the years; how we could have worked a little harder for that coveted goal or how we forgot to enjoy the little things in the greed for that material goal; how our heart / mind tricked us into choosing an inappropriate career / relationships.

Still deeper and we are turning philosophical –  Questioning the purpose of life – regretting to have participated in the rat-race while our soul was dying a slow death – questioning our decision to move out of country just for the glitter or it - whether like everyone else, we kept straying in to this complex web of family, friends, culture, religion, career and actually got no-where spiritually.

Seldom have we taken these thoughts to conclusion. Most of them are paused somewhere and are resumed the next time we are in pensive mood. If enough time passes, the old unresolved ones are replaced with the new, more pertinent ones and are moved out of the system

Let’s resolve to take actions this year!