AN ODE TO THOUGHTS

At the risk of sounding clichéd, proverbial and philosophical, I am going to have to draw an embarrassing metaphor to try and explain where I am going with this blog. Here it comes. Life is a Rubik’s cube. Very few understand the pattern and only a handful crack the trick. I am certainly not one of them. Just like most people, I am constantly groping in the dark to make sense of my life and the world around. But what is interesting is that this obscure and incomprehensible life is richly laden with situations, events and thus thoughts. These thoughts emerge as I fall and then again when I rise, sometimes with effort and sometimes with fervour.

Actually thoughts are the funniest things. They seem to bombard you from all the directions, at any time during the day or night and take you to places unguarded, unforeseen and untrodden. They can be simple, they can be complex and they can be outright bizarre. And man, can they be powerful! They can wreck you and leave you frail and feeble. They can invigorate you and motivate you to go on living and loving this strange life. They can give you ideas - ideas for a better life, ideas for a richer life and ideas for a creative life.

If such is the case then why do we suppress our thoughts so much? Why do we force ourselves to push them back in the darker recesses of our labyrinthine mind? I mean, of course, we are all social animals and sometimes you just have to...for the sake of living a symbiotic life. But aren't we doing it a bit much these days? Aren't we restricting ourselves to blindly following the thoughts of the larger group out there? Why aren't we allowing our beautiful minds to flourish and grow through those thoughts that bear ideas and expressions? Why does everything new and different always amount to blasphemy? Why are stranger hairstyles not acceptable to us? Why are dress codes so strictly adhered to? Why do we watch only Bollywood or Hollywood movies with a certain pace and linear structure? Why does everyone have to believe in God? Why do I have to be tolerant to those who think astrology is science? (Well I do. I do have to be tolerant. That is what we all need to learn to be. I think that is the only way for individuality to sneak in. But coming back to astrology; this is again a product of not rational and individual thinking but blind adherence to 'Indianness'.) Why do I have to belong to a religion, perform its never-ending rites and rituals and why, oh why, do I have to belong at all? These are questions I ask myself everyday. These are questions I wish people asked themselves more often. These are the thoughts I wish weren't suppressed so often as they are.

Sometimes when I think just how many categories I fall into, I get amazed. Why can't I simply break out of all those boundaries that stifle me and be a nomad just like my thoughts? Being an Indian student, you can either take up Arts, Science or Commerce. Why the bloody hell can't I choose mathematics and English literature together as my subjects? Again, why are we limiting our thoughts to regular, mundane and accepted?

The key I think is like I mentioned earlier; tolerance. We need to learn to listen, to bear with what we hear and to give people a real chance to express themselves. We need to accept that there can be diverse ways of thinking and living life. We need to stop oppressing people on basis of what they are, how they think and how they live their lives. And when we do reach that level of tolerance towards 'the other', we need to do some creative and yet rational thinking for once. We just need to think and I swear, we won't need wings to fly.