Achievements & success are overrated

The goal of all endeavours should be our happiness, peace and satisfaction. It comes from doing what we are good at and what we enjoy doing. Any achievement which happens is just a by product and not the purpose. But the majority of people are striving to be successful in the eyes of their peers and society. A vain drive & struggle to make efforts towards a superficial aim to boost our false ego. You dont have to succeed at everything that you do, the only thing that matters is readiness to try new things for the purpose of learning. Nobody knows for sure when but if you keep trying things that make you happy then you will end discovering what you are best & natural at. In fact, I believe you will have abundance of what you seek now, unknowingly, that you d want to share it with anybody who needs it.

All I see around me is tremendous pressure to excel to win recognition for your efforts and gain some benefit from it. Everybody constantly wants more and more, without knowing what to do with what you are already gathering. It only results in fear, grief and anxiety in your heart & mind. Everyone so readily compromises with their mental health to achieve trivial and ephemeral goals. I will illustrate an example which has been the most conventional and orthodox (in my opinion) norm. If you can afford Rs.20,000/- to buy a watch then nobody settles for a watch worth 5-6 thousand. Suddenly it becomes very difficult to find something in your taste and style in a reduced budget. In fact it seems only natural to be driven towards watches that are priced much above. I have even seen people take pride in having expensive taste. Though I keep wondering what exactly does it contribute to or what purpose will it ultimately solve. You will only want more and in few years you will aim to buy a more expensive watch. Nobody aims to get something of lesser value as their second buy, as it would somehow mean that your status or choice has become low. You’d worry that others will think, you cant afford better things anymore. The same goes for most things that we buy like a house, car, smartphone, etc. going way beyond our needs into the never ending realm of desires & wishes. In order to fulfil them you want to earn more and more.

If only anyone can realise this then the extra that you save can be utilised to gift something to your dear ones. You can even expand your horizon by gifting somebody you think deserves or needs. There are so many opportunities to contribute to the needs & happiness of people around you.

I have often seen that if a person is good at say painting, singing or a sport then each and everyone around starts advocating to pursue it as a career or aim for a higher ambition in that. The moment such vain ambition seeps into the mind of the one with the talent, its the tragic & untimely death of the free spirited expression and the contentment it was yielding. Its become a chore for which you & others keep evaluating your self and comparing with those who are better than you. Soon you have all the anxieties and complex which you didn't have when you begun. 

Its so common to see people wanting to befriend those who are more successful and avoid those who havent achieved much. I dont see any harm in wanting to learn from people who are better than you at a particular skill or position but I dont condone ignoring or belittling those who are not as good as you are. As it will only lead to chaos and imbalance of nature. Why would those above you pay you any heed if you yourself are ignoring those below you in any strata. 

Its not all that important to aim for promotion in all spheres of life and specially ones with monetary gains. As long as you are happy doing what you do and you have discovered what you are good at. As long as you get time to spend with your loved ones and some time to help others (friends, relatives or strangers). If you are not satisfied with what you already have then you will never find any peace when you get more. The peace & satisfaction is always in the present moment, if at all there is any. Its in your outlook & perspective of life, people and things around. 

Believe me you don't have to rush anywhere to fulfil your fundamental needs. As you have everything that you need or its already on its way to you. If you need it and if you deserve it then it will be yours. You just have to fully accept yourself in your eyes and stop paying any heed to others opinion. People who hate weekends for they love their work or who live for weekends so they can enjoy their life, are both equally miserable. As they are not in acceptance of whats natural and are driven by fake ambitions and purposes. Its okay to fail, its okay to not succeed or be less successful than others. You can enjoy the most mundane activities like dusting or washing clothes, utensils, etc. Do not trap your happiness in only certain activities deemed by others to be fun and worthwhile.  Everything else is an elaborate hoax. 

Without a closure its meaningless but so it is, even after that!

There is no meaning to any activity without a closure. Its rendered useless without reaching the eventual purpose. I, you and everyone else seek the means to an end in our every pursuit and the most mundane involvement or participation. Imagine no salary at month’s end in a job or a mystery novel without its climax . A musician working on a piece without completion or an artist unable to complete a painting. A meal that doesnt get over or satiates hunger, drinking water without thirst or worse water unable to quench thirst. A never ending day or night that has no morning. Winters that dont lead to summers or vice versa. Even during meditation if you dont reach the recess in your inner depth then you struggle within, if you cannot park your mind their for just one moment then you crave for this closure.  

Everything is running in a cycle but it has to reach closure, its inevitable and a must. If it weren't so then we’ll all be too hopeless and disoriented. Every day work hours have to end so we can rest and the rest too shall end so we can work again. Same goes for the best of parties one can attend. How else do we find or give it a justifiable comprehension, we wont be able to relate without finding the final point. The most fascinating trek has to come back to its start point, sky diving or river rafting, all these exciting activities will just become a never ending horror without reaching their last point. There is no road trip or train/flight journey without a destination. We may or may not get back to square one every time but still there is somewhere to be reached and that is its closure point. 

How can anyone be in love with a person whom you could never express and now that person has gone beyond your reach? They might have left the locality, city or even country and you dont know how to trace them. The memory will eventually fade away. Even if you have earned enough in your life or at least more than you ever require, then too you wont find a closure in binge spending or continuous frivolity. We cant ever do enough to conclude for all times, we have to stop somewhere and then start somewhere again. Its a tedious and vicious circle. 

Clearly the only closure to life is death. They are inseparable companions, two sides of same coin, like day & night, winters & summers. But there’s got to be more to life than death. Or can we deny the fact that the weakest & strongest, sickest & healthiest, richest & poorest, sane & insane, ruler & ruled, all reach the same end. No discrimination or difference. Except for the repetition of same activities and/or trying new ones every now & then, is there really anthing more to our lives? Is there anything sustainable, meaning thats not rendered futile with age & time? There is so much we do just out of pressure of family, society and our peers. Its not necessarily bad but have they ever questioned or tried to break out of this cycle. So even if you find closure to many activities daily they still turn around every time. 

When I see people around, they all seem pretending without realising, seeking thrill, faking expressions & emotion without reaching their depth or maximum intensity, doing most things without actually knowing why, going about every day like a machine. Its rare to find anybody truly alive, anyone with eyes full of life, with acceptance without question, complete harmony with nature, with no attachment or aversion, or fully involved in self less acts. I know its sounds hypothetical but somewhere deep in my heart i believe its possible.

I am seeking a closure to my life before my time ends and my life expires. I dont want to accept death as my ultimate fate. Anybody who doesn't believe in fate is a liar, as we all know that death will come to us all at last. Its undeniable and inevitable. Clearly just earning a living, taking care of a family, raising children so on and so forth, is the most common regime of mankind across the globe. I am yet to meet anybody who has found a closure by doing just that. So I choose to seek by other means. May be I will find or may be not? I will know that I tried. 

Everybody lives in their own imaginary world

We have a incessant construction going on in our head. The world we keep building and modifying within. We keep picking elements knowingly and unknowingly, on a subconscious level. Hence losing our purity and innocence in the process. As no matter what the reality is, we make a world for ourselves based on our prior experience, exposure and mindset. There is no neutrality only biased view point. We constantly pick likes & dislikes, cool & not cool, tasteful & not, new or repetitive, etc. After collecting all these fragments every moment, we have what is generally referred to as outlook, viewpoint or even attitude towards things. Generally, most of our upbringing is focused on materialistic values as in studying, career and jobs/profession/business with occasional drift here & there towards values of life. In our schools moral science is looked upon as an extra subject and hardly anyone pats your back if you score well or highest in it. What is the broader aim of life, what kind of person should you be, righteousness & helping/contributing others as well society; all these questions are debatable and based on personal choices. Our personal gains always take the precedence. Though everyone vouches for success and appreciates successful people. In this race people take shortcuts and not so legitimate means at times.  

Where exactly are we heading? What is the end purpose of our various pursuits? Certainly, it should be more than ending up in a funeral pyre or grave. Irrespective of anything and everything we all do end up there eventually. Is it to lead `a happy life’ for us and our dear ones? What exactly is `a happy life’? We don’t draw satisfaction from the same activity or achievement in the same level at every given point. But nobody lets any such realization dawn upon them fully before they have moved on to searching for something new & next. Thankfully, sooner or later life serves us and shows us new possibilities, to what ends.

So based on our living and the imaginary world we have created within us, there is a sort of code of conduct we have formed for our individual self. We adhere to it fully and partially as & when it suits. Nobody really questions you for that; its for your eyes only. As there are many unanswered, unsolved, inexplicable instances in our imaginary world. There are many conflicts there everyday which nobody can see and nobody can judge you for. We can be whoever we desire in our world, we can cheat, rush and skip any rules. Thankfully scientists have not been able to create a device to picturize what goes on in one’s head, it certainly wouldn’t be ‘a happy film about a happy life’. We rise and fall in our eyes, in our world all the time. Some people luckily find others in front of whom they can open up completely and reveal to a great extent the actual happenings of our private world. But its hard to find the same frequency with another person all the time as even that person has their own world to manage.

People like to gather for events, parties, get together, etc. who have this common reception of various degrees for a certain activity. Or they are trying to seek similar worlds in others head unknowingly. Much like our quest to find water on other planets. If we are successful in such an attempt it makes for ‘a happy day or event in our happy life’. Books, movies, television and live show are often a binding agent when our connection gets weak with reality and its hard to pick anything from it. These mediums further provide imagination for our imaginary world. Its like dreaming in a dream.

In the end its still not very clear what exactly are we seeking, how to hold on to what we have found and where will we find more. Our ‘pursuit of happiness’ seems frivolous and yielding only fleeting success. Do we really know and understand what to strive for and how? Is there something everlasting at all?

I hope for now, every now and then, if we just step aside our imaginary world or come out of it then new & true possibilities can emerge. There can be sliver of harmony amongst us, our peers, our society & country and above all with nature.