On January 24, 1995, some sixteen years ago, at the always-awake age of fifteen, bundled with surplus energy, I sprinted out to the sides of the apartment complex early in the morning. In those days, I was living a charmed life borrowed from friend John in his apartment. In the midst of the second long lap with my brand-new brilliant blue marathon shoes glittering like gems, with smash hit music of Arcade Hits pouring pure magic of mellifluous music in my tender yet all-absorbing ears, I realized something odd. Something that would change my life forever, even though stating this during the first passage of my writing might evoke a rather odd response from the audience. Odd simply because I was the only one who was gyrating the gates of the apartment complex in a direction that was outlandishly opposite to that of the other dozen daily strollers.
Oddly, no one realized that I was the sole soul marching hopelessly to cover one lap after another, until I had done my day with six rounds, three lesser than the others gone by. I was in utter hurry to go back to my friend’s room and hide myself and assess what was wrong with me. Well, luckily, I had dreamed the previous night, and I had envisioned a situation where I would rip the heart of those twelve commoners and critics and make my mark in this world, albeit not feeling shy of any stutter that could always accompany me in my unending quest to attain success.
Even more oddly, I had inherited a legacy of high achievers from my parents, their parents and others in my freak family tree. So, it was difficult to break the mold of the usually successful lineage and form a BRAND of my own. Come, watch the journey how I achieved my dream in these dramatic yet eventful sixteen years.
That day, I came back to the room of John, almost crying at my poor presence of mind to have not realized that I should have been following the same direction of walking as the twelve others had been following. After all, they were all much more experienced with living in that apartment complex. So, sanity should have prevailed upon me after having realized that I was walking wrong. Something sub-special should have occurred to me in a split second saying that I needed to alter my direction and follow the herd. Still, there was something odd that avoided me from taking that step and also avoided me from the extreme event of cursing myself. Instead, I stopped short, mollycoddled myself and took it as an opportune moment to drive home the point within my majestic mind that I was built to last a longer lap of life.
At a handful age of twenty two, I was embarking into USA for pursuing my Master’s degree program from Virginia Tech, a school which was classified as the big league institute for learning. Taking my confident but cold legs – yes, I was awestruck by the magnanimity of the situation – my eyes suddenly fell on a plethora of orange and maroon flags flying forming a V-shape to signify victory. Already, I could scent success and suddenly my favorite tune of Yamaha Sports Update started pulsating my mind like the speed of thought. It was a very charged up and exciting moment for me to find myself among students who brought with them traits like different diversity, crisp communication, classic creativity and awesome athleticism. It would be this trait called classic creativity that would define my future, although it would change slightly to associate me with class and creativity.
Enter the age of twenty four, and I was soon dating a lovely blond girl in the campus. Although she could not team up with me for the rest of my life, yet I thoroughly enjoyed meeting her at one of the coffee shops. I was particularly attracted towards the smell of coffee beans and it raised images of brew forming a curvilinear shape above the coffee cup. It is this moment that aroused a high level of creativity in me. The girl was so classy that I decided to be influenced by her class and blend it with my creativity.
It was just after a few weeks that I happened to watch some of the legends, most of them alive, on the giant screen at Times Square in New York City. They were the enigmatic Rafael Nadal, the classy Roger Federer, the sporty Andre Agassi, the gritty Michael Jordan, the revolutionary Verghese Kurien, the eye-catching idols Sachin Tendulkar – who was proudly donning an Indian flag on his helmet - and Stefan Edberg, the never-to-forget Mother Teresa and a certain Steve Waugh flaunting a fluttering full bright yellow shirt and steely steering his team to win the World Cup after all had grotesquely given up on his team. There were more, like the God gifted Lionel Messi of Argentine soccer, the trend-setting mythical musician Michael Jackson, the always at your face Al Pacino from Hollywood, and the creative yet competitive Michael Schumacher of the red, feisty and fearless Ferrari. Given my thoroughly indecisive mind, I always grappled with whom to filter and which all to select so as to learn the most from!
It took six long years for my abject attitude to realize that it had to be the class of Federer coupled with the creativity and competitiveness of Schumacher, not to forget the never-to-forget passionate selflessness of Mother Teresa. It was a non-trivial exercise to cut down from the laundry list of good traits to the two or three attributes that would define the shape of my character and the way I would live – yes, LIVE – each and every moment of my life. In the hindsight, I am glad that I took six years to learn from the success of all these personalities, to learn from their long living legacy, and to choose such traits like creativity and class from them. Now, whenever I come across a dull phase of life, which suddenly threatens to snatch the energy and action that are so symptomatic of me, I merely look forward to these three icons and draw an image in my head about how they would have coped with such a similar stressful scenario. And guess what, more often than not, I am aptly able to focus on the task at hand and also add a bit of Midas touch to it.
As I conclude writing about myself, it brims me with purpose, passion and pulse that I need to learn more from these three folks and constantly improve myself so that next decade might see someone hailing me as the next LIVE legend.
Over to you, LIFE. Now, I am yearning to ask you to give me more cruel challenges so that I can improve upon myself. Oh, so sinister of me, I still haven’t learnt how to close my autobiography on a classy (elegant) note!
Hope you liked my creative yet compelling choice of colors and its contrasts to code my sentiments while writing this piece. Takeaway for you: think big, and back yourself to brace the new surprises and challenges that hit hard at you, and think of drawing long-lasting inspiration from some great idols. But, please never blindly follow me, lest you risk yourself from being creative.
A special word to my parents who created me.
