What are you most worried about for the future?
Yuddhakaale shastrabhyasam (last-minute preparations for war) never worked. It never worked during the war. It’s never going to work in real life either. But, I always tried to prove this wrong. And much to my irritation, Dad had ample opportunities to repeat this proverb to me. I had 12 papers in my grade 10 preliminary examinations and the best part was that it was scheduled as one examination per day and the worst part was that it was scheduled as one examination per day. I hadn’t prepared enough throughout the year, so I did quite a few all-nighters right through my examinations. Dad would prepare my flask of tea, and remind me again, that studying a day before the examinations would not help me much. But, stubborn as I was, I remember staying up all night to study and prepare. The 10th paper was my geography paper and geography was a subject I used to enjoy. So staying up to prepare for it was something I had a lot of fun doing. The following morning, I walked to school, dizzy and exhausted, but eager to finish the paper stronger. I was eager to do my best. The examinations were scheduled between 830 am and 12 noon and at 930 am roughly an hour after my exams started, I put my pen down, happy with the progress I had made in the paper, and decided to take a break. I slept for the rest of the paper. When the results came, I realized that I had slept for most of my exams and had only completed 30% of the paper and although I got most of my answers right, it was insufficient to get me the scores to boost my confidence.
Mum always said, “As you sow, so you reap”. Although geography was a preferred subject until then, I did not bother working on any subjects that involved traveling for work. So, journalism, which was a major just fell by the wayside. I did pass the exams in grade 10 and I finally learned the lesson Dad kept trying to teach me, “Yuddhakaale Shastrabhyasam” did not work. I did not become a journalist, but I am a reluctant traveler. In the few journies that I have completed, I have realized that people across the world have one thing in common- they want to survive and thrive. We want to survive and thrive. To this end, we make a lot of efforts and sacrifices and most often these efforts and sacrifices are in vain. They seem almost insufficient to meet the demand placed on life and the living.
So, when you ask me what most worries me about the future, it’s our very existence. How can a world that’s at perpetual war with each other find a way to heal and thrive? How can a world where we find no peace and no harmony living as individuals do we live as groups? How is it that we spout theories and values and rules to follow to prevent catastrophic climate changes but we constantly make the decision to use weapons of mass destruction that ultimately ruin the world? How is it that the rules of morality no longer apply to those against who we fight? We’ve lived through numerous wars, and even a few genocides, what have we learned from these instances?
Obviously nothing! Because here we are again. In the present, waging wars against each other, for reasons that may no longer be relevant on issues that have ceased to exist the moment you fired a bomb against his home.
I live in the present. I consider the past and try not to dwell too much on it, but, that’s a tough battle for me because I remember quite a bit- some good and some not so great. I never considered the future apart from the most basic because Mum always said, ‘As you sow, so you reap’. But today as I sit and ponder over the prompt, I am thinking about all the seeds of disharmony and the wars we are silently witnessing and worry about the fruits we are going to reap. Not a pleasant thought and definitely not the kind of future I am looking forward to.
Just a little more 