May 22, 2007

What's the BIG picture?

We come to this world as 'some one', become 'somebody's son/daughter', 'somebody's sibling', later 'somebody's spouse', 'somebody's parent'. Then we die. Full stop.

Don't get me wrong. The reason why I have specified 'somebody' in the above sentence is because from a broader perspective, that is what everyone around us are. Small parts of a bigger picture, aren't they? We do not necessarily choose a lot of people who get associated with us. Yet we believe they are important and spend almost our entire life for their happiness and well-being. We create a clear and distinct 'universe' of 'somebodies' whom we think are worth our time and energy. Rest of the world becomes irrelevant or fall within the 'I do not care' zone. Simply because they have not been 'incorporated' to our universe. For instance, I may meet 'somebody' in the train whom I do not know. We see each other quite some times but don't really take efforts to know each other. I don't get up to offer him a seat when I see him. We just 'see' each other. However, if I later get married to that 'somebody's' daughter, this person suddenly becomes very important for me! Offering a seat when I meet him is the least I could do, isn't it? As I said earlier, we do not necessairly cherry-pick few 'somebodies' into our universe.

If we take a third-party view of our own lives, the observations are so interesting. I do a lot of things in my life for few 'somebodies' who are a part of my universe. Some of them leave our universe, many die. On one of the coming days, my parents will die. They will just leave me, never to be seen again. Years of association just ends one day.. we do not have a choice even in that aspect! I don't know how to put my feelings in words. One day, all the 'somebodies' leave us forever, people whom we loved so much, people who cared for us, loved us, who were with us for years together.

We are still expected to continue living for the rest of the 'somebodies' in our lives. The process continues till eventually we die. That's about it?

Don't you think there is something missing in this scheme of things? I feel so, and strongly. Are we supposed to be living just like this? Chasing something without ever knowing what is it that we are chasing? Striving hard to earn money without ever knowing how much money is enough? So many things happen around us and beyond our control. Some affect us, many don't. We eat, sleep, drink, walk, cry, laugh, run.. all without knowing the big picture. Where is it that we are headed? Is it all about money, more money and some more money? And about happiness and welfare of only those 'somebodies' who have come within our universe? And end up dying after doing some things, and not doing many? There has to be something more, something deeper and more meaningful than all this..

How many of us smile at total strangers? If we do, how many of them smile back? Am sure the reaction would be a strange stare, at most. Rarely would someone genuinely smile back at us if we do. I've made a reference to this smiling thing only as a pointer towards the fact that we have become so self-indulgent, so much into our own interests and that of the 'somebodies' in our universe.

At work, we have our deliverables defined clearly by our boss. We have targets and roles to play. We get rated on that basis. Extending the same concept, what is the Key Responsibility Area (KRA) of our lives? What are our 'goals'? Have they been defined for us? Who rates us? And what is the rating process like? Would we ever know all this?

Whenever I start to discuss things like this with 'somebody' in my universe, the typical reply is: "Hey mate, all's well? You seem disturbed!" And the topic ends there. Sadly so.

3 comments:

sumi said...

wow..that was really touching..kept me thinking for a few minutes as t what to write...
but personally i never bind myself to "somebodies"..
and my profession doesnt allow me to do so...
but there is one more thing to it..if i keep thinking apart from the special "somebodies" i end up losing many things...and when it comes to gain, i guess they r very few...
and i guess u know how selfish i am..or infact we all are..so the best thing is we put our heart and soul for the special "somebodies" and for the rest keep smiling..who knows one smile might turn out to be the cause for the addition in our list of "somebodies"...
keep thinking and writing such good posts

Diviya said...

Life just is. Enjoy the moment.

Snehal said...

We do lot of things for such "special somebodies".. Some things r recognise by such somebodies & some r not recognise by them. Then we got disturb, upset. Why all such happened in so called in all stages of life?????? I don't know.......