I am happy to be to some degree an old-fashioned bhadrolok (Bengali for decent one), too delicately subtle and passive to a fault that even squashing a bug or a mosquito by mistake might have that terrible ring of misappropriation of one’s inherited virtues writ all over it; consequently, becoming needlessly aggressive and domineering is nothing short of being Satanic and that, as I say see it, is poisonous enough to asphyxiate my way of infinitely sweet Brahmanic existence: the Hindu highway of life of my beaming, gleaming, and shining India.
Most of all, I am used to believing that being spiritlessly domineering and tactlessly aggressive to achieve something great (or not so great) in life is not in God’s glory, it cannot be, and I still have that belief system, that conviction, proudly intact. What’s more, being aggressive is like an overshot tumor which spreads quickly in our society and I was one of those mute witnesses to that thing happening during my growing up years in the wonderful Allwell parkland. As things stand now, I still am freely detached from the idea of being aggressive and all that horrific tosh being bandied about these days that one can achieve something great in life only by being aggressive and not by being humble, is all over the place. It’s a pity really. Too bad.
That’s so wrong and erroneous thinking on the part of those individuals who cannot ward off these scary phantoms out of their lives, their dreams, and their part of confusing realities. I recommend they should look themselves in the mirror that looks back at you and try and think positively about life and what you desire from it. So ask yourself this question: Why does one have to inculcate oneself with an aggressiveness trait to make your dreams come true? You don’t have to. Give Humble and its lovely humility gene a chance and see what it entails. Being humble it’s on the Mother Nature’s side, whereas Aggressive isn’t as it destroys than it likes to preserve. Being old-fashioned is the only way to sustain life on Earth.
As Paul Auster says so beautifully in one of his books “Good begets good; evil begets evil; and even if the good you give is met by evil, you have no choice but to go on giving better than you get.” Therefore, the good in our lives always begets good. So be humble, always.
So What Do You Want To Become?
If all that you need to become in life is an Engineer or a Doctor or for that matter a Milkman or a Choir Singer or an Air Traffic Controller, you don’t need to be aggressive at all, rather you need to read your lessons with love and care – and this is increasingly essential now: unconditionally love your parents for having given you birth in the first place – towards achieving your career goals and that’s enough stack of virtues you can peruse to see you through any ordeals that your life tosses at you. Likewise, it also matters whether you end up being “aggressive” or “humble” or both or whatever worldly manmade s**t is latched onto you in the process! You’ve got to remember one thing that Aggressive is a vice, Humble is a virtue. Choose your stuff wisely.
Ostensibly, this line of encouraging albeit – I come clean on this – self-satisfied thinking has afforded me a wonderful consolation like no other thing could in my life; except pursuing an Arts degree: English Literature, precisely. It had brought me much-needed gifts like “control” and “tact” and some creative juices of “emotional steadfastness” in its wake. And lest I forget mentioning the gorgeous memory of the saucy girl I was so crazy about in my school.
Golden memories instill a strong sense of nostalgia in you so much so that you become eternally thankful for the kind of contemplative life you lead and that such unforgettable calming recollections go on to shape your future, promising to be never anything out of ordinary that you cannot handle or deal with. Memories, especially of the vintage kind, and it don’t matter whether they are sweet or bittersweet, flattering or dismaying, have that innate magical power to see you through in life.
