by - Madalsa Singh
Some words can send
chills down your spine. Contemplate if you may. Of course everyone is well
familiar with the above quote extracted from Polonius’ advice to his son
Laertus in Hamlet, which well remains to be one of my favourite (well, nothing
beats Midsummers nightdream though). It is worth a read !
To Thine Own Self Be
True
Yet here,
Laertes! Aboard, aboard for shame!
The wind sits in
the shoulder of your sail,
And you are
stay'd for.
There ... my
blessing with thee!
And these few
precepts in thy memory
Look thou
character. Give thy thoughts no tongue,
Nor any
unproportion'd thought his act.
Be thou
familiar, but by no means vulgar.
Those friends
thou hast, and their adoption tried,
Grapple them to
thy soul with hoops of steel;
But do not dull
thy palm with entertainment
Of each
new-hatch'd, unfledg’d comrade. Beware
Of entrance to a
quarrel but, being in,
Bear't that th'
opposed may beware of thee.
Give every man
thy ear, but few thy voice;
Take each man's
censure, but reserve thy judgement.
Costly thy habit
as thy purse can buy,
But not
express'd in fancy; rich, not gaudy;
For the apparel
oft proclaims the man;
And they in
France of the best rank and station
Are of a most
select and generous chief in that.
Neither a
borrower, nor a lender be;
For loan oft
loses both itself and friend,
And borrowing
dulls the edge of husbandry.
This above all:
to thine own self be true,
And it must
follow, as the night the day,
Thou canst not
then be false to any man.
Farewell; my
blessing season this in thee!
~ William
Shakespeare.
Oh please don’t click
the cross already! Things’ll flow. Promise.
I have come back home
after spending a year in one of the most multifarious places ever. You can find
absolutely any sort of people; from the pretentious pseudo-intellects,
extremely restrained introverts to the absolutely die hard fans of Shahrukh
Khan. And then there lie, lurking in the corner few abysmally confused souls
still finding a hue of grey to paint themselves in.
And with a brush in my
hand, I ask only one question, Why is making the choice so inevitable?
Why do I have to I have to take either of the roads? Why can’t I just sit
at the crossroads and enjoy my gin and tonic; at least for a while? Why the
haste?
Hence, I run to the
lakeside (the best place in this universe) to find the answers to the running
commentary of rhetoric questions in my jumbled head.
All this while, you
have been trying. Too hard. For once. You must stop trying. For once, you must.
Jump off the boundaries and come out of the suffocating restrictions. And be
free.
You are not answerable
to anyone except yourself. Do things that please no one, except you. Be true to
none, except for yourself. And then you shall be euphoric.
I remember owning the
grossest yellow cycle with a green seat when I was 8. Everybody in my
neighbourhood simply loathed it. Kids would steal it and throw it near the
Shyam Bhaiya’s Puncture stall and everyday I would walk up there and ride it
back to the colony. With the head (with cornrows) held high. Why?
I chose the lemon
yellow for it fascinated me. The green seat would match my favourite green socks.
Because I chose it for myself, not for the kids.
And hence you stupid
cretin with the brush, choose for yourself. Make a choice of not making
any choice. You can stand and stare into the abyss. It’s okay.
For you shall
experience pure ecstasy like the Maynard gull. Embrace it.
Come along then.” said
Jonathan. “Climb with me away from the ground, and we’ll begin.”“You don’t understand My wing. I can’t move my wing.”
“Maynard Gull, you have the freedom to be yourself, your true self, here and now, and nothing can stand in your way. It is the Law of the Great Gull, the Law that Is.”
“Are you saying I can fly?”
“I say you are free.”
~ Jonathan
Livingston Seagull
And yes, now that you
are true to yourself and free; please ask for the girl’s number and take her
for an ice-cream :) (hey we did talk about jumping of restrictions,
right? )
If you’re still
confused, it’s okay. I am still at the crossroads with the gin and tonic.
