Oh God!............. God willing!………Its God’s wish!……..God’s ‘Will’ be done.
Throughout the history of mankind, the human race has consciously or otherwise surrendered itself to the belief, faith and trust in the supernatural – a force never seen, only believed. And yet the belief has been handed down through generations, with every subsequent generation adding a little more by way of its own contribution to the already mystique existence of a supernatural power of God, with Region, Religion, Race, Caste, Creed, Community, Consensus notwithstanding.
Somewhere in this race to outdo each other in the manifestation of a supernatural power, Mankind has slowly and steadily but surely eroded belief in its own simple power of touch, feeling, understanding, empathy, sensitivity and sharing being the ultimate harbinger of succor and sensibility. Man has forgotten to connect to mankind. Period.
She is all of seven, - bubbly, sprightly, witty, mischievous with a huge sense of humor and never known to cry or crib, instead blessed with a resounding laughter to boot. She could be the life of any home any where in this huge world of mankind, without a care in the world, innocent and yet ignorant to the vagaries of success and failures this life throws up at regular intervals to test Man’s belief in his own self worth.
Not any more.
Today her world collapsed, for she tasted what would be her first ever failure in life.
She flunked her academic examination in school. Everyone was shocked to say the least but still no one lost any time in ridiculing and chiding her. Her every action, which till a few moments ago was the cynosure of all eyes was derided for being the root cause in puncturing the inflated expectations of her fair weather fan club.
On hearing the news, my senses went numb, not as much for her failure, but for the fact that in our enthusiasm in partaking her little joys and victories we had forgotten to condition her to accept failure. I asked for her to be brought home immediately. Even that fact was conveyed to her as a veiled threat.
She walked in, with small hesitant steps, a pale shadow of her exuberant self, eyes puffed up, tears swelling, literally shivering, barely audible and a look of sheer fright of not knowing what was in store, a look of the death of innocence.
When she reached arms length, I did what she had least anticipated. I smiled.
I held out my arms, gathered her, softly kissed her forehead, looked straight in to her welled up eyes and softly told her,
“How many times you have slipped and fallen, and then simply jumped back, just patted clean your dress and smiled at your audience as if nothing ever happened. Treat this also the same way. Nothing has changed. Everyone fails sometime or the other. You are no different. You are still what you were a few moments ago before you got your report card, our little angel.
The welled up tears slowly trickled down, and as if waiting for her vision to clear and she was actually able to see my smiling countenance she suddenly without warning just threw up her small frail hands around my neck as tightly as she could, nearly choking me and throwing me off balance. She whispered in a clearly overwhelmed but barely audible voice, without releasing me,
“I love you” and clung to me for dear life.
A full minute later which seemed an eternity, when she released me I saw her face slowly get its glow back with the renewed blood circulation which had nearly threatened to stop.
Parity restored. Childhood returned. Innocence restored. Mankind was alive and kicking.
We always tend to forget our own powers to understand, touch, feel and interpret. To do just this we don’t have to disturb God.
It is time we told ourselves, the world at large and someone in particular, that I am here, just….
yours 4 ever.
Throughout the history of mankind, the human race has consciously or otherwise surrendered itself to the belief, faith and trust in the supernatural – a force never seen, only believed. And yet the belief has been handed down through generations, with every subsequent generation adding a little more by way of its own contribution to the already mystique existence of a supernatural power of God, with Region, Religion, Race, Caste, Creed, Community, Consensus notwithstanding.
Somewhere in this race to outdo each other in the manifestation of a supernatural power, Mankind has slowly and steadily but surely eroded belief in its own simple power of touch, feeling, understanding, empathy, sensitivity and sharing being the ultimate harbinger of succor and sensibility. Man has forgotten to connect to mankind. Period.
She is all of seven, - bubbly, sprightly, witty, mischievous with a huge sense of humor and never known to cry or crib, instead blessed with a resounding laughter to boot. She could be the life of any home any where in this huge world of mankind, without a care in the world, innocent and yet ignorant to the vagaries of success and failures this life throws up at regular intervals to test Man’s belief in his own self worth.
Not any more.
Today her world collapsed, for she tasted what would be her first ever failure in life.
She flunked her academic examination in school. Everyone was shocked to say the least but still no one lost any time in ridiculing and chiding her. Her every action, which till a few moments ago was the cynosure of all eyes was derided for being the root cause in puncturing the inflated expectations of her fair weather fan club.
On hearing the news, my senses went numb, not as much for her failure, but for the fact that in our enthusiasm in partaking her little joys and victories we had forgotten to condition her to accept failure. I asked for her to be brought home immediately. Even that fact was conveyed to her as a veiled threat.
She walked in, with small hesitant steps, a pale shadow of her exuberant self, eyes puffed up, tears swelling, literally shivering, barely audible and a look of sheer fright of not knowing what was in store, a look of the death of innocence.
When she reached arms length, I did what she had least anticipated. I smiled.
I held out my arms, gathered her, softly kissed her forehead, looked straight in to her welled up eyes and softly told her,
“How many times you have slipped and fallen, and then simply jumped back, just patted clean your dress and smiled at your audience as if nothing ever happened. Treat this also the same way. Nothing has changed. Everyone fails sometime or the other. You are no different. You are still what you were a few moments ago before you got your report card, our little angel.
The welled up tears slowly trickled down, and as if waiting for her vision to clear and she was actually able to see my smiling countenance she suddenly without warning just threw up her small frail hands around my neck as tightly as she could, nearly choking me and throwing me off balance. She whispered in a clearly overwhelmed but barely audible voice, without releasing me,
“I love you” and clung to me for dear life.
A full minute later which seemed an eternity, when she released me I saw her face slowly get its glow back with the renewed blood circulation which had nearly threatened to stop.
Parity restored. Childhood returned. Innocence restored. Mankind was alive and kicking.
We always tend to forget our own powers to understand, touch, feel and interpret. To do just this we don’t have to disturb God.
It is time we told ourselves, the world at large and someone in particular, that I am here, just….
yours 4 ever.
