Opinion

Getting it right in life

“Chill, these are just school exams, we have to face much more bigger challenges in life,” said my friend.

I looked at my young best friend. I looked at all the youngsters in their uniforms and the ones enjoying their free time.

It was a weekend and the event was a gathering of people at a farm. There was a beautiful seating area away from the main function which also featured a play area. Soon the children began to arrive at first with their siblings or best friends and then they were all playing together and challenging each other. They were competing with the performers on stage with much higher decibel.

Some one not their age group happened to sit in the same area, but that did not bother them a bit. They continued to challenge each other in the game. The onlooker feared for their safety as well as the game. The metal see-saw creaked and complained and I silently yelled and screamed worried about a potential mishap that might occur.

Multiply this group and that’s how many groups teachers must be handling at school each day. Some of the children knew each other from school. Then there were the seniors who were ready for higher studies but had not completely shed off their school life and friends.

Now it is these children who would have to face the real world as they complete schooling and head for college and then on specialisations and a career on which they will have to make a decision soon. Life is not meant to be easy they say because then we would not learn much would we?

The toughest education in life is communication. This is one area people do not think much about until they have to give a presentation or a recitation. But most of that comes across as mechanical. It is so much easier to sound and look the same. Try being different in style and appearance and you will be whispered about. Continue and find your own individuality and soon you find your true voice but make sure you respect and accept others because that is when you find harmony and truly begin to grow. That is because when we accept others we get an opportunity to learn from them. Education is life long and they need not always be institutions where you learn from. Look back and we realise we all have at least someone who has been a role model, a mentor, a best friend who stood by us and allowed us to be who we are until we found ourselves. They nudged us, giggled with us and listened to us while we bragged. It is them who at times made us think and reasoned with us when we were being difficult.

Come back to today and look back and you realise some of the best tools you have adapted are the qualities such as empathy.

How we say, what we say makes all the difference. Understanding that no one is above anyone makes one able to respect. That need not mean we lose our identity or not have our say. Politeness is often taken as weakness and calmness as shyness. It is just that some people prefer to maintain their peace and preserve their energy.

Just as they say in art, layer the colours and put pressure on the same spot with colour pencil and you get opacity go lighter on the colour as in water colours and you get translucency. We can have the same effect on people. The more pressure we put people through sooner they close up. Let people be and they breathe easy. So are we responsible for how we make others feel?

When we are there for others there is a sense of satisfaction that no award might be able to fulfil. So if there is someone who would reach out to you it must be with full of trust.

But budding are the ones in schools, some of them high on achievements and others figuring out what are they missing out on. But the world will give everyone an opportunity and the ones who will survive are the ones who have the endurance, patience and have the ability to communicate right because they would have the right attitude.

In the real world the right attitude opens doors. If they are not so quite amicable, then some might hesitate to open the door, in case of opening the door due to qualifications but a glimpse into the wrong attitude a person will take the first opportunity to show the exit.

Another aspect of attitude is we cannot fake it for too long. So the question goes - is it inborn or can we develop an attitude. We can be trained and it may not be an overnight change but at least we would be aware about it.

We might like a person or we may not, after all is there anyone who is perfect?

The world has space for everyone just look at jellyfish. They have survived through millions of years. Experts say they have been there for 600 million years. And you still see them on the beach. They is 98 per cent water and have no brain, heart or lungs. And they manage it all. Their magnificent nervous system help them detect light and have the ability to sting their prey and paralyse them before consuming them. But they also have predators to deal with and thus the nature maintains its balance.