Straight
Talk
Do
Our Dreams Change?
Nadia
Kabir Barb
A
conversation at a party set me on a chain of thought along
the lines of how many times in our lives we have said, "I
wish I had done …." Or "God, I wish I had
never done…" In fact this is a question that really
doesn't even require an answer as I am more than aware that
most people spend a great part of their lives regretting not
having done a multitude of things or lamenting countless things
they had done. A guest at the party was telling us how he
had decided to follow his heart by quitting his job as a consultant
and completing a course in film making something he had always
wanted to do. Currently he had just finished his first short
film. "It's funny how you sometimes end up with a job
that doesn't give you any mental satisfaction and forget all
the dreams and aspirations you started off with". As
we grow up, we don't necessarily get to plan how our lives
are going to turn out to be. Even when we start off with preconceived
ideas of how we intend to achieve certain things by the time
we are thirty, forty, fifty etc. it doesn't always turn out
that way. We tend to grasp the opportunities confronting us
believing them to be the best choices at the time and react
to situations as and when they happen and let our heads dictate
to us the decisions we take and in the process bury many of
the dreams we weave when we are children.
As
a child we have the most spectacular and even at the best
of times rather impractical ideas of all the glorious things
we want to do when we grow up but by the time we get to College
or University those aspirations change. For whatever reason,
be it family expectations or pressure, the desire to establish
ourselves financially or the unfeasibility of our initial
ideas we let go of those childish dreams. If I think about
it I have met a banker who given a choice would love to have
been a musician, another one who said she had a background
in fashion and had taken a job in the banking industry but
subsequently had never made the actual effort to get into
the fashion industry. I know a businessman who would love
to be an archaeologist, a lawyer who has a penchant for cooking
and would have made a superb chef, I could go on. It always
amuses me when I hear my son tell me how he wants to be a
toy maker, restaurateur, sports car designer, actor etc. when
he grows up, the form of employment changing regularly but
usually based on what activity he might be involved in at
the time. Behold the exuberance and naivety of children and
long may it last. But sadly life and reality take its toll
and gradually most of us settle into routines and lifestyles
that make it impossible for us to drag ourselves out of the
quagmire of apathy and actually do something that genuinely
makes us happy or is fulfilling.
Then
again not everyone has the luxury of being able to pursue
the career of their dreams but the funny thing is we seem
to extend this inability to follow our hearts into every sphere
of our lives including the little things. Once again we never
do half the things we want to. The reasoning behind our reluctance
can be due to the lack of time, lack of funds, and concern
of what other people might say or just general ennui. Come
on if you had a chance to do three things in your life that
you always regretted not doing, what would they be? I can
come up with at least half a dozen if not more! Some people
regret not having learnt to sing, never stood on top of a
mountain and shouted at the top of their lungs, never slept
under the stars, never done something that was truly selfless
or told someone they care for that they love them. Let me
bare my soul and tell you that I have always wanted to go
sky diving or parachuting but have never looked into it properly
or followed through with this particularly bizarre ambition.
My husband usually gives me a look of horror every time I
mention it, "Why on earth would you want to throw yourself
out of a plane especially when you are afraid of heights?"
Well I don't know but I guess as a child (and as an adult)
I have always wanted to know what it would be like to fly
and this seems like the next best thing! He on the other hand
decided a few years ago that he wanted to learn to rollerblade
so he bought himself a pair and went off to Hyde Park for
a few weeks. Maybe what we need to do is to dredge up the
inner child that exists stifled inside us and start doing
some of things that we secretly hanker for but never get around
to doing. You can do that can't you?
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