'What is Life?' As a young child, I used to think that life is something that has
infinite definitions and forms. To name a few, I felt that life is just a stretch of
time. I also used to think that life is merely spending time doing a great number of
things. Later, when I grew up, I saw how mistaken I was. I began to see life as a
tall mountain - taller than the mighty Everest, full of ups and downs, where at its
peak, success awaits us, ready to greet us. To make the long story short, I realized
that life is not just about sitting idle in the hope that luck may strike, and a miracle
would make us successful. No, life is also not about studying 15 hours a day and
passing all the school exams. Life is like a spaceship. When a spaceship takes off
from the launch pad, it is the start of our life filled with energy and vitality. As
young children, we are busy observing and gathering every bit of information
around us. By the time we start to understand the laws of life, we are almost ready
to face the world, away from the safe haven of our schools. Is this all about life?
No! As the spaceship travels, its surroundings also change; new territories unknown and unchartered, come in its path, which projects an unfamiliar set of
rules. We encounter hurdles in life that hurtle towards us with lightning speed. The
spaceship has to navigate through and surge ahead - BOOM! Till we find ourselves
on a planet that makes our mission successful.
Life is not what one may think, as complicated, confusing, stressful, tiring, or
idling. By observing older folks, I believe life can be either complex or
straightforward if one can look beyond the haze. Life is not about lying in our
beds, dreaming of standing on a stage and smiling at the people cheering and
clapping for us. Life is a long winding road with success waiting for us at the other
end. Just like when an astronaut looks back at the earth and finds it to be a tiny
blue dot in the universe, success does seem to take us far away from our present.
Once we achieve success, what do we see? We see ourselves standing on top of the
world! The feelings that creep in - the tingling sensation running down our spines,
the moments of pride, and the sweet joy of our hard work - congratulate and
encourage us to carry on the regimen. It remains so that success must be an
indispensable objective of our lives, but should we spend our entire lives chasing
it? Is life all about the deep focus on our goals? Perhaps not. Life is also about
having those distractions like watching birds splashing in a birdbath, sending
messages to my classmates right in the middle of an ongoing lecture, catching up
with the grapevine, or solving the puzzling controversies in our social circles.
Rarely does one appreciate the value of such distractions, but I believe we learn
quite a lot from them.
So, what is life? I think life is like a space odyssey that has both - a destination and
distractions. While we are consciously aware of our respective end goals, we
should not forget the intermediary distractions to discover more about life. Too
much focus on success can make us blind to the small wonders that make our lives
enjoyable. Also, if we spend our lives idling and whiling away our time, then life
would be meaningless. We must find a purpose amidst the strong influences from
others around us. As I see from my eyes, life is about how one wants to see it whether we wish to end up with a timeline of posts on Facebook or Instagram,
which people might recall as a life well-lived, or we want to have a timeline of funfilled memories that people would remember as the most adventurous journey with
us - the choice is ours.