T(rue) Self

It was a simple two liner from a school friend, who had been on her friends list for so many days and had faded to a statistic after the initial euphoria of status updates and settling in. A two liner which forced her to analyse her own life and look back a little longer than the fleeting someplace two minutes on her childhood and her adolescence. Starry eyed youth, her friend had said. Yes, it was true, she realized.

Somewhere between the promotions and the exotic holidays, she had lost a sense of vitality, novelty, excitement. Everything seemed mundane to her-the flashy new big car, the expensive cosmetics which she had drooled over in magazines in her youth and which now stood displayed on her dressing table, the designer clothes, the custom fits, the luxurious jet settling- it all seemed so meaningless. What was she doing here, with her life?

Was it only a series of numbers- her life- she thought? Age, salary, sales figures, number of years of married life? Yes, that was it- everything could be summed up in numbers- bank balance, mileage on the car, number of mp3s she had amassed over the years.

What could it be that was lacking in her life? A sense of direction,  a purpose?

Suddenly all those late nights at the office felt meaningless. She longed for the carefreeness of her youth- the love and care that was doled out to her endlessly when she was just a girl.

And now? She thought of her parents, away, lonely in a big house- and her infrequent visits and daily phone calls through which her mother would condense sixteen hours of her life into sixteen minutes. She thought back onto her childhood- she had always been a strong, independent and ambitious girl- each of her decisions conveying and validating her strong headedness.

And then it hit her. Her life suffered from lack of future planning. She, who had always been ten steps ahead of herself, now lived day to day. Somewhere, along the course of family obligations and her married life, she had lost track of the future.

Armed with this new knowledge, she set out on mapping a path for herself. Starting with what she loved the most.

And then, wrote a long mail to her friend for helping her find her true self.

(September 16, 2010)