Tell me your dream’s!
“War may end, but the battle continues” So here I am, again. In spite of the piled up work and pressure of work surmounted on my head I took up this post. Almost for the last one month I came through so much of things which seem to be tightly coupled to each other but revealed me the only thing that I want to know. I dint joined the dots but when I look back now, the joined dots makes some sense. Or is it my mind which got into such illusion? Irrespective, I have an answer which is though not the final enlightenment I sought. This is the improvised version of the draft post “To Do or Don’t” as I mentioned in the Hibernation post. Everyone come across the situation of this “To Do” or “Don’t” at various point in their life. What counts for one doesn’t for the other but finally everyone makes a decision, have too. I do have funny decisions which I made not so in the past. My decision before I went back to India last December was “I am not going to make any decision until I go to India” Though its an act of escapism from reality, I am still normal human who would love to runaway from the reality for a small time in a hope to come back and face the reality with a stronger mind.
What about this “Living Your Dream – How Far You Will Go” “Tell me your dreams”? To point back exactly where it all started, it’s from the wish I made to my buddy on his birthday, continues with other incidence, experience I had in the short span of 1 month time and I hope it will continue further.
FIRST DOT: “Go. Just go behind your passion. Sometime it’s better to burn out rather than to fade away!”
More than a wish, this is something I keep telling myself nowadays. Of course there is a huge difference between my real passion considering what I have done so far and what I am doing now. Because I have convinced myself in the recent past, just like others to compromising for few other things. The real question now is, how far and how long I may have to compromise? Reading between the lines, it may be tough to understand the real meaning of the above statement. Examples are better than explanations. Aren’t they? Let me try!
Before I started this post, I read almost the entire life history of all the top 50 billionaires listed in the Forbes list of billionaires. Ok, some 5% odd of the entire top 100 billionaires were from wealthy background. Though all of them had different passions say Bill Gates with a passion towards software, Ingvar Kamprad towards retail, or anyone else in the list. What I see is, at some point I see there passion turned more towards making money or if that’s inappropriate I would say their passion paid off them with “Billions”.
Is that all? Is there were all the race ends? Money, more money, more and more money. I do agree that in today’s world money is one of the most important criteria and sometime it’s the most needed to achieve some of our dreams. Being said that, I do admire the great minds which made billions out of their passion. Now how about the other side of the coin? Those dare devil minds, to which I look up and say in simple terms “The way of life”. This is an article I read long back (I mean in the last one month).
A man called Michel Fournier aged 64. He is just another man but with a difference from all those billionaires. I admire this mind more than those minds which made billions. He is a French skydiver with more than 8000 jumps under his belt. But that’s not what I want to point out here. He set out last month on a mission to break four world records by free falling 40,000m (25 miles) from a balloon in
Now let’s get on to some more detail. This is not his first attempt. He made attempts in 2002 and 2003 which ended unfruitful when wind gusts shredded his balloon before it even became airborne. He has spent two decades and nearly $20 million in his quest to send him to the heavens in a stratospheric balloon. According to his Web site, Fournier sold virtually all his possessions to finance the launch of this project.
In an interview he said “This project is a great scientific and human challenge, and this is my baby, my dream. I just want to realise my dream.”
Great minds: Michel Fournier + add the billionaire list in case you want.
SECOND DOT: Long back (again in the one month gap) I had been to a café shop to meet my friend. As she was late and since I am no superman I went to the loo to answer the Nature’s call. And I found some sticker on the walls. After reading what’s written in that, I decided to take a snap shot of what’s written. In the mean time you can imagine the weirdest/wildest thing that could happen for a guy standing in the loo with a camera in his hand. Sorry about the bad photo from iPhone.
It doesn’t stop there. I made RSS feeder so that next day I can get the update about his attempt. Fortunately or unfortunately his attempt to break the world free fall record failed to get off the ground when his balloon lifted off without him on board. He saw his balloon going up the sky leaving him beside. The balloon cost nearly US$400,000 (€253,800) and Fournier was said to have already exhausted his finances. But he said he will bring two balloons next time.
In an interview after the failure he said “It was like having a hammer over my head, when it doesn’t work like that you just cannot think of anything. You just say, ‘How come it didn’t work?’ I am not giving up” adding that the crew will test the part and aim for another launch in late August 2008.
THIRD DOT: I came across so many times people saying to me “Everything happens for a reason” Is there a reason for his failure? In the last one month I had some bitter experience and again the same consoling. I know few who got lost in trying to find that reason. But I read this in one my friend’s post.
“I am going to say this only once. I dont want to say more than what I want to. Miracles exist. Magik exist. And if you wait your turn, while not too worried about what’s going to happen, and really and truly let go and enjoy the here and now, and did not compromise by taking up what you know you wont enjoy just to have something; it will come knocking on to your door, without notice, without hurry or delay. And it will be exactly what you want and need, and what you then decided was too good to exist and forgot with a regretful shrug.
And when it does, the only thing to be done is to go with the flow, and murmur a prayer in thanks to whoever delivered it.”