Are You One of the Millions?

Shivani rues that whatever one does has been done before making us one of the millions. She asks us to listen to our inner selves. An exclusive for Different Truths.

All of us have a bit of I-want-to-go-down-in-history, all of us want to be remembered, we are told that we are one in a million but what if we are just ‘one of the millions’, think about it , everything you do, everything you go by, everything you have done until now, has been already, probably done by someone else, something as small as even typing this article, I am sure I am not the first one to talk about this.

Now, I am not saying that all of what you have done your whole life is useless and does not count. All I am saying is, we are just being one of the millions, walking the same path, but how can we not? Millions have walked it.

We are so scared to change the path, we have completely pinned ourselves to hopes of the expectations people have from us. If you are an adult reader, which you probably are, you might have some regrets, you might have a little fire in you still burning, to you know, work on yourself, modify your lifestyle maybe or just go for a trek to the mountains, whatever it may be, you will always procrastinate over the thought of it, always and right now I bet you’re thinking , ‘time hi kahan hai’, so that basically means that you are ready to reside all the time to the things you’re too “stuck up” .

Going by that assumption, since you are tangled into your responsibilities and whatever it is, why not try to be different in those knots, nothing is going to change even if you go down on the streets with banners saying, ‘Save Girl Child’, ‘Protect our Religion’, ‘This is Bad’, ‘Burn This’. Oh! Let us take a huge printout of some minister and burn it in front of the cameras, in front of the media, to prove to the public that it is a democracy. I know you might not be into that, but you see what I am saying. Your rapid actions of active display of “the right” are not going to impact any person or even your own mentality. You must work on your lifestyle; the way you see the world and the way you react to it are two different things.

I too participated in a ‘Save Girl Child’ march with my mother, and a lot of other people who were there to support it, it was a good experience, made a banner too, but you see…? It was just for a show, just another display of the ‘right’.

I am saying that because I know a woman, who gets beaten up by her husband, almost has lost her hearing. And I seem to be able to do nothing about it because, who listens to us teenagers anyway right? Not like I have not tried speaking up, I have, a couple of times, but she herself is so scared that, she is ready to sacrifice her entire life for some drunkard, who cannot get enough of abusing a woman, his wife.

So, what I am saying is, if you re ready to go on the streets with banners, write articles, talk about how bad the roads are or how dirty the area is or how unequipped has the government been, or how there is so much corruption, anything that you talk about, why not try picking up random wrappers off the road which you’d notice while walking to some place? or why not decrease the use of plastic? Why not actually speak up for the ones who seem to be avoided by society? why not invest your excess wealth into a homeless child’s education? Why not stop paying extra for the last-minute train ticket? Or why not stop offering money to get things done? Why not talk for a change, talk to others with a belief that you can impact theirs? who not do something different?

Your inner child wants to do photography, do it then, even if you are sixty-five, pick up a camera, and join a photography club, you want to lay low for a while, fine, you want to write, write, you want to change the world? You can, you really can, if you just see it differently and imply all of what you think of.

Visuals by Different Truths