A LETTER TO MY FUTURE SELF

"Invent yourself, and then, Re-invent yourself, 

Don't Swim in the same slough, 

Invent yourself and then, re-invent yourself, 

Change your shape and size so often, 

that they may not categorize you!

Invent yourself and then, Re-invent yourself"

~ Charles Bukowski  

Dear Vibhat, 

If you are reading this in future, it means you already know what has happened with you and the situation might again seem to be unbearable, I want you to read this. You might remember when something like this happened with you when you were preparing for Civil services exam also. And you tried talking to your friends about this. Have you noticed lately that all your friends, most of them are struggling in their professional lives and hence grown out to be passive aggressive and rude. You talked to Kinshuk last night and he was frustrated as hell. You talk to your childhood friends (Abhishek and Nitesh) on weekends, and you find them either repressing their frustration or just being defensive about their life choices. I wonder why these people do not see this simple fact that all attempts to have a good career is eventually an attempt to have a good life, a good life can simply be available if you smile, do not take yourself too seriously, assume that you might have made mistakes and move on. I have seen my friends grow bitter and bitter. All they have seem like complaints about the world and how it is like a shithole. I have some other friends that I made in my former workplace. Sidhant and Deep are those people, who I do not find at least expressing their frustration. There is a certain kind of awareness that only working people have, the awareness that frustration is a temporary reality, so the expression of every small frustration might mean amplifying it. Also doing good professionally makes you calmer. Then, I have my friend Rustam. Rustam seems to be in best of his time. He still is trying to find a job. But He seems pretty happy. Rustam is having a pretty good personal life. Reminds you of Freud's declaration, "How bold one gets when one is sure of getting love!" But, Rustam has always been a cheerful guy. He has seen bad times. He has seen times when for 2-3 years, at home preparing for NEET and that he could not qualify. It is noteworthy to say how he passed those times and still kept a cheerful perspective about life. 

Vibhat, I know you often face a crisis of meaning in your daily life. More often after you have left the well-trodden path of your long-cherished dream of being a Scientist and now that you wish to be Civil servant or may be an academician. But one thing I might remind you. How, when you see people whining and complaining about life, you get reminded of people of your family. You never idealized your own father, your own mother and not even your own Grandfather. You saw them only complain about life and you do not like it. Somehow you know that their complains are not legit. If an upper caste of this country complains about not having enough opportunities, if a man in this country complains about gender bias at workplace, how legit can this complain be. You always saw who real victims of this economy are. All this I am telling you to remind you that this is the source of a well-profound meaning for you, Vibhat. Never become a Whinner about life, never complain about how hard your life has been. Always try to find a cheerful aspect of it. Not because it is necessary, but because there always is a silver lining. It is just, we are blinded by our complain bias, that we refuse to see it. However hard life may seem, there is always a way. Always remember, you have to become something you can look and smile about and feel, yes this was a life worth living. It could be teaching a bunch of village children, to running a multi-national company, to administering a state to even doing research in academics. Whatever you do, always remember, smiling back is so important. Happiness should not be an outcome; it should be an input to life. 

Also, recall, your dream regarding future generations, recall how you broadened the much-cherished dreams of economic empowerment to intellectual growth. Most people, especially of your age, might only wish that their future must be an economic improvement over their past. Notice, how you had linked economic improvement to intellectual improvement. and how intellectual improvement is the goal every educated man should have. Remember you came from a highly regressive patriarchal family, a highly casteist, a highly bigoted, a highly communal family. Only good thing you ever found in your family, was your laborious and hardworking grandfather, who had books of all kinds in his mini shelf. Recall how you read all his books till you aged 14. It is nothing but sort of a miracle. You quickly stopped idealizing people who children your age idealize may be all of their lives. Soon, your ideals became some warriors of social justice, Dr. Ambedkar, to Gandhi, to Bhagat Singh, to Einstein. You understood how as a parent, it is good to give your children an economically better life, but it is even more essential to give them an intellectually stimulating and free environment to expand their minds out of these parochial visions of society, like Patriarchy, Casteism etc. Your friends, even though, they can think all this, care less and less about this because, parochial vision prevails in them. They do not see life as you through your value system. They did not have a grandfather who cherished knowledge this much in their house.  One of your friends, Nitesh, had a teacher dad, who could only transfer in him a zeal to crack government exams and carry responsibilities of his household. Not to be biased, it is also true that you were slightly better than him in economic condition, you had no such responsibilities. But, also, see, Responsibility is a tricky thing. Nobody in middle class puts it on you. You usually take it on your head and run with it. Nobody in the middle-class household questions their child, why are you running with your head filled with Family trauma. It is true, every household has a family trauma. You had a broken family with both parents with severe mental issues, Nitesh's family trauma is probably economic insufficiency, Abhishek's is the same. But I think what separates you from them, is that you never ran with the family trauma. You brother sure did once, but you did not. You understood that you have a self-independent of your family. However, attached one is from his family; one should always cherish an independence from the family if he wishes to cherish freedom and happiness. You did and that's why I am so proud of you. 

At last, I only want to say, never believe someone who tells you that you were not special. You outgrew your historical horizon as Gadamer would have put it. Nobody, I repeat, nobody among your peers were able to do it so extensively. Ask yourself, do any of your friends have the courage to outgrow their male ego and cry in front of their friends? They might say, this is not in their nature. But that is the fucking point. We have to fight the regressive aspects of our own self to become better versions of ourselves. You ex-girlfriend, whom you loved so dearly, ask your heart. Did she ever understand you? if she would have, she would have learnt a lot from you. She remained fixated to her older self even after 5 years of duration. In turn, you learnt a lot from her. You learnt cheerfulness, you learnt bubbliness. In fact, she lost it in her quest to become richer. You learnt it in your quest to understand life better. 

Always remember Vibhat, the key to understanding is to assume the lowest position in life. Nobody learnt anything new being superior to others. And The key to being superior is always to lend a helping hand to people who feel inferior to you. Always, take knowledge assuming you are nothing, then give assuming you are everything. 

Your life is your life Vibhat, never listen to people if they wish to impart some worldly wisdom in your head. Recall how you were against wisdom from Day one. This differentiates again you and Nitesh. All he has collected from reading philosophy is a bunch of quotes. He never understood the essence of it all. The essence of reading anything is just to acquaint yourself with thoughts and then become freshly a child. A child, who can think and not just recall who said what. 

Now, the 10 promises I want from you: 

1. Promise me Vibhat, even in your most dull and most successful days, you will never become passive aggressive, arrogant and non-reflective of life. 

2. Promise me Vibhat, you will not become like your friends, your family or for that matter like anyone. You have to invent new avenues, new perspective of looking at life. 

3. You will work for a good life. But a good life is not just material wealth, but also intellectual wealth. Your children, if any, should have an intellectually free environment to grow and not the suffocating one you grew in. 

4. Promise me Vibhat, whatever you end up doing Vibhat, you will do it like worshipping some god. Never believe people like Javed Akhtar, who say work humiliates you. It does not. You humiliate yourself. Since, you have a habit of seeing yourself at a particular standard of working and since you are a beginner to a field, you cannot so you think you are a loser. You know these people cannot see what you see. A child should not feel a loser if he could not walk in initial years of his life. Work is worship.

5. Promise me Vibhat, you will remain an idealist. All you have is your honesty. You were the one who accepted your fault in second standard when your own friend Abhishek helped you by saying you did not do a particular thing. Recall, how you were beaten with one blow of stick, while rest of them were given two blows. But you were happier than people who suffered not even one blow. Your happiness standards were always better than others Vibhat. Remain honest, please. Remain an idealist. 

6. Promise me Vibhat, you will love people in your life with utmost sincerity. I know, your experience with Love has not been good. But believe me, never ever be bitter towards love. God is love. Love encompasses the Universe like anything. If someone broke your heart, it is the Universe's love in disguise. Follow your duties. Someone will someday love you so much that you will not be able to comprehend. Love Love and Love existence. 

7. Promise me Vibhat, people who wish to learn from you, you will not refuse to help. 

8. Promise me Vibhat, you will never pretend something you are not. 

9. Promise me Vibhat, you will not fixate with anything for long. 

10. Promise me Vibhat, that we both will kiss death with the same wide smile and laughter that is our signature. 

And I promise you, everyone will remember a smiling, cheerful Vibhat. He will not whine about life. 

Hoping for a reply not soon enough :) 

Yours past, 

Vibhat, 16th October 2024