Adult Vs Child

So, what is the difference in being a child and being an adult? My answer is choice. Deliberate choice.

To the unobserved eye, the actions of an adult and child might look just the same. But their intention and level of awareness are on completely different levels. 

How?

Its 6 am. You are doing your daily jog when you see a 5 year old and a 40 year old (dad) enter the park. The child runs towards the flower beds. The dad runs behind him. Playfully. They chase each other, the child cackling with laughter and the adult with a big wide grin till he finally catches the kid. A great start to the day- for both of them, you wonder.

But lets go back an hour. 

Its 5 am. Dad hasnt slept much last night. The new boss has been giving him a lot of grief - giving him stiff deadlines to achieve sales targets. At this time, leaving the job is not an option. Jobs are difficult to come by. And then there is the pain in the heels that refuses to go away. He has been planning to get to the doc for the last 4 days but the only appointment available is 2 days later.  And he has to be there for dad's surgery this weekend that has been freaking him out. Right now, life  is hard. He wishes he could just sleep away the troubles and wake up to a boss-free and pain-free day. But that is just wishful magic thinking. Not gonna happen. So, he talks to himself, reminds how important it is for him to spend these 45 minute with his son in the morning, and begins to get ready.

The kid had a good night's sleep. He looks forward to every morning when he can catch up and play with dad. He is groggy when dad wakes him up, but then he has the whole day to sleep since it is still summer vacation. He does not think too much. 

So, here they are, an hour later. Running around the park. But the adult made a choice. He accepted that life, right now, was hard. But that was ok. He knows that there never will be a perfect care-free morning. Something or the other will always worry him. He has to get into the arena and dare the bull, knowing that he will never have the complete armour. That the fear of bungling it all up would always be there and he has to accept the fear and yet act. 

Brave. Yes, that is what adult acts are like. And mind you, it has nothing to do with age. Some children never grow up.

The gentle beat...

Today, I decide to live with my heart. I realize that it has been constantly at work since I had my first breath. Constantly. Working harder when I ran or climbed, working slower when I rested. But working. It spoke silently when I went headlong into a direction which really wasn't mine- coming from shoulds that others thrust upon me. It sang when I found the right path again. Yes, sometimes the mind shifted into the driver's seat, giving meaning and interpretation to what I felt. Sometimes, even creating fear when I did not listen to it. But the heart was always there. Like a constant presence of the princess behind the curtains. Ready to be revealed if I reached out. And today I decide to...

Lessons from the Tarahumara

I love walking. It is like a religion to me. You can wake me up in the middle of the night and ask me if I could come for a walk, and I'll come. Walking makes me happy. Maybe, that is how I have survived so many hikes, so many treks. I just walked. Half the metaphors I write are about paths, trails and terrains- all linked to walking!

So when a few days ago, I woke up to a sharp pain in my heels, it threatened something I held dear. I had to know why.

And so began the search. Pronation, Overpronation, Supination, Arch Support, Plantar Fasciitis. The terms helped me come know what was happening and why but I did not like where they were leading me as a solution-" Buy a nice cushioned pair of shoes with a thick tongue and support for your arch", they said. It felt logical but something was missing. Till yesterday.

"Born to run" is a book about the Tarahumara (Tara-oo-mara), a tribe in Mexico known for their unbelievable running abilities. As Chris Mcdougall, who wrote the book, describes. a 60-70 mile run over an inhospitable terrain with stone walls and dry cold is nothing. They do it like a warm up. For them, it is fun.

So, here I am, walking a few miles everyday, in my modern nike and addidas and I get heel pain. While they have nothing but pieces of leather strapped to their feet and they run till the terrain ends and that too with no pain. 

How? If I were to simplify it to one word, it is love.

Love for running. They just love it. It bring them joy. It makes them happy. Perhaps a primeval feeling that we all get when we stretch our legs and run. The trees zipping past, the wind in the hair, the throbbing of the heart as the legs kiss the ground. The mind goes quiet. What is there to not love, I ask. It is hard wired into us. It is how we travelled for centuries. And then chose comfort and efficiency. Yes, we can now go to London in 8 hours but maybe we lost something more basic on the way.

But I am digressing. What I wanted to say is that if you really love something and you dont let someone tell you how much of it should you do, just do it. An 80 year old Tarahumara grandfather can run 100 miles because he loves it and because no one told him that he could not. 

In a strange way, my search for freedom from heel pain led me to another alley of insights. It solved another question that had been on my mind for a while.
  
You see, I love working and over the past few months, I have heard so many people and friends wonder why I should work so much. Especially, on Sundays. Take a break, they say. And every time I rested, it  felt strange, sad and unnatural. It did not serve to rejuvenate, it only broke the rhythm. And now I am beginning to understand why.

I guess I am made that way. Work brings me joy. Thinking through a new course, teaching a subject, designing a seminar or writing a report nourishes me. I can work hours and then a few more. I know it might sound strange but that is how I feel and now I am beginning to be ok with it.

Does it take a toll on social life? Not at all. Because when I stop, I am more happy to reach out and talk to friends. I am more aware of the of the cloudless skies in the afternoon or the headlights of the cars as they crawl through the roads at night. I am more in tune with myself and less cribbing of life in general. Is it tiring? Of course, it is. But, it is the kind of happy exhaustion which make thoughts cease and make me reach out for the bed at night.

I dont know if I would solve the puzzle of plantar fasciitis or whatever is the cause of this heel pain. But I do know that the answer lies somewhere connected to what I LOVE doing and if I keep walking on that path and being in rhythm with myself, irrespective of what others think is actually possible, I am sure that it wont be long before I discover what will make it disappear.

And as for the Tarahumara, bless them for telling me this.

No..we are not! Yes..we are..

I am walking in the city. The kind of aimless walking which does not lead anywhere and yet is soothing to the soul. It has just rained. The sky is still dark as if it is still giving the city streets a last look to see if they are wet enough.

The pavement is lined with shops. They sell everything. Clothes, jewellery, coffee, shoes...you name it and there would be some shop closeby that would give you something interesting to look at and entice you to spend.

The people breeze in and out of the shops. For some, the hunt is still on. For others, it is over. They got what they needed... for the time being. I look at them but they dont look at me. They notice me just enough to ensure that they dont bump into me as they are walking towards me. There is no eye contact.

There are at least a thousand people on the streets but they could all be walking in an empty city. If I screamed aloud, at least a hundred would hear it clearly. It is easier to hear the swish of the traffic on the wet roads than to hear the words they murmur to each other. Never to the strangers.

Where am I? Dont these people feel the way I do? Do they have the same struggles, the same issues, the same dilemmas? Do they feel happy the way I do when I meet someone I love? Do they also have the same rush of blood when someone pushes them in the crowd. Of course, they do. But then, why dont they say something aloud. Why be so quiet?

I am not in India. I am in Singapore. And I keep wondering if they are the same like us or they are not...

The beautiful thing that writing is...

There are times I am compelled to write. I just get pulled into a chair and my fingers start typing. Often, I have struggled to come up with something rich and insightful, something so honest that its nakedness is hard hitting. But all that comes up is regurled bits of conversations, phrases, books...

I want that energy, that intensity to lead to something profound, something magical. I try hard to wrap my mind around what i am feeling. I want some answers and I want writing to throw them up so that I can catch them and see where they came from and what do they tell about me. It is a lovely game. But what if I often missed something else when doing this catch and tell.

Let me explain.

When I let go of this desire to find something awesome, I am much more at peace. If I am sad, my eyes begin to water as I write, the outside noises fade away and the heart warms up as if it is in tune with something larger and deeper. If I am happy, my hands become a living embodiment of an energetic dance. Sometimes, the energy is too much to stay put.

There is no purpose in writing, except to write. Can I stay with that? Can I just relish that writing is just like the hands that massage my soul. It is a path I take to find my lost rhythm. It needs no one but an honest me...and sometimes a cup of coffee. Peace comes cheap. Believe me, I know.