O-zone: I deserve better, I am special

A wonderful article I came across today, which I'd like to share with you guys..this has been penned by Vinita Nangia from the Times of India



O-zone: I deserve better, I am special
12 Apr 2009, 0948 hrs IST, VINITA DAWRA NANGIA, TNN
Come on, admit it... all of you at some point have felt bigger than the situation you are in. It’s like you can give much more to life than life


I deserve better, I am special seems to want from you; much more to your work than the office demands of you — more in quality and bigger roles, that is, not in quantity of work. You feel you deserve more than is on your plate and a larger chunk of that pie called life. Your mind is restless because you are not stretching it to its limits and it tells you that life is passing you by — whizzing by real fast. I deserve much better than this, is the constant refrain in your head. I am special. That’s what Kate Winslet and Leonardo diCaprio (April and Frank Wheeler in the movie) tell themselves as a young couple in Revolutionary Road. Convinced they are “special”, they chafe at the bit that ties them to their mundane existence and the ordinariness of regular life. Frank swears he will not end up like his dad, but can see himself heading exactly that way. April cannot see herself as a housewife involved in routine chores and is yet doing nothing beyond that. It’s a case of life refusing to match their vision for themselves. Their reality has taken a completely different tangent from the life they planned and dreamt of and they do not like it. Sounds familiar? Is that self-delusional? When we think like that, are we deluding ourselves that circumstances are holding us back from the greatness we deserve and aspire for? Is it abnormal or is it the way the rest of the world thinks too? Does anybody anywhere believe “This is it! This is the life I want and this is exactly where I want to be at this point in time!” Why do we all get the feeling we are in the wrong place at the wrong time? We feel this all our professional life and feel it even more when one fine morning, we retire from work. With mental faculties that are sharper than ever, we wonder why the office suddenly doesn’t need us anymore. April feels deeply caught in the little life of suburban America in the 1950s in Revolutionary Road. She dreams of a life in Paris and plans to relocate her entire family in an attempt to shake off her angst and feeling of dissatisfaction — “running away from the hopeless emptiness of life here,” as they explain to a friend. However the whole thing boomerangs in her face because her husband apparently doesn’t feel the same depth of dissatisfaction and the movie ends in a tragedy. So many of us feeling caught in our circumstances, rue the situation and seek to change it. Is that good or bad? It can be argued both ways. A permanent state of dissatisfaction can only lead to misery and frustration, and so should be avoided. On the other hand, complete satisfaction with a situation leads to complacence and a lack of drive to achieve bigger and better! Is there a path between the two? Wonder if April had sought to deal with her angst in some other way than by changing towns, would the result have been as disastrous? She wails to her husband, “It’s what we are that’s being stifled; it’s what we want that’s being denied...” Can we possibly, as spiritual gurus suggest, change circumstances by changing ourselves? By looking within? Quite often, circumstances may be beyond our power, but we can certainly change the way we respond to them. All you need to do is step away and take a good, hard look. What is it that you really want to do with life? What is it that you hope to achieve? You can either focus on your limitations and lead a defeatist life, or resolve to turn your adversity into an opportunity and make the best of a given situation. Astrologer Sunita Chabra says, “Is there an end to wanting? If you achieve what you want today, you will want something else tomorrow.

There can be no peace from wanting and needing. The only peace can come from acceptance.” But acceptance sounds somewhat defeatist, unless taken in well-measured doses. We should have the wisdom and capability of figuring out what we need to accept and what needs to be challenged and overcome. The idea is not to quit dreaming and planning. Because it’s from those dreams that we evolve. The idea is simply to make sure we live life to our full potential. For as someone said, it isn’t dying that we need to be afraid of, but of an unlived life...