Do It Yourself

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gEpaXf5djk4

I couldn’t find anybody who could guide me to my classroom. Now lost in this massive campus of my new college I exasperate “Senior college”. I walked in spanning almost 75 heads of students, skipping the “I’m sorry I’m late” embarrassment and made my way to the only vacant benches at the left-end corner of the room. When the lecture ended, Sir asked us a question, “What would the world lose, if you die today?”. I thought to myself, creeped-out at this question. It is the beginning of a new career, a whole new life experience and why does he talk about—– death?

I never really understood what it meant and he said you’ll figure it out. Holding on to that hope, life moved on. 5:42 A.M. trains for 7:30 lectures,weird lecture timings like 8:18 and 9:26, ice breaker sessions, young pretty teachers, lectures at chawpatty, dahi samosa, chicken frankies, chicken fried rice anda marke, the Oh so sweet nimbu pani, sukh sugar cheese dosa scenes and holding a 6 minute breath till you pee in these awful washrooms(gosh this needs development).

The whole year went by doing challenging projects, some brilliant some that taught me lessons to learn from and do better next time. ALL IN ALL, this course gave me an insight into my own life. I got to know things about me I never knew I could do. We all have it in us and we just need to bring it out in the open. But how do we do this? How do we know what talents we have? It’s when we try. Try new hobbies each time. You won’t know if you don’t try.

I made this my action plan. Gave various things a try, failed at some, exceled at some and scraping through all this I now have a clarity of what I love to do and what I want to do in life. I combined bits and pieces of my talents and designed for a fashion show, drew out a comic book, who knew doodling behind books could lead to this?

I learnt a lot about how to feed your soul with creativity and found out that even the slightest thought you have when you watch a movie and you wished the plot would’ve been different is your inner writer. Ink blots, mirror illusions, clouds of weird shapes, glass window patterns is your inner artist. Are you a person who loves collecting that one earing of which you lost the other one? Are you a person who sees toilet rolls as building blocks? Old school white converse as canvas, old Pringle boxes as pen stands? Yes, that is your inner designer, your inner architect.

“You’ll have button eyes” – Sir always told us. We seemed to miss out on little things around us. Ever sat in a train and noticed the many beautiful eyes around you, the different patterns on each clothing, the shades of lipstick colours, the sizes of bindis, which man has the craziest moustache, observe their postures, how many of them look around and maybe smile at you and how many of them are glued to their smartphones and maybe you’re one of them too. Yes, keep that phone down for a moment and look around you. Try to name the colour of sound, or give each posture a movie name ( Try finding a face that says ‘Hum apke hai kaun’ or some people who sit in ‘Dabaang style’)

The added benefit is that all this doesn’t need money,doesn’t need a work schedule, doesn’t have a deadline or a review. It’s just you, your thought, your bubble, your space, you’re the Queen and you’re the King, it’s your world and you only live once. So make the most of it.

And when this struck me right into those button eyes of mine, is when revelation broke out – THE WORLD DOESN’T OWE ME, I OWE THE WORLD. DO - IT- YOURSELF. It’s these little things in life we need to start doing to make a difference, to find home for our voices, to find other voices and create a capella of brilliance. You don’t know what the world would lose if YOU die today? So give them something that they’ll DAMN WELL MISS.