Something irrelevant yet imperative

This morning I woke up and found a question looming overhead…….”WHAT
IS FAILURE??”
The dictionary defines ‘failure’: “to be unsuccessful in something”.
But that is hardly an answer to my question, is it?

So I folded my hands and took the ‘prayer stance’; but no matter how
much I summoned all the celestial powers to enlighten me, I couldn’t
find a satisfying answer to it.
Each time I thought I was anywhere near the answer, my thinking was
probed in a different direction altogether and new theories arose,
defying the previous thought process and I was back to square one.


I wondered if I should ask someone. My dad came to my mind and I
thought maybe I could ask him.
But then I was confused how to convincingly and effectively put my
question across.
Would he identify with the way I perceive my failures?
Would he give a diplomatic yet a rambling elucidation to my problems
just to duck the awkward and slightly delicate situation? Would he
even want to know?


And that’s when I had the epiphany that failure is ‘strictly individual’!
No one, except ‘you’, can look at your failure the way you do.
Every one makes their own mistakes, and that is why every one has
their ‘own version’ of failures. A person looking at it from the
outside can only see the outer shroud.

“Everyone has the right to run his own life- even if you’re heading
for a crash”-Mae West

The way only a criminal can reasonably justify his crime, and no-one
else can appreciate his side of the story or even be conscious of his
right of having ‘his side of the story’; the same way only the person
who has failed can know what made him fail and what taste the failure
has.


Maybe “failure”, by the theory of relativity is ‘strictly relative’ too.
Maybe what you perceive as failure is not considered significant
enough by some-one else to be named as a ‘failure’. Maybe the failure
of that someone else is so hugely impacting that your failure doesn’t
look like a failure in such a case. Who in that case is more correct?
Who decides who is correct?

I realized there isn’t any answer to this question, or if there is
one, I don’t seem to be getting anywhere close to it.
So I consoled myself by propounding my own theory that “failure is a
temporary condition whose time period is inversely proportional to the
‘square of the determination of the individual to replace the “absence
of success” with “success”’”.

I know it is nauseatingly optimistic thinking, but the other option
being ‘sulking and grieving infinitely’ I would anytime opt for the
first option. Because no-one likes to be around a person who is ‘sorry
for self’s existence’, and I wouldn’t like anyone ‘not liking’ being
around me. Forget that, I myself wouldn’t like being around me in such
case! and who wants that? So I would undoubtedly grab the first option
though it involves a lot of work.
And in any case, I believe no-one can grieve a ‘lifetime’, because it
is tooo looooonggg a time and you might just get bored of being a cry
baby, or your mammary glands might just display "EMPTY, SHUTTING DOWN"
and invariably someday you have to start afresh with hope, then “Why
waste time? Why not do it now?”


It’s strange, that while it is a little forlorn to be unable to share
your failures (remember: strictly individual!) with anyone, at the
same time it is oddly comforting, because then you already know that
you wouldn’t be getting any relief from anyone, but ‘you’.


So then I thought about the ways of comforting myself after a failure.
I had two options. Either I could console and convince myself to keep ‘low’
ambitions thereafter so that I could limit the likelihood of failures
and thereby steer clear of the menacing hurt, which to be frank,
didn’t seem such a good option to me.
I mean who on this earth would expect not more than ‘mediocre’ success
from self? Not me for sure!
Because isn’t having such peewee expectations a sign of ‘not believing
in your own capabilities’ and in that case wouldn’t it be the worst
form of self depreciation, self-humiliation?
And when one treats ‘oneself’ so low, how do they manage to live with
themselves?


Nonetheless, obviously I looked upon the other option. The other
option being: I could simply acknowledge and ascertain in my
conscience (or even the sub conscience, if there exists such a thing)
that there would ceaselessly, be innumerable possibilities that I
could fail, ANYTIME, EVERY TIME, during the lengthy journey of my
lifetime, for which I might or might not be responsible.
But possibility there will be for sure!


In that case, I thought, ‘Why waste time? Why not accept and make
peace with this nature of life?
Why not be friends and overcome, instead of being a foe and lose?


All that would be needed then is the relentless inclination to bounce
back every time you fail; how beautifully you do that again depends on
‘you’.
Because it is only you who truly cares about your failures and that is
why you are answerable to only you!
And you being enough satisfied with the way you tackle the situation
is the only thing that matters.

And then I reflected, that when everything about ‘you’, is within
‘you’, for ‘you’, and by ‘you’; then why do we humans waste time in
looking elsewhere for solutions? WHY DON’T WE TRUST OURSELVES, TO BE
‘THE ANSWER’?

And so I laughed at the comical prejudices of human minds.

And having gotten enough answers to take me through the time being, I
got up, and once again said to myself, “Why waste time?” *wink*