Contemplating…

It was dark and it was noisy, but it was not that kind of noise that I am usually accustomed to…Instead of the usual honks I could hear hundreds of different animal sounds…It was half past midnight and all my friends were asleep…I too hit the bed but sleep seems to elude me…

There was no electricity and the only source of light was a lantern placed outside the “tented cottage”!! It was more like an indicator to animals rather than anything else…I decided to go for a stroll…It took me just a few steps to realize how risky this might get…I could hardly see my own outstretched hands and I decided to head back.

Maybe the cushioned chair placed outside the cottage was meant for nocturnal animals like me…It was definitely not sumptuous but had to compete with a couple of centipedes to sit on it…It was cold, pitch dark with the lantern trying its best to provide me the required heat & light…

I close my eyes and try to sleep. Instead of staring at complete darkness, I see a chain of mountains. I turn around wondering where I am and I see peaks everywhere. But the difference was that I could recognize all the peaks behind me but not those ahead of me. These were the ones that I had already trekked and conquered. Each had a different story behind it and each one of them was a source of delectation.

Most of them were not the final destination but only a path to one, but the experience made it more eventful than maybe reaching the final destination. The path showed that it was obviously not well planned nor straight forward but somehow each of them ended with a very good story behind them…Most of them were intentionally conquered while others were purely co-incidental & those were the ones which was most fruitful because you least expected them…

I could see a number of paths which were sketched but not taken. Some of them taken but given up midway. I could see that at every valley I have made decisions sometimes rational while others irrational (as I now see it!!!) but all of them leading to my destination. I could see that as time progressed, the problems and the corresponding solutions were tougher but I was making better decisions based on the extra information available and my past experiences. I have made my choices and I have landed where I am today. I have no way of knowing what might have happened if I had taken other paths, but one thing I am sure of is that it has turned out to be an excellent experience and there are no regrets. To add to it, sometimes I wonder whether the things I was pursuing did actually matter that much? Maybe it mattered then when I was busy sketching the paths to scale those peaks, but now when I think about them I just want to laugh…I have realized that some of those things were actually not what I wanted…

I redo my sketching and choose new paths which I know will make me deviate from where I was heading. But I am happy about it…The change in the roadmap may undo a lot of things that I had done but now it no longer matters because I have a new path, a new mountain to climb and a new destination…

There is excitement and I am looking forward to the new challenge. I am sure I have the ability to shine and conquer this peak which I think will lead me where I rightfully have to be…Maybe this is the final big peak, maybe this is not the final peak but just a prelude to the actual peak, maybe the peak is not what I had thought it might be, but I am sure it will be something that I would love and will lead me to such a place that would be much more than I had imagined or perceived, which makes me think of how close I was in not coming to this place. It was an experience to relish and to relish it, you have to experience it… Like most things, it happened and it happened for good...

When I see the mountain range ahead of me, I have chosen a path which I think will lead me the place that I rightfully belong. The past successes and the debacles have given me the doughty attitude that is needed to take the right step forward and actually look forward in conquering them…

Some of the paths that I had traveled no longer seem relevant and some of them were just a waste of time. But by tackling those paths I have gained immense knowledge which will definitely hold me in good stead…I have immense confidence in my destiny which has until now never let me down. The fact that I have no major regrets surprises me and what surprises me even more is that, this was not only because of the well planned decisions that I had taken but also because of the course that was forced upon me by a number of factors…

I would have continued to contemplate, but for my mobile which beeped twice to indicate that someone was messaging me. Trust Airtel to provide you coverage even in these remote areas!!! It was well past 1.00 AM and the message made me grin because it was a message from a friend who was doing exactly what I was doing, contemplating into the night!!!