Those little dreams.

Those little dreams.

Life today is about the money you make and the success you have. From early childhood, you are taught to find ways to make money, to excel in your pursuit of success. You are trained to look out for option to make and keep oodles of money. In fact the quality of your life is measured by the amount of money you have or what you possess, that money can buy for you, or those word of appreciation you received from your peers. The cars, the buildings, the club memberships…..the list continues. The neighbor’s eye pops when you drive into your house compound in your brand new Jag F Style. In fact, these are the dreams you see, as a child and tries to achieve as you grow up.

In the mad rush to make money, there a few things that we all miss out on. How many years has it been since you saw that little purple flower on the wild bush in the corner of your garden, or the little white butterfly that buzzed around it. Your time is worth a lot more and watching butterflies does not exactly fit in with your sense of eminence. Your social standing needs you to sit in a corner office, with outsized windows and an expansive desk in front of you. You never tire of the same papers lying about on that desk, the made up smile of your secretary in her attempts to impress you, or the aging reproduction of Mona Lisa, with her fading smile on the wall. Yet you do not even have time to hear the tweet of the bird in the garden, which are brand new and different every day.

But there was a time in every life, at an age of innocence when you did see the lovely things that nature offered you. You had time to listen to the singing of the birds, the buzz of the dragonfly and the beauty of the tiny flowers that blossomed in your backyard. You had time to plant the wild plants and seeds you picked up from somewhere. You woke up every morning to water the plant and watch the tiny shoots that sprouted. You were thrilled to bits when it did.

Yet, as you grew up, you lost the wonderment.  You took all this for granted. This is the state of human mind, so attuned watching manmade wonders and in our hearts we fix a price to it.  It has never struck us, that the so called wonders, we so adore are one time wonders that do not replicate themselves with ease. The little shrub that grew, flowered, gave you those bitter sweet berries, dies one day, but reproduces in multiples. This is unlike any manmade thing that eventually gets destroyed forever.

Why don’t we try, just for a day or a few hours to go back to those days of wonderment? Let us plant a little sapling and water. I did and the first time it sprouted, it had the same or more thrill to it as when I was a kid. When it grew to be the little shrub, it made me proud. And a couple of years later, as a young tree, it gave be a fruits, as if to say “Thank You”. Today, bird nest it and I have a swing on its branches, on which my little ones play.