Where do we go?

So yeah. My blog's been down on the activity for a good amount of time now. Why, you ask? Well, large number of reasons, least of them not being the summer placements. That got over, and of course the post placement euphoria studded with trips to Mysore and Wonderla. And now life's back to normal. A life studded with minor yet significant events. A life that's a roller coaster and full of colors - all you need to do is to keep your eyes open and see the colors rush past you.

We are, at the outset, students. Why do we study? To gain the oft-quoted highly priced and respected knowledge. We work hard for entrance exams, and in our enthusiasm, do courses that claim to give us value addition. We continue to work hard,and strive for figures that exalted masters consider apt descriptions of our calibre and greatness. We sit through assignments and submissions that make us not just reflect on the subject that we study, but on how well our co-students are able to understand the same.

Where does this come from, the strange nature of this quest? Why do we always compare ourselves? Why is it that every time we run a race, we need to have people lose to us? What is victory? What is failure? Why is it that we do not satisfice even when we perform to our best, but we are exhilarated when we beat our competitors even at the cost of underperforming? Is that the reason we are here? To beat people and feel happy about it?

The road doesn't end here. It doesn't stop at scoring marks, scoring grades, securing jobs or even securing promotions for that matter. It's like an endless path, a maze, a craze. Sometimes you do well - you're in form. But sometimes, you don't. And what happens then? You cry. You fall down into the scum of the earth and wish you could bury yourself lower. A friend of mine had a quote to say that I found interesting - "I love walking in the rain because no one can see I'm crying." That's how it feels to be on the receiving end.

And so the road carries. The infection spreads from career to every other sanctified and revered walk of life we may have - friendships, relations, even our own selves. It happens all the time. You help your friends make up after a stupid fight, and suddenly now you're feeling left out and lonely as they're all over each other. You sit in a team of people with a common aim, a common goal - and the filthy head of what some of us call ego rises. Sometimes you even try to be the bigger and better person - a so called domination of the angel over the devil in you. And when that happens you feel cheated, unjustly treated - by the fact that you don't get paid for what you've fought.

We dream of success, of love, of friendship. We wish for a Utopian world where all and sundry are good and kind. And yet to achieve this end, we are ready to sacrifice all notions of fraternity and friendship - a paradox in itself. We dream, hope, pray. Who we ask, from the world of strangers we meet on the way will hold our hand, drag us out from this mire, and redeem us.