Grayer shades of life: The darkness within

Human personality is a blend of a plethora of qualities – some good, some bad, some desirable, some inherent. But it’s not a unique entity. In my opinion every individual has multiple shades to how he presents himself to the environment – each with its own peculiar virtues and vices. This in itself is an inherent attribute of human personality.

If I for once think how I portray myself to my parents, with my friends, with my coworkers, with acquaintances and with unknowns – I can come up with at least five different answers for all the five categories and even more when I consider myself in different scenarios. This for once might seem a very generic statement but then it’s how human life has been designed. Most of us have different faces for various people in our lives.

And not all of these faces are beautiful – at least not the ones which most people hide from the eyes of the world. Every individual’s life has some grayer shades. Purity is seldom to be found, there is bound to exist some darkness within everybody in this demoniacal world, so scandalous and sinful.

When I for once reflect upon my inner-self, I find loads of bad patches on my persona. There are things everybody does which he or she is not proud of and I am no exception. There are great moments when I have had to be selfish and some when there have been extreme levels of egocentricity. I consider myself to be a person who has lived for his friends but at time I did unknowingly harm my friends, even stabbed them in the back for selfish gains. Lying, there is nothing wrong in it when it’s not discovered and it’s not extremely disturbing for others. But there have been lies which if revealed could create a whole makeover of things going on in my life.

There are people whose life is an open book and some prefer to keep it shunned to themselves. I believe mine is one which has three volumes. The first volume, I try to keep it as public as possible. The second one is known only to people really close to me, friends: partners in crime. But there is this last version, full of dark chapters – ugly and mean which I prefer to be keep only to myself, not even to be revealed to the people those are really close to me.

No matter how much you try to keep this darkness limited, it always keeps on growing. Life has been designed that way and nobody can escape from the demon within.

Dodgy desires

I looked at the rich and desired for money. I looked at a sweet little kid and desired for innocence. I looked at a happy couple and desired for love.... I looked at life...I looked at myself...Compound of needs and necessities, most of them hard to satisfy. Even if they were to be satisfied, the state of painlessness would be too boring. Goals are mere illusions which vanish when we reach them. And even sensual pleasure itself means nothing but a struggle and aspiration, ceasing the moment its aim is attained.

Desire: The root cause of all misery and pain in life. If humans were satisfied with all what they have, there would be no ambitions, no desire. But this in itself is no good. It may seem paradoxical, but desires are the driving force of life; it is only when that we try too hard to strive for those goals, those desires - when suffering starts coming into play. When you know you can have something, all the abilities and resources to strive for your goals but the moment your dreams are shattered and you are forced to stop just moments away from conquering your desires – the frustration is boundless.

(These are my thoughts as I lay on my bed here in NUS, getting bored, frustrated without friends; unable to realize what I have achieved so far, whether I have been able to live those dreams; whether my long-lived ambition of travelling the whole world as it now seems to be on the path to being achieved seems so pleasure-less…….Is this all what I wanted – a lonely life.....Life is a bitch)