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Journalism of Courage
I hate self help books. All that quot;It is within you!quot;, quot;You alone can changeyour lifequot;, quot;Today is the first day of your lifequot; stuff makes me gag. So youcan imagine just how drag-in-the-dust low I must have been to pick up one ofthem and sit down to re-organise my life. The first thing it said was Whatis your life going to be like five years from now?8217; and went on to exhortyou to imagine every single thing that you could ever want for yourself fiveyears from now. Waking from dreams of Venetian villas and Oscars, I foundmyself regarding the next mantra which said You can achieve every singlething you dream8217;. Can you? Really? Can you read a book, draw up a grandplan, follow the road map and bingo in five years everything you everdreamed is yours! It is all within you.
Of course it is. But there are lots of other things in there as well. Thereare rejection slips from 13 publishing houses, there are unfinished jobs,there are unpaid cheques, there are friends who turned out all wrong. Thetrick is to shoulder past all that to the belief that lies humming quietlyin your skull, turning out dreams of things still to be done, things you cando. And I suppose you can do them. After all, you only use 10 per cent ofyour brain. But oh, the effort, the terror of allowing in that thought: youtoo can be a genius, an achiever, whatever you want to be. Always behind thethought echoes softly the words that were whispered into the ears of RomanEmperors Remember thou art mortal8217;. You could fail. You could fall. Youcould be laughed at.
I shook the hand of the showman of Hindi cinema and discovered he was anarrogant gasbag with very little knowledge. I met a famous society lady andnow editor, and was apalled at just how dumb she was. I wrote a film for myfavourite director and came away convinced that his most famous film couldnever have been his work, he just didn8217;t have it in him. I met a firebrandsocial worker and fighter against communalism and found that most of it wasfor the cameras. Ah! Where have all the heroes gone?
I also think belief in yourself is not enough. That8217;s the easy part. Youalso have to believe that talent is rewarded. That hard work gets yousomewhere. That there is justice in the world and rewards for right andpunishments for wrong. Ha! There8217;s not much evidence to support thosebeliefs when you look around. A frightening thought entered my head. What isIndia going to be like five years from now? I didn8217;t even want to thinkabout it. I went back to my book. Several hearty chapters later I gave up onthe book as well. But the thought kept nagging me.
Do you believe in yourself? Really truly? Enough to go out and try andchange your life? Enough to give up all the stability, the security and dothings? To be or not to be? That is indeed the question. Ask it of yourself.And find strength and comfort in my two favourite lines of poetry The onesthat I always remember when everyone around me wails: quot;VC you can8217;t! That8217;scrazy!quot; : Ah, but a man8217;s reach should exceed his grasp
Or, what8217;s a heaven for?
