It has poured all night! I live in the northern suburbs of Mumbai, the highest point of the city. All the rain water drains down the length of the city and collects in the low lying areas in the southern part of the city. That’s where my office is,33 Km. from my place. Most likely the suburban train system has stopped moving because the tracks generally get inundated with water. Even if it is working, not more than a third of the trains would be operational, and they too must be delayed. That doesn’t affect me directly, because I stopped using them years ago. I commute to the office in a car and that too with a driver. I sit at the back seat consuming one national daily and three financial dailies…dozing off in between. But, it indirectly affects me because as people struggle to take trains, they overwhelm the road traffic. As a result my commute time shoots up frustratingly from 2-½ hours to & fro on regular days to 4 hours during such wet days! It starts getting really frustrating because the work can’t wait – Phone starts ringing, mails start popping. And I’m trapped in bumper to bumper traffic, attending the calls while checking mails on the laptop. The aggregate frustration on the road in such scenarios is not just plain aggregation of the frustrations oozing out from each car; it is a lively manifestation of the gestalt effect – where the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. The frustration translates into rash driving, honking, and road rage. And the worst part – when the low lying areas get water logged so much that cars simply stall on the top of a flyover, because the flyover ends into a lake created on the road overnight. I can leave the car with my driver and walk to the office (just 500 metres away), but I’m too well dressed to walk in knee deep water on the road and more pouring from the sky. I dread the rain and the monsoon season!
This was my state for several years when I was a corporate slave. Then, 2560 days back I set myself free. Today, I like a free life – free from all unpleasant, undesired commitments and constraints. Everything’s changed…even the way I look at rains!
Born & brought up in the dry state of Rajasthan, I actually love the rains… I actually love the smell of the first drops of the first rain falling on dry soil (petrichor, as it is called very unromantically!). I’m mostly in a round neck T-shirt and shorts nowadays. My study/office hangs out into a garden which boasts of many trees and bird species, I don’t know the names of. The view extends into a hill, though the view is interspersed by a few man made structures now. And this view comes to its greenest health with the hint of first rain. When it rains here, sometimes we don’t get to see the Sun for days altogether. British colonialism left such a deep impact on us that we call such weather gloomy! It’s gloomy conditions for a place like England, but for India, it’s a blessing – pleasant weather, all the air pollution is washed down, hills are green, birds chirping, and cats & dogs are pouring from the sky!
Rains here, in Mumbai, are similar to my running sessions – two gears: moderate most of the time, with small bursts of speed, but no rest. It takes a bit of anticipation (actually all it needs is to peep out of my already hanging out window), but when it looks like the wild bursts are about to happen, I get down in the garden within seconds for a walk in the rain. You see, it takes me seconds, because for one I’m always in my rain gear anyways – a round neck T-shirt and shorts. Two, I’m no longer a slave. I have a free life. I’m always busy with the work I want to do (like I’m writing this article now), but I’m always free if something comes up that I always wanted to do – like a quick drive with the family, a movie, a meeting with a dear friend, or an inviting burst of rain!
And then I get drenched for as long as I like, or the rain lasts…with friends or my kiddo or alone, it doesn’t matter. I revolve around in my garden, admiring flora, fauna and rains. I deliberately walk through all the puddle pools splashing water with my feet. Thankfully, there are no costly leather shoes or trousers getting spoilt anymore.
The neighbours pass by occasionally, snugged inside a car, or under an umbrella or peeping out of their windows. They smile at me in what appears to be admiration & envy. I smile back at them signalling an invitation and dare. They admire & envy my rain dance, because deep inside they also want to dance in the rain like I, but the leash of adulthood and busyness prevents them from doing so, and hence a touch of envy. My smile invites & dares them to listen to their hearts and enjoy this moment of sheer joy and not pin the idea on their wall for a weekend trip to a crowded hill station or an expensive holiday that they have been munching on.
What I’m going to say next is nothing that people aren’t aware of; yet my simple act of walking in the rain and getting soaked is so rare. Saying it nevertheless…
- There’s only one life
- That one life is short
- Time is a resource, and that resource is scarce
- If the resource is scarce, Economics teaches us that we must prioritise
- There needs to be a judicious mix of here & now and the future
- Money is a measure of wealth and unit of transaction, not an end goal
- Beyond a certain point, money hits marginal utility
- The thing about rat race is that, even if you’re winning, you’re still a rat.
- But most still keep chasing money in a state of zombiedom
“Men suffer the worst evils for the sake of the most alien desires…and they neglect the most necessary appetites as if they were the most alien to nature.”
– Philodemus
- The day you stop racing, is the day you win the rat race.
- Money is to be treated, not as a master, but as a slave, who earns for you while you enjoy life
- Simple pleasures of life are to be enjoyed then & there and not pinned on the wall for a future date.
- If you have a bucket list, but waiting for an appropriate time, then that appropriate time is just flying past you as you’re reading this article and getting back into your zombiedom
“Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.”
– Mark Twain
- You can create a life of your choice, if you choose to do so and take a small step towards it.
- Paraphrasing Shahrukh Khan, “Don’t underestimate the power of the simple pleasure of life and the small steps you take towards building a capability to enjoy them
- Every event is positive or negative depending on which side of the trade you’re sitting. The rain can be dreaded or loved, depending on if you’re a slave or a free person. Be on the right side, don’t miss the trade!
As I look back at my enslaved self in the past and the enslaved zombies around me in the present, I close with the following quote:
“It is comforting, when winds are whipping up the waters of the vast sea, to watch from land the severe trials of another person: not that anyone’s distress is a cause of agreeable pleasure; but it is comforting to see from what troubles you yourself are exempt. It is comforting also to witness mighty clashes of warriors embattled on the plains, when you have no share in the danger. But nothing is more blissful than to occupy the heights effectively fortified by the teaching of the wise, tranquil sanctuaries from which you can look down upon others and see them wandering everywhere in their random search for the way of life, competing for intellectual eminence, disputing about rank, and striving night and day with prodigious effort to scale the summit of wealth and to secure power.”
– Lucretius, de rerum natura (On the nature of things)