What ails me? To answer this question, I first need to find out, who I am? Unless I discover myself, it is not possible to determine what my problems are? If so, who I am actually?  I am a common man; an ordinary but highly sentimental Kashmiri on the street with a mix bag of emotions, desires, ambitions and aspirations as well.  Irrespective of any race, region and religion, these are all the traits of any normal human being. However what starkly distinguishes me from the rest is my fickle mindedness. I am more known universally for my wild and paradoxical mood swings. In June I amazed all and sundry with my upmost intense desire to usher in a change; tender and innocent youth made a beeline to paint every nock and corner red with their holy blood. And alas within a span of few months, in December I am part of a serpentine queue to provide stability to the yoke, I was rather I am desirous to get rid of. What a profound paradox, I serve the system with perfect obedience, yet I dream of Azadi.
What is real, my abhorrence or my more than eager subservience? My servitude not only consolidates but in the process also expands the established order; still I struggle and pay a heavy price to change the system.   My unfulfilled dreams and unrealized and mutilated aspirations are some of the reasons for my historic restlessness, yet I am in complete consonance with the unjust order.  My abject credibility crisis is due to my profound dilemmas.   My friends consider my struggle unreal, yet masters construe my acquiescence as a mere pretension.  In my own ingenious way I call it a survival instinct. What I have been made to believe is that in seemingly inhospitable and hostile conditions I have developed an art to survive while keeping the sentiment alive. However, in reality it’s sheer hypocrisy. What an irony I am here nor there. Actually deep down within I am thoroughly a highly materialistic creature. My disliking for the system notwithstanding, I am completely at ease with the present order. My acquiescence rather active collaboration is the process that eventually culminates in my extermination only.  This so called survival instinct has led to the erosion of three E’s; Ethics, Economy and Environment, which has endangered my existence.  Yet I fully absolve myself in the name of conspiracy theories.           
What is this conspiracy theory? It is a cunning way of hiding my charlatan character. Indeed to spread its tentacles much deep and to provide longevity to the unjust order, occupation inculcated a dubious character within me. Do I willfully derive pleasure and draw comforts from what I describe a deliberate and designed inculcation of licentious behaviour?  Since I fully correspond with the system and do not find any iota of repulsion towards the indiscriminate desecration of my value systems, how can I continue to blame the occupation for my moral depravation? By the way how strong is this occupation? It fully relates to my inner strengths and weaknesses, the occupation could be as strong as morally weak I am. If my resistance is weak, why should I blame the occupation to be all pervasive and powerful? Is this not a truth that my hopelessness is the real bedrock of the occupation?  Why I easily like to believe in conspiracies?  Conspiracy theories provide me an excuse not to look within. That is the reason why I am infatuated with the history.
What I was is the past. What I am is the present. And what I could be is the future.  Present is the link between past and the future.  Understanding the past is necessary, but my obsession with the history alone obscures my vision of tomorrow. What I aspire today after all is my vision for tomorrow. There might be a tomorrow without a context. But without a vision there is no tomorrow.  The values I adhere today, is my vision for tomorrow. Why I over emphasise history?  I am unwilling to reform my present, is the real answer.    
What is my real failure? Each and every time I resist, invariably I have failed. I pride my resistance but am unable to locate reasons for my persistent failures. Still the question remains, what is my real weakness. I am scattered like a herd without a shepherd.  In case I am not a community, I can’t be a cohesive society. In the absence of a society how can I qualify to be a nation?
What about a new dawn, is there another tomorrow?  The moment I am able to discover who I am that very time my journey of renascence begins; confronting the realities howsoever ugly is the real hope.  A coward dies hundred times a day, yet is unable to escape the death, and hence dies a final death. Brave die only once, but continues to live eternally.

(Feedback at firdoussyed@yahoo.com)

Lastupdate on : Fri, 3 Aug 2012 21:30:00 Makkah time
Lastupdate on : Fri, 3 Aug 2012 18:30:00 GMT
Lastupdate on : Sat, 4 Aug 2012 00:00:00 IST