- Sir Edmund Hillary
Beautifully put by a man of great character. And I didn't know he was so much more than the guy who ended up being the first to get to the peak of Mt. Everest (with all due respect to Tenzing Norway). I did not know he spend most of his life after everest to the betterment of the lives of the sherpa community in northern bengal. And another fact which I didn't know was that after climbing the Mt. Everest, he spent his years in search for the mythical Yeti - the abominable snowman. But returning to what he said, I think to myself, what his summary of his own life actually means. And as always, I am tempted to diverge to give my own expert comments on this. But I am just to young and naive to do so. I know too little. And that makes me look inside myself and see if there is any part of me that yearns for knowledge. Ever since I read Tennyson's "Ulysses", I wished to be a seeker of knowledge. I wanted to "follow knowledge like a sinking star, beyond the utmost bound of human thought". I tried to read different things, learn as much as I could about things around me. But then I lost my way. I got caught up with life. But the ironic thing is that I didn't give on my dream because I got too busy, but because I got too lazy. Even as I write this piece, I still can't find that thirst in me. I want to have that desire, the craving to learn, I so wish I have it, but there is a void there. It is weird how even when I know right from wrong, I can't motivate myself to do the right thing. What does that make me? But as I blame myself for not being that committed to gaining knowledge, I am faced with another question. When you learn about something for the first time and you find it interesting, you dive into the details and try to find as much as you can. But as you dig deeper and deeper, you sometimes start to lose interest. The thing seems to have lost its charm. And at that moment, anything new and remotely interesting attracts your interest and you yearn to learn about it. Here it may seem that it is the lack of strength in our character that makes us jump from one topic to another. But I ask why is wrong to do so? I am still gaining knowledge, maybe not in depth, but in breadth nonetheless. And knowledge in any form is a gain. So why is it wrong?
Why is this form of quest for knowledge not as noble? I know it is wrong, but why is it so? I can't find the logic in it. Please help me out here. And somehow this can be extended to more parts of life. You try new things out when they seem interesting and novel. But as the attraction fades and the you have just run out of beginner's luck, you start to see the real work you need to put in. You start feeling bored and frustrated and yearn for a change. I guess that is where your strength of character is being tested. Are you strong enough to strive on and move forward, to follow beyond the utmost bound, or are you just a weak backboned creature, one who changes shape whenever it is a bit hard to fit in. Do you back out when the going gets tough or do you walk on? Well I believe I just answered my own question, by while doing that, I realized a lot about myself. I have realized how many times I have just given up only because it meant a little more hard work. How many times I took the easy way out. Looking back now, I realize how I am missing so many great things just because I was too lazy, too coward.
But hanging on the past never did good to me. Pondering over them just made me lose precious moments in the present, moments when I could do something really significant. What I am trying to say that I have just so long to live, and if I waste my life crying over how I made wrong decisions in my past, things will only get worse. So I shall move forward, pick pieces of the past, and move forward. I guess failure is not as bad as chickening out. So here and now, I make the decision to actually strive on, to try real hard to learn. Learn anything I can, but not give when things start to squeeze too hard.
And to think I was just trying to comprehend what Sir Hillary had said. I guess I did learn something about myself. Now time can only tell if I put that knowledge to any good use. Maybe whenever it starts getting hard, I can get back to this blog, and maybe understand why it is important to not give up.
Beautifully put by a man of great character. And I didn't know he was so much more than the guy who ended up being the first to get to the peak of Mt. Everest (with all due respect to Tenzing Norway). I did not know he spend most of his life after everest to the betterment of the lives of the sherpa community in northern bengal. And another fact which I didn't know was that after climbing the Mt. Everest, he spent his years in search for the mythical Yeti - the abominable snowman. But returning to what he said, I think to myself, what his summary of his own life actually means. And as always, I am tempted to diverge to give my own expert comments on this. But I am just to young and naive to do so. I know too little. And that makes me look inside myself and see if there is any part of me that yearns for knowledge. Ever since I read Tennyson's "Ulysses", I wished to be a seeker of knowledge. I wanted to "follow knowledge like a sinking star, beyond the utmost bound of human thought". I tried to read different things, learn as much as I could about things around me. But then I lost my way. I got caught up with life. But the ironic thing is that I didn't give on my dream because I got too busy, but because I got too lazy. Even as I write this piece, I still can't find that thirst in me. I want to have that desire, the craving to learn, I so wish I have it, but there is a void there. It is weird how even when I know right from wrong, I can't motivate myself to do the right thing. What does that make me? But as I blame myself for not being that committed to gaining knowledge, I am faced with another question. When you learn about something for the first time and you find it interesting, you dive into the details and try to find as much as you can. But as you dig deeper and deeper, you sometimes start to lose interest. The thing seems to have lost its charm. And at that moment, anything new and remotely interesting attracts your interest and you yearn to learn about it. Here it may seem that it is the lack of strength in our character that makes us jump from one topic to another. But I ask why is wrong to do so? I am still gaining knowledge, maybe not in depth, but in breadth nonetheless. And knowledge in any form is a gain. So why is it wrong?
Why is this form of quest for knowledge not as noble? I know it is wrong, but why is it so? I can't find the logic in it. Please help me out here. And somehow this can be extended to more parts of life. You try new things out when they seem interesting and novel. But as the attraction fades and the you have just run out of beginner's luck, you start to see the real work you need to put in. You start feeling bored and frustrated and yearn for a change. I guess that is where your strength of character is being tested. Are you strong enough to strive on and move forward, to follow beyond the utmost bound, or are you just a weak backboned creature, one who changes shape whenever it is a bit hard to fit in. Do you back out when the going gets tough or do you walk on? Well I believe I just answered my own question, by while doing that, I realized a lot about myself. I have realized how many times I have just given up only because it meant a little more hard work. How many times I took the easy way out. Looking back now, I realize how I am missing so many great things just because I was too lazy, too coward.
But hanging on the past never did good to me. Pondering over them just made me lose precious moments in the present, moments when I could do something really significant. What I am trying to say that I have just so long to live, and if I waste my life crying over how I made wrong decisions in my past, things will only get worse. So I shall move forward, pick pieces of the past, and move forward. I guess failure is not as bad as chickening out. So here and now, I make the decision to actually strive on, to try real hard to learn. Learn anything I can, but not give when things start to squeeze too hard.
And to think I was just trying to comprehend what Sir Hillary had said. I guess I did learn something about myself. Now time can only tell if I put that knowledge to any good use. Maybe whenever it starts getting hard, I can get back to this blog, and maybe understand why it is important to not give up.
