Deify (or may be not)

My second post in two days. Looks like I'm on a roll, but then, let me not get over myself here. How I am doing this is, I have a folder on my system with text files named after each topic I want to write about. This list is being accumulated from about a couple of months (ever since I got this machine..) and I haven't worked on them until yesterday. Alright, none of your business, right? I know. but then, it feels good to be sharing these things with friends. :) Well, I named this text file deify and hope the title stays the same at the end too. Just a declaration :). Anyway, I am enjoying the first few days of my holidays very much, what with nothing and yet, everything to do. Why, just today, I enquired for a course to learn Spanish and was astounded by the exorbitant price and decided to download one instead. Typical Indian, you might say, but then, lack of resources and the exorbitant price makes me do that, Fine, jokes apart, what is this post about? Well, this is something we see virtually everyday. I'll barge into the post, because one of my friends (and avid reader of this blog) doesn't apparently like my dragging on the first few paragraphs of each post.

You might have seen people praising people. That's pretty common, I am not saying praising people is bad. But sometimes, what happens is, people just deify (I don't know a more superlative word for this...) their peers (yes, I forgot to mention this, just peers and I'm gonna make an elaborate argument stating how everyone is a peer. :)). Fine, let me start off with some building statements. Everyone is equal. People who have achieved something have done so just because they have worked hard on it. Having said that, I'd like to play a bit with the borderlines of religion here. Let me state some more things here. God does not play cricket. God has (most probably) better things to do than making you laugh by enacting a bit as your favorite comedian. God does not get a paltry 10 Lakhs per annum package for a job. And there are many more things on those lines. I have seen people (quite many around me) compare people especially peers with God. Let me stop being religious here. Let's face it, Sachin is not God. (A post on my views on games and stuff might be just around the corner) (this is just an example, no offence to you hardcore fans) This has become a common practice, at least I believe, in the recent past. Let me move away from this, you may prefer to call celebs whatever you like, but let me get to my point.

Fine, coming to peers. A guy gets a good score on a test, or may be a fine placement, I dunno why some of us are compelled to deify the person. He may be whatever he/she is, but then let me put some perspective here. Did you ever notice that, by deifying a peer of yours, you are simply creating delusions to yourself that you are a good-for-nothing person? A person may deserve praise, I'm all for it. But do that in a way that is not pretentious and constructive to yourself too. For instance, call the person up, talk to them and congratulate on the achievement. I don't see any reason why a successful person needs to be deified. Get inspired, yes, but there is no reason to deify the person and least of all to tell the person himself/herself. You know, your peer probably got to be good just because he worked hard to get there, so just simply let him be and for once, be selfish. Being a guy who thinks a looooot, I know what kind of effect deifying people has on your own efforts and may be even you levels of confidence. So, simple solution - do not deify. May be revere, may be just respect, but deifying is completely not in the same league. And about everyone being peers, this is not the right place for it. May be another post :). But thing is, I haven;t thought out this whole post a lot, I must be better prepared for future posts :).

Ok, almost sleep-time, I'll leave it here. I think I have made a statement of sorts with this and my previous posts. I have my own thought process and ideas and for all I know, they might be as twisted as a mobius strip. What I actaully want to do using this medium is - urge readers to think about these topics and build their own opinions. I shall never rub my personal thought process on anyone at all. *batting eye-lids* :)

And of course, the disclaimer at the end of the last post applies here too :). By the way, I lost all my ":P"s if you haven't noticed. :)

Nighty Night!!

P.S.: Please give your opinions too in the comments section :)

Me v/s Ignorance

People tell me 'Ignorance is bliss', and for once, I would like to take their word for it. Ignorance indeed seems to be bliss. I am the kind of person who believes in knowledge for the sake of knowledge. That is, the only reason you can have knowledge is to have it. A bit confusing, I know, but it's easy to get over. Why do we study? (Study, as in, acquire knowledge...) You may have several reasons, but, for me, it's just one... I want to be knowledgable. Period. Let me give you examples. I am very knowledgable about medicine (thanks to Robin Cook and Michael Crichton, besides that, if I'm interested about something, I look it up on the Internet...). So much so that, I could get into a decent level of talk with a doctor about any kind of medical procedure. Then, there is law. I can reel off legal procedures in the US in my sleep (thanks to John Grisham and the Internet again...). Not that I'm compaining or bragging, but it certainly is discomfiting.

Recently, I've made an important observation (for me at least). Everything I know, seems to have some use ater some time. I can easily elate after the event that, I needed to know that thing because of this! I can't remember them off-hand, but happens pretty often with me. Some are pretty trivial, but still, my intuition seems to know what I need to know. What disconcerts me is, is it really a good idea to have so much knowledge? I don't know in what kind of situations this knowledge is gonna help me. If I were to guess wildly, I'd say they'll help me in writing a book :). Still, as long as I'm playing "what if", I'd indeed like to have all the knowledge I can get, for the sake of being knowledgable.

I'd like to believe that Ignorance is bliss, but knowledge according to me is more blissful and powerful.

I rest my case :).