Do you remember when, as a little child (even as a grown-up, for some), while strolling along a road on a paved footpath, you tried to keep your feet within the lines defined by the boundaries of the engraved tiles? It was a game of sorts - a challenge to yourself, your concentration, your determination. Even if a tiny fraction of your shoe stepped on a line, lo! The game's over. Some of us made more creative efforts in trying to always step on the lines or alternate lines or... The mind wandered, and the challenge always demanded more with every step the mind took.
Fast forward a few years, many of us have not exactly forgotten, but stopped playing what seems like a stupid little game. You're often branded as 'lame' or 'boring' if that's your nerdy definition of a game. Everyone has different opinions, however, I'm trying to look beyond what seems like a game we used to play as little infants and perceive it with a broader view, symbolizing the challenges we set for ourselves, when our mind wasn't blurred with the reprimanding voices of things we couldn't achieve saying, 'You can't do this.'
As a child, each one of us (I'm speaking for the people I knew) wanted to grow up and join a certain profession whose description attracted us the most - everyone had an answer to the question, 'What do you want to become when you grow up?' - an answer lost with the years gone by.
Why did this determination to become something slowly fade away with the number of years passing? It's because we tried our hand at it and realized that nothing is easy, that you have to work hard for everything you want to do in life. This is where the now-adolescent children separated into two groups - those who let the voice in their head stop them from following their dreams, duly noting the amount of themselves and their time they had to sacrifice, and those who had but one aim - to achieve their dreams, regardless of the challenges life offered them. Instead, they set challenges for themselves, and even though they couldn't attain success in most of them, they found themselves at a place which was extraordinary nonetheless.
These are the people who aren't afraid of the laughs when they answer 'an astronaut' or 'an athlete' to a question about their future career goals. The childhood dream stays as fresh as ever, because the multiple failures they overcome and the occasional successes they revel in do nothing but push them further in achieving their dreams instead of convincing them to give up. After all these years, they don't hesitate to joyfully take the path life offers them and twist it into challenges, which isn't a kind of pressure but instead lots of fun.
And that's what defines the line between a child and an adult - challenging yourself and believing you could find yourself at the top of that hill. In a world of magnets and miracles, growing up seems like giving up, but childhood seems pure, because demons who kill determination and imagination have never been allowed to enter the brain. Even if your naïve mind conjures up impossible dreams, you might end up in a place no one else has ever trodden.
Try to walk between the lines, on the lines, or far away from them. But most important of all, dare to think about them even if the world flashes scorn. Don't let that sweet child o' yours die, instead be like the ones whose thoughts stray without boundary, who burn and revel in the fireworks of their dreams and burst in blue when their words reach your ears and another dimension of this world suddenly comes into view.
Fast forward a few years, many of us have not exactly forgotten, but stopped playing what seems like a stupid little game. You're often branded as 'lame' or 'boring' if that's your nerdy definition of a game. Everyone has different opinions, however, I'm trying to look beyond what seems like a game we used to play as little infants and perceive it with a broader view, symbolizing the challenges we set for ourselves, when our mind wasn't blurred with the reprimanding voices of things we couldn't achieve saying, 'You can't do this.'
As a child, each one of us (I'm speaking for the people I knew) wanted to grow up and join a certain profession whose description attracted us the most - everyone had an answer to the question, 'What do you want to become when you grow up?' - an answer lost with the years gone by.
Why did this determination to become something slowly fade away with the number of years passing? It's because we tried our hand at it and realized that nothing is easy, that you have to work hard for everything you want to do in life. This is where the now-adolescent children separated into two groups - those who let the voice in their head stop them from following their dreams, duly noting the amount of themselves and their time they had to sacrifice, and those who had but one aim - to achieve their dreams, regardless of the challenges life offered them. Instead, they set challenges for themselves, and even though they couldn't attain success in most of them, they found themselves at a place which was extraordinary nonetheless.
These are the people who aren't afraid of the laughs when they answer 'an astronaut' or 'an athlete' to a question about their future career goals. The childhood dream stays as fresh as ever, because the multiple failures they overcome and the occasional successes they revel in do nothing but push them further in achieving their dreams instead of convincing them to give up. After all these years, they don't hesitate to joyfully take the path life offers them and twist it into challenges, which isn't a kind of pressure but instead lots of fun.
And that's what defines the line between a child and an adult - challenging yourself and believing you could find yourself at the top of that hill. In a world of magnets and miracles, growing up seems like giving up, but childhood seems pure, because demons who kill determination and imagination have never been allowed to enter the brain. Even if your naïve mind conjures up impossible dreams, you might end up in a place no one else has ever trodden.
Try to walk between the lines, on the lines, or far away from them. But most important of all, dare to think about them even if the world flashes scorn. Don't let that sweet child o' yours die, instead be like the ones whose thoughts stray without boundary, who burn and revel in the fireworks of their dreams and burst in blue when their words reach your ears and another dimension of this world suddenly comes into view.
