Friday, April 19, 2013

WE and EXAMS.....

Learning and knowledge go alongside. We learn and gain knowledge everyday of our life! We face exams every second of our life! Be it a job, or college, or school, or our homes and relationships, we are always assessed & appraised!

Exams! Mine are over at least for now! The college one, I mean!! Being a renowned university student I had my share of fearing exams and even studies sometimes. But should we fear exams? Should we run away from that knowledge of wisdom? My friend had some time back said that life would have been easier & blissful if we didn't have exams!!
I sometimes try to imagine, whether life would have been that easier and blissful, if we didn't have exams?! What would have happened if we didn't learn anything? Our life would be standstill... We wouldn't move forward!

For us students, school and college exams were not heavenly! We were never happy with the question paper and the teachers were never happy with our answer sheets! And we were never content with our marks even! We wanted more! Wanting more is good!! Desiring more is always welcome but we should first be happy and content with what we have got! Anyways, Exams were never our best friends! Yes, past tense because I have learnt to love exams! Studies and exam were not my best friends! But if I enjoy those exams, I would love that college and school exams? With entrance exams, competitive exams, and God knows what exams, studies and exams nowadays are more than our little brains can cope with... Yet, still, should we not try enjoying??.............

One may say that jobs are always tough and hard-hitting when it comes to assessment and evaluation! The always judge and criticize and never praise! Well, as my friend has said, one has to learn to enjoy that review result!  One has to enjoy that work, whether it’s praise or analysis! So, in this way we face exams, but we always pass with flying colours at the end of the day!

I always had the thought that if my teacher’s told me how they wanted the answers in the answer scripts, how and what the examination board will assess for the allotted marks, it would have been more easy and blissful as my friend has said! Suppose, if we had an assigned class, where we were asked of our problems, what we wanted like marks or fewer syllabuses, and also taught how to write an answer which the assessment board will evaluate, would have been better! All that hard feelings wouldn't be there, the wrong methods would not be used!

Relationships are tricky! Here we expect more than we get! Here we want more than we gain! But a relationship should be watered with love not pricked with desires and wishes! Any relationship, when faced with troubles, would be asked why! So that we can rectify it and make that relationship strong and enjoyable! A relation exam needs care and attention, which we should give, if we want to sustain that relation!

Exams teach us how to live our life! With the hurdles and hardship we learn that optimism is the core of success… We learn that failures and difficulties are part of life which when enjoyed proves to be an achievement… An achievement of joy, happiness and wisdom… Ecstasy and contentment of doing what our hearts want… Knowledge and wisdom of following one’s own dreams and aims… Achieving that perfect dream…

“Do not follow where the path may lead. Go instead where there is no path and leave a trail.”

Thursday, April 04, 2013

WHITE....

I was really happy when I got my selection letter for my post graduation degree course. But the mere thought of leaving my Kolkata life brought me to tears! I was at loss!

Just then, my eyes fell on one picture. White waves splashing on the shore... Immediately, the white bubbling foam of the sea waves that crashes on the sand came to my mind. It reminds me of the poems where the poet gives description  about white bubbling sea waves crashing on the sea beach and leaving behind shells, pebbles etc.. The white water makes me ecstatic, for some minutes I lead a carefree life without any worries, any tensions…
A mountain, as well as sea, gives immense pleasure to the eye, and the heart. Mountains when covered with snow give an ecstatically pure pleasure…  Mauna Kea in Hawaiian, or Mont Blanc in the Alps are heavenly experience.

The colour white is one of the primary colours, the most tranquil colour. Whenever I think of the colour White, the words Peace, Harmony, Pleasure, Contentment, Satisfaction, Innocence, Happiness comes to my mind. As if, I lead a peacefully content life… Like I have every happiness……
 
White…… In Church weddings, a beautiful woman in a beautiful white wedding gown with a nice bouquet of white lilies looking marvelous… Such a beautiful sight...! I wish I were that girl!!

I think of the angels attired in white, seated on the “Elysian Lawns” with happiness, joy, comfort and contentment, watching and blessing us.

Speaking about white, I was thinking about white wine. A relishing moment, & top it up with soft cheese, its heavenly! Talking about food luxuries, for me cheese cream chicken delicacy is the best option. In addition, white chocolates are another threat, which are creamy and delicious! It is like experiencing magic!

White also reminds me of Holi when everyone wears White, to play the festival of colours. Everyone ecstatically plays with colours, throwing and pasting red, blue, yellow, green, pink colours on each other and splashing coloured water on each other. White is made colourful that day. It looks like the seven rainbow colours have come down to earth.

The seven rainbow colours are refracted into its component colours when the white light of God passes through the prism. The colour white is my remembrance of Sarojini Naidu’s “Soul’s Prayer” – “Life is a prism of My light”

White… so pure, so graceful, so enlightening, so divine. However, the colour white has other connotations also. In Hindu religion, the people are attired in white whenever they go to a mourning house. Though White is the symbol of sadness, sense of loss, yet White makes me feel very happy, calm, contended. White makes me feel closer to God!

“White is not a mere absence of color; it is a shining and affirmative thing, as fierce as red, as definite as black. God paints in many colors; but He never paints so gorgeously, I had almost said so gaudily, as when He paints in white.” – Gilbert Keith Chesterton.