The hues of life

I was watching the carpenter repair something in my house. As he selected one piece of wood over the other, I asked him the inevitable “ Is it not good” questions. And he replied without even looking at me “No, madam this piece of wood is perfect too, it is just not right in this place.”

His statement makes so much sense. We do tend to categorise our world into good and bad. Something that doesn’t fit in our grand scheme of things is automatically pushed into the bad category.

Remember the story of the “Fox and the grapes” that we heard as a child and how we laughed at the silliness of the fox? Do we not do the same thing as well?

A friend of mine recently went through a break up. Everyone around her tried to point out to her how “bad” the person was and how she was lucky without him. Now I know the guy too and he was definitely not bad, they were just not compatible together. When I tried to point that out I was accused of making her feel worse!!

Then there was this family which discussed from dawn to dusk how engineers are doing badly and have no scope because their son did not get through the field. Ironically the father was an engineer too. Wonder if he quit his job after that?

A choice that doesn’t suit us is not necessarily a bad choice. It is just a choice which did not give us the expected results. Why is it incomprehensible to us that two good things don’t need to necessarily get along together?

All of us have faced this issue of having two friends that don’t get along. You apparently can’t love one without hating the other!!! It is a proof of loyalty to hate your friend’s enemy. I would rather not talk to both!

It is not just friends you need to choose, it is as if the whole world is out to test your loyalties. You can’t support one sports team if you praise its rival team and you can’t be a true patriot if you don’t hate your rival country.

Why do we need a villain in our life? Can there be no hero without the bad guy. Someone told me that it is easier to place the blame on someone other than yourself. So in a broken relationship it is easier to move on if you convince yourself that your partner was the wicked one. Apparently it helps in moving on.

I never understood how that works. Will that not make it difficult to love again? Or trust again. If I just accept that both of us were good but we were not good together you not only trust your judgment but also retain your self esteem.

Another reason we want a bad guy is to make us feel good. If I admit that the partner was good, the job was promising or the result was fair then there has to be something wrong with me. That is so unfair. It is just not about good or bad it is also about compatibility. I might love biryani and I might love strawberries but I definitely don’t want a strawberry flavoured biryani. And I don’t have to hate biryani to love strawberry.

Life is not just about black, white and grey it has a lot of hues. Some look good together and some look awfully mis-matched but they are brilliant hues in themselves. And ironically black and white look best together. Your favourite colour may not look good in all situations (imagine a baby pink car!!)

Love every hue of life without judging its character after all they are all part of your rainbow.