Commitment

Recently someone, who matters to me, queried me to this effect - "Would you stop valuing someone or something which is important to you, once you have got it?"

Since the "someone" part doesnt apply to my past history, I had only "something" to rely on, in order to decide. The most important "something" achieved so far has been finishing my book. It was one initiative, where I put all my heart and soul into it, even when towards the end, I had no heart left at all. I kept focus over a long period of time - in fact finishing it has been my finest achievement, irrespective of it getting published or not. But now it doesnt figure anywhere on top of the list of my important things. Does this then prove the rhetorical question posed above? The answer, I believe, is not really straightforward.

To answer this question, I have to start from the other end - i.e. the source, the root. And in my case (as also in most other cases, I believe) the source is passion for someone or something. To give an idea, how passion works, imagine passion as a lake - a finite fount of water, from where flows a stream of thought and feelings which drive us in a particular direction. If, one were to be free and relaxed, then the flow of passion acts on its own propelling a person towards its object and passion is always well-directed.

As long as one relies on the flow of the stream, its fine - the involvement in something passionate is one of the most satisfying experiences, believe me! Sometimes, like torrential waterfalls in a rainy season - the flood of thought and feelings could be overwhelming, but then sometimes it can peter down to a thin streak of water. In the latter case, if you are desperate to make things happen, when the flow itself doesnt suffice, then you try to invoke passion. One forces oneself to be passionate and thats when one starts using up that finite fount. Its like pushing water in thousands of gallons out from the lake and trying to create a torrential flow, which is nothing but artificial. One can continue doing this only so much and for so long for soon one would scratching the sand of the lake bed. Something similar happened with my book writing. By the time I finished up with it, I was as tired as Pheidippidis was after running the Marathon and like Pheidippidis, my passion for book-writing died soon after this Marathon.

But as lakes can be replenished by fresh water from rains or from some new source or channel of water feeding into it, similarly passion can be rejuvenated. After all, all it requires is water - the flow of thoughts and feelings in one specific direction. While I am not much inspired to start writing a book, nowadays I do have this occassional strong flow of thoughts and feelings like days of yore - when I am not restful until I write down what I feel or think.

While the analogy seems okay - what does it tell about my character, which, in fact, was what the original question sought to understand. This dependance on an inconsistent passion doesnt flatter me about myself. I admire a guy like Tendulkar who has played the same game since he was 4 years old and professionally for the last 20 years. Would such long-term commitment come without a deep, abiding passion? And yet how can one have such a Pacific Ocean full of passion is mindboggling! I got fizzled out after writing one book and here is this guy, as greedy as ever, even after scoring nearly 30,000 runs at international level!

Tendulkar, also seems to be a person, who is committed to his family and relations - the ideal family man. There could be a relation between these two, which links to the kind of man he is. But would this also mean that someone who is not committed on professional field would be similar on the personal relationships? No, I dont think so...Its because with people, unlike inanimate things - there is whole lot of different dimension called reciprocity involved. Books dont react, people do! And their reactions affect us in ways we can neither understand nor foresee. And though passion may be a starting point - with regards to people, over a period of time there are lot of other parameters like attachment, comfort, compatibility that come into reckoning, which create new channels to fill that fount.

So while our founts of professional and personal passions could be related, but they are entirely different.

To summarize the answer to the original question - firstly I believe that valuing "someone" and valuing "something" are wholly different questions. You can never be attached to an inanimate thing as a book as you can be to a person. People reciprocate, they are unpredictable, they can move you by their show of care and concern - none of which a book or any other "thing" can do. Also passions towards things, depending upon the nature of a person, can fizzle out, while sentiments towards people, once arisen do not die out as easily - they continuouly get augmented by interactions. Have we not faced situations where someone makes us notice them, simply by the attention they shower on us - we may enjoy it or we may even get irritated - but we cannot be indifferent to it. Secondly - whether it be person or thing - when we start forcing ourselves into feeling for something or someone, instead of allowing our nature to prevail, thats when we start killing that passion, attachment or whatever, by drying up that feeding fount.