His Birthday

His Birthday

Focus. Run. Lead.

His father always underlined these huge and blood thumping words.

While in sleep he used to encounter a unicorn. The unicorn never ran. It used to walk slowly, as if it had no hurry. He just wanted to see whether rainbow comes out of its tail when it starts to run. But it never ran.

There was another man, quite old, with white beard and no hair. He always had a pipe and the way smoked it, it was peculiar. As if all his life he practised to smoke and he achieved it very well. But he never focused on the unicorn. He had eyes on the sky, searching something. The place in his dream was grassland, medium grasses all over. He didn’t know the word meadow back then may that is why he couldn’t figure out the geographical location. But every night in his dream he goes to the old man to ask what he is doing, but then everything starts to shake as if it’s an earthquake.

 It was his father waking him up in morning for practice.

And the dream where he had quires and may be answers too but never reached its brim. Then he would wake up and go for his practise. He never wanted to be an athlete. But his father always was adamant as mountain to see him in Olympics. He was good but not the best. He worked hard and followed his father’s order- Focus Run lead. In his school period he always came second or third and his father was unhappy. He had the best gear anyone can dream. Adidas shoes Nike pants, his friends were jealous. But no one knew what he was jealous of.

The best part was dream. One day he asked the old man in his dream “Why are you looking to the sky?” The old man laughed and said “I am looking for a rainbow.” Again everything started to shake and he is up for practise. Time passed and he never came up to his father’s dream. He became a renowned director. He bagged many national and international awards. Still his father’s words keep ringing in his minds and that had led him to success. But he never understood the meaning of his dream. He stopped pondering about it and eventually forgot about it.

One day he was shooting in Tibet. He was all emerged in the work. He was inspecting the location to get what he wanted. The place was exotic. He inhaled the fresh air and closed his eyes to think. Basically he was concentrating. Then he opened his eyes, he saw a man, rather old man but he looked familiar. But he could not remember him. The old man was looking like a monk. He brought himself back to his job. At the end of the shift the crew planned to visit a Buddha temple nearby. They went to the temple and it was beautiful. Simply breathtaking and wonderful, as if the soul has come to a shrine of angels. The sky was all golden and the air had its fragrance of peach fruit. As he stepped into the temple he saw the same old man merged in his meditation. All of a sudden he recognised him. The old man was from his dreams. The moment he realised this, the monk smiled and opened his eyes. He could not believe it. He had stopped seeing that dream since a long time, his subconscious had it but all his success and his dream coming true made him more realistic and materialistic.

The films that he made always had human feeling described in details but he knew he was lacking something. His passion and his work were in same spot but the more he tried to involve himself in spirituality and in self, it was an uneven road. Whole world loved his films, they were critically acclaimed and thoughtful but he knew he is lacking something. But he never knew where to look for answers. He went and sat beside the monk. The monk said “you saw your rainbow my boy?” Again he lost himself. He collected his lost thoughts and said “no. I never pondered it much. I got what I wanted. Followed my passion and forgot about the childhood dream.”

The monk closed his eyes and said “son, look to the sky. And tell me what you see?” He looked up and described its texture and colour. The monk smiled and said “son, life shows us many things and keeps us revolving around what we want to know, but we get so involved in revolving around, we forget about the answer. So just focus and tell me again.” This time he closed his eyes. After sometime he saw it. All his life he was running. Running to define his choices. He gave everything he had to prove that he made a right choice of opting being a filmmaker, a story teller. In that long process he lost the meaning of his passion. He knew something was lacking deep inside but he was too involved in his race with himself.

 People either run to be something, to prove the world or run to prove themselves that they are independent. They saw a dream and followed it irrespective of every ordeal and achieved it. Those who do job to show the world their status are just crowd that gather. Thinking about the crowd is wasting time and power and that is why he never made commercial films and he never had a huge crowd. But in that process he lost the reason of his dream. He never got there, because unknowingly he was concentrating on the crowd. Yes a small crowd but he was.

In the dream he wanted to see a rainbow, he had heard stories of unicorn. He knew when a unicorn will run a rainbow will come out of his tail, but back then his subconscious was not mature to look at the sky. He had his own imagination. And that imagination was reflected in his dream. He never understood why the old man said he was searching for rainbow in the sky, later he thought the man knew that for rainbow one must see to the sky not to mystical and mythical animals. Now he got it all clear. To see a rainbow, to see the dream come true, to live a life that we really want is to do things for ourselves, not for anyone else. He explained this theory to the monk. The monk smiled and nodded.

Then still he had one doubt. He asked “will it not be shear selfishness?” The monk questioned him “what is enlightenment? Why every religion asks us to search for enlightenment?” He thought for a while. “Because that is a process through which we can amalgam our self to the almighty”. Suddenly the monk said “will it not be shear selfishness?” He got it all clear. The monk explained him “look at every great man. What they really are? They did justice to the self. They were selfish like anything. If a person fails to justify his soul his works then he cannot be successful. He may become a hero, a great scientist, but in his last moments he will think of this question and all his achievements will fall down in front of himself. Then what is the joy of that success? I hope you know where you lack my son.”

He got it. Now he knows what to do and how to do. He looked at the sky and saw himself painting the rainbow in it. He resolved all his questions and stood up to create a difference. He wished his father to be alive to see his son getting the meaning of his word- Run Focus Lead. Suddenly he thought how come the man he saw in his dreams back in his childhood is sitting next to him? Then suddenly he heard a loud beeping sound. He looked around felt very cold. He is getting all wet from cold water falling from the roof of the temple. All of a sudden he woke up. It was his birthday and all the time he was dreaming. His crew members threw cold water on him to wish him happy birthday. They celebrated it with a cake and tea. He could not stop thinking about what he saw.

 But it was really his birthday.