“Success is a journey, not a destination.”
– Ben Sweetland
Aakash, a teenager, thought that his time had come when he opted to study for Chartered Accountancy after his school life. His father was a CA practitioner and all his life all he ever wanted to become was a CA. He toiled and slogged for five years to wait for his moment to become what he always wanted and in the process he had to sacrifice quite a lot: he reduced on his socializing with friends, became serious about life and every moment felt and behaved as if it was his destiny to become CA. Although there was nothing within him that made him smarter than others around him but he had this will to be that person and that was what kept him going. The day had arrived when the results were going to be out for the final year. All the batch mates looked forward to the result.
Among the fifteen friends that gathered to watch the results, only six passed. Most of those who passed were the ones likely to pass any exams but then there were some other big time casualties as well. Aakash was one of them. He thought that the world had come to a standstill, that this could not be his fate; he was supposed to be rejoicing this moment of becoming the only thing that he ever dreamt of. But the moment of truth had struck, and he with other eight people had failed the exam and they will not be what they call the CA in first attempt. And then on things changed for Aakash; he studied as if it was a matter of formality and he had to pass it anyhow or else it would be like the end of the world. What happened in the process was that the charm of becoming that one professional he ever wanted to be was lost, he thought that it was just another thing and he had to pass it whether he liked it or not.
He cleared the exam in the second attempt but for him he felt no joy. He thought that it was his destiny to become one and there was no cause for celebration. His one failure made him feel as if he had lost the war and was just merely winning a lesser battle by clearing it in second attempt.
The question here is “why is the moment bigger than the journey?” why is it that when the person fails at the final hurdle he seems to believe that he has been a loser through the whole journey. It is true that the moments make our life and that is what remains when we look back at our lives in a nutshell. All we remember is what we scored in the exams; whether we won or not and so on. But we don’t remember how much fun it was studying or how we hated to study that subject; how one practiced to win a particular thing – all that remains is result. Then the question is – whether the life that you have had in journey bigger or that moment that changes your life itself more important? It is only those three hours that matter doesn’t it. You write your paper and boom! – you have your result; all the hard work of years is put down in those three hours; three hours to destiny. But are these three hours all that matters?
Not only students but every person fails somewhere; fails at the last step and then there it is – work of years goes down and everyone moves on forgetting you and remembering the successful ones. How can you measure the effort that a runner puts in for four years to get to the Olympics and run that race and eventually it ends in less than ten seconds. Your moment of glory has gone down in less than ten seconds and you don’t even realize it as you came in last. The fair answer is that it is true that moment is bigger than the journey for it all comes down to that moment where you win or lose it all. No one remembers the hard work or pain you put in; all others remember is the result and it is you who has to face the music.
But then all I want to argue is isn’t that journey equally beautiful. All others remember is the result but what would you remember – I remember the long night calls with friends before the board exams, I remember studying subjects all night long which I hadn’t touched round the year to pass my college exams, the tireless practice that we did to play in football matches. What do you remember – do you only remember that you either failed or passed in your exams; whether you were able to get a better result than you mate.
Yes life is made of the moments in which you pass or fail but what life really is, is the journey to make those moments. Fight for the moment but don’t let the moment go by for what you really letting go – is life.
P.S. – to all those who attempt suicide, there is just this one thing, no moment or event is bigger than one’s life. Life is a beautiful journey made of failures; please don’t waste it.
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