Letting u down...

Life is full of expectations. There are a lot of things parents expect from their children, there are a lot of things our friends expects out of us and at large, there are societal and other expectations but what we cannot help is not meetings those expectations and letting down others. I remember as a kid when at times I used to be really naughty, I would be shit scared of what Mom will tell, “How can u do this” and this emphasis of YOU on what was made me feel bad more and more. A lot has happened since those days of childish fun but even today letting down anyone is as painful as ever. It hurts to see people your own feel sad because of the things u do. I remember going to visit a friend in the hospital who had a bad drunken driving accident. That look on his mom’s face could tell a lot. She didn’t know whether to sympathize with her child or be angry with him. He had simply let her down. Another case I can distinctly remember is a friend who was asked to repeat a year because he was caught cheating. I remember the look on his Dad’s face..it said a lot. I am in no way defending these acts of these people but let us step back and analyze it a bit. Do we always look at the fallouts of our actions when we indulge in things which we ideally should not. Think about it; how many of us actually think before having a drink that we will have to drive back; how many of us actually think before putting that piece of red meat in our mouth that its extremely high on cholesterol; how many of us really bother. When we do what we shouldn’t, we are simply being cool and when we have to face the consequences, we had simply been idiots (as per the same set of people who had called us cool) This brings us to another point- Why do we do what we are not supposed to do? A lot of it depends on the circle we move in, our will-power, our tastes, preferences etc. Let us look into one aspect-will-power. Will-power or the lack of it essentially is nothing but a reflection of the strength of our character which again is based on so many other things. For those who would have seen “Gandhi, My Father” it’s a classic case of a person’s lack of strength. It is easy to say that he let down his father and that he had absolutely no strength of character but has anyone thought, what made him do that? That brings to us to the classic case of cause Vs symptom. His lack of strength was a symptom which was drawn because of the frustration in his early years due to lack of love, lack of opportunities or simply, lack of emotional anchoring. Emotional detachment and aloofness can be disastrous and if your thoughts are always engulfed by these, nothing in the world can make you successful or happy. Returning to the main topic, letting someone down; how do we cope with the situation when we have let down someone? I mean in an ideal scenario, we shouldn’t do anything that would call for a situation like this but when we have done it there is no way we can undo the harm, what should we do. In my opinion the best way is to face it upfront. Many a times postponing a problem only aggravates it. It requires immense guts to stand up and say something unpleasant but a fact in front of someone you love but think of it, cheating and deceit are worse pains to conflict on your loved ones than facing the unpleasant truth. Further, if you are hiding something, chances are very high that you are distancing yourself from your loved ones as well. However its not that easy; if you require guts to speak, the other person also requires guts to listen and that presence of maturity across both the parties might simply not be present. What do you do in that….Well, I wish I knew!!!!