ALL THINGS UNDER THE SKY CAN BE DONE BY US DIFFERENTLY, CREATIVELY
“One must still have chaos in oneself
to be able to give birth to a dancing
star.”
A couple of days ago, on the Raksha Bandhan night, the five-year-old daughter
of my friend, Vishwanath, came to show me her latest art-work. In a ruled
notebook, she had drawn two rakhies with
color pencils…
“Uncle,
I made them; you liked?” the little-one wanted my verdict… and was waiting for
it…
“Wow,
you made them?” I said with excitement, “They are beautiful!”
The
glow on the little-lady’s face was immediate… “Thank-you, uncle,” she folded
the notebook.
“Tell
me, dear, did you tie Rakhi today?” I
asked our little-girl.
“Yes, I tied,” the reply was packed with excitement.
“Who
did you tie, beta?” I asked, knowing that
she was the only child of my friend.
“My
daddy,” the shy-girl slipped into my friend’s fold.
“How
sweet!”
Now, was the little-lady’s art-work really
beautiful… and my “Wow” sincere?
Did
I really mean when I said, “How sweet!”?
Little
children are the most creative people on this earth… They are so innocent and curious,
so wonder-struck and excited, that whatever they create comes out fresh,
out-of-the-box… It is only when they learn to be concerned and afraid about the
opinion of people around them – yes, the ‘big people’ – that their creative
mind learns to be cautious and calculative… The innocence and wonder begin to
die out and, the stereotype mind takes charge…
Yesterday morning, Sean, another friend of mine, had
shared on FB the images of some of world’s most creative sculptures and had wondered,
how on earth such a simple stuff can be made into such a mind-blowing piece of
art. He had written, “Incredibly awesome
stuff!! Can't help wondering, the cool people who thought these up......what
were they on? I mean someone was at these places and just imagined these
sculptures there and went and made these.......How crazily cool are they!”
When I viewed those images, I was left
equally amazed!
At home, in the night, I saw the
full-page advertisement of Kalyan Jewelers. Their brand ambassador, the
gorgeous Aishwarya Rai Bachchan, was draped in a full-length golden gown… Yes,
incredibly designed with hundreds of varieties of gold bangles… Whether thousands
of those bangles used to make that neck-to-ground dress are made of real gold
or fake gold, is not the question here… The question here is, some cool fellow
out there had the baby-like innocence, wonder and gumption to conceive it in
his mind, and then go ahead and do it… When I watched, later, the video of that
ad on YouTube, I could feel the power
and value of that substance called ‘Gold’!
If we need to give our little-children
the most precious gift, far more valuable than gold, I think, it should be the lesson,
that, all things under the sky can be done by us differently, creatively… and, there is no
limit to it, end to it… Everything can be created or re-created by us with our special
touch…. With our own magic and mystery.
I, also, think, that, if we can allow
our children to trust their creative instincts and explore their world, we
would be the most creative parents, teachers and guardians in this, otherwise,
stereotype world…
This
time, a little-one had tied Rakhi to
her dear daddy…
So
what?
Yes,
how sweet that can be!
GERALD
D’CUNHA
Video courtesy: YouTube
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