{"id":627,"date":"2020-11-18T09:53:32","date_gmt":"2020-11-18T09:53:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.competitionreview.in\/blogs\/?p=627"},"modified":"2020-11-18T09:53:58","modified_gmt":"2020-11-18T09:53:58","slug":"inspiration-comes-from-within","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.competitionreview.in\/blogs\/2020\/11\/18\/inspiration-comes-from-within\/","title":{"rendered":"INSPIRATION COMES FROM WITHIN"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\u201cAll of us are incandescent with the same light, infected with the same blight.\u201d<\/em> \u2014Valson Thampu <\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Human beings are indeed the most unique of\nspecies. We are empowered with the strength of imagination, the willpower which\nenables us to dominate animals and species physically superior to us, prime\nexamples being horses and elephants and, not to forget, an indominable\ndetermination and sense of wisdom which has, over centuries, given shape to the\nmodern civilisation that we witness today.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In our daily monotonous lives amidst the hustle and bustle of this\nvibrant and ever-expanding civilisation, we seldom have the liberty or leisure\nto stop on our tracks and introspect\u2014face our own selves and interrogate as to\nhow or what provided us with the inspiration to develop the modern society as\nwe know it today. For instance, what inspired the first real-estate developers\nto construct a structure (or \u201cmega-structure\u201d as they are popularly known\nnowadays) which we have subsequently christened \u201cbuildings\u201d or \u201cmonuments\u201d?\nWhat was the source of idea behind the first man-made \u201cbridge\u201d? What caused us\nto imagine the structure of the first-ever \u201cdam across a river\u201d? What led to\nthe emergence of the \u201cInternet\u201d, the \u201cWorld Wide Web\u201d and the myriad wonders of\nthe scientific age it has given rise to in subsequent times?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

An obvious answer to all the above questions may be \u201cnecessity\u201d going\nby the famous adage\u2014\u201cNecessity is the mother of invention.\u201d But mere necessity\ndid not provide a complete blueprint of the structure or constituents of these\ninventions. Something much more powerful, much more comprehensive and yet much\nmore abstract has gone into the making of a thing we call, in simple words,\n\u201cinspiration\u201d. But as enunciated earlier too, there were no such things\npreviously existing which could have inspired these man-made wonders. Then a\nmillion dollar question arises as to where this inspiration behind the first\nsuch creations of the kind came from. The answer to the above question requires\na bit of pondering but after deep introspection and thinking one can conclude\nthat there could have been only one possible origin\u2014the creator itself!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is indeed strange and should leave one awestruck as one marvels at\nthe vastness of the inspirational powers within us. Since time immemorial we\nhave been traversing the endless path of civilisation guided by our \u201cInner\nLight\u201d\u2014the power of inspiration within us that makes itself prominent at each\nhurdle that we face along the path. And yet, it is indeed most unfortunate that\nmost of the time, we are reduced to being at the mercy of others\u2019 ideas and\nbeliefs when confronted with a situation not very much within our self-defined\n\u201ccomfort zones\u201d. We do not rely on the inspiration and inner strength we are\nendowed with but prefer to surrender our independence of thinking and\ninnovating at the altar of the narrow notion of \u201cflowing with the tide\u201d\u2014being\nsubservient to the so-called established and traditional forms of thinking.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I share a personal experience which I am quite certain has been faced\nby many people. Since early childhood, I had a fear of facing a large audience\na majority of whom were unknown to me (a mental state many commonly refer to as\n\u201cstage-fear\u201d). In the first such instance of my life, I was asked by the\norganisers of a cultural programme at my apartment in 2014 to speak at a\ngathering of the residents for a particular occasion, most of whom were\nhitherto unknown to me. To be very honest, initially, I was quite nervous and\neagerly looking for a chance to skip the programme altogether. However, someone\nwithin kept on repeatedly telling me to calm down and snatch at this\nopportunity of reaching out to an audience largely unknown to me. Finally, I\ndid muster the courage to stand in front of the gathering and give a speech\nwhich was greeted with a thumping round of applause. That was indeed the day\nwhen I triumphed over my \u201cstage-fear\u201d once and for all, guided by the\ninspiration which came from within.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We are citizens of the world\u2019s largest democracy, and are gifted with\nthe freedom to think independently and in the light of our self-acquired sense\nof rationalism and values. Our dynamic and vibrant nation is in itself\ntestimony to what the greatness and inspiration from a billion human souls can\nachieve, only if they are allowed to act and think in tandem with the\nconvergence of Western civilisation and Eastern orientalism. Celebrated personalities\nand achievers from various walks of life in our country have proved time and\nagain that it is not the riches or legacy one is born with that determine the\nquantum of success that she\/he shall achieve in her\/his lifetime, rather it is\nthe self-confidence, self-inspiration and superiority of innovative ideas over\nestablished notions that result in the development of an enlightened persona,\nglimmering with the aura of positivity and strength whose source can be traced\nto the \u201cinspiration from within\u201d. \n\nToday, in an age when news headlines across most countries of the world\nare dominated by incidents of depression and suicides due to a variety of\nreasons like unemployment, jilted love, rural distress and so on, it is my firm\nbelief that one basic ingredient that really needs to be revived within\nourselves is self-confidence and a belief in the indomitable spirit of\nhumanity.
\nBefore plummeting into the dismal abyss of depression or before bidding adieu\nto this God-gifted human life once and for all, it may be fruitful to face\nourselves for once and interrogate our inner self as to what can be the\npossible way out. Turnarounds are not unheard of for the resilient human soul,\nbut if only one believes in the strength of inspiration that eternally enlightens\nour inner selves. To quote the words of Swami Vivekananda : \u201cWe are responsible\nfor what we are, and whatever we wish ourselves to be, we have the power to\nmake ourselves. If what we are now has been the result of our own past actions,\nit certainly follows that whatever we wish to be in future can be produced by\nour present actions.\u201d <\/s><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cAll of us are incandescent with the same light, infected with the same blight.\u201d \u2014Valson Thampu Human beings are indeed the most unique of species. We are empowered with the strength of imagination, the willpower which enables us to dominate animals and species physically superior to us, prime examples being horses and elephants and, not […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[3],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.competitionreview.in\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/627"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.competitionreview.in\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.competitionreview.in\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.competitionreview.in\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.competitionreview.in\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=627"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.competitionreview.in\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/627\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":628,"href":"https:\/\/www.competitionreview.in\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/627\/revisions\/628"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.competitionreview.in\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=627"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.competitionreview.in\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=627"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.competitionreview.in\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=627"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}