Plums or Blueberries?

If you were to get a kid choose if she wants plums or blueberries; she would just pick one and get on with relishing them. To her; both are fruits and equally delicious. Not too much to think about.

As we grow up and get older and wiser; (argh how boring growing up is) choices get more complex, serious and difficult.

Often, we have the difficult task of making choices. Be it as simple as choosing between a skirt or a trousers to as serious as choosing life's path. Its the latter that leaves us so many ifs and buts. Why should it be that difficult?

As grown ups; we are not sure about ourselves. We dont know what we need. We are confused. And we call ourselves grown ups ;-) We often base our choices on how others are. What others' would choose, what they would prefer. We want to be them, our sense of well being is what we see others to be. We are not clear about ourselves, our wishes, what we want; instead we see us through their eyes and mould ourselves.

Or maybe we are super clear on what we need, what we want to be. How should our life be, our goals...people belonging to this category are level headed, know themselves well, their limitations and strengths well and are rare.

Now combine it with striving for perfection. Whoa! The other day; I was chatting with a close friend. Its good to share burdens and talk out once in a while. You can sleep with a consolation that you are not alone and that there are others out there with similar confusion. Had a very philosophical or should I rather say practical discussion. These talks happen regularly. The topic of contention was around who is the perfect partner for you? Now this is an ever worrying thought at the back of one's mind until you tie the knot with that someone.

My friend has numerous questions around this. How do I know the one person would be right for me. What if things dont work. We do discuss the harsh realities of marriage and boredom as well. I hope I do my best in not scaring him :-) So is it fear of dissatisfaction? Could be...This is how our conversation turned...

We humans try to be amicable with others and try to please people around us, we dont want to appear bad; unless we want that one thing very bad when we are ready to throw everything off and take on the world for something we really want. Now thats duality of human being. Our own self is more important than others. Thats how we are. How far do we go? Where does the search for that perfect career, life, spouse end?

But is there anything called as perfection? With the intention of searching and aiming for perfection; dont we lose out on experiencing and being grateful to what we have?  - is what I had to say. My genius of a friend said - But now isn't this settling for less? By settling for less, are we not missing out on experiencing something much better?

So, there is nothing like perfection, who knows what is perfection? We keep wanting more because we think 'more' is perfection. Bottom line - Can you ever settle for something in life? If you settle, you miss out on more but if you dont settle and are not satisfied; you miss out on your present and could never be satisfied chasing for the 'better' which is unknown. Is it possible to find a middle ground? Like be aware of your blessing and enjoy it and not get lost? But we still have to search for better!

Looks like it gets further difficult when it comes to choosing life partner. Change being a necessity looks like a curse here! We are not perfect; we have our flaws which makes it more interesting and intriguing.

Anyway; what was the conclusion? None actually. We will be touching upon it many more times ;-) So we abruptly just dropped it and started discussing about our upcoming travel :-D