QUI VIVE ON THE ROAD LESS TAKEN

                                               QUI VIVE ON THE ROAD LESS TAKEN

There is a reason why the poem, ‘The Road Not Taken’ by Robert Frost remains a favourite. It lets you imagine yourself in the road less travelled. What would happen if you took that road? 

This May will mark a year of my journey in the road less travelled. I would borrow the term serendipity, which is the favourite word of an entire team that gave a direction to the route I took. Starting a blog and writing was way out of my league. It was never my dream, for I wasn’t confident about what to dream. For the hazy and unsure days I spend after graduation, starting this blog was an impulsive decision. I wasn’t worried for the first time in my life what others would think, that there would be few extra eyes looking at me through a world I was about to start building through words. It helped me focus on what I wanted to do for the rest of my life in the road less travelled. By less travelled it doesn’t mean that nobody takes it up. There could umpteen numbers of souls that has taken the same path. But, I bootstrapped my way into the woods completely unaware of myself, racing against a few odds and pushing the non-confident soul out of the system. I understood that art in any form is liberating in itself. It frees you of the heaviness you carry within, may it be singing, dancing or taking photographs.

My childhood friend who is now a photographer has been an inspiration throughout. He unlearned what he knew and has been traveling in this path ever since. We have crossed each other enroute our journey, complimented each other and continues the voyage. Photography has made him a traveller in search of new dimensions and perspectives. He gives me confidence because there is an acknowledgement from a creative person, though I am well aware that these writings are just a drop in the ocean. But that is absolutely all right because there is a concept of anonymous creativity J.D Krishnamurthy had mentioned which, not just me, but a person whom I recently made friends with also believes in. An artist who is the lead singer of his music band, he believes in loving art but not necessarily excelling in it. That is the concept J. D. Krishnamurthy portrays through the concept I had mentioned earlier. He says, ‘…it is good to hide your brilliance under a bushel, to be anonymous, to love what you are doing and not to show off.’

So how did I get to meet these people who are super artsy, who I wouldn’t have imagined talking to, a year ago? My notsoloosetalks has gained me friends, well wishers and a job or two in a year! It became my CV, with which I applied to a startup that believed in making people write. YourQuote, the app/start up with which I started working with, has been the road least travelled in the road less travelled.

Finally I started believing what I thought was clichéd. That, the whole universe conspires in helping you achieve what you wanted to. I might have been on high alert, with apprehensions about each step I took. With each stride, there was a reaffirmation of faith and hope. With a year of few ‘loose thoughts’, I might not have become a skillful story teller, but just a soul who reflects on writing, pretty much this way;

‘Writing is,

undressing your mind

word by word.

Unleashing your emotions

thought by thought.

It finds the bare you,

with speckles and burns all over.

You run your fingers through,

fingertips aflame,

Writing it is.’