Friday, December 12, 2008

IF

Life is so full of If's and buts.
If there is one poem that sums up so many philosophies across the world, it is the poem "IF" by Rudyard Kipling. This poem brings me solace, and sometimes is the guiding light for my corporate as well as my personal life.

If
If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or, being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or, being hated, don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise;

If you can dream - and not make dreams your master;
If you can think - and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with triumph and disaster
And treat those two imposters just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to broken,
And stoop and build 'em up with wornout tools;
If you can make one heap of all your winnings

And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breath a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on";

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings - nor lose the common touch;
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run -
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And - which is more - you'll be a Man my son!

6 comments:

  1. Last night, while I lay thinking here,
    some Whatifs crawled inside my ear
    and pranced and partied all night long
    and sang their same old Whatif song:
    Whatif I'm dumb in school?
    Whatif they've closed the swimming pool?
    Whatif I get beat up?
    Whatif there's poison in my cup?
    Whatif I start to cry?
    Whatif I get sick and die?
    Whatif I flunk that test?
    Whatif green hair grows on my chest?
    Whatif nobody likes me?
    Whatif a bolt of lightning strikes me?
    Whatif I don't grow talle?
    Whatif my head starts getting smaller?
    Whatif the fish won't bite?
    Whatif the wind tears up my kite?
    Whatif they start a war?
    Whatif my parents get divorced?
    Whatif the bus is late?
    Whatif my teeth don't grow in straight?
    Whatif I tear my pants?
    Whatif I never learn to dance?
    Everything seems well, and then
    the nighttime Whatifs strike again

    --- Shel Silverstein

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  2. Did you just open up your ISAG schoolbook, again! :)

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  3. Rohit: That was lovely, but very pessimistic. I guess, the if's can also be "what if i won a 10 billion dollars lottery", "what if I topped my class", "what if there were no wars"! If we think more optimistically, life would be much better wont it?

    Saagar: Yeah..thats where it all started :)

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  5. Aah... good old Mr Bhatnagar! My copy's still on the shelf, reminding me of where I came from. :)

    Good times.

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  6. haha.. ok ok ok.... iam a pessimist.. i admit...

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