Holding Back

Holding yourself back is possibly the worst thing one can do to themselves. Holding back emotions, tears, thoughts is like forcing yourself to live a contradiction. Where one part of you tells you that something is wrong, there is another which prompts you to go ahead saying that it is right under that circumstance.There are many stories heard about wrong choices, about phone calls not made to loved ones and losing them, about unrequited love that could have actually grown to become something if someone had just said what they felt rather than think of the consequences of their words. This is not to say that I am advocating a vile society, where people act without thinking of consequences. It's just that when one feels strongly about something, they should act upon it if there is even a small part of them that wants to act.

There was a theatre actor who used to be too afraid of the stage and what people would think of him. In an attempt to overcome his fear of being judged and criticized, he auditioned for the school play. He got the lead role. His talents finally came out. The plunge he had taken had been rewarded.

There was a poet who would write everything on her mind in verse, on paper. This helped her record her life and thoughts as it passed for she had noone to hear her out. Nobody cared enough to do that. She died, unloved, leaving her words behind for the world to read, though with no takers. 

A little girl got a phone call from her brother at 6 a.m on a Sunday morning. He had had a bad dream in which something terrible happened to her. He was worried about his little sister. He called her up to reassure himself that she was alive. He reminded her that he loved her and would always be there if she needed him. Even if she didn't need him, he was there for her. He cared about her immensely, though he could not always show it. That day, the little girl was reminded of the love of family members. Her mother could not understand why she  was woken up by a tight hug from her daughter.

It is human to want to vent, to want to be told that somebody misses them. It is human to want to tell the boy you like how much you like being held by him, to want to receive a call from your mother every night before she sleeps in another city far away from you. It is human to want to play Snakes & Ladders or to just go crazy roller-blading to relive your childhood. It is human to want to express, feel, love, show, tell, speak. 

Holding back and suppressing your instinct is against human nature. It is pointless. If you want to remind your ex-flame that you are alive and that the two of you used to be best friends once, it is okay to make the call. If you want to spend four months' savings for a plane ticket to go surprise your Ma on her birthday, it is good to not let money matters hold you back. If a close friend or family member is critically ill, Time should not hold one back from making each living moment for the person as beautiful as one could possibly make it.

There are already too many restrictions imposed by the society we live in. To impose more constraints on one's natural self and curb the natural flow of things would just be plain foolish. Go live your own life today. For once?

Entry for Indiblogger and Close Up.