Wednesday, October 24, 2007

Fight or Flight

This was my status message for the last whole week in gtalk. And needless to say I got quite a few comments, Some funny, some from people who identified with the message and some asking me what does it mean and some tried to pick my morale up!

Well, the first thing, the message is inspired (stolen) from Heroes season 2 episode 5 title. I picked it up as it described my situation perfectly, I have a feeling I am not able to cope up here, the pressure of doing good, the environment, the away from home feeling, And I am thinking is it worth it? Should I Fight or Flight?

Am I alone in thinking so? I am sure am not.

But are we right in thinking so? I am not sure.

IS anybody gonna take the flight? NO way!

When is right time to call it quits? Do we always have to stand up and fight or should we calmly say "I tried doing it, but I am sure now I will fail(or not able to achieve my target)". So do you lower your expectations and if yes, by how much?

Even if you lower your target then won't it affect the benefit of Fighting or taking the thing in your hand at first place. What if you think "I have realized it's not possible for me to do it without loosing more than what I would gain if I tried to persevere through it".

I believe it takes a much bolder person to take a flight rather than to fight! It's easier to fail for us than to give up, its instinct of a human to get up and fight even if he knows it may be futile. Why? Coz getting up is heroic, we see it in the movies, we have that inspiring moments and decide why can't I do it? But are those moments of inspiration or insanity? That is decided by the outcome not your effort.

The basic question is till what time do you fight and when's the right time to take the flight .

11 comments:

Tapasya said...

You have manged to pen down just precisely what I am feeling and going through at this moment. I wonder if our failures are attributed to our inner strengths and to our determinations. Is it all about just holding on? Is it all about fighting back? But then, what if we lose the battle? Would we be rejected by the world? What about the niche that we carved out for ourselves till we reached this point of time in our lives? Have we over-written our pasts too? How do we decide whether to move forward or retract backwards- when we can neither rely on the past nor look into the future?

maverick said...

Hey Amit. You have just described the perfect picture of a grad student in the first semester.

From your writing I felt you surely are under pressure but trust me You get used to it and then there is no looking back. In fact I wont be surprised if your blog 3 months later is just Fight and not Fight or Flight coz you would have already started enjoying it.

As of now the confusion in the head is good. But let it be confusion and not depression.

maverick said...

By the way 5 episode of Heroes was AWESOME !!

Unknown said...

Thanks Mav, I guess I would take your word since you've been through this. There's no giving up, its just a moment of weakness.

It's gonna be a hell of a ride but is it going to be worth the trouble?

Unknown said...

Thanks for the comments :) About heroes: I loved the hallucination thing that Dad Parker did with Nathan and his own son.. way too cool.

Natasha said...

Amit trust me when I say this, it gets better with time. My first semester here was tough too, i was not sure about how to manage time, caught between coursework, projects, homeworks, RA work etc. Don't resist the change, try to keep your nose above the water and do the best you can. I think you're doing alright, so just keep at it and remember, you're not alone.

And thanks for the Heroes publicity, you already know i lovvvve the show!

Unknown said...

nat, love ur profile name :P which nick do u prefer, nat sounds so hollywood

Natasha said...

so used to ppl keeping different names for me, honestly take your pick! :)

Nivi said...

"its instinct of a human to get up and fight even if he knows it may be futile. Why? Coz getting up is heroic, we see it in the movies, we have that inspiring moments and decide why can't I do it? But are those moments of inspiration or insanity? That is decided by the outcome not your effort."

I dont think I can quite agree. Its only when you have atleast a slight glimmer of hope that your the outcome might be favourable, we have the drive to fight!

And nope, I dont think its the heroism that makes us fight,because be it movies or television, the reason we are awed by them and enjoy them is because we know that it can never be real. It is the vicarious pleasure it gives us that makes us enjoy it.

And hence it is neither insanity or inspiration.It's hope. Hope that our efforts would never go waste. Maybe we fail now, but we see the beacon of success glowing.even if it is far far away. It's hope, the eternal elixir of Life.

Unknown said...

Hope... where does it come from? Isn't it the feeling that keeps the million TVs switched on when India is 8 wickets down and still need 100 runs to win.

One has to draw a line between "real hope" and "wishful thinking" and recognize the difference between the two.

History is filled with instances where "wishful thinking" might have come true! But then history rarely records failures and you have to realize the value of investment done to achieve the same.

Btw.. welcome to the blog nivi :)

Unknown said...

P.S. Movies do influence us
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1272/is_n2598_v123/ai_16805664

If they can influence us to smoke they can influence us to get up and fight
http://www.textually.org/tv/archives/2007/05/015943.htm