My brother and his wife were blessed with a baby girl last night. And what a day she chose to enter this world—at midnight, on Indian Independence Day.
Now that is an entry.
For those wondering, everything went well. Honestly, though, I am still clueless about what to write. I am sure anyone who has welcomed a new life into their family understands the strange mix of emotions that comes with it. You are happy, excited, overwhelmed, and somewhere in between all of that, you start thinking about the future.
And I can't help worrying about hers.
Maybe I wouldn't be thinking about it this much if I didn't know so much about what is happening in the world. But I do know. And sometimes, knowing too much makes it difficult to simply enjoy the moment.
Of course, every generation eventually finds its own way. People have been worrying about the future forever, and somehow humanity keeps moving forward. Still, when you look at a newborn baby, it is difficult not to wonder what kind of world she will grow up in.
The whole struggle for existence sometimes feels absurd to me. We all know that one day we are going to die, yet generation after generation, we keep fighting over things we cannot take with us. Land. Money. Power. Religion. Identity. History.
We fight for futures we may never live to see and spend years trying to settle scores with the past.
Somewhere in between all of this, we forget to live.
Our time here is limited. And yet we spend so much of it fighting, proving ourselves right, playing power games, and trying to control one another. It sounds simple to say that we should just live and let others live, but apparently, humans have never been very good at keeping things simple.
What makes it even stranger is that the great teachers of the world have been telling us versions of the same thing for centuries.
I have read the Buddha, Ashtavakra, and Shankaracharya, and they all spoke in their own ways about the same truth: that the divine cannot be found merely outside ourselves. The Prophet Muhammad spoke about compassion and justice and even worked to free enslaved people. Jesus spoke about dignity, self-reliance, and caring for those in need. Jusus often said never beg for your food.
Different people. Different times. Different words.
Yet somehow, we keep missing the point.
We still have to ask uncomfortable questions about our own history. Who enslaved people? Who denied others food? Who decided that one human being was worth more than another?
I have my own thoughts about these questions, but I also know that not everyone is ready to hear them. And maybe that is okay.
Sometimes we need to let people arrive at their own conclusions. They may eventually find the answers themselves. Or perhaps they already know the answers somewhere inside but are not ready to accept them.
Ego can do that.
Fear can do that too.
Are we really that helpless?
I don't think we are.
A while ago, I was reading about Muhammad Ali Jinnah and came across details about his family's background that made me think about how complicated identity can be. History is rarely as simple as the version we learn in school. Jinnah was born into a Lohana family, a Hindu community traditionally associated with trade. His family’s social and religious journey was shaped by the circumstances of their time. It made me think about what people do when their means of livelihood, identity, or dignity is threatened. People's choices are shaped by their circumstances—fear, survival, ambition, discrimination, opportunity, dignity, and sometimes simply the lack of better options.
When people feel they have no choice, they often fall in line. They accept things they might otherwise resist.
But give someone another option, and they may choose differently.
Perhaps that is how rebels are created. Not always because they were born rebellious, but because something around them pushed them.
This is why the arguments we have every Independence Day about Muhammad Ali Jinnah and Partition often feel incomplete to me. It is easy to blame one person. It is much harder to ask what happened before that. What political decisions were made? What fears were created? What injustices were ignored? What mistakes kept piling up until there was almost no way back?
History is rarely the result of one person making one decision on one particular day. Usually, it is the result of thousands of decisions made long before anyone realizes where they are leading.
I have a question for everyone who is part of system.
You had a chance to do good. Why did you choose otherwise?
I don't really expect an answer.
I've seen people defend systems even when those systems are clearly hurting them.
Take children's nutrition. We know that growing children need proper nutrition. Yet we cut down the very essential protein from the meal. Don't we want stronger generation who can take part in our progress? Or we just want a generation who don't ask question's.
Maybe having a baby in the family is making me think about all this differently today.
Because suddenly, the future isn't some distant thing we discuss in newspapers or on social media.
It has a face.
It has a name.
It has tiny hands.
And when a new life enters your family, the world suddenly feels a little more personal.
You start wondering what kind of society she will grow up in. What will she believe? What will she have to fight for? What will we leave behind for her?
I don't have answers to any of these questions.
For now, I'm going out to celebrate with my friends. There will probably be food, laughter, conversations, and hopefully a few hours when I can stop thinking about the state of the world and simply enjoy the fact that someone new has arrived in ours.
Maybe that is enough for today.
We don't have to solve the entire world before we are allowed to celebrate life.
So, welcome to the world, little one.
I hope we do a better job with it than we have so far.
And I hope you have a beautiful Sunday too.
Until next time, take care.😇
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