Sometimes, grown-ups device weird tales to manage children. Yet, they seldom realise how those narratives will affect the child's thinking, especially when the child is curious, imaginative, or ponders over bygone tales a lot.
So, long back, a teacher told us to talk less for the reason that - and here the tale begins - we are given a lifelong quota or a budget of everything, including the spoken words. And if we speak too much too soon, we will exhaust the budget early on in life and will remain muted for the rest of our life.
Well, it was an effective narrative to influence the 10 year old me. And 20 year old me too. And 30 year old me too. And as I come to think of it, I guess, I always thought of that tale as a genuine idea. Maybe, it is. Maybe, we are given a lifelong quota or a budget of everything, like spoken words, like breaths, like sleep, like steps, like love. And sometimes, we exhaust that budget way too soon. And that is when we are rendered incapable of speaking any more words, or breathing any more breaths, or sleeping any more dreams, or walking any more distances, or loving any more loves.
It must be a genuine tale... Because I think I have exhausted some of those budgets... maybe, except for the breaths. A lot of those budgets. Like my budgets for dreams, my budgets of loves, and my budgets of life.
ज़िन्दगी तूने मुझे कब्र से कम दी है ज़मीन,
पाँव फैलाऊँ तो दीवार में सर लगता है।
