These Voices Don’t Lie
“Look before you leap,” says Jack. “Will he?” argues Jasmine. “He’ll rise from the fall,” predicts Henry.
Even if you turn deaf, you’ll still be able to overhear the conversations going between a group of people that witness your footsteps. “You still want to continue.” “Halt.” “I have a better alternative.” “You need help?” Hampering your progress, in the work you’re engrossed in, these statements often hit you and leave you in pandemonium.
Who are these people? Friends or foes; fiendish or divine; solvers or troublemaker? It is too soon to disclose their identities. How do they affect the routines of people coming from different walks of life? Let’s see.
Does a painter polish off a painting with a single stroke? Obviously not. After each line he draws, he has to get it verified from Peter; get remarks from Hannah; argue with George on the appropriateness of the sketch. Do similar things happen with the writers? Often Britney mocks them for the grammatical errors they commit and for the irrelevant phrases they use to formulate a sentence; Lisa warns them of the consequences that would follow if a literate person gives their writings a thorough reading; while Fred will always praise your work no matter what gibberish you pen down.
Now you must be thinking who are these: Fred, George, Peter, Lisa, Hannah, and Britney? Well, some of them have their residences in medulla and cerebrum while some dwell in the corners of your cornea; some in ear-ossicles while some swimming in the bloodstream in the arteries. Do these creatures exist? Maybe you call them by some other names. Maybe you aren’t familiar with them, but I’m sure you must have heard them murmuring as they are never silent. They’re never dormant. They are always engaged in poking fingers in your work, digging pits for you to hop in. Britney is assigned to ridicule you which makes you suspicious of your own decisions, while Lisa scares the soul out of you and you end up in altering your route. Both these fellows do their jobs and leave you lamenting. You can blame them for your failure. Suppose you are sitting at the dining table, digging in, and out of the blue Britney enunciates, “What mom! I’m tired of this insipid meal you make for me.” You reiterate the same statement and then apologise the whole day. So to whom should you listen? George? He’s there to boost you. But paying him too much attention will result in finding yourself in deep water. If you have an exam the other day, echoing sounds like “You’re prepared, man,” “No one can outdo you,” “The paper will be a piece of cake for you,” will charge you with overconfidence and the next day you will be in a helpless plight. George and his twins’ verbose preachings contribute to the conflicting voices. The schemes you’ll implement might bear favourable results or prove to be futile. Extracting the requisite substance from their speech is similar to searching for a needle in a haystack. It depends on you how you construe their talks. Since you are the master of this council, these voices aren’t mighty enough to be ‘your voice.’ All you try to do is replicate. So you need to be decisive. The voices won’t die out, nor they would fade. Will you allow these loquacious creatures to shape ‘your voice?’ You listen, you decide.
