Science fiction: Inside the mind of a maverick

 

Science fiction: Inside the mind of a maverick

When you are hungry, completely famished, you desperately search for means to overcome your hunger. And when someone calls you a fool, you go to every extent to prove that you are not one, and you adamantly defend your territory as a man/woman who believes in his/her mental and moral integrity, and the force it builds within him/her.

“Believes” is the word to focus on! 

Who believes he/she can, is the one who actually can. So, whatever we may pursue in our lives, every action is preceded by this magic like feeling called “belief!” It has enabled men and women to conquer the highest peaks of mountains. Though they look formidable, intimidating; and very often bearing a look of shameless and unaffected indifference towards everyone who challenges the mountain’s gaze of supremacy. Because it wants to establish itself as an unconquerable force. However, then it collides against the will and belief of few men and women, who tame this gaze into nothing more than a sight, that welcomes the believer to scale its every inch, its every corner.

And human history is packed with men and women who have tamed this gaze of unnecessary superiority, this gaze that seeks unwanted adulations, because it somehow feels it is the only exalted thing there is. The invincible one, that has the right to be indifferent and at times hideous.

This gaze of intimidation was offered by the lofty and grand Andes mountains to the young and lively championship rugby team that had flown out of Montevideo, Uruguay; headed for Santiago, Chile, to play a top squad. It was Friday, the 13th of October 1972.

The plane crashed and out of the 456 people aboard, few survived in the harshness and total indifference of the Andes. They made the freezing fuselage of the plane, their home for more than 60 days; and came out alive. 

Many psychologists, biologists and doctors, including research scientists have interacted with the survivors and tried to understand how they beat this indifferent and obnoxious gaze of the Andes. Because going by the standards of human biology and understanding of peaks of human endurance, it was something unheard of. And when the news about their survival broke before the world, Everyone was stunned. And few believed there must have been some divine intervention that helped them overcome so many odds. Well, everyone speculated the way they wanted to.

But the basic fact remains the same, it was their will and their belief that made them survive and push the limits of human endurance at physical and mental level as well. This incident proves the peak of human endurance acting against an adversary as colossal and unforgiving, as the Andes mountains. And prove human will is mightier than any mountain and taller than any wall.

There is one more name that redefines the limits of human endurance, and elevates it to a totally new peak. Especially when it comes to innovation and thinking like nobody else could. No guesses there, because I am referring to modern times, and not comparing this person to the giants of innovators from the past.

Ah, anxiety is taking over, before it sets in completely let me declare his name.Yes, the late Mr. Steve Jobs. Who could push human thinking to a totally new height and achieve the impossible. Because he believed if you could think of something, there are means out there somewhere, that will help you achieve it. You just need to figure out these means.

Maybe that is what prompted him to say the following:

“Here's to the crazy ones. The misfits. The rebels. The troublemakers. The round pegs in the square holes. The ones who see things differently. They're not fond of rules. And they have no respect for the status quo. You can quote them, disagree with them, glorify or vilify them. About the only thing you can't do is ignore them. Because they change things. They push the human race forward. And while some may see them as the crazy ones, we see genius. Because the people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world, are the ones who do!”

So I guess, the rugby players were crazy enough to believe and then gather the courage to establish a new peak of human will and defiance. Maybe when apple smartphone was launched, Mr. Jobs was compared to a crazy nut. But was he?

We all know the answer, I can hear the tender flaring in the silence of your neural network. Lighting up with an argument that mostly favours this belief of Mr. Jobs, and the survivors from the plane crash in the Andes. 

Maybe you too are as crazy, you too are as innovative, you too are born with the same madness and endurance, but you somehow deny yourself the belief that you are required to jump into the darkness without worrying about the depth or the anonymity that may greet you at the bottom. Because in the end it is all about jumping, not about whether you hit the bottom or you fall. Because no matter who you are, whenever you jump you rise and then you hit the bottom. That is the principle of jumping. Well isn't this true for everything in our lives? 

It is, so believe and jump!

And if someone tells you, you are a misfit and a sort of troublemaker. Do not do anything, just smile and offer him/her the gaze of the Andes Mountains and walk away with strong belief and even stronger will. And understand one thing, if they took the trouble of calling you a misfit, they have already proven they cannot ignore you. Triumph, triumph, what a realisation!

You should thank me for this. But being from the community of the crazy ones, I owe this much to the fraternity of equals. The equally crazy ones!

These days everyone is talking about electric cars, but have you ever thought that an electric battery can self charge whenever the car plies. Think about it, it may seem crazy but it is very easy and possible.

Mr. Jobs was a genius beyond excellence. But don't you think we need another Mr. Jobs’s like moment in the domain of smartphones? 

The opportunity and the new smartphone that will revolutionise everything related to digital smartness, is already out there. You, who are mad and crazy enough, think, and think hard. Can’t you still figure it out? Ah, brood on it and you will find it. It too is right there. I can see it, why can't you? Maybe I am a bit too crazy or maverick oriented. Now that is self confession about proclaiming insanity, even Gods from the royal house of Argos, will be smiling. And the asylum of technology compound, somewhere, will be flapping its main gate, hoping that it will cast its gaze of indifference at us, the crazy ones. But let us make it clear to this gate mocking at us, that we shall force it open one day; and dismantle its very foundation. 

And let it be known, we are crazy, we are born free, because we are born only once, but we can live forever by enduring to take humanity a little further than yesterday. And offer the future generations of humans a legacy they can seek pride in and confess with pride, “we too belong to this clan of crazy men and women! The men and women who are crazy when it comes to thinking, but are the wisest and most patient when it comes to doing. Acting on something I mean!”

Let us establish new deities and new Gods, let us fall in love with Argus once again. Because the old ones are a little reluctant to believe in the new, believe in the contemporary. Let men like Mr. Jobs and women like Ms. Mary Shelly, be the new apostles of science. In the compounds where a new genesis of human thinking is taking place as I am writing this blog post. Let us be crazy enough, to think crazy and yet act sanely.

It takes some madness to develop a phone like apple smartphone, it takes a lot of madness, to think of an operating system like Windows, and it takes the mind of a maverick to shoot rockets into the space and hope someday humans will colonise every inch of the universe. And it also takes a mind that is crazy and extremely balanced, to launch a mission like Chandrayaan 3 to the Moon. 

But to be truly crazy you have to be truly in love. First with someone and then with something. Because then, you are not a lunatic, you are just crazy about something. Because it fascinates you, and does not let you sleep. Even when you do sleep, it flows through you via your dreams. Like a flower that you saw many years ago, but its scent lingers on and on. Thus making it eternal like the beauty of Argus. And Argus is very special, because she is beautiful, she is the guardian of Io, princess as well, but at the same time a priestess too. Now that is beauty worth personification. And that is why she and her beauty invaded the mind of the most powerful God, Zeus himself!

Are you moved enough, or you still need a higher dose of craziness?

Do not be scared, it is happening because you believe you can. You believe in her, and you believe in it too! ( This part can only be understood by the crazy ones who live in the highest realm of human endurance. Or perhaps, you should ask Zeus for some guidance.)

And to these newly established deities, let us offer our prayers and obediences, and they are no different from the conventional Gods. They too are hard to appease, and extremely difficult to please. 

So, which form of prayer would make them listen to your heart's calling, and lessen the unyielding gaze of the mountain standing tall and mighty before us?

The answer is simple.

Hard work is equal to prayer!

It is only then, brave warriors like Wade are born.

If you are crazy enough and you possess sufficient will, you will understand what I meant. And always remember, “whether you think you can or whether you think you cannot, you are right!”

Always damn right!

They say, the most important thing a father can do for his children, is love their mother unconditionally and madly. And only a crazy father can do this, and in return only a truly crazy mother can do this. Because it is a love affair that ought to last forever. But usually love evades both of them after a few years. It takes madness to maintain the same kind of love, till the end, until one of them breathes his/her last.

Take it easy and relax. Listen to this song:

That is why I said, “First love someone madly and then love something.” Because only then you will be crazy, yet not a lunatic. There is a fine balance that exists between being crazy and a lunatic. Only the element of passionate love can manage it.

Then you will have reasons to be in eternal love with both: the purpose of your professional life, and the meaning of your personal life-Then your someone special can easily coexist with your something special. I call it achieving crazy balance. If you can do this you shall be able to climb any mountain and cross any hurdle.

It was this crazy belief that made me write my science fiction novel, They Loved in 2075. Where two people are madly in love, but the gaze of all mountains has unified to keep them apart, keep them separated, but they believe; and they climb one mountain at a time. 

To know which mountains humans will be climbing in 2075 and how formidable will these new adversaries of humanity be in 2075, you must experience the romance of epic proportions expressed via the science fiction novel, They Loved in 2075!

Dedicated to the crazy lovers, to the crazy thinkers, to the crazy believers, to the crazy politicians ( these are actually rare, when we actually need more of them) , to the crazy scientists, to the crazy artists, to the crazy writers, and to the crazy entrepreneurs. And especially, to the wise and thinking doers. To all of you willing to be crazy enough to believe in the impossible and try it.

I did, what about you?

PS. When we chase these crazy dreams. Let us not forget our due that we owe to the poor, to the suffering, because until they are uplifted. Being crazy will be justified, but it will lack its formidable punch. Because it will be less gratifying. Then the mountain will not gaze at us, it will pity us. And that will be a dangerous predicament to deal with. To be reasonably and rightly crazy requires perfect balance. And I mean balance in every way. But be crazy anyway!

I shall let you figure out the rest!