‘Babu Moshaye, babu moshaye, zindagi aur maut oopar wale ke haath hai jahanpanah! Use na to aap badal sakte hain na to main. Hum sab to rang manch ki kathputliyan hain jinki dor oopar wale ki ungaliyon mein bandhi hain. Kab, kaun, kaise uthega, ye koi nahi bata sakta hai! Hahahahahahahahaha…..’

Amazing lines immortalized by Rajesh Khanna in the film ‘Anand’. This is the grim reality of life. I’m sure anyone who has seen this movie can never forget these lines. But the issue is how many of us actually think about the same, draw lessons and try to implement them in day to day life. And there may be more than one lesson that can be drawn from these lines only, forget the movie.

What emerges clearly from these lines, as also from many other sources, is that we as human beings are merely actors in the drama of the world. We come here, play our roles as set by the script writer & director and at the end of this role go back to where we came from. All this is towards learning and growing as a human being and as a soul. I’m not an authority to write on such serious issues. What I feel is that as humans, we don’t need to be actors all the time. It is exactly like the conduct of an actor in the movie. While the actor has to completely get inside the skin of the role he is playing, an observer is better able to find out the extent to which he is successful in doing so. First person is the director, who as an observer watches the act and then asks for multiple takes if required, it being a movie. Then there are editors who observe each frame and do the editing. Finally, it is the viewers who decide. But in between is the actor, who can try to observe himself from a distance and do self-correction. This is more in terms of mental visualization. People who do this successfully become great actors. And this is true for almost everything. To give a very simple example, just now I’m writing this piece as a writer of the blog, or let’s say actor. But tomorrow morning I shall read it as a reader, or an observer. Will analyse, find errors, edit and then post. A great cook is a person who while cooking is thinking how the people who eat the dish would like it. Think of your own home cooking. Some people never go wrong even without tasting what they have cooked. They become ‘observers’ mentally by getting into the shoes of people who’d eat.

There is word in corporate world, ‘big picture’. Most people in an organization just play their roles without thinking of the ‘big picture’. This means they are so immersed in what they are doing that they don’t see the rightful expectations from that role and its impact on the organizational objectives. This results in sub-optimal outcome. And this can happen at any level. A quality control person takes it upon himself to ensure highest level of surveillance to ensure 100% quality in each product. This results in delays, loss of time, expenses and impacts profitability, since in that product category it is acceptable to have 0.2% error. Over zealousness of one person becomes detrimental to the larger objective. All because he did not see the ‘big picture’ or never tried to be an observer of the drama and his own role in that. We need to show such a person the so called ‘big picture’. Other extreme is a CEO who’s is involved in micro managing the work. All the time busy, fully involved in work and ensuring everything is right. Suddenly the business environment changes and despite a hardworking and sincere CEO the business suffers. Reason is again the ‘big picture’ or being an observer. This man refused to see the operating environment and create the organizational ‘big picture’ for others to see. All because he did not observe himself and see the ‘bigger picture’ and his role in the scheme of things as an inspirational leader, leveraging human resources, giving direction to the company, managing ecosystem and taking it to the next level of growth.

Similar could be the case of a soldier fighting a battle on the front. He may have been assigned a task to reach an objective at a time and not engage with enemy even if he sees them so that he joins other colleagues for a larger objective. A very sincere soldier, he fights the enemy that he sees and gets late in reaching the destination, putting the mission in jeopardy. He was a well-meaning and honest soldier, but refused to see his role in the ‘big picture’.

Essential point that I’m making by giving these examples is that it is very important for us to know the our role well, it’s placement and importance in the ‘big picture’ and then observing it from a distance in a detached manner, visualizing about how well we are playing that role.

But then all these examples are in a particular context. Whereas the drama that we initially started talking about was the drama which we call ‘life’, in which we are all actors. Though it is tough and abstract, even here we have to understand the role, its importance and being an observer in a detached manner. We play multiple roles in this drama and each role has a larger reason, objective and impact on others. While the director of this drama called life is God Almighty, we remain the actors. It is up to us on how well we play our assigned role.

And becoming an ‘observer’ of self makes us play the role better.

As actors we are in the thick of action – with all heat and dust, emotions, fireworks, victories, losses, in the process of which we tend to forget being an observer to play the rightful role. For example, after years of hard work and study we get a good job, money, family but we worry for the future intensely, completely ruining those beautiful days. We may not realize that these days have been bestowed on us after big struggles and they need to be enjoyed while playing each of the new smaller roles well. But not only we may ruin them by worrying, we go astray and do things that are completely not expected of the role. Life may have given that opportunity for a larger purpose, not only to savour those days but to lay foundation for higher objectives, either for bigger and important roles or tougher struggles in future. If we don’t play our current roles well it is bound to have an impact on the future roles. Similarly, a period of challenges in life may have a larger purpose behind it. While as an actor, we may be sweating, perspiring, cursing the fate and making our lives more difficult, there may be a larger purpose behind it. That may be higher growth within this life time or in the next, but the role has a purpose. Every role, however small like in a drama, has a purpose. What is the full story or how it unfolds is for the director to know, but we as actors can try to visualize from a distance about how well we are playing that role. A great real life example could be a commando course in armed forces. The trainees would be put through much higher level of hardships to prepare them for tougher battles ahead. If they think only of hardships, they will never be able to become good commandos. But if they realize and understand that these hardships are for larger purpose and they are the chosen few for this, they will play the role to perfection & go through the agony of hardships better – only to become better commandos and soldiers.

My little thought of life in this context is that in the drama called ‘life’ we are all actors having to play many roles, with the script writer and director being the God Almighty. For us to play this role well, it is important that we understand each of these roles that we play, see the ‘big picture’ and placement of that role in right context and then be an observer to ourselves. Identifying too much with the role as an actor without realizing that after all it is just a role for an actor which is the ‘soul’, with director being the higher powers, will only mean a sub-optimal performance of us in that role.