Interesting Things
I read a sentence in a book that went, “She tried to be the kind of person that interesting things happened to.” And I thought that was such a pretty line. But what did it mean? And because I was enjoying the book, I immediately applied it to myself wondering if I’d ever done that.
I don’t know if interesting things just ‘happen’ to people. You have to go looking for things that will grab you by the neck and demand that you expend breaths, thoughts and emotions on them. That doesn’t sound pleasant, does it? Interesting things rarely are. There’s a reason ‘May you live in interesting times’ is a curse and not a blessing.
It is true that I grew up in Mumbai with multiethnic influences so perhaps I didn’t have to look very far for the next adventure. Just finding an identity and holding on to it continues to be the biggest challenge. But spiritual soliloquy aside, what are the things of interest that can happen?
Romance. Friendship. God. The next BIG idea. A flash mob proposal. A near-death experience. A chance to rescue someone. A celebrity spotting. A spiritual epiphany. A lottery. How does one become the kind of person these things happen to? It’s simple. You open your eyes and you breathe. In, out.
In seeking these experiences (finding some, discovering other things and still seeking a few), I realised that I became that interesting thing that happened to somebody else. Inspiration to a student dropping by an open mic. Book recommendations that changed someone’s college major. Crazy makeup for a person seeing people beyond their masks for the first time. The first claps that started the round of applause for an uncertain performer. The uncomfortable thought that made someone who wanted to think of themselves as kind…think differently. A broken rule to demonstrate it could be done.
So what interesting thing are you going to be today and whose life are you changing?
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