It is not about the gloom reading the newspaper causes, it's not about the boredom which has become a part of life of every urban youth, yet it's all about the mundane which is really a bunch of shackles.
The hobbies take a back seat and what overcomes them is nothing but a vicious circle of daily bread and butter(Of Course! Butter too. Well! in this era where half of the people are fighting cholesterol related issues - it's awkward to mention Butter. Anyways!).
Works of great people are an inspiration, works of art, literature, social service, etc. From Vincent Van Gogh to Salvador Dali to M.F.Hussain to Tyeb Mehta, From Chisrtopher Marlowe to Shakespeare to Bernard Shaw to Mohan Rakesh to Girish Karnad & Satyabrat Raut, from Geoffery Chaucer to Milton to John Donne to Fyodor Dosteoesky to Tolstoy to Anton Chekhov to Kafka to Kahlil Gibran to Mirza Ghalib to Premchand to Gulzar, From Ibn-e-Sina to Mahatma Gandhi to Abraham Lincoln to Mother Teresa to Kailash Satyarthi - Art, Philanthropy and Philosophy(I like calling Philosophy -'Darshan Shastra' as it encompasses a major spectrum) has a vast, very vast field to explore as well as to contribute. But it's hard to find time(Well! that's a very cliched sentence). Sometimes there's leisure and theirs mood too but that something which hinders the creativity is the critic within, It's such a powerful entity in itself that it over shadows the artist within.
The artist tries to makes peace but the critic disrupts the whole process even before it could start, for instance playing harmonica is such a relief without even considering whether you are playing sweet or burning people's ears but if you have seen how the master's play you have a fear to blow into the harmonica out of doing injustice to the music, even if you have heard the haunting background scores punctuated by playing harmonica in Spaghetti Western films(Once upon a time in the West or'The Dollar trilogy') you'll try to blow the tune but when it turns out something else the critic begins self discrimination. You try to paint something but when a line goes wrong the painting stops, you try to write an essay but couldn't find the vocabulary. All of these are the instances where the self criticism overtakes the artist.
I asked this question to myself,'How did this critic become such a forceful entity that it has the capacity to disrupt the creative prowess?'
Without much pondering, I concluded that it's based on the knowledge of assessment. If you are able to assess the magnitude of quality of a work of art, literature, etc. you become critical of your own work, during the creation starts the analysis which is the root cause of hindrance, the critic pursues perfection which can never be attained, Any and every field requires dedication, it's a continuous process, it's a journey it's not a destination, it keeps evolving all the time. And when you are masquerading as a critic you stand still, you are neither producing, nor evolving, the process stops, the journey ends and there's no satisfaction because the talent remains unused, that's what happens and it's dangerous!. But then I pondered why should I assess my own work based on the opinions made by keenly observing the works by masters - after all, they all have their peculiar style and they followed their instincts rather self controlling, so they created and left it for the judgement of the observers, for the analysis of the critics.
Putting the self critic into coffin on a lighter note with a sarcophagus written "Sang-e-lahad to tod kar sabzaah kabhi ugaa nahi"(No vegetation ever grew on the tomb stone).
Likewise, nurturing a hobby is a great bliss in itself, paint, draw, write, hum do whatever refreshes the mind and leave it for others, may be they too get mental enrichment from one's works or they might be critical too, that's the choice for others. For one's own self, following the instinct is Originality.
And Originality comes first, then come the opinions.
So when I write after putting up the heading, it comes naturally without check - and can be summed up in Ghalib's couplet -
"Aate hain ghaib se yeh mazameen khyaal mein!
Ghalib sareer-e-khama nawa-e-sarosh hai!"
These thoughts come to mind from the unseen!
O Ghalib! the moving sound of pen is the voice of angels!.
