The pursuit of true happiness

Some moments are nice:some are nicer:some are even worth writing about.

“Our next participant is Rishabh Suri,from Ramjas School,Anand Parvat.”

 The day had come.Weeks of preparations,rehearsals,scoldings by the teachers,and at times,losing confidence in myself—it all came down to this one moment.

One thing you can’t hide--is when you are crippled inside.Mustering up courage,and remembering my God,I went up the stage,and froze,with a thousand eyes looking at me expectantly-some hoping me to do my best,some wanting me to be the worst.

Clearing my voice,I closed my eyes,took a deep breath….and started speaking.

Emotions are a funny thing-especially when others express them.The thousand eyes hung on to my every word-one fault,and I could very well bid goodbye to the shining trophy.

The bell rung:3 minutes were over.

Ending with a “Thank you”,I got down from the stage,and took my seat.With each coming participant,my hopes of winning slowly diminished.But then,sometimes you win,sometimes you learn.

“Shit,I pronounced a word wrong.” “I spoke too fast.” “Pausing while talking is probably the worst thing I could do on stage”. As Charles Butowski put it-The problem with the world is that the intelligent people are full of doubts,while the stupid ones are full of confidence…

“We will be announcing the results now.”

Silence. I swear you could cut the tension in the room with a knife.

“The 3^rd position goes to this boy from that international school!”

“There goes the only position you could have won”,I said to myself,while clapping for the recipient.

“And the 2^nd  position goes to that girl from our school!”

I wanted my name to be announced.But it wasn’t.

…Yes.I wanted to win.Badly.I wanted to win for my school,my teachers who believed in me,my parents who wanted me to win it for my school…I just wanted to WIN.There-I couldn’t have put it more clearly.

“Finally,the 1^st position goes to..any guesses?”

Ughh.Just say it!No one’s in the mood for a stupid guessing game!

“Before we announce the winner,the chief guest for today’s competition will like to say 2 words to the audience..”

2 words. “I won’t take much time.My friends,all of you are..” 11 words already.Might as well have said “Good bye.” :P

Anyways,the 2 words finally ended in 5 minutes.And it was time for the announcement.

“The winner of the 5^th Annual Inter-School Declamation competition is Rishabh Suri from Ramjas School…”

Honestly,I don’t remember what happened next-what was my reaction,what the others around me said…nothing.All I remember is holding that trophy-sorry,MY trophy-and feeling I had achieved everything.But what I had really achieved-was happiness.