Fri, 29 Mar, 2024

So, What's the Plan?

By Hitesh Karki

I never thought things would go this far. It was a chance accident that I happened to be in Hawaii, perhaps the last place on planet I thought I would be, and another chance accident happened when I was introduced to a gray haired surgeon from University of Hawaii. The reason we, my friend and I, were talking to him was we had heard that he does this clinical mission every year in Philippines operating critical diseases for free. What he told me was pretty baffling and blowing his own trumpets, so I thought, at that moment. He told us that he has been going to remote part of Philippines with a team of 35 plus doctors and nurses along with more than two thousand pounds of surgical equipments to treat people in that remote part of the country every year! I might have asked him hundred questions but the two that I remember are, who pays for these travels and what’s the ulterior motive of people involved in this? His answer was simple "Hitesh, the world is still not as cynical a place as you think. These doctors & nurses pay for their travels and hotels themselves. And, they do want to serve the mankind in whatever little way possible!" I still don't know what hit me but almost instantaneously I asked him “Would you come to Nepal?". His reply wasn't an answer but a counter-question. "Would you be able to manage the logistics in your country?" Without sparing even a second to think about it, I just said "Yes!" It’s been five years that they have been coming to Nepal and people of Dhankuta, one of the most beautiful places in the country but equally underrated, simply adore Dr. Bradley Wong and his team. One story ends here and begins another one. Life perhaps has nothing to do with planning. It’s just a rough sketch. Just the ER diagrams but nothing much beyond that. Often times you plan, you set your own expectations and when you manage to live up to your expectations, when you achieve them you feel happy. Take a pause. Think. What if you did not have a plan on the first place and still something good happened? Would you be unhappy or less happy? Certainly NOT! It’s all but human that as long as things work in your favor, you feel happy irrespective of the fact that whether it was planned or not. Nothing much in here, right? Now, think what if nothing was planned and no expectations were set. If nothing happened, you would not be disappointed for there was nothing you were expecting in the first place. You negate the chances of being unhappy. Needless to say, a happy mind is always more creative. You hear people asking you to be 'un-ordinary', asking you to try 'think-out-of-the-box' all the time. And in the process you fail to understand why this irony leaving you utterly confused? What is this paradox of “mugging up formulas” and doing "good in exams" and also being "unconventional" by following your passion or dream? Perhaps, it’s not that confusing at all! It’s not that we want to be 'boxed' but the reality is we have been conditioned in such a way that we have no choice but to be "boxed". “A” will always be “Apple” and so will “Ball” be for “B”. That’s boxed. We have no choice of ducking and dodging this way of learning. Life is much easy when there are no choices. Sounds little absurd but I am sure that you cannot deny it either. The way out is we ensure that we travel in such a way that we go past these boxes. Not avoid them but 'flatten' them out as we move on. Give your 3H into it - Head, Heart and Hand - and unplanned outcomes yielding happy 'results' will begin to appear on the 'horizon'. On a subconscious level, you are already thinking “out of the box”. It’s just that you have not realized it. How better can it get for you? To wrap things up, you then reach to a point where you not just stop thinking of “thinking-out-of-the-box’ but completely cease to see the 'boxes'. This is where you are at your happiest best. So, what’s the plan?