I was watching this anime sometime ago in which everything just turns out great, of course after some effort. It got me thinking. In cartoons, anime, stories, plays... anything that man created/creates, there’s always a “happily ever after” in the end (except a few tragedies, but then they depict something great too). And how they get there is plain and interesting. Especially cartoons. Even though it is for pure entertainment for kids, every little story does have something to offer. They teach morals and values to the little kids, about karma – how every good you do pays off in the future. The values always held in the highest regard throughout history (picked up from the anime Digimon): Courage, Friendship, Love, Knowledge, Reliability, Purity, Hope and Light; the values that tell Honesty is the best policy; the values that tell Sacrificing is not so bad and in fact if it’s to make someone happy, how it pays off in the form of new friend(s) or just pure satisfaction; the values that tell being united, you can overcome anything; and the values that tell putting your family and friends above everything else is one of the noblest things in the world. There are a million forms in which the different lessons of life are taught. Some of them simply put it across directly by showing how the deed (courageously facing something or sacrificing something, for example) leads to good over evil. But it’s not so easy in the rest.
No person is born cynic or pessimist. They turn into one because of the people they are influenced by, or the experiences they undergo. But if the lessons taught by these little stories are ingrained and is still intact in their hearts, I don’t see why the world can be a better place. For kids, the world is black and white. There is good, and there is bad. There is positive (things that cause happiness and satisfaction) and negative (stuff that hurts others). Everything is binary. When we were little, there weren’t any politics or manipulative bitches. You don’t like someone, you spit on their face. You like someone, you talked to them, gave them gifts. Whatever you felt, you showed it. And there weren’t any complications. How simple life would have been if the same dynamics were applied among adults! Transparency and honesty –everything laid out in the open, all conflicts resolved, no misunderstandings. So why do grey areas emerge? I’m sure even the most complicated of issues can be broken into 1’s and 0’s at the most basic level. Well, I don’t understand why nobody sees it. And if they do, why nobody practices it and applies it. Wouldn’t the world become a much better place than it is now? I think people turn sceptical and cynical because things always just kept failing, not reaching their expectations and so they lose faith. But when this happens, a little hope and optimism with love and compassion and of course, effort might just turn things round. But this is just my simple mind trying to reason things, and find a solution, so I cannot say for sure.
I do not want to give up. I want to believe that people will stop fighting each other. I want to believe that people believe in what they say, and keep their promises. But I guess the cynics I met in the last few years have done their jobs well, because when I think of the world now, the big bad world with over 6 billion people in which maybe around 60% of them have either lost hope, or will have been crushed by truants, or are plain depressed; I know the world cannot turn into Utopia. But my basics are deep, intact in my heart. There is a small spotless patch on my heart, somewhere in midst of all the “realistic” dirt and grime of scepticism and cynicism, shining with the brightest light which is now filling me up as I write this – and it’s giving me a magic talisman: believe in yourself, and don’t stop believing in the people around you, and everything will be all right. Yes, I now know, everything is going to be just fine because I believe in it. And everyone’s life can be a story with a “happily ever after” only if they truly believe it.
