Follow your dream?

Yesterday, I watched the movie American Chai. I simply LOVED it.

The film was full of subtle nuances that made me relate to it on a whole other level. Sureel's passion for music, how he inspires Maya to follow her heart, his dad's dialogue when he meets him in the Green room after the competition, and so many other scenes. I loved the scene where Maya is performing and he stands side-stage, transfixed by the music and the elegant but crisp movements she makes as she fuses different styles of dance..

Oh well, I wonder what transpired between the actors and THEIR real-life parents before they were actually allowed to go act in this movie :)

But what does 'following your dream' entail, in reality? Shattering the dreams that others have/had for you? Carrying the baggage of your roots? Being bound to all the emotional ties in life? I wonder if it is an isolated phenomenon pertaining to desis.. do people in other countries feel bound to the dreams that their parents have for them? I do understand that parents have our best interests at heart. But these best interests stem from life experiences that they have had all along. Granted, they are wise, but how do those same rules apply to our lives, 10 years down the line? Are we trying to fuse two different subsets, that barely intersect within a wider universal set? I am all for 'freedom of choice/thought', or so I claim now. Will my mind also get polluted by the experiences I have along the way, and will I expend my 'wisdom' in an 'I know it all, you're not mature' attitude to my offspring? People tend to forget that they were also in the same stages of life, but in a different context, at some other point of time. Inertia affects people, they refuse to move on. They use the term 'generation gap' in a very broad sense. Whatever happened to the 'dreams' that our parents had for themselves when they were young? Don't they then work toward helping their kids achieve the same in their life? Isn't that why my mom enrolled me in all those extra-curricular activities, and helped me be the person I am today! But somewhere, the link snaps. At some point, the mind closes up and does not think about it from a different viewpoint altogether.

There is no use, however, in berating the older generation. They talk about experiences in a whole other angle, since the subtext of them all was set in a different time and era. Some things may never change, like the dread of the unknown future, the thirst for stability, and the age old rituals of maintaining your image in society. But, trying to force people to understand things out of context is like trying to tout the great taste of peanut-butter and jelly on idlis. Granted the PBJ is the best tasting thing you can slather on your breakfast. But you're talking about bread for breakfast, while your folks are looking at the idlis on their plate. And there-in, lies the jarring truth. Someone has to adapt. Which continues the vicious cycle of 'broken dreams' to avoid conflicts and confrontation, or the extreme opposite - the 'misguided rebel'.

The bridging of the so-called 'generation-gap' is a long time coming...