You can't drive forward by continuously looking in a rearview mirror

Traditions, culture, history, and legacy all connect us with our past. Any country or civilization that is old enough will have enough incidents and achievements to celebrate and feel good about it, at the same time, there will be incidents about which they owe an apology to a certain section of their society. Old civilizations like the Chinese, Indians, or Romans are no exceptions to it. History is not only about glorious triumphs or grand wars or golden eras, but it is also about racism, casteism, gender discrimination, massacres, and exploitation of certain sections of society at the hands of a few privileged ones. It won't be an exaggeration to say that each golden era of any civilization is associated with some sort of travesty inflicted on some section of society. This is true irrespective of which country or civilization we are talking about. However, there will be very few from that corresponding country or civilization to acknowledge this fact, rather, we can find many who either deny or try to justify even the ugliest or most cruel historical incidents.

Learning lessons from history is important, that is why we study history, it is not just important to know what happened, but also important to know why happened. Also, if we don't feel sorry, bad, disgusted, apologetic, or angry while studying history, then we may be studying something but not real history. There is no country or civilization that does not have skeletons buried in their closet. As I mentioned, there are some bright spots in every civilization, and it is important to know about them. But the problem arises when in the mode of hyper-nationalism, people highlight only bright spots and cover up or worse, blatantly deny some inconvenient truths. The result of this is that the most vocal class of such societies keeps on indulging in past glories. They fall in love with their past so much, that they do not even recognize that their current situation is not even close to the so-called golden era about which they are harping. It is like trying to drive a vehicle on a highway by continuously looking in a rear-view mirror.

The rear-view mirror has its utility, one has to look at it occasionally while driving to check on the surroundings. One cannot look in the rear-view mirror and drive forward, if we do that we are bound to crash. Check your present situation and think about how to move forward, know about your competition today, and design a strategy to compete based on what you have today. If I want to win a gold medal in the Olympics, then I need to train hard and compete with my fellow contestants, not brag about my grandfather winning Olympic gold, such bragging is not going to help me a bit to win any medal or even get qualified for that event, rather, others might feel pity for my situation. This is what is happening in countries where hyper-nationalism is on the rise, they are forgetting that their competitors are getting better day by day, by thumping their chest about their past glories they are not doing any good to their current situation but helping their competitors to get better and better. Hopefully, these people realize their mistakes and shift their gaze from the rear-view mirror. Because if they don't, all they can go is in the reverse direction. The more one indulges in the past, the more one loses connection with the present, this is true for an individual, group, or country.  Learn from the past to create a better future for everyone, for things from the past apologize or salute and move on, don't get stuck.

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Happy new year

2020 was not an ordinary year. The entire world faced the unprecedented challenge of dealing with a pandemic that we wrongly assumed would never hit us again. We spent most of 2020 dealing with a variety of challenges thrown at us by the Covid-19 pandemic. There are stories of immense loss and personal tragedies, at the same time there are also stories of immense courage, determination, and resilience from all over the world. We got confused, scared, and even misled by people who were supposed to guide us, we became anxious about this added uncertainty in our lives, some of us lost some near and dear ones, and some of us faced personal and professional setbacks. However, after the initial chaos, we adjusted, adapted, and tried our best to deal with whatever challenges came our way, the response was not perfect, but there was a response and there was always hope. Humanity has survived many such challenges and will survive many more if they come our way.

Soon, we will get over this pandemic and life will come back to its new normal. I am calling it a new normal because life not necessarily going to be the same as it was before. Things are bound to change. Along with throwing many surprises, this pandemic has taught us many things, both, in a personal and professional capacity. Many companies and other institutions realized that working remotely is not a bad option to provide to employees who want it, we do have technological capabilities to support online traffic for a large workforce. We also realized that we can increase the frequency of our interpersonal interactions by supplementing them with technological platforms that are being invented almost every day. Of course, some interactions are always better if they can be done in person, but many times, some constraints stop us from being physically present, during those times, we can make use of technology and still be a part of these special moments. We also learned the importance of supporting each other, listening to each other, and the importance of being in touch. There are many such lessons we learned as a society, family, and also as an individual. These lessons are going to stay with us. Years like 2020, teach us a lot and transform us internally as well as externally. We will see some of these changes which we were forced to adapt as becoming a new norm.

Personally, for me, 2020 was not bad at all. I finished law school and passed two bar exams, I am working at a firm where I wanted to work. I also managed to remain physically active in the way I wanted. I adapted to the changes in circumstances and devised ways to be physically active while working from home. My interactions with my family increased a lot as we all had to spend so much time together, we learned quite a few things about each other which we could not have done without these changed circumstances.

We already entered the new year, 2021. No doubt, we are starting this year with a lot of hope and enthusiasm. We are going to win our battle with this pandemic and move on. We all are looking forward to getting rid of many restrictions due to this pandemic, especially related to international travel. Let's keep doing all the good things that we learned during these unprecedented times, let's continue to focus on our health and overall well-being. Let's be happy and try to spread happiness. Let's begin this year with a resolve that no matter what challenges come our way we will deal with them to the best of our capabilities. Wishing you all a happy new year.

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