FINDING JONATHAN

 (This essay is dedicated to all dreamers who pursue their dreams irrespective, and all the teachers who motivate, teach and stand solid with them creating generations of Jonathans who go beyond themselves to make this world a better place)

                         

                                         FINDING JONATHAN!

First time i met Jonathan

                 I first got hold of Jonathan Livingston Seagull when I had just cleared my board exams and was poised to enter the professional world of medicine.

                The author Richard Bach, a professional pilot by training, narrates the story of an extraordinary seagull called Jonathan who goes against the flock and learns to fly high where 'no gull has gone', braving death and conquering fear to achieve his dream.  For most gulls, life is just about eating and surviving. Flying is just a means to find food. None in the flock have ever dared to, or rather even thought about flying to greater heights. Flying high or venturing into the unknown came with its   risk of injury and death and none ventured into the unseen. The community of gulls was so particular about not allowing the gulls to do anything but find food as their only mission and aim in life that anyone who even thought of revolting was banished forever from the community into the land where

                    Then comes along Jonathan Livingston Seagull, a tiny seagull who loves to fly. He experiments with glides, sweeps and heights even doing the stalling mid-way much to horror of his parents who could not fathom why he did not live to eat like the rest. You are all bone and feathers, screams his mother in agony looking at her son who has lost interest in food while pursuing his passion. Winter is coming and you need to store food, so get back to doing what other gulls are doing, reprimands his father. Jonathan does not heed their worried calls and continues to perfect his flying techniques, modifying height and speed and always trying to  break his limitations brought about by his physical and mental self.  His experiments of flying from great heights, curving his wings below the body and gliding ever so smoothly, stalling mid-way and reaching the skies, where lie his dreams, continue unabated, unmindful of the hardships that come along its way. The elders in the flock disapprove of his un-gull like behavior, shame him for doing the unthinkable and banish him from the flock forever. Saddened but not disheartened, Jonathan tries to explain to the flock the joy of finding the strength to fly beyond your universe to realise your dreams and potentials and not just live to eat but the flock elders are unperturbed and blind to his pleas. 

                           Eventually, Jonathan flies away to a distant land, pursuing his dream of learning to fly higher and higher, unmindful of day or night, food or water, flock or loneliness. He is eventually guided by angel gulls to a higher world where he finds gulls that have a similar purpose as him and a teacher who helps him to understand the pursuit of happiness and more importantly, the responsibility of carrying the teachings of love and following your heart. Eventually he becomes the teacher to outcasts like Fletcher Gull and Kirk Maynard Gull whom he teaches to fly against odds like wing injuries and fear of heights. In his words, " Maynard Gull, you have the freedom to be yourself, your true self, here and now, and nothing can stand in your way." Maynard Gull who is barely dragging his broken wings finds the power to spread the wings and fly to freedom. Gradually, the taught become the teachers and its time for Jonathan to fly away into the silver sky beyond nothing.

Meeting Jonathan as a young student

Quote

"I don't mind being bones and feathers.

I just want to know what I can do in the air and what I can't. That's all.

I just want to know."

Unquote

                           As a hard working ambitious student I just wanted to soar ahead.  Performance mattered at that time and all I wanted was to be in the top rung of performers. Jonathan Livingston inspired me to plough on and march ahead to find my happiness. Then came the time to realise my dream of becoming a doctor. He was there with me, nudging and pushing, helping me to fight hard to get there where I wanted to go. My selection of the subject of my choice during that time, as specialisation, inspired by Jonathan, was like swimming against the current and getting into deep troubled waters where no 'female medical student' had ventured. Jonathan came to my rescue. He had shown me the way to fight tooth and nail for getting what I wanted. He had prepared me to go against the flock. He had energised me to climb the steep straight cliff without fearing for defeat or being labeled an outcast.

                                  The young blood that flowed in my veins was unmindful of the consequences and like Jonathan, I was ready to face it chin up. As a 'green behind the ears' young girl, my perception of Jonathan stopped there. It was inspirational to work hard to achieve what we have set out for. It was inspirational to fight the system if need be. It gave the fire to climb ‘every mountain and cross every brook’. There was a fearlessness of the path unseen and not taken.

                                   Jonathan feared nothing but his inability to fly higher than what he wanted to. Jonathan threw caution to the wind and life asunder to reach the dream he had wanted to. Survival was not for food but for the goal he wanted to achieve.

                                      As young restless souls, we look towards the sun face up and dive headlong into the turbulent waters. We hurtle us towards the horizon on the rainbow of our dreams, collecting abrasions and cuts on the way that we carry proudly on our shoulders. With stars in our eyes and fire in our heart we move forward, inching towards our goals, unruffled and uncaring about the difficulties that are strewn in the path. It is that age where the power to mount the insurmountable lies deep in the heart and all that hurts are the midnight oil fumes burning bright as nights melt into days and the horizon appears closer than what it was. The single-minded determination of achieving the unachievable ploughs the body forward, the tiny flicker of light far away beckons the tired body and the joy of struggle fills the heart with warmth of the impending success.

                                  As one climbs the steps inching closer to the dream, the feathers fall off and the bones hurt. But the heart is exhilarated with the sweet smell of achievement. It doesn’t matter that you have paid a price, it matters that you have made it!

Meeting Jonathan after decades

Quote

‘The gull sees the farthest who flies the highest’

‘As days went past, Jonathan found himself thinking time and again of the Earth from which he had come. He stood on the sand wondering if there was a gull back there who might be struggling to break out of its limits. The more he thought, the more he wanted to give something of the truth he had seen to a gull who only asked for a chance to see the truth for himself.’

‘ You, Jonathan, can show a gull how to see beyond a thousand miles’

Unquote

                               A lifetime was spent in pursuing the dreams, following the heart, facing the challenges that came with it, building the moments, days, years brick by brick to build what one calls life. Yet there had to be a pause to look back and understand what I had done this far and look ahead to know where I wanted to go. The passion that was work had seen me through the smooth and rough patches as is with every person who dares to leave the flock and learns to fly rather than live to eat! The toil and the late nights, the sweat and the palpitations, the thought and the plan, the recovery and the reward were all there to make me realise the strength of my decision and the freedom to fly ‘where no gull has ever been’. Life came with its frills of a family, children and social responsibilities that completed my world. Life introduced me to the joys and sorrows of living the dream. The path was walked, treaded, bruised yet strangely satisfying.

                                    Then came the crossroads of an uneasy sense of lack of fulfilment, when I met Jonathan again. It was time to find the meaning to my existence and to the path that lay ahead. My knowledge was beneficial to the many, many suffering souls who walked into my clinic to be delivered from pain and disease and more often than not, walked out happy and relieved. The blessings only multiplied the joy of knowing that the struggle was worth every heart beat that had gone haywire till the patient went home.

                                     Yet there was a sense of emptiness, a sense of incomplete achievement in-spite of having walked through the dream. The proverbial thorns had long past stopped causing pain. The work had fallen into a routine and a plateau had struck that made me restless, wondering where I was heading or if I had just fallen into the rut of routine!

                                      I met Jonathan again on the crossroads that once again challenged my restless soul.

                                       My decision to become a teacher came after a few months of pondering and then realizing that like Jonathan, it was time to be the fire beneath the wings of those who were dreaming to fly into the unknown. The emptiness, the restlessness or that incomplete feeling seemed to have found its answer. I had to give strength to the dreams of those who wanted to walk the path taken by me and so many others who chose to follow their dreams. The cycle of life had to go on. Jonathan had chosen me to help perpetuate that innate desire in each one of us to explore our limits and go beyond them.

                                         As ‘green behind the ears’ students came to me for knowledge, Jonathan guided me to make them understand their ability to look farthest so that they could fly highest. The knowledge I had acquired from my teachers and the most important teacher of all, life itself, had to be passed on to the eager, restless, inquisitive young ones just setting out on the path unseen. I reveled in the happiness of holding unlearned hands and guiding them through the mysteries of the body till they could maneuver on their own. I found happiness in finding answers to the barrage of questions that came out of inquisitive minds. I had found my path, yet again. Imparting whatever I had learnt about my subject became that purpose that brought meaning to my existence.  

                                    My search was over. Jonathan had found me yet once again.

                                    A decade of being the teacher has gone by. As the baton passes and as I gradually fade into the sunset, there will be Jonathans to take the next generation of young restless souls to that edge of the cliff from where they can spread their wings and soar towards the limitless sky. They will have found the purpose which defines us as beings with a meaning.

Jonathan lives on, in all of us!