Built to Last

We live in timeless times, one click away from being forgotten.

The last wonder of the world was built in 1931. The last volume of the longest novel in the world was published in 1927. Very few things in the world today are left as untouched as they came. I think about this from time to time and I apply it to myself too. I keep changing, I shape-shift from age to age, phase to phase. The pages of history continue to turn.

It is not that I crave a return to the past, there is a reason we have come so far. As I work on my dreams and myself, tinkering away bit by bit, peeling old wrinkled layers away, I start to think about what my intentions are. I have come to a conclusion that I would like to build something that will last.

Spoilt for choice

When everything in the world can be reduced to a choice, we are bombarded by options. For the longest time I felt like a kid in the candy store, unable to make my choices, trapping myself in the choices life made for me instead. Optional optionality is more than a state of being. The choice becomes both the object and the justification. It is scary just as it is fascinating that our entire identity could boil down to a singular choice.

Choice comes with its limitations. Not all of us are allowed to make every choice. Some choices were made for us before we even got to choose. If we speak to those who were here before us, they would say that some of these choices were good, others not so much. Everything should work out for the best? So we believe.

We have all taken advantage of the options bestowed upon us. It taught us in a very subtle way, how to put ourselves first. We all end up seeing these choices through one way or another. These choices have had their own connotations too. Not just professional, in every area of life. One choice leads to another one and before we know it, we are standing in the middle of nowhere, completely unexpected.

Over time as inventors perfected everything, markets opened up, and money took centre stage, options cropped up. Endless options. Whether it be — religion, politics, houses, food, or careers. We are attached to them, emotionally, sometimes financially. They stem from our culture and values, teaching us some things are meant for some people.

Everyone had their place, and that is where it gets a bit complicated. When certain paths or options are put out of your reach just by virtue of access, it calls for rethinking. Who you are should not be barrier for what you choose to do. Even as we move towards challenged norms, identities going beyond their defined boundaries, there is still resistance to the new. Change and choice must go hand in hand, for there to be any freedom.

There is also another matter at play, everything built so far, was built to make life easier. They were meant to solve our problems, but how is it that we are not any happier? Why do the same problems persist? With it comes a lack of contentment, restlessness. We buy and sell ideas and solutions, hoping we feel happier, content, and safe. Yet all does is keep us stuck in a loop. I think somewhere deep down we all know the answer to that question. We do not solve the problems we need to, we prefer to solve the problems we can. We choose what is easy, the immediate, the best problem to solve.

The existentialists have their own arguments on the topic. But my question is slightly different, I wonder if we were only looking for quick fixes all along, perhaps permanence felt too overwhelming for us. It is a commitment after all. Sometimes it is not personal, it is generational.

Striking a balance

While choice is a part of it, everything that was built or made, that means something to the world today was born as a challenge to impossibility. There was a defiance in their vision. What made them tick? Resilience is often a test of time.

I belong to a cultural mindset that believes nothing comes easy. We had to be resilient. If it is not hard to do, it is not worth doing. At school, we were taught there could be no wrong answers, and what was the point of trying if we were to fail? These were all the lessons we needed to alter for ourselves as adults. If we did not, the same resilience would break us.

Results meant everything back then, the quicker you got these results, the smarter you were. And, the smarter you were, the more you were worth. Our skills were honed as commodities, they would become our future assets. So choice was limited to the most favourable path, we stopped trying to look within ourselves for skills that would carry us the farthest, that put us at the helm of what we do.

We were not taught that comfort and rest also builds resilience, that there were different types of intelligence that were equally coveted. Or that there were multiple ways to solve a problem, or build something. We did not grow up with empathy and joy being reliable markers of overall development, they were not considered important traits. Sometimes resilience is not made up of sharp lines, and hard edges.

So we lived, we did our best, battling it out as a generation to outwit the system. We played by the rules, thinking our adulthood would be our ticket out of reality. But as it would turn out, adulthood was more of the same thing. Unless you reset the clock, wiped your slate clean, and taught yourself new lessons by breaking all the patterns learnt.

One day we all realise that the key to resilience is balance. It is a tough lesson to learn. There can be no sound structure without balance. Since the goal here is to build, this might be the only sensible starting point I would presume.

My next dose of instant gratification?

I dislike instant gratification. Am I slave to it? Of course I am, but I am aware of it and do my best to tone it down. It might seem like I am heading there, but I do not blame everything on social media. I do think we have lost touch with time, with the essence of time, which is to let it pass. We have gotten so used to comfort, we dread discomfort. We dread the awkwardness that comes with waiting for something real, always settling for the most fleeting, transient replica of joy.

This impatience has seeped into anything we do, affecting our consistency and how we show up, whether it is online or offline. Cheaper materials, simpler designs, sloppy writing, poor research, you see it everywhere in architecture, art, and science. You might find evidence in this piece too, if you read closely enough. No field is spared. Replicable and predictable are to me the most boring words in the dictionary. They inspire nothing. No emotion, no imagination.

We want it all now, results, ideas, and content. It kills drive, creativity comes to die on the precipice of a deadline. The first time I ventured into writing on my own time, it was the equivalent of drowning. I did not know how I would function without the clock breathing down my neck, hot on my heels. To produce something of meaning however, I had to learn to befriend the clock, rather than fear it.

As I redefine my entire life as I know it, I have come to understand how important self-assurance and good command over one’s craft is. Hard work, time, these are relative in nature. But good hold over craft, is more valuable than perfection. It keeps the journey exciting, and it forces you to look inward. That is what I am trying to do.

Unlike those who came before me, I have the opportunity to figure this out. We force what we deserve out of time, the ingredients are all there. We just need somewhere to begin. Unfortunately, it begins with us.

It does not have to be the biggest, the best, or the first - the goal is to create, without chasing after a goal. I want to create something that stirs an emotion, forces a thought. Something built to last, weathered by time, yet incomparable.

Before I try to swim, I shall learn to float. We cannot help ourselves, so the only solution is to build anything that outlives us all. I do not crave to be remembered myself, but I would like my work to be memorable, if nothing.