My life... your life

I recently read the book Five people you meet in heaven, by Mitch Albom. The book seems to say that no life exists in isolation, our lives are woven into other's lives and vice versa...For the western world, this might seem like a whole new view towards one's life, but for an Indian like me, this was no news. When one grows up in a joint family, you don't need a book to tell you how one person's life can affect yours. Unlike the west, where childern have the independence to move out of the family homes when they grow up, in India a person has to consider and reconsider his/her decisions from the point of view of family/parents, even if he/she is quarter of a century old. The decision could be something as mundane as choosing a Television of a particular brand to something as major as selecting a career or the person he/she wants to spend the rest of their lives with. The irony, however, is that even as the younger generation in the East wants to break free from the shackles of cultural pressure, their counterparts in the West are beginning to emulate and yearn for the eastern way of life.

Mitch's book got me thinking...why is it that sometimes we wish to exercise control over our loved ones lives? Is it because we think they are incapable of managing it themselves? Or is it because we fear that they would make the same mistakes we did and hope to save them in time so that they do not have the same regrets we did? Or is it because we believe that we are leading just the perfect lives and want our loved ones to have the same? One thing, we must all understand is that the definition of 'perfect' will vary from person to person. Hence, your recipe for a 'perfect' life would not whip up the same dish for another person. Instead, what could end up on the table could be nothing more than burnt breakfast that will ruin one's day!