The Force Within
written by: Rajiv Noronha
The lights were dim, the curtains drawn. The freshness of the spring did not soak into the drawing room where Aaroosh sat. The glow of his phone reflected in the mirror on the opposite end of the room. The mindless scrolling and the meaningless “Likes” had become a silent ritual that wrapped him in a deceptive sense of connectedness with the world. Hours would pass, yet he felt emptier with every swipe and every click. His digital world linkage seemed to embrace him in a boundless hold as strong as the grip of a vice. His world existed within that 8-inch frame, flickering between likes, comments, forwards, and stories of lives more vibrant than his own.
Aaroosh wondered if things had always been this way. There was a time when he would meet friends for coffee, chase project deadlines excitedly, and dream of starting his own leather design studio. After all, he pursued a design course to become his own master and create his own brand. But somewhere along the way, the dopamine rush of notifications had replaced the deep satisfaction of real conversations and small victories.
His friendships began to fray. Chat messages from old college friends to meet up were left unanswered. Deadlines were missed. He was coming up with no new ideas at Shero Labs, where he had been a designer for the past two years. His confidence wilted under the weight of constant comparison. Every accomplishment someone posted felt like a silent reminder of his own stagnation. Anxiety seemed to claw him from within—wasn’t he falling behind? What if he was destined to always watch from the sidelines?
His closest friends tried to reach him. Navjot, his childhood companion, would call every other weekend, urging him to step out and breathe in the world beyond the screen. His mother would gently remind him of the books gathering dust on his desk and of the half-written business plan for Aaroosh Design Labs tucked away in a forgotten folder. But Aaroosh always had the same response—“Brother, I’ll start tomorrow.” Or “Oh Ma, I know, I know.”
The calendar pages seemed to get flipped over slowly and steadily, but life seemed stuck on the same old page.
One evening, as the rain lashed against his window, Aaroosh’s gaze caught up on a tiny bird outside, perched on the connecting beam across the balcony. The sparrow was shaking the water droplets off its feathers, seemingly trying very hard to get the burden off its back. It struggled for a while; it seemed it would never be able to fly away. However, it flapped its wings once, twice—hesitating—before flapping them a couple more times and then taking flight into the greyness of the evening.
Aaroosh felt an unusual stirring deep within him. The world outside the window was real. The bird’s struggle to take flight by shaking off any burden that held it in its perch was real. And yet here he was, trapped not by the walls around him but by the invisible bars of his own making, a psychic prison with imaginary bars in front of him.
That night, Aaroosh lay awake, staring at the ceiling. He noticed the fluorescent glowing stars and planets pasted on his ceiling and bedroom wall behind his cot. His dad gave him those as a gift while he was studying in the ninth standard ten years ago. They reminded him that the world was moving and life was ticking in this vast universe. Yet today, time seemed to stand still for him.
As he remembered the struggle of the sparrow to fly away, he realized how it did so without support from any other sparrow. He wondered where that spirit came from.
It dawned on him that the bird learned how to survive the day it came out into this world, breaking open the eggshell. The force to hatch had to come from within. The mother bird could only provide warmth to the eggs, but only the life within could break free and emerge into this world from inside the shell. Attempts by anyone trying to help by breaking the shell from the outside could end up with no sign of life.
The next morning, his fingers trembled as he deleted the unwanted, time-wasting social media apps, the meaningless games, and other digital distractions from his phone—hesitant fingers lingering over each icon before they vanished. He felt an immediate hollowness within, a sense of fear of what he might miss. But the silence that followed was different—clean, unburdened. He sat there for an hour reflecting on his dream of setting up a great design lab producing the finest leather products for the fashion world.
Aaroosh picked up his diary. Its pages were empty, and they seemed to yearn for the tip of a pen to set them aglow with words and ideas. He jotted down a few points for the business he’d once dreamed of. He messaged Navjot, asking to meet for coffee. The first few days were hard. The pull of the screen seemed so magnetic. But each time he resisted, he felt something shift inside—a faint crack in the shell.
Weeks passed. His mind, once clouded with anxiety, began to clear. Small victories began accumulating—a completed project, a rekindled friendship, a morning spent reading instead of mindless scrolling. He started running, feeling his heart pound against his ribs, reminding him he was alive—not just observing life from the sidelines but living it on the field.
One afternoon, as Aaroosh and Navjot sat in their favorite café, the sun warming their faces, Navjot looked at him and said, “You seem different, man. What changed for you, man?”
Aaroosh smiled, stirring at the decorative heart on his coffee. “I realized no one could hatch the egg for me. All of you could support and help. I had to break out myself.”
Navjot grinned. “Took you long enough.”
Aaroosh laughed—a sound he hadn’t heard from himself in months. The glass cage had shattered, not by the hands of those who loved or cared for him, but by the force that had been waiting within him all along.
The world outside was still the same, but Aaroosh wasn’t. He knew the temptation of the toughened glass screen would always be there, whispering promises of unknown distractions. But now, he also knew the power of choosing the real over the virtual—of choosing life.
With each passing day, when the sun rose, he would remind himself that the only way out was through his effort, and the only force strong enough to break the shell was the one that came from within.
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