Nerve Endings Firing Away

Have you ever heard someone around you say that we shouldn’t really be over joyous when things are going great, least they turn bad? Sounds weird, right? You are almost tempted to say that why not enjoy it while it lasts and then take the turn when we come to it. I have seen tons of people who will not divulge the good things in their life because they are afraid that people may cast an evil eye. We often have seen our grandmothers trying to ward off the evil eye whenever we receive excessive praise from other people. The entire ritual of moving about few grains of a particular kind around us, spitting on them and then tossing them out is amusing but am not sure if it does the trick. The explanation mostly offered is that, not all people who praise us have our best interests at heart and are generally jealous of our achievements.

But going through the rigmarole of hanging the nimbu-mirchi combo hasn’t exactly been proven to guard us against the evil eye. When bad times come, they descend in full force and I don’t think anything can exactly stop them. So why do we even try to hide our good fortune from a supposedly evil eye?

The traditional form of riding ourselves of the evil eye is still amusing but blatant avoidance of your success seems so fake and stupid. Couple of girls in my school, were a living example of this fact. Obviously smart and brainier than most of us, they didn’t need good luck charms to breeze all the way to the top because they worked hard for their marks. But on the exam day, you ask them if they are prepared, they will whimper out a “No yaar, I am totally screwed this time”. Or as soon as they emerged from the exam hall, they were quick to confess that they had messed up royally and were bound to fail. But in reality, that time never came. Over time, we just laughed when they said they weren’t prepared. Now did they assume that if they were honest enough to admit that they were in fact well-prepared and poised to take the top ranks, they would falter and fail? All because of our collective ill-wishes although not all of us wished for that?

Another close friend was extremely paranoid of being happy; so much that when she would laugh, she would immediately try to stop because “such blatant display of joy and pleasure might attract bad luck and I might end up crying more than I laugh”. No amount of cajoling or convincing worked for her. Numerous examples abound around us. We are not supposed talk about a favorable result because we just might jinx it. Instead we wish for the opposite, in order to keep our expectations low. But mind you, we are not less crushed when precisely the opposite that we wished for happens.

Can people with not-so-good intentions really influence your luck or fortune? I recently read that positive vibrations or spreading a general atmosphere of cheer brings more fortune for you. If you expect bad luck coming your way, chances are that you will definitely end up experiencing misfortune. Whatever goes around comes around. So, why not instead focus our energies or keep our eyes on the favorable result or willingly admit how capable we are and direct positive energies towards us?

The pessimism within us holds us back from expressing our hope. And we are surprised when we don’t get our way when in fact; we openly expressed a wish for the same.