I can. You can. Anyone can. It’s not really easy to follow your heart. But it has rich rewards. Cynics will tell you: The heart is an idiot follow your head. But I am a champion of this ‘idiot’. Because this idiot has worked for me. I believe that the choices you make from your head may get you the moolah and power; the decisions you make from your heart make you happy. In my world there is no contest, really. Two decades ago, I quit the editorship of the No 1 film magazine to be with my father in his last days. He’d been diagnosed with cancer. Everyone around told me, especially my dad, not to quit because it would be career suicide. Perhaps it was, for a brief while, and if I had listened to my head, I wouldn’t have resigned, and lived with guilt forever after losing him!
I have always believed, perhaps foolishly, that when you follow your heart, things fall into place. My sister was trapped in an unhappy marriage for over a decade. She held for the sake of her two daughters despite the mental and physical abuse. Then one day, 16 years later, she decided to choose happiness. I am sure she felt insecurity, fear, anxiety but she walked out with her girls. She hasn’t regretted her decision.
Not once. She is independent and at peace with her decision. It’s never too late to follow your heart.
I am not ambitious. Never have been. I have never had a goal. Except to be happy. Whether it was my professional or personal life. A decade ago, I went on from being an Assistant Vice-President of a million-dollar company to being a Senior Features writer in Cosmopolitan because I wanted to work in the magazine that had been my Bible in my teenage years (I admit that, somewhat sheepishly now). The designation or the pay-cut didn’t matter. It was a no-brainer for me.
The choices, like I said earlier, are not always easy. Sometimes it entails giving up things you love, and have worked hard for. I have friends who have single-mindedly chased their careers; reached the top of the corporate ladder and then given it all up to bring up their babies. Now, if that isn’t a decision from your heart, what is? I salute everyone who follows their heart. And I urge those who don’t, to listen to their heart and make the pursuit of happiness their own goal in life. Because then, everything else falls into place.
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