How does one measure life?
Is life measured by the number of years? I don’t think so. I think there are more important criteria by
which life can be measured.
It’s Mother’s Day today.
So how do I measure up as a mother? Surely it’s not by the number of children I
have had. More likely it’s by the times
I have been there when my kids needed me… the times when I left a mark on their
lives that perhaps helped them to become better people… more confident in
themselves. Probably the measure of motherhood is how far the mother succeeds
in making the children individuals – unique individuals - rather than copies of
herself.
As an artist, how do I measure myself? Again not by the number of pieces I have
produced. I think it is more by the
moments when I felt I had discovered something new, saw something in a
different light. I measure my growth by the times I sat with a problem and
experimented with ways to solve it in a manner that was both realistic and
pleasing –exciting both to me as the artist and to the viewer.
In her novel To The Lighthouse, English author Virginia
Woolf says that life is not made up of big, dramatic episodes but of tiny,
seemingly insignificant moments. That is a quote that has always remained in my
mind and has coloured a lot of my life.
So maybe I shall measure my life by the number of onions I have peeled and chopped and the number
of onions I will in future peel and chop….
the times when I do something, unpleasant as it may be, that is intended to for the pleasure and sustenance of another…
the times I manage to forget myself.
