Essay : Untrodden Path

~Khagendra Bhattarai~Khagendra Bhattarai

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I
I took the one less travelled by,
And that has made all the difference

Unlike Robert Frost in his poem ‘The Road Not Taken’, it must, however, be difficult for many to make such a choice. Umpteen choices come our way as we become conscious and begin to understand our circumstances. Only the right choice at the right time will help make life more comfortable.

But what if one has no option? Many youngsters who have come across my life have said that they are confused about what to do in life. Should I join the media, become a teacher or apply for study abroad? Again the choices have a long list – which media, which school and which country.

Yes, there is a need to give them counsel, but who will do so? Neither our college system nor all parents can help the youths make the right choice.

All parents desire to get their children the best possible job. Getting a good job means getting the children into the best schools, which means they must be among the best-performing students, which again means we need to get started very early to prepare them for the future. To attain all these things, we need to be free to choose. Throughout your life, you have had to make choices, but now that you are getting older, decisions may be more difficult to make.

A number of people who study in one field and work in another complain about the things that they have failed to attain in life. If you are constantly regretting over missed opportunities or choices, then you’re making yourself miserable for nothing.

Certainly, life is about choices, and we make them daily – big ones and small ones. The word ‘choice’ is powerful and guarantees a change in one’s life. Both the circumstance and person are responsible for deciding the future course of one’s life. I just think that there is so much more to life when you lead yourself astray from the beaten path and go forth to explore. Who knows what wonders you will find? Wouldn’t your life be more interesting and richer?

It’s never too late to start a new thing. So you must find out what makes you happy and go for that with unflinching determination. You will certainly succeed one day. Here, too, as in Frost’s lines, the untrodden path will bring you a lot of unexpected joys. Life is after all a bundle of miracles, and as you go on unfolding it, there will be more surprises waiting for you.

Khagendra Bhattarai, Melbourne, Australia

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