Fitting in , Standing out, Masking and Unmasking

Back to blogosphere after a break with a rather instrospective topic :)

People fascinate me...and among 'n' not so desirable qualities which both D and I may have, there is one quality I am really proud of, that enriches our lives and makes it really worthwhile...and that's our love for people and diversity...

I have been fortunate enough to have lived in different parts of India as a child, lived dormitory life as a student and then of course have had the opportunity to interact with different kinds of people from all over India and the world, from different social and economic backgrounds, in the professional and social environment...essentially I have had opportunities galore to learn a whole lot of things about people and cultures that have added enriched perspectives to different facets of my life...I would be lying if I said I love every aspect of every person I meet, I wouldn't really be human if that were the case:)...what I am trying to say is that being open minded about people, in general, has helped me learn important things from a lot of people I have come in contact with...that has enriched my life...I am grateful for that...and that sense of gratitude adds to whatever little sense of tolerance I have...

Yesterday I caught up with a friend of mine over coffee and had a very interesting and refreshing discussion...the discussion among other things involved the notion of "fitting in and sometimes living with the illusion of being liked and loved vs standing out for who you are and being genuinely liked and loved, if loved at all"..my friend had some rather interesting incidents to narrate...I will not dwell on those further...

But yes, the general observation was that a lot of people try to fit themselves into stereotypes...aka "the intellectual", "the cool dude/dudette", "the goody two shoes","the connoisseur","the spiritualist"...doing things not because they are passionate about it or love it or believe in it but because they feel that's the "cool" or " in" or "right" thing to do, given the circumstances...perhaps it emerges from their inherent human need to be accepted into certain cliques... you see certain facets of their personality emerge with a specific set of people and a completely different facet of the same personality trait emerge in front of another set of people or another situation...it's scary, but true ..not just that, they often keep you guessing most of the time about who they are and in most cases, as these people keep wearing one mask above the other and trying to fit into different cliques, they often adopt a condescending attitude towards people who would much rather stand out in the crowd for who they are and still love and be loved/hated rather than fit in for reasons they don't necessarrily believe in...another observation was that we rarely see such people having too many constants in their life...they always seem to be in a perennial, never ending search for something more!!

While both my friend and I love debates, on this issue ,we were unfortunately on the same side of the discussion :)...so there was not much of a debate...both of us felt that the kind of people we are, we would much rather stand out in the crowd for who we are and be loved/hated for that while we learn and assimilate perspective from people coming from different backgrounds, while making and keeping them a part of our lives...but then of course we had this feeling that perhaps we were missing some important point here, that was biasing us towards our viewpoint...so I just thought, it would be a good idea to throw this topic out for debate on the blog...

So what do you think, in today's world, what constitutes happiness, contentment and success... "Fitting into preset notions and cliques and having a sense of belonging there" or " Standing out for who you while being flexible and learning from diverse people and life experiences and assimilating everyone's experiences into your lives"....my friend and I feel it's the latter...but then more often than not, I definitely am wrong:)...so do share your perspective if the issue strikes a chord…

So is "fitting in" synonymous to living life on someone else's terms while "standing out" in the above context synonymous to living life on your own terms...or have I got it all wrong ? And if it is, is one or the other the right way of living life !?