The biggest con – ‘CONTROL’

Singapore, Malaysia, Hongkong, China, Dubai, Paris, etc, even India for that matter - these are shopping havens, where one has to take some basic, gut-level decisions in life. And one of those decisions calls for making a definitive choice between one's Credit Card and one's Wife! 

If one chooses to hold on to the Wife (which is what most of us would do anyway), then one loses custody of the Credit Card (which then goes to the Wife - mayhem); If one chooses to hold on to the Credit Card (which is what one would want to do - freedom) then, one loses the Wife to another (who has a give-away Credit Card – freedom of another kind). 

These shopping destinations not only are among the chief wreckers of home, family and peace but also they bring in an absolute awareness for man. Which is – that he is not in control of the situation. An awareness that any man hates to be acquainted with. 

Why can't a man have the Wife and the Credit Card? Not in that order anyway. He isn't asking for much, is he now? 

Well actually, he is! 

The days of having a say in any and every matter are long gone. Man’s authority and control have slowly been delegated, diminished, dissolved, disintegrated, and has now become defunct. 

Take a classic example. 

The TV remote. 

Remember the days when the man in the family decided which TV channels the other members of his household got to watch. He would dictate which program got the maximum TRP’s in his house and which films were suitable for family viewing with total disregard to the censor board ratings. 

With the remote, man could put the Wife in ‘mute’ mode, stall the Kids on ‘pause’ and disregard anyone else by pressing the ‘Off’ buttons. 

Now, he is lucky if the remote ends up in his hands. Lucky too if the Kids let him watch any program other than cartoons, lucky if the Wife decides not to pursue her favourite soaps, of which there are plenty – by the numbers and never-ending. 

It is usually a cold day in hell when he gets to watch the FIFA world cup telecast, the Grand Prix, or the boring but ‘oh-so-essential’ daily dose of news. 

With the TV remote gone, his control has been taken away, his authority seriously undermined, his ego shattered. All this and more, inside his very home! 

His home. His turf. 

The small area on this planet earth which he thought he could rule. The king of all and sundry, within the walls of his abode, now, a common man with no powers. 

Well how about outside the home, then?

Take the Car for instance. 

Man’s never ending desire for adventure, travel and conquest led to the invention of the motorcar. 

A Motorcar – a man thing! Made by Men, for Men! 

Powerful, Fast, Noisy, Oily, smoke-belching – masculine images, no doubt. 

And always with one steering wheel – for the man in control! 

With a loud horn to announce his arrival; with great decals to sport his style; with plush interiors to suit his comfort; with thumping pistons and thingamajigs under the hood. 

All nut and bolts, steel and glass, wood and leather, spit and polish. 

All Male. Most definitely – male. 

Suddenly he finds one day that he cannot take his beloved car to his office. How on earth did this happen? 

Oh, the Wife has taken the car to the salon; Oh, the Son has taken the car and his friends for a party; Oh, the daughter’s gone on a date – what? And in my car? 

And you take the bus ride home. 

Car gone, Power gone, Control gone. 

Man realized that he had no more say in the matters involving his possessions. Or that which he used to think of as his possessions. 

He then turned to Society. 

Man tried to impose his will on the general public. He joined forums, organizations, institutes, associations, groups, any gathering which accommodated him, where, he could do as he willed and others would also do, again, as he willed. He set up establishments, rules, policies, governments. He did everything to keep his authority, his control. He used the stick, the carrot, the bullet and the ballot. 

But lost them all to revolutions, coups, wars and Freedom. 

Only puppets dance to the tunes of their masters. People don’t.

‘Cogito ergo sum’ - I think therefore I am, Rene Descartes has said. 

History has proved time and again that monarchies give way to democracies, hegemony steps aside for free will, and monopoly surrenders to choice. 

We played a childhood game, Simon says “Do this”. Well, Simon can keeping saying. Cause nobody’s listening! 

There went his control over society. 

By now Man was desperate but he did not give up. 

He turned to the spiritual. He evoked the fear of the unknown in others. ‘Thou shalt’ and ‘thou shalt not’ became the weapons of his new trade. Every word uttered by him was law; every act committed by him was religion. He assumed de-facto leadership over the masses. He was the soothsayer, the faith healer, the heretic, the seer, the prophet, the God. 

Man’s authority was unquestioned and his commands were obeyed. His control was far greater than ever before. 

People worshiped him, fell at his feet, idolized him, cannonised him, deitized him. 

‘So shall it be written, so shall it be done’, Rameses had spoken. 

But it was Moses who eventually conquered and whose will was done. 

Awakening, Education and Life pulled the masses out of Man’s trance. They started questioning his ideals, his beliefs, his deeds and his words. Till now he did the thinking for all, but now they themselves practiced thought. It was okay now to be an infidel. To be a contrarian was normal. His followers left him for another and another. 

He was now alone. 

His power had eroded. His control was lost. 

Dejection and dismissal plagued him. Despair controlled him. 

Or so he thought. 

There was no way Man could hold onto to control. He had strived and schemed for it, but it had always slipped through his fingers. Would he never master Control? Would it always evade him? 

On the contrary he would find it. 

He had had it all along, but never realized that he had it. 

He had never understood it and would never understand it. 

He had not known how to use it and still had used it unknowingly. The more he used it, the greater the control he had. 

He would never lose it, and didn’t mind losing this Control. 

What was this Control? 

LOVE, my fellow men, LOVE. 

It was Love when his six-month old baby peed all over his important office papers and then gave him the most beautiful smile any man could ask for. 

It was Love when his wife offered him his most hated vegetable as dinner which he had sworn not to eat, but she had cooked - just for him. 

It was Love when his Son paid the bill at the restaurant because he was now earning more than his father. 

It was Love when his daughter wore his favourite shirt and stained it with sauce at the party, came back, hugged him and told him how everyone loved her in that shirt. 

It was Love, finally which made him part with his Credit Card, the TV remote, his Car, his free will and his faith. 

It was Love which gave him ultimate Control over everything. 

And then he suddenly realized – he never really had control over Love. 

It was Love that controlled him.