Be yourself my child

As a kid, I was told to carefully listen and to carefully see,

“Be yourself my child”, my mother told me;

I used to wonder and ponder about that piously,

Anything but myself? How could I be?

As I grew I learnt about diversity,

All those different colored birds that flew gleefully;

Not all birds fly I learnt slowly,

Frame of reference in Physics now meant so much more to me!

Those debates in college and those rivalries, 

Made me understand that I should think before I speak;

Such reflections on actions became the key,

To muddling through to adulthood, from being a baby.

Making like-minded friends along the way,

Helped this co-evolutionary process;

Those cards and cups and clothes we shared, became artifacts of friendships,

Meaning so much more to us, though no one else cared!

The rebel in us didn’t need those prescriptions,

Deviating from norms was reflecting in our actions;

This framework we’ve followed hopefully takes us somewhere,

It has helped me rekindle with a dazzling flare.

Now in this light I am realizing,

How some frameworks I followed without understanding;

I merely accepted someone else’s assumptions,

Didn’t think if it’s applicable to my disposition.

“Be yourself my child”, my mother told me,

Those words as an adult are dawning upon me!