Say it while you can

My father is a happy man. One of the best kind as they come. He doesn’t take anything to his heart, never impolite or loud or rude. He accepts and battles everything with a smile. But there is just one thing I see him regret. As he recollects, years ago, he came home to his village from the town he was working at.

After spending his vacation in the village, the night before departure, he sat with his dad and both of them had a couple of drinks. As the night drew to a close, his father said to him, “There is something I wish to share with you which is important to me.” My father in the swing of drinks and exhaustion from a long day, told him that he could rest it out and they could discuss it in the morning. The next morning though, in the rush of packing and catching the bus they couldn’t sit down and have a talk.

15 days later, since that night, my grandfather passed away. The conversation was left unfinished. And to this day, my father tries to guess what his father would have said? He longs to go back to the moment when he suggested for the sharing to be done the next morning. He wishes to know what his father desired to share.

That incident, especially when my father recounts it, leaves me gasping for air. I think of all the people I have something to tell but I haven’t had the time or courage or will or words to express myself.

What if we all are postponing the important stuff for another morning? What if that morning isn’t coming? It isn’t promised. Nothing is. I am provoked to say or share what I feel in the instance I am moved - whether it’s a compliment, a note of love, an emotion that needs to be unburdened or a song that needs to be sung. Allowing ourselves to give fully into listening or sharing in the present moment must be the fundamental truth of mindful living. The weight of guilt or regret or not knowing is too heavy to bear.

Our favourite joke, a nostalgic story, a deep secret, a long-due thank you, a delayed apology, a memory of yesteryears, a dream about an unknown tomorrow, an idea brewing inside of you—Do not let anything be buried within. Give it your voice. Our throats shouldn't echo with words like an endless tunnel. Our mouths must never become graveyards of what could and should have been spoken. The bigger tragedy than not being understood is to have never expressed.

As my father emphasises when he tells that story, “The moment is the moment. There is no substitute.”