www.indicorps.org
Where do you see yourself in the next ten years? Our direction, our choices and our success have as much of a bearing on where we aspire to be as where we are from. The connection to our heritage is a powerful one and it is this that fills a void in understanding who we are. At the heart of this lies an identity, a connection with our homeland, a bond that has a limitless capacity to share and develop. Our love for India and its people provides the fuel, our skills suggest an ability; but how can we now fuse these in such a way as to serve our country, and in turn to develop ourselves?
There is a beautiful richness of culture, a deep and sacred spirituality that we can learn so much from. The identity we seek will never be found in the midst of the glitzy wedding crowd, nor will it be found in the hyper shopping streets of Mumbai, nor even in the Bollywood bazaar. Our identity is intrinsically linked with the people of the real India, the people that make India, the people that are India. It isn't just something that we will learn from them, but the meaning of all things beautiful: an unconditional love from untouched lives.
When I sit in a rickshaw and drive past the most spectacular buildings, then come across the most heart-pulling children asking for some money; when I eat in an air-conditioned restaurant, then look at the poor, scraping through the rubbish for food; when I know that I waste water, and yet there is a lack of clean water in India; that's when a question arises, a question that must have crossed your mind: can I make a difference?
The skills that we have, we can use to change and cure many things. Given the opportunity, we can become great leaders through a dual service, participating in an improvement of their lifestyles and a development of our lives. Let's give back to India what India has given us. Let's resuscitate an inherited identity.