One of the best lines ever said in a movie or elsewhere come
from the movie “The Shawshank Redemption”. It is an inspiring movie; the pace
of the movie belies the climax.
Remember Red, hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things, and no good thing ever dies.
Every time I hear word hope, I get reminded of
the movie and the line above. Every time I think about it, I get to think about it in a different
way, based on the phase of life I am in and the state of mind I am in.
The part that I hadn't noticed so much earlier but that
comes to my mind when I got reminded of the movie today was the pace. There was
hardly any urgency or many tense moments throughout the movie. It just takes an
easy and lazy pace, definitely out of tune with the climax that is awaiting
you.
I also thought a little bit about the restlessness that
comes with hope. Your restlessness is driven of the fact that you don’t like
your current state and you would like to change and you have some hope of changing
it. But the fact that there is restlessness is enough to spoil your present and
for some folks that is the kind of hope they have, which can make them miserable,
like Red said in the movie.
Let me tell you
something my friend. Hope is a dangerous thing. Hope can drive a man insane
The kind of state Andy appears to be in the movie is a sense
of acceptance that comes with finality. Some times that fact that you are in a
dead end state drives acceptance and you end up compromising with your current
situation. That is the sense you get out of most part of the movie as he tries
to do things inside the prison as if he is going to be there forever. The acceptance
hides behind itself an indomitable spirit and an undying hope that remained
alive despite near impossibility of ever being able to get out.
In the end the hope does work out, but the aspect that
struck me more this time is the possibility, what if it hadn't. Would that be
considered a sad ending? It wouldn't be exemplary ending (and definitely worse for a movie), but then the way
things seemed to be going it seemed an acceptable ending for Andy. He was doing things, changing
his world in little ways possible for himself. He built a name and reputation
for himself, made real friends, real relationships, had leisure, time to
indulge in his hobbies (some if not all). A lot of things people in the outside
world struggle to keep because of a lifestyle they chose for themselves or
decisions they made in life. The point that struck me was, it probably would
have been OK for Andy even if he wasn't able to break out. He seemed happy and
content with where he was. Even though he was aspiring for more, it wasn't as
much from a sense of hating his situation and trying to escape it, it came more
out of being OK with the situation but still striving to be at a better place,
a content-er place if you will. As he also comments at some point
Get busy living, or
get busy dying
A hope that drives madness and spoils your current situation isn't real hope. The best kind is the one where you don’t end up being
miserable in your present, yet you look up to something even better.
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