Lessons from a turbulent flight

Extraordinary airplane turbulence 35,000 feet in the air is God’s way of reminding us who’s really in charge and how little we control of our lives. Two weeks ago, on a flight to New York City, we experienced such dramatic turbulence and altitude swings that most of us started saying our prayers and strangers started looking at each other for reassurance, after losing the fear of appearing afraid or vulnerable. The only time I’ve experienced something like this was in the movies. Taking cues from Hollywood, I was waiting for my life to flash past in a series of fast paced images. I was almost curious to find out how my memory would select and deselect the happy and sad moments from my life. For the nearly 20 minutes that the turbulence and rapid swings continued, I kept waiting for my life to flash past by me. But that moment never came. 

Don’t be afraid of telling people how much you love them

Instead of any flashes of the past, I felt a burning desire to tell my closest family and friends how much I loved them and how sorry I was for not expressing it enough. While this might seem obvious and cliche, the intensity with which I wanted to show my love, took me by surprise. I wanted to apologise to my parents for periods of my life when I didn’t call them for days — all they wanted was to hear my voice but I was too busy with my life. I wanted to tell my fiancee that I’ve been holding myself back from actions and expressions that show love because I didn’t want to create unrealistic expectations, which I couldn’t meet after marriage and I didn’t want to be the husband who changed after marriage. Now, I wanted to kick myself in the gut for holding back from telling her how much she really means to me.

I wanted to apologise to my brother for not calling him and his wife for weeks at a time. I felt guilty that he always calls me first. I wanted to thank my closest friends for bringing so much joy during my university years. What in the world am I so busy doing every day if I don’t have the time to tell the people closest to me that I love them? What sort of twisted society do we live in, where expressing our love makes us appear weak and vulnerable, while bottling up our feelings and taking them to the grave is a sign of strength? No wonder most of our heroes in Pakistan are either dead or flirting with death. We’re afraid of letting people know how much they mean to us. We prefer keeping them in check instead. This paradigm flips on its head at the end of our journey, when you realise that it’s the love you give to others that gives meaning to a relationship, not just the love you receive. 

Joy enters your life when you lose your sense of fear

After running out of every prayer my mom had taught me, I had to innovate. I promised that I’d be a good Muslim, human being and tell everyone close to me how much I loved them when I landed. But I still couldn’t get rid of the overpowering sense of fear. Perhaps, not the smartest thing to do in this situation but to distract myself, I thought about what I’d actually regret in life if something went seriously wrong on this flight. And the only regrets I had were for the things I wasn’t doing, because I was afraid, imagining the worst case scenarios and what people would say and think. My fears in everyday life — although less dramatic than what I was experiencing right now — were actually having a bigger impact on my life choices and happiness as compared to this turbulent flight. So I promised myself that I would practice living fearlessly and see what it felt like. 

Human beings forget

I landed and forgot all the promises by the time the taxi got me to my destination. I told my fiance about my flight experience without much drama but asked her to help me practice living life without fear. I didn’t tell everyone how much I loved them but did try to live life fearlessly. Every time I found myself making a choice under the influence of fear, I tried to picture the flight and put the fear in context. Life slowly became more colourful — like moving from a black and white TV to a colour experience. I realised one way to keep promises is to write them down and have others hold you accountable. And so, I’m writing this on my flight back home. Here’s to hoping there’s no turbulence on the rest of this flight.

Published in The Express Tribune, February 25^th,  2016.

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