Bottle

Bottles come in many shapes and sizes, colours and functions.

The first bottle that we encounter are the baby bottles we hold in our hands when hungry. They have the best shape of all bottles. They used to be made of glass, which is really heavy for the small hands. Now, they are mostly made of plastic. They are much lighter and the shapes and colours become more attractive. Over the years, as people discover the dangers of plastic, parents are moving back to the safer option, glass.

As time goes by, we make new discoveries and decisions that change our lives for the better. We only look forward.

We can relate the life that we are living in to a bottle.

When we are born, we have no choice but to be the little fish living in the bottle. Our parents choose the contents they want to feed us with. We can be fed natural foods like worms and moss or we can be fed manmade granules which is supposedly compact with nutrients. Everything that our parents feed us with is the best we can get.

As we grow, the little bottle can no longer contain us. We overgrow and overflow with knowledge and choices. Which is better?

Perhaps we feel that being protected is still the best choice. We choose to live the way our parents tell us to, the safe way. We choose to live the way our teachers guide us to, the correct way. We believe that the elders are more experienced and they know what is best for us, or so we think. But what do they really know about us? Whose life are we living for?

We may feel stuck in one way or the other. May be it is time to shape ourselves and learn to be someone we really want to be. There is no point living the dreams of others while setting our own aside. In the end, we are the one walking ourselves till the last breath. We cannot expect anyone else to be there with us, though it may be wonderful.

Life may challenge us to the brink of giving up in whatever we do. However way we choose to live, there will always be events that arise against our wishes. At that point of time, we loathe them but when we quiet ourselves, we will find a way to go through or around them. Either way, we get past the challenge and move forward. There will come to a point when we pause and reflect back, we will understand that the past challenges we have been through are inevitable to growing us to become who we are now.

Life is not coated with sugar. Even if it was, sugar is versatile. It hardens when cool and melts when warm. It can be shaped, and coloured as to how we want it. It can be as pure and clear as glass or as fragrant and tasty when burnt. It can be dissolved and mixed to become something extraordinary. For the sweet toothed, sugar is a need. Whenever the person feels happy or sad, the first thing they will think of is dessert.

Lately, motivational speakers have created a way to make people understand the way of life with just a bottle and the contents in the bottle.

If we look at a bottle, it is in a fixed shape and size but what it contains make a huge difference in its function. We put stones in it to the top, and it seems full. We throw in peppercorns and observe that they fill in the voids between the stones, and it seems full. We add fine sugar and find that they even fill in the voids between the stones and peppercorns, and it seems full. We pour in water and find that it fills up all voids between the stones, peppercorns and fine sugar, and now it is really full. Overtime, we notice that fine sugar has dissolved into water. Some of the peppercorns will float while some stay submerged. The stones have not altered a bit. If we are to keep this bottle capped over decades, there may or may not be any further changes.

We have many choices. We can be the stone, the peppercorn, the fine sugar, the water, or even the bottle. Studying how objects behave in different situations and ponder upon them, and we will be surprised how it can change our mindset in life.

Whether we want to be the bottle or be contained in the bottle, is entirely up to us.

 

Inside my empty bottle I was constructing a lighthouse while all others were making ships.

Dusan Simic (Charles Simic), Serbian American poet, 1938-present