‘Kissa’ of my Car #3 (when I became the consumer)

This is the third post in the series of entries detailing the mental turmoil I am going through while convincing myself to buy a car. You can figure out the earlier entries if you try hard enough.

After having convinced myself, my parents and the people around me about my decision to buy a car, I experienced this feeling of extreme calm. That night when my parents teamed up with my decision, I dreamt of myself sitting in a 70mm theater watching myself drive a car all alone on the screen. It wasn’t a slow motion sequence. It was extreme slow motion. I saw my hands on the steering wheel, the road was endless without any sign of any other vehicle and the sky slightly overcast. As I rolled down the windows the heavens wept in joy. Chilled droplets of water gushed inside and touched my face creating a sensation throughout the body.

And since it was a dream, I have no clue when it got over or led to another figment of imagination. When I woke up what remained, was a pleasant memory and a question: what car was I driving?

I tried really hard to recollect. I could afford to spend time on trying to think over my dream as it was a weekend. I took it a step further and decided to sleep off once again hoping that I would dream the same dream all over again. Sadly, I didn’t.

So the question remained. For a moment I felt that my situation was similar to that of those young girls who would imagine their knights in shining armour driving down from the heaven on a white stallion to set them free. In their case, there would usually be a bright white light that would make it impossible for them to see the guys face. In mine, it was just memory lapse.

However, as I kept thinking more about the car that I had seen in my dreams, my vision of the world around myself with the cars in it changed.

As I stepped out of the house for the first time that day and walked past the cars parked outside my building, my speed slowed down. Till now they were just vehicles that belonged to others in my building. From now on, they were cars. They had probably always been in existence, but now they were alive for me. Now they were a part of my world.

Before I reached the end of my lane, I felt that my eyes were moving along with every car that was passing by. It was as if a magnet attracted some piece of iron.

I smiled to myself and looked enjoyed this new way of looking at life. I always thought that I could observe things closely. However, I had never explored this dimension of my faculty. The days that followed, saw me observing more and more cars. Asking questions such as what is a beautiful car and what is an ugly car? While travelling in the bus, I would stare outside the window more than concentrate on my reading. I tried to understand why a car was named what it was and how cars were different from each other?

This new phase of calm was an eye-opener and let it pass slowly. I enjoyed each moment as I always saw something that I had not explored before. This was my trip.

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‘Kissa’ of my Car #2 (when I became the consumer)

This is the second post in the series of entries talking detailing the mental turmoil I am going through while convincing myself to buy a car. The earlier post can be accessed here: http://advertisinginsight.blogspot.com/2011/06/kissa-of-my-car-1-when-i-became.html

By now, I felt that I had convinced myself. Or was it really?

Arriving at a decision is anyways difficult for Librans (that is me). My sun-sign aptly visualises my mental conundrum using the beam-balance, which keeps oscillating between two opposite sides.

On top of this, taking decisions about important events such as career, matrimony, purchase of an expensive asset, etc. in India; acquires a completely varied dimension. In such cases, your choice needs to be tabled before the family, friends and peers in the social and professional circles for approval. A thorough analysis is then carried out by these experienced and opinionated ones who most often are not even a part of the Google+ circle; yet hold the position of key influencers in your life. The matter is duly considered by them. Somewhere in this process, they also ensure that your choices are conveniently forgotten. Over time the judgement is passed. Usually it isn’t in your favour. And you can do nothing against this ruling.

I have two key sets of audiences to convince: my parents and my friends & colleagues.

My parents felt that buying a car is an eventuality predicted in my charts. However, considering this purchase at the current moment is like throwing a challenge at my destiny. I need to wait till the time is ripe and the stars occupy the apt positions in the sky. I should concentrate my efforts on building assets such as gold, life insurance, mutual funds, house, etc. for now.

I had somehow predicted this response and kept my rebuttal ready. The speech was a mix of emotional drama and functional reasoning. I dropped the emotional weaponry first by narrating my gruelling bus journey to work and back each day in a public bus. At times I would not even get a place to sit. On days with bad traffic, which are common in Mumbai, the journey would last eat into around five hours of my time in the day. The icing on the cake was when I mentioned how I felt like forcing myself to eat dinner after returning home.

Seeing positive reactions on their faces, I decided to launch the functional reasoning. I argued about how I should spend my hard earned money on repayment of loan which I was currently spending on uncomfortable public transport. I told them about how I could drive them over to meet up with various people on weekends and also have a social life for myself which has almost reduced to zero.

I guess they were convinced even before I had launched my functional argumentation. Parents being parents can accept anything other than their seeing their kids in any form of pain. Having completed the first part of my struggle, I decided to initiate my discussion with the next set.

One would wonder why is it important to seek approval of friends/ colleagues while buying a car. I faced the same dilemma, yet I could not stop myself from seeking social approval from people around me.

For me, the reason to do this is because of my faith in the law of karma. I want my progress and success to be perceived as an outcome of my hard work and efforts and not a sudden jolt of luck. As per the law of karma, one needs to do enough of good deeds to be blessed with goodies in return. The perception I wanted people to carry about me, is that my car is an outcome of years of toil and not a sudden change in fortunes. That is exactly how I confided my intentions into the ears of the people around me. I used my collection of stories about hardships and that would leave a long lasting rags-to-riches image in their minds.

Having conquered both the audiences, I had successfully managed to cross the second hurdle to reach my long cherished dream of owning a car.

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