In our younger days, we did it. Even today, some of the teenyboppers, traipsing on the terrains of teenage, are still doing it. That is, shining in borrowed feathers, wherein, during some occasions, they bedeck themselves in borrowed fashion apparels or accessories of their bosom buddies and flaunt them as their own. This rather innocuous act is done for fleeting moments of borrowed glory.
However, there is yet another unique breed of human species, who try shining in someone’s feathers – not for few moments, but forever in life! Here, I am reminded of an over garrulous lady, who used to get into grand monologues, during our get-togethers.
Once, she was holding forth her dreary drivel on, “You know… my maternal aunt happens to be a topnotch lawyer in her city. My bro’s friend is the new dean of a reputed medical college. My friend, a novelist, keeps cranking out books, which sell like hot pastries…My paternal cousin, working in a prestigious MNC, got pitched up to a plum position recently with a pretty good pay-hike….” Then, someone beside interjected her verbal deluge with, “How about you?” Needless to say, after that she remained all clammed up, ceasing to speak!
There is yet another way, in which people try ‘shining’, wherein they unscrupulously try usurping the credit/compliments, belonging to someone else. Some time back, I was at a friend’s cousin’s house warming function. My close pal, using her copious creative energy, had helped her cousin, in creating a cool magnificent home decor.
When the guests started showering encomiums on her cousin over the exquisite interiors, merrily she basked in them, without even acknowledging my friend’s contribution! In fact, in many places, we witness this phenomenon, wherein the person actually responsible for a remarkably done work, would be somewhere unobtrusively hidden in backstage, while someone else, would be wrongly nabbing all the credit from others around!
We fail to realize that when we shine in others’ feathers, the joy we derive would be for only ephemeral moments. But, when we shine in our own feathers, the joy would be everlasting.