Frail is the nature of Fame

I walked upon the sand at ebb-tide.

And bending down, I wrote a line upon the sand.

And in that line I wrote what my mind thought

And what my soul desired.
 

And when the tide was high,

I returned to that very shore,

And of that which I had written I found naught.

I found only the staff-marks of one who had walked blindly.

Source: http://www.ronedmondson.com/2012/04/reflection-on-the-poem-footprints.html

How True!!! The prophet that he is Kahlil Gibran wrote this about fame long back and people like Tiger Woods, Lance Armstrong, Oscar Pistorius, Britney Spears, Ben Johnson experienced this very frail nature of fame themselves.

Worst part is that the list seems to be getting updated thick and fast…..

Will Vijender Singh, the Indian pugilist, be latest entrant in the list? I hope not…For Indian Boxing needs such ‘Pin-Up Boys’ to make the sport popular in India.

I started to ponder over the etiology of ‘Celebrity Today-Zero Tomorrow’ syndrome. In my opinion the drowning reason, contributing reason to this syndrome is ‘handling fame’ or the lack of it!!!

Only those celebrities who are successful in understanding and maintaining success metamorphose themselves into Role Models/Heroes. Following is blow by blow analysis of why celebrities fall from the pedestal. (Note: These are my own opinions and I stand to be corrected, moderated or even vindicated!!!!)

• Once they taste a little success, once they become a little famous, ‘I don’t give a damn’, ‘Devil may care’ attitude becomes second skin of these celebrities and the focus on the job at hand is lost.
• The world for them begins with ‘I’, flows with ‘Me’ and ends with ‘Myself’. They start to believe that ‘I am the king of the world’. The transition from….

-   God fearing to hardened atheist: For they believe they are God

 - Grateful to ungrateful: Disrespecting, sometimes even disowning the very people who had helped them reach this far

-   Humble to haughty

….happens so quickly that even they do not realize when they have crossed the Rubicon.

In such a ‘high’ they indulge in activities, which they otherwise would not have, and one such small mistake leads to shattering of the glass house, knocking them off the pedestal…..

Samuel Smiles had said “The work of many of the greatest men, inspired by duty, has been done amidst suffering and trial and difficulty. They have struggled against the tide, and reached the shore exhausted”.

How true is that!!!. Today celebrities do not reach the ‘shore’ exhausted; but they reach ‘in a high’. Nowadays getting famous is not as painstaking it was earlier. Thanks to the media…. celebrities are created in a jiffy and felled overnight. Singing Superstars, Acting Greats, Dance Kings/ Queens, Idols, Master Chefs are created every six-eight months. Such quick fame follows the universal rule ‘What goes up quick; comes down even quicker’. Within no time such ‘neo celebrities’ become ‘no celebrities’ and continue to live that ‘semi celebrity-semi commoner’, confused life.

Well; do not get me wrong, I am not saying that these celebrities have not done the hard work.. Yes they have worked hard to reach where they have reached…but many fail to maintain the success, fail to cross the chasm to reach the next level…Role Models.

Living peaceful life atop Mount Everest is even harder than scaling it!!!! In order to sustain at that stage once needs to understand that:

- Fame/ Celebrity status is quicksilver, Fame is like vapor….difficult to hold

- Fame is blind and noisy applause

- With fame comes the responsibility

- One needs to be really dogged, down to earth, humble and really passionate enough  to guard the celebrity status.

A case in point is Vinod Kambli. In my opinion he could not handle success that he achieved. He and Sachin Tendulkar created history by amassing 664 runs together, Kambli scoring 349 of those. There was a time when cricket connoisseurs rated Kambli better talent than Sachin. But 24 years after this record breaking partnership, the comparison ceases to exist completely. He will certainly not be counted when the list of cricketing greats is being drawn up.

As Richard Lord writes “Kambli, represents one of the greatest wastes of talent the game has seen. What his story really shows is that at the top level, talent only gets you so far. Because even if Kambli wasn't more naturally talented than Tendulkar, he certainly seemed more talented than just-retired Rahul Dravid. The latter, almost exactly a year younger than Kambli, was bolstered by a temperament of steel, and went on to an average of 53 in 157 Tests and the second-highest number of runs in the history of the game.”

I am in no way trying to belittle Kambli’s achievements, but just trying to drive the point that steely resolve could help you to reach the level of Role Model.

Cases of Lance Armstrong, Tiger Woods and Oscar Pistorius show that, our belief in these role models can come crashing down at any time, thus from now on, we need to be super selective while tagging a celebrity as ‘Role Model/Hero/Idol’.

In my opinion, only those celebrities whose achievements stand the ‘Time Test’: 25 years of untainted working/professional/personal life or minimum of 5 years post retirement; should be considered Role Model…       

Lata Mangeshkar, Asha Bhosale, Abraham Lincoln, Nelson Mandela, Rod Laver, Ratan Tata are all legends, ‘Role Models’ for they have stood the “Time Test”.

Yes we already have few souls like V. Anand, Lionel Messi, Roger Federer, Sachin Tendulkar, Leander Paes, Rahul Dravid who can be treated as role models.

Humans are only fallible, but I hope these souls do not falter even once and remain role models for all their life,  because in today’s ever shrinking, secular world we need such role models to look up to. As now famous lines from Spiderman go “Everybody loves a hero. People line up for them, cheer them, scream their names. And years later, they'll tell how they stood in the rain for hours just to get a glimpse of the one who taught them how to hold on a second longer”.