Looking for second chance at happiness? Living a better tomorrow is a step away!

Life yields a second chance to every one of us. It’s called tomorrow. And it doesn’t happen by chance. We begin to live our second life the moment we realize that we’ve got only one and fancy a new morning with a fresh chance to make of it whatever we want!

I think that’s great!! Life is just too short to leave things at odds.

The only creepy thing about it though is that these breaks rarely happen by chance and for the most part are scary. What if everything ends with the same outcome? How’d I know that I ain’t cloning the same mistakes and nothing is actually going to change?

That’s funny! While we anxiously hope and look forward for some kind of rescue, fear of unlikely payoffs is hurting!

Angst aside, I believe everyone deserves a new start even when we cannot control how it is going to end. Making bad choices is normal but regretting them is what makes us free to choose again.

Like Qusay Hussein, a wounded Iraqi teen who met a new life in the US, when I think of my childhood, I think of colors; the dull brick red walls and the deep rich greens of the lush front gardens on either side of our beautiful home. More like him, I gave myself a second chance to learn and grow along others after an early exit of my dad left behind shattered dreams and hard times. I didn’t do anything real until I was 25. Not only after a few impromptu accomplishments in post grad and doctor’s, that I could gather enough courage to test the unknown! And all the time I was sharply aware that it was really a shot at becoming who I wanted. It all had stretched out like one long dazzling promise to break out and shine! Sure I wasn’t hungry for a huge career but something that I’d enjoy.

I held on to all the chances that came my way...

I’m not sure when the wakeup call tipped off but it did saw me a lot wiser … I’d come to realize that it’s never too late to do what you love most!

Just a few years ago, I thought everything was over, and now …I’ve discovered my happy self!

Everybody has a story to tell

I don’t think that happiness is big or infinite or that you’d meet it only when you get your second break. People make mistakes all the time. No one’s perfect but you cannot rewind the movie of your life to the point you thought was Ok and play it again. I gave myself chances upon chances until I realized that I can only change the movie from this point forward.

Giving yourself a second chance doesn’t make you stupid; it means that you believe that you can change for the better. It’s an opportunity for you to learn and grow and be a finer person.

Look… I’m not the first or the only person who’s made bad choices in life. And neither are you. So why stay pissed off over something that can be won back!

People often make bad ones only to regret later. Everybody does, but that doesn’t mean that they have to pay for them for the rest of their lives. Sometimes even good people make bad choices; it doesn’t make them any more severe! Like everybody else they too get hurt but they learn and they move on.

Life is short lived to hold on to the past. Can you imagine yourself not giving someone a second chance? I can’t. Things never go the way we all want most of the time, but that doesn’t mean you’d hang on to hard feelings and not allow yourself a free happy life! If you don’t forgive someone and give him or her another shot, you too will be drawn into a dirty ‘negative edge pool’. Worse, you’ll drain yourself emotionally completely.

Not only that if it weren’t for the second chances, we all would have lost good friends, warm relations and perhaps missed a snug hug back home. Trust me, it’s human to make choices we think were right but so often turn up wrong and end hurting others.

We’re not perfect and we would never be. So forgive, forget and buzz off.

Giving somebody another try is your one more chance to thrive and be happy.

May be on that day, you could finally let go and move on.

For Colin Thackery, the Chelsea pensioner who won BGT at the age of 89 or for Jan Jacob, who at the age 50 realized she was a gay- it wasn’t the first time that future had looked uncertain or the life felt painfully strung to a distant North Pole. But both were certain about one thing; giving themselves as many chances as came their way; second, third, fourth; they seized each one never knowing when they’ll get one again. They knew that someday they would find a way through to smile again.

Today their phones are all filled up with texts and calls and I’m sure they have umpteen exciting stories to tell.

Whatever… I’m glad their lives could help show others how to live their best lives too.

Curiously, their tales remind me of a somewhat sweet and noble virtue…

“It’s never too late to become everything you want to become. It’s never too late to try again”.

That’s how life is!