Your Beliefs or Mine?

People I know, closer and around the year I descended on this planet, are indulging and how. In satsangs, chanting, joining cults, motivational meetings, self-disciple-ing and the likes. And here I am beginning again to read books, exchanging ideas with newer people (sometimes half my age), thinking of travelling, giving up on 'No-chicken on Tuesdays' notions, wondering if it's too late to start a new vocation and the likes.

It is quite confounding to see how we are formulated with this basic urge to slink into roles at different phases of our lives almost as though sleep walking through it. My mom tells me "High time you start devoting your mind to some place now" like she began telling me I must get regular facials as soon as I stepped into my thirties. Like it's an unwritten rule and blasphemous to go otherwise.

However, I look around and wonder who's getting the better or closer to what's within! The same are these spiritual devotees who return back satiated with the idea of having “found” themselves at a certain level and then let manipulative bitchiness of the television serials consume them. Or allow the desires of flaunting their assets or knowledge, override enjoying the simple pleasures. Splurge on materialistic acquisitions and squirm at the idea of not being invited at someone's party while the whole town was there. Gossip and judging others is what feeds them, doubts nurture and the "me" surfaces most conspicuously while they demand time to do something for self to make them selfless. Kahe ka self improvement! Ghanta!

I also muse over my own relationship of convenience with God. Say a "Thank you for being with me and stay with me" is the only prayer I manage to sneak in everyday and sometimes I forget even that. Cramming my head with the notion that God shouldn't be narcissist enough to want to hear you praise him in mantras and read holy scriptures all day. That's a human craving, isn't it, minus the semblance to divine, or so we've learnt? Spirituality sounds like all the things that you already know being told to you so that you forget and be told about it differently next time. Tell us about it if you remember it still while you look down upon someone wearing a tacky dress or narrating animatedly how you heard XYZ's wife is having an affair. Some people don't need to grow within. They first need to grow up. And if it is just a brilliant ideology that dazzles you, dive in Literature, saunter around the lanes of fiction, join Twitter, whatever!

Maybe they are right and I am wrong. I do have these occasional bursts of inner ruffle. Don't they? I'd like to reform too as soon as someone convinces me that reformation comes with the guaranteed assurance of no-ruffling. “The frequency would be less”, they argue. “You'd be more patient and make peace with problems”. Hmm, isn't that what we anyways do when problems don't seem to be fringing on solutions? Tell me about the middlemen who've shunned limelight to light your soul. Who say beyond what age-old moralistic values have upheld almost blindly through time! Who let you believe what you believe in and not what you should believe in!

The priests and the sadhus and the babas and the gurus and the palm readers, insist they can change your life but for that you must have faith. I say bring that change first for me to watch that faith being born within, than have to cultivate it in, as though through surrogate mothers of your believers.

Or maybe I miss G who's gone on tour and Seeya who's begun school from today or this is just because I've not eaten anything remotely exciting since Navratri fasts ~ the ranting of a hungry woman. Why I keep them? I have no idea. Just been keeping them forever. Perhaps because the only reflection for me of God can be "ma". Perhaps because I want to clear my conscience with the idea that "Kuch to mein bhi karte hoon" after all. Or perhaps, dizzy in this pseudo superior complex of my idea being better than theirs, I’m looking for an excuse to give up fasting from next time and indulge in the pleasures of food. God would understand, won’t He? He does not want me to stay empty stomach to feed His ego? Well, I always win in the argument against him never mind if the world thinks He is just a silent observer.

I'm the Queen of the World!

So I saw Queen last night finally-

A. Because of all the hype created around it.

B. Because in all cuteness people were asking if I had seen the flick and wanted to know how I felt about it *I feel so critic-ishly kicked*

For otherwise, it would have been difficult to make me watch a Kangana Renawat movie just by the merit of her being in it.

Like I’ve said before, it is always better to watch a movie before they cram you with their opinions on it. The perspective is always truer.

Queen IS beautiful!

Also, I am beginning to realize that I can relate to anything onscreen that is based on a sense of abandon, with streaks of freedom from the stereotyped molds. It sometimes sends me into self introspection mode going in circles in my mind till real life takes over (Also the reason perhaps why I never watch anything on television). Aren’t we all trying to break free from whatever it is that defines us? Those tucked deep in riches want to live life the common man way, the common man strives to get out of his mediocrity, the house bound wife seeks adventure, the nomad travels relentlessly to find a base to root into and so on. Hence we are unified by a common thread for that desire to experience the uncommon of our lives.

Perhaps this craving is right. Why else should we get up from our beds each morning or what else would we dream of when we go to bed at night?

Queen celebrates the idea of being on your own.

Such a defining thought!

And for someone like me, it was a personal nudge. I CANNOT travel alone. Is there a name for the fear of traveling alone, some kind of phobia? Well, if there is, it would be what I suffer from. Ironically for someone who in her heart only sees herself as a nomad, experiencing life from place to place, is declaredly scared if she finds herself alone at the airport for over 5 minutes for the fear of being left behind or someone digging out drugs from her bags and getting her arrested before anyone even discovers she is missing. Not that I’d be travelling by air in those mind dreams.

Anyway, how beautifully does the movie sketch the female psyche!

I remembered my own mehndi and a thousand different thoughts zig zagging in that little head of mine like in Rani’s while the entire space around was a menagerie of sorts. That flickering doubt that came and went- Is it too soon? I haven’t even become anything in life yet? I might not become anything in life post this? But too many hopes hanging on me of everyone I’m pinned with, to tell them now to let me live my life first instead of building another one as a couple. My grandfather telling me he was glad he was seeing me getting married and could now die in peace; which he did within just three months of me leaving that house. Girls are like that or grow up conditioned like that in varying degrees - whether they live in Lajpat Nagar or not.

But then not everyone would be as lucky as Rani to be able to squeeze out a life from a latent existence in an unknown land. In a sense, the movie was real but dipped in a beautiful fairy tale flavor. The freshness emitting out of the fact that she became her own Prince Charming rescuing her from the gnawing miseries!

G looked at me intermittently through the scenes telling me now and again, “Seekho” implying on the streaks of independence as was being sketched out on screen. Little did he care to ponder over though that with an independent body comes a very independent mind! While driving back from the theatre, I asked him what did he learn from the movie. He’s a smart one now, my husband; he asks back- “What do you think I should learn from the movie?”

And very complacently I said, that it IS possible to have friends all over the world, who may or may not subscribe to the same age group, social strata or thinking genre as our lives are in. It is not always sexual. (Dear Mohnish Behl saying in Meine Pyar Kiya- “Ek ladka aur ladke kabhi dost nahi ho sakte”. Yes, fuck off!)

And he smiled mischievously for he refuses to believe one can find genuine friends over the internet and be close to them, even sometimes surpassing real life friends we’ve lived with. He shakes his head when I tell him of a 23 year old friend who confides in me, his life's trials and tribulations or of a 55 years old someone whose voyages on the sea fascinate me as though I journeyed with him. It is possible to share lives with strangers. Not all strangers come with dangerous motives. Some come with empathy that familiar faces find it strange to offer, without petty judging. And a woman thinking out of the box is not playing with her character.

But the most important thing that dawned upon me from there - Nothing good will happen to your stuck up life till daaroo happens to you! Oh yes!

I always forget I am reviewing a movie after a paragraph on it.

·        I wished I could see myself standing on a crowded threshold with that huge-ish map and make out anything from what seems like gibberish there.

·        I wished I knew what heeng was called in English, for friends around then looked up to the “English ma’am” honouring her presence to the group, to enlighten them.

·        I wished I knew how to contrive golgappas, even on Indian soil for that matter, to be able to eventually have that first kiss with that Italian hottie.

·        I wished I was streamlined Lisa Haydon-ish enough to be able to wear some Alexander’s shirt and scream out of the bathroom for the fear of some lizard, which I anyway do.

·        I wished I knew how to wear a bra like that under the covers just as stealthily as I can take out one.

·        I wished my parents would have at least let me go on that all-girls school trip in class 9 from my convent school. At least some kind of taste of that life on my lips for my life to look back on and not write such dreary reviews.

Let everyone live their lives before someone decides they should walk the aisle. Let that someone be the one who has to do it.

P.S. I still loved Highway more. While everyone gushed over Alia’s performance, I still can’t get over Randeep’s characterization and how well he sank and vanished into it, losing every iota of who he is otherwise. To an extent Kangana did too. That’s why these movies work for me. Also I’ve told my husband I am going to America alone now just to face my fears. He says, first try and book tickets uptil Unnao from here, some 100 odd kms from Kanpur. And to think I thought he’d be a new man post the movie. Tch!

Lunchboxing with my Mind.

And I’ve just returned from watching The Lunchbox.

Strange it is how sometimes things happening around you are not motivation enough to write but a contrived screenplay of a couple of hours on the big screen forces you to send your brain cells for a little jog or may be a leisurely saunter in the by-lanes of your mind, so far blocked or ignored in life’s humdrum.

I knew the story would not appeal to my husband, so I tagged along a couple of my girlfriends. We had seen Lootera and although he enjoyed it, he went weary with the pace. The Lunchbox seemed even tardier, like a soft uncertain wind trying to raise its head in a placid backdrop but bogged down before it can rise, managing only to rustle a few already withered or on-the-verge-of-crumpling leaves. Most people can’t relate to sentiments, especially when we are used to of motion or suppression.

I loved the movie.

Perhaps because I am, at a certain level one such leaf watching autumn slowly color my evergreen pride?

Perhaps because the idea of two people who are absolute strangers getting to bond through a thread of simple conversations, is not new skin for me?

Perhaps because as a woman I could relate to the restlessness in Ila’s form that wants to be heard, wants to be important and seeks a purpose of this all?

Perhaps because as a human I could empathize with Mr. Fernandez, a man who knows how to take care of himself but yearns to be taken care of?

Irrfan’s character is heart-warming, a face in the crowd yet subconsciously refusing to accept being one. He looked into that bathroom mirror and said that the space smelt of his grandfather and stiflingly comprehended that he was that grandfather ~ it was nothing short of a revelation for anyone who beholds such a marvelous conceptualization. He says he realized then he had turned old. Here was a man welcoming an early retirement, a man who lost his wife to old age and the same man who did not fathom when old age dawned on him. How amazingly well captured an emotion it was that only someone on this side of the fence would relate to!

Do we really realize how gradually age catches up on us? One day we are twenty and things move on, like a whirlwind sometimes and like the standstill of waters at the other. While weighed down in the twenties to establish our identity and lives, all too soon, thirty knocks at our door. We open the gates and let him in, as though it was in guise of opportunity, with a bit of apprehensions and some exhilaration too, for such a thing is anticipation. Little by little every day the same old drudgery as nothing changes and then one fine day we are forty and out of the blue everything’s changed forever.

But does the person who live inside the aging body really change? His aspirations, his fancies, his dreams, his desires, they remain ageless. He molds himself to the accepted beliefs of the society to behave in a certain mature way because that’s what adults do, to think in a grown up manner, to give up on particular things because it is the way the wheels of the society turn. He surrenders considering perhaps his aging bones too weak to stand before the frail fingers that could be raised. But the heart ~ It still remains at some threshold where it found its identity and continues to stay there. It just loses its legs or will to move on.

How empty are lives that get trapped in the wheels of earning a livelihood everyday so they have no time to stop and stare even at each other perhaps? And then some other voids that just make you stop and stare at them, having no motivation to stop doing it? Lives that have within their grasp everything a normal person should be glad to have and yet feel like sand hastening through the gaping edges of the begging palm.

I remember in the early years of my marriage I would leave little notes in my husband’s lunchbox, his office pouch, his wallet, his cupboard drawer, etc.-something that would remind him of me out of the blue and make him smile. Yes, a hopeless romantic like that. I would put up a picture of someone with open arms asking for an embrace or a sticker that said “I want you every day” in the inner cupboard door to catch his eye as soon as he’d open it. I would send him random messages of “miss you” at particular times to build the stimulation of meeting me upon reaching home eventually. I don’t know when I stopped. I don’t know when it began to seem that he had more important things to do than get bothered by inconsequential notes popping every now and then, every here and somewhere.

We give up and give in without realization.

When the protagonist says he should have looked at his wife laughing at those now forlorn serials a bit longer, my heart went out to him. Why do we realize we should have loved a little more, laughed a little longer, lived a little livelier only when it is no longer possible to do so?

I came across arguments on Twitter that stated had it been an aging woman and a young man in the same scenario, the society would have not been so generous in accepting it. Sad, that we want acceptance of the society for every bloody thing. They fail to realize that it’s not so much a matter of an old man and a young woman, or a married woman and a single man and other such classifications. Marital status or age is immaterial here. It’s the matter of two mortals trying to haul out their individuality through a reflection of similar needs in each other; the acceptance that such an unearthing of oneself is possible at any milestone in life and through our co-passengers in this journey, whether they boarded on the same route with us or not.

I was quite glad that the director here did not make a moral issue out of the entire predicament where the characters find themselves. When the man writes back to her asking if she would go to Bhutan with him, I quite anticipated a horrified Indian woman sentimentality surfacing that would go aghast at the idea of having crossed the line or even of its thought crossing her mind.

I silently rejoiced when she didn’t.

It is distressing to see people judge others without knowing what places in life they come from. What’s wrong with an old man finding a girlfriend? How is it morally a crime if a married woman finds solace in someone’s words outside the bounds of her matrimony that the dwindling threads of it fail to ensure? What right do we have to stop someone from getting happiness from whatever that redeems him unless we have better ways to ensuring it for him that pleases his hungry soul?

It’s a love deprived epoch that we live in,

Where money is easy to get and people difficult to find!

Where faces abound but familiarity fails!

Where we laugh too often but smile too less!

We live in a world where living it up is not thought as much as finishing it all up. Yes, the streaks of such ideas cross by even the sanest of minds. Like she said, we all find ourselves at some point or the other, ready to take the plunge but the depths to which we would have to fall, freezes our feet and numbs the mind. We continue where we are, allowing it to lead to a slow, excruciating death than a sudden, end-all one.

Little battles of little people. Millions of lunchboxes opening every day and so do millions of hearts. And day after day, without a second glance, with eyes riveted to some other priority each time, they come to a close. And the sun sets and the sun rises and the fan on the ceiling continues to sway.

My New Grown-Up Drug.

Once upon a time, I read books, dedicatedly, painstakingly, like a pilgrim at the threshold of his pilgrimage. Books consumed me, as I would devour page after page, lost in translation. Then along came people-with speaking faces and myriad feelings, with mincing grudges and obsessions, with overriding affections and affectations, with intense emotions and motions. Their moving hands, the receptive ears, beholding the tingled skin, the eager or hesitant mouths which round and widen, taking shapes of smiles and frowns, as words flowed out of them effortlessly and sometimes, post great deliberation!

Yes, I had found the more grown-up drug.

Faces can beam and rot you know, taking from blossoms. Not due to age, but experiences. It’s not about ‘Does the face make you swoon?’ It’s more about ‘Does it make you smile?’ Faces tell stories, they are an index of our minds, of all that is otherwise latent and sublime. Not eyes, they just need an empathetic heart. Have you noticed someone getting goose bumps on their skin post something you said? Yes, priceless! Sensual pleasures are just not restricted to bed-they can be derived by receptive senses, anywhere and anytime.

The voices, ah! You see most by listening. You could travel up and down an entire scale of passions with the voice that perhaps could personify character itself-the way it ranges from sometimes jingling with excitement like a fresh water spring to soft whispers, like falling into a bed of cotton caressing you with gentle taps till within. Voices don’t lie, people do. Voices entice, beckon, ensnare-like little magical spells that are woven by their mere echo on a person’s hearing. Eargasms, anyone? A soft, passion-smeared whisper in the ear can often be equivalent to the adrenalin rush received by wild searching fingers on the body, the chill down the spine.

I began to study people as though with a voracious starvation, live little lives and learn little lessons. They come wrapped in bundles of expectations and a cartload of disappointments, helping them evolve every minute. Sometimes they live, at other times let-live. Real, breathing, heaving, sighing human beings-they brought along with them hitherto untold stories, of lives they’ve led in bodies and mind. They respond to touch, whether or not there is any skin contact and they embody drama that we only hear of, for like they say, truth is stranger than fiction.

Words are potent, as books prove. However, when they emanate from voices separated from us by miles, generations and no relations, they just touch or instruct us. But when they stem from a person we know and look up to, how quickly they take, to not just touching but clinging and mingling in our very fabric. Words become you. They fill the empty specs, some voids that need to reverberate with some words, magnetically searching each other in the noises of the world. Romance, you ask? Well, yes, to a certain extent. For when he fills your mouth with his words, it is also a kiss or something like that.

I took to people-fascinated by the realms of lives unravelling layer by layer into a common man’s grand saga. How like a bud someone slowly opens to you and how like the petals then slowly encompass you within an embrace of trust! I took to being a co-passenger with some, lighting their path with whatever wispily shone within my own horizon, lending a listening ear to a mouth that craved to be heard, or just giving the complacent pleasure of the knowledge that someone’s there to care.

It’s a more long term gratification that a book could compete to concede. They say you live lives with books-fall in unadulterated love, climb lofty, indomitable mountains, dive into the alluring depths of oceans, conquer countries, travel path-breaking journeys and the likes. Human experience is all that and more.

Reach out to people. Be interested in their stories than in relating your own woes. For in un-knotting someone else’s tangles, you derive solutions for your own. Get outside of books, get into people. Find those worth drenching in, for such are the showers of communicating with brilliant minds that leave you wet in ecstasy of an unheard kinds. Books could help you search your soul, people could end your search for the soul mate.

As I write, I look wistfully at three freshly bought books lying beckoning on my writing table. The scent of a new paperback how like the scent of a man, tends to sneak in your insides to pull from within. Perhaps, I would return to my old love again. Or perhaps, there’d someday be someone to read to me the same. A cold winter evening, a balmy fire place, hands curling onto a simmering coffee mug and a huge bean bag wanting for us to give it shape. Come, let’s glow in this fire and as I sit looking at you mesmerized, read to me from a book and then from a life!

Nobody Loves Me.

Drama and I have an age old association.

Usually blah these days, while in conversation with a dear friend I crooned my eternal favourite drama line “Nobody loves me” in my whining, attention reeking-seeking tone. And just like that he suggested putting it up on my status to see who all do. And yes, just like that I did. Some 90 comments later, this is what I have concluded from it all:

1. Fine, a lot of people commented though 1/3^rd of this number was my own replies. A little drama never hurts anyone, but I don’t take chances and go all the way.  And three people actually “liked” the idea of me being unloved-et tu Brutuses. Bah, Facebook has gone to the dogs I tell you!

2. There were comments from:

       A. My brother (My own khoon, calling me crazy and attention seeker-meh!)

       B. My mother (The epitome of naatak-giving me a jhappad)

       C. 2 Maasis (expressing less concern for me and more for my G)

       D. 3 Mami jis

       E. 4 students

       F. 3 sisters-in-law

       G. 2 students’ mothers

       H. Handful of cousins

Really people? This is NOT THE love I was anticipating! I know hum saath saath hain, but family planning will have to step down for my flirt planning to materialize. Waise, I am blessed that none of them raised an eyebrow at such a distorted status-Nobody doubts me ;) Charm runs in my family, it practically gallops and so does over-expressiveness it seems. Control people, let others take the stage sometimes.

3.  I realized that many of my Facebook friends’ favourite national pass time is calling me a ‘Nautanki’ and how generous I am to provide them this fodder to graze on. Nobody appreciates me should come next. Any references to donkeys is purely coincidental and unintentional.

5. Some great minds sauntered in there and voiced how they empathised and whimpered that nobody loves them either. Ahem, so I ended up doing the very arduous task of sharing the already dim spotlight-boosting their sagging whatevers rather than focussing on my needs! I am a rebirth of the Buddha it seems-such selflessness is unheard of in Kalyug.

5. The targeted audience-THE MEN, were conspicuous by their absence. Bloody hell! What a waste of well-chalked out Naatak! I was hoping for some inbox messages at least to salvage my sinking self-worth or MSA (Market Shelf-life Analysis) but the box was as empty as my brain. *Sigh!*

6. More women dared to openly address the issue of loving me. Yes, that is a nice way, Dear God of hinting that since the men are anyway absent, I might try rethinking of my preferences-the Mayans were right, the end IS near.

7. I think I scared away any remotely prospective “I love you” with my little stint. Sometimes things pop in my head and jump feet first out of my mouth-I need to handle this OCD. Random fact-Most women suffer from some form of OCDs-Obsessive Caring/Cuddling/Cribbing/Crying/Cursing Disorder. Mine is Obsessive Cuteness Disorder which more often than not, materializes and backfires into Chutiappa sometimes.

8. Not ready to give up, my next status was:

Tough choice-To buy a branded watch or a DSLR camera first, especially since I don’t have money for either now.  All those who professed love for me yesterday on my status, now is the time to show. Even if you contribute 10% each, I will feel very loved. Truly!

Only three helpless comments so far, mostly suggesting that they love me but their hands are tied-as if I asked for their kinky bedroom details.

So now, all love has vaporized. Kitne matlabi duniya! *sniff, sniff*

Nobody loves me! *Now where are one of those crying icons when you need them?*

Dear Girl nursing a Broken Heart

Dear Girl nursing a broken heart,

“Sometimes you just have to erase the messages, delete the numbers and move on. You don’t have to forget who that person was to you; only accept that they aren’t that person anymore.”

You know world over, genders alike, there is one disease that is slyly killing vulnerable souls even of the strongest of exteriors-heart breaks. The higher brains need to develop some vaccinations or immunity from heartaches instead of spending time, resources and intelligence on things like bacteria and atoms. Meh! The world is equipped to handle itself-we collapse miserably when it comes to managing the inner void, desires and unrequited love.

Everyone may smugly think they are above it-no sir, you are not and definitely not you ma’am. You mistake tumbling for love and you've just not fallen still how you should. We all are likely to get enslaved, with or without our knowledge or permission. The higher you fall in fantasy of someone, the lower you sink in depths of despair after having lost him or her. Love in the extremes is really what and how love should be and hence the most difficult to bear by your insides whichever side the see-saw dips. Even when at its brightest and most passionate, it burns you yet with restlessness!

It is not the moving on part which is difficult-it is the fact that you keep turning back to see if there are any remnants of what you sowed or has the harvest been burnt beyond recognition. You can close your eyes to the things you don’t want to see but how does one close the heart to stop it from feeling what you don’t want to? Yes, it is that tough and you are not alone my pretty one in feeling thus.

It is sad when the people you know become the people you knew. It is not so impossible to comprehend the bafflement of how you spend hours with someone discussing life as though he was a fabric of it and suddenly he gets covered in a veil that you find difficult to pierce through or reach out to, however you squint your eyes and fuck your brains for it. With every deep breath you take to puff yourself up with courage, you know something inside always crumbles. You wait for him to realize what he gave up on and repent while the wait slowly withers you within.

Love is like that-sweetest when it is lifting you up and cruellest when it throws you with a thud. You wish he chokes on the words when he says “I love you” to another girl. What makes you most generous, can very well turn you most heartless-for it robs you of all emotions. And when someone leaves without a reason, it becomes a sore point and pull for life, a point of no return.

People say that the most painful thing in love is losing someone whom you loved; not really-the painful part begins when you realize that you lost yourself in the process. The ache culminates into anger, frustration, regret and hopelessness borne out of the doubt and that tormenting, looming question-why did you allow yourself and your happiness to be dependent on one person?

Love stories that do not wrap up in a “happily ever after” are the strongest. It is perhaps because they leave us with many ‘what-ifs’ that you turn and toss over despite being on the most comfortable of beds that life may offer. We crave to hear the truth...Was that the truth when you said you loved me as if there was no other human filling up the earth or is this the truth when you choose to look through me like I am unwanted or non-existent?

Girl, do you hear Beyonce play in the backdrop while I talk to you? “You are the only one I wish I could forget and the only one I love to not forgive. You’re everything I thought you never were and nothing like I thought you could have been....” Beyonce is a wise girl. Love can make or break, give or take, mourn and elate. Such an oxymoron!

So now that you are ruined, how do you help you? Talking does the trick-not to someone else per se but to yourself. The brain may be the smartest of all organs but silliest when it comes to being convinced and especially of an argument born in itself. Cry a river-build a bridge-get over it. Tears perhaps were watery by default for a reason-they cleanse as they drain. Don't fight them, don't resist the closure for therein might lie the key. Let him know how you feel now-for if he wanted to hear how you felt when he tingled your body with mere words, he ought to know how he makes it shudder too.

You have to remind yourself that he may continue to live in your heart but there was no way, he could have lived in your life. And until you are broken, you don’t know what you are made of. Collect the pieces and start as a whole again. Try not to remember half the things you will never forget.  The best way to ensure you don’t go treading back on his path again, is to erase the footprints you walked along with and uproot the milestones that lure you to digress again.

It is often seen that people jump into one relationship from another. It is not because they are fickle-it is the best way to nurse the wound of the organ which was meant to just pump blood but does everything unspecified instead. A new muse for the broken heart is as necessary as new strings for a guitar that loses its rhythm. It helps you to not keep running back to the one person you need to walk away from. 

So keep the mind alert and heart open to allow the one who suits your fancy again but be patient for comparisons would set in and it would be a while before you find someone interesting again. But then you will-that’s how we are conceptualized. You tend to find things that attract you and the things that attract you tend to somehow reach to you.

Also vomit the anger and pain on someone who is ready to take that shit from you-there always is. Be proud of every blow made at your heart for it left you with lessons that made you stronger and wiser for future. And remember you can never make the same mistake twice, the next time it will show a choice. You can never be “just good friends” with someone you loved once-the feelings fade with time or injury, but they never die if they truly lived when they did. So don’t look to be friends, accept the anonymity.

Realize that what is dead must be buried before it deforms to something ghastly. Realize that you can live without him-his first mistake was leaving you and then now, allowing you to bring to fruition that you can live without him. The very people who said they would never hurt you are the very those who take your heart to task. Guard yourself and your self respect. Don’t dismiss it in the name of pride-respect it in the name of your individuality. Anything that does not make us happy has no right to live even in the periphery of our existence.

It will hurt for a first few weeks, maybe even months but then life moves on, love learns to unlearn and heart aspires to mend and fend for itself again.

I know dear girl, it seems the end of the world for you fear you won’t find anyone this perfect again. His perfection was an illusion-a pedestal where YOU raised him to for nobody is perfect and that’s what he should become-a nobody. Learn to unlearn, grieve to rejoice, rise again to stamp down-chin up and smile to scare the doubts away and drag yourself out of the bottomless pit. There are many who deserve you in all your glory so gather it before you lose the sunshine.

And then keep the faith-Love does not hurt, lovers do.

Take care and heal fast,

Yours lovingly,

Been there, seen that.

All that hoopla about Flirting-Sigh!

While rummaging around for Jawarhar Lal Nehru’s picture for the last post, Google brought to me some more interesting facts about his persona and extra-curricular activities.

Though I had sighed and cringed and pined in ‘Impressionable Reading!’ about his unfaltering loyalty and exemplary love, interestingly Google says Lady Edwina Mountbatten was not the only one who was flushed by his overflowing juices of mush, drenching many a women in ecstasy.

Hmm...Kya baat hain, Nehru ji, India’s very own n perhaps the only Casanova n charismatic Prime Minister.

The ‘stumbled upon’ post mentioned that Nehru could not help being an incorrigible flirt. Wow...path breaking-the man who wrote The Discovery of India, seems like he made many cute discoveries for his own wandering self too.

My first impulsive reaction to that was of OMG and I felt he just fell thud down from the enviable altar that I had unpretentiously sited him on.
On second thoughts*and thank god for them*I pondered over if it really was such a blasphemous sin to tarnish the poor guys’ super dapper clean stint otherwise?

Is flirting as bad as the general scrunching of noses that it evokes, followed by an unreasonable character assassination?
Could Nehru really help it, being in the enviable prime position that he was and thereby privileged to come across the crème of the society?
Many of these would have been women who were distinguished in exceptional lady like graces and would evoke praise even from their own gender...and in such a predicament, my friends....kya hua body Prime Minister ke hain to...aakhir dil to bachcha he hain na ji!

I have never tried to be a hypocrite and hide the fact that I love to flirt.
I often cite it as a favourite hobby where I feel the listeners would not be shocked into an untimely demise caused by irreversible stroke of heart failure.
Occasional flirting keeps me alive...my creative juices flowing and provides me the mind games that keep me at the edge.

And I don’t pretend to do it under covers, I make my beloved stand with me and watch me play and watch him smile.
He knows he would never find me in a bevy of ladies twittering about the mundane, but in a circle of men, bursting into guffaws for I would be enthralling with a tease*sigh for those days too as post Seeya my reins seem to suddenly go in a heartbreaking state of restraint...my own heart breaking that is, rather than of anyone else*

Of course though in most cases it is harmless and more of ‘blah, blah’ big talk than thunderous and volcanic “actions”!
*Look at my comment box for example...I never miss an opportunity!*
And whenever it has fringed on being harmful to my mangal sutra and maathe ka sindoor, I let the urges pass by and sigh some more.
*What the heck...as if by sighing less I would reduce the global warming...so I sigh to my heart’s content...er...discontent...whatever!*

My point is...why does flirting harbour in the territory of negative discretion by the so-called social guardians?
With education and self dependence, opening up of minds and perceptions, it is a very natural urge to impress the opposite sex into a belief that you are a cut above the rest in your gender.

It is an unsurpassable ego boost to have someone intellectual, be inclined to hear you for he finds you interesting enough to hold a conversation*of course in case of men, let’s say the ego boost would come by someone sexy as hell, inclined to see you for she finds you interesting enough to bed...and there we sigh again! Please don’t keep a sigh count in this post....numerically that would be a challenge and hence this statutory warning for I like my readers to have a furrow free mind*

Another point of dispute here would be the very definition of flirting.
One man’s dip may be another man’s drowning*ah...what a mind-blowing twist in the proverb...giving the world a new, blaze a trail theory...
I am so damn good that I sometimes scare myself only*

Like take me for example*yes, a scapegoat again for the experimentation to derive onto pioneering conclusions that alter the destiny of mankind*
What I term as flirting you might deem as just interesting and intriguing conversational skills and if you are crass and unintelligent and pseudo-modern, you might call me a kalank to naari-jaat!

I like to hold the interest of a man in my conversation...
I sometimes let the laughs flow like a natural cascade and smiles to remain a permanent fixture on my pretty face.
And I might unwittingly ask you questions that show my genuine interest in you. Contrary to what my blogs project, I am a better listener than a talker.
I notice, I sometimes bat my eyelids a little too innocently or use the signature handshake of my softest of hands to make a point.
As if making these things ain’t enough I also make the wittiest of repartee and rebuttals without wasting a moment of thought on it.
My voice sometimes becomes huskier than usual and somehow a twirl of a lock of hair playfully dangles down my forehead.
Alrite, maybe I don’t use all of these arsenals together but I have seen them being used and win many a quaint battles.

Of course also these are observations and not conscious deliberations.
But the frequency of these naturally occurring behaviour patterns, made me stumble upon the idea that may be I am a natural flirt and these instinctive urges flow out without so much as even an effort required from my side.

Like I said...some may deem that as just dipping my feet in the troubled waters and others might rip me apart for having the waters gone past my head already.

Flirting is an integral thread of the fabric of today’s society and anyone out there with a reasonable amount of impression made has used it to reach where he is...consciously or impulsively...in greater degrees or less...garbing it in the array of charm or flaunting it in the wake of his sexuality.

So can the moral police please rest in peace and let the flirt games begin!

P.S. I do have some standards too...so flirting with the author in the wake of this post, without the essential back-up of my list of requirements may be injurious to your health.

Impressionable Reading!

It is amazing how sometimes some things that you read move you to the core n stay with you long after your eyes have waded though those written words that blot the paper.

I remember reading Ritu Beri, the famous fashion designer somewhere...
She was invited to a high flier brunch by one of her English friends.
She reached the quaint suburban villa to see about a dozen ladies sitting pretty and twittering little nothings around a round table.
Ritu was led by the gracious hostess to her seat and slowly the chit chat began. She introduced herself to a lady called Danielle and after the pleasantries, Ritu unconsciously harboured upon how tough she was finding it to manage work n social calls and her home, due to the fact that she had recently had a baby.

After sometime of whining n blabbering on her harsh calls, she suddenly stopped short and a little embarrassed, when she realized she had spoken so much about her troubled state of affairs to a stranger and muttered an apology saying she won’t really understand it.

Then Danielle remarked, “No, I wouldn’t...I am just raising nine of them.”
She was not just any Danielle you would find on the prim English streets.
She was THE Danielle Steele-the fêted author of uncountable mush drenched, best sellers. Those were top selling books that she wrote between changing diapers and singing lullabies for nine babies...omg!

How bloody beautiful is that, isn’t it?
Makes you feel so small for whimpering about ‘me, me, and why me’ in the face of the mildest brush of a storm.

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I also vividly remember leafing through somewhere about the ‘mute romance or really?’ between Pandit Jawahar Lal Nehru and Lady Mountbatten, the better half of the then Viceroy of the British-India Empire, Lord Mountbatten, apparently in the latter’s full knowledge and perhaps approval.

She was a striking embodiment of all the British suave and nuances and he, the charming leader of millions...an eloquent speaker and an unparalleled wizard of words.

It is said that after a very brief encounter of secretly admiration and then perchance open confrontation to each other of the unquenchable undercurrent of an attraction...they were separated.
Not bogged by distance, Pt. Nehru wrote a letter EVERY day to Edwina till the rest of his days, laying bare his love-anguished heart and a suitcase full of these heart rendering mails was discovered after her demise.

Omg...can you imagine the intensity of such love?
The urgency of performing this as a sacred and unbreakable ritual despite having a million teething troubles of a nation just born on your head?
What an unfathomable exchange must have transpired between the two to evoke this allegiance in the fickle matters of heart!
Absolutely unsurpassable!

Even in this age of internet when doing so is possible just at the click of a button and if not a mail...even a phone message would certify*thanks to free messaging plans*...would anyone still do it and continue to do it every day till the very end?

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Another impressionable mention should be made of what I came across about Umberto Echo, a university professor at Bologna, Italy.
He taught for most of the day as well as wrote books on semiotics, children’s books, academic texts, essays and also the best selling fiction novel ‘The Name of the Rose’ which had sold 10 million copies in those times. His written output is staggeringly large and he had acquired the equivalent of intellectual stardom.

When asked how could he manage to do it all within the constraints of just 24 hours in a day...how did he find time?
Echo simply and enigmatically replied with a brilliant allegory and explanation. The world is made of atoms, with empty spaces in between them.
If we remove the empty spaces, the atoms could fill up perhaps just in our palm. Similarly he finds these empty spaces in his schedules which gave him the larger-than-life attitude.
Between the duration when a visitor would reach from the ground floor to his doorstep through the elevator, he said he would have written an article.
That’s the relevance of such fissures that each one has in his life no matter how break-neck is his agenda.
Some squander it away in waiting for the next thing to happen, some use it...squeeze it to the core to derive the next big thing!

If only I could ever write/suggest/relate something half as inspirational...my job here is done!

We are made for certain things and maybe not for others!

I was having an interesting conversation with a dear friend the other day when a kind of hypothesis or premise appeared quite conspicuously to the fore!

I was generally cribbing about the odious tasks pertaining to motherhood*I swear I have not cribbed so much in 32 years of my existence on Mother Earth as I have in the last 32 days...Motherhood makes you a cribbing pot, dear folks...so beware n please bear*

Okay...so I was generally ranting n doing waa-waa*sob, sob* when this friend pointed out to me that maybe I was not made for motherhood!

It struck me as a thunderbolt for in my subconscious I was always afraid of the same!

You know how people beam post having a child in their arms...
A smile is like a permanent fixture and could put even Monalisa to shame...
My countenance is often the display of exasperation n tiredness!
And if there is anything that I am sure of on this planet, it is this that I would have felt the very same had Seeya been born of my own womb!

After entertaining my daughter for an odd three-four hours at an end and anyways being 24/7 around her*she hardly sleeps* and for lack of other expected sources doing the needful, I am at a loss for more means or energy to amuse her any further!
I mean I can engross an adult for hours at a stretch...but a one sided communication...I wondered what makes mothers go on n on...

So I did what I thought was sensible...becoming Ms. Sherlock Homes again!
I enquired of other women if they actually had any similar tendencies or am I the only weird one on this planet...
Thankfully many of them report of having gone through severe bouts of depressions, PMS that got extended to months*ouch* and some even saying that they were so tired of the constant yelling n bawling of the child that they did not want to see his face for a while*omg*!

Thankfully, things have not gone down that road!

But sometime or the other...I miss my old life that I had been used to of, since ten years of my married life!

Being responsible for no one else really but yourself!

Having the whole day n often night also to do anything n everything you liked!
Gyming...long walks...happy times with your beloved when you talked about each other and other F-words instead of farex and fever...
Coffee with friends...random dinners...parties...a movie every Sunday...
Blogging my guts out...flirting my heart out...making new friends...giggles over the phone...
Teaching for six hours a day n loving the interaction with kids!
Shopping whenever discounts hit the market...parlour visits...dressing up...occasional holiday trips...n more blah blah...
Basically leading a pointless, self-centred life and so busy enjoying it to the core that not even getting bored or apologetic about it!
I loved my life despite also the constant and crushing struggle to have a baby!


Cut to now...it’s been some one n half months with Seeya!
I have hardly moved out of the house...not tasted any outside food apart from ghar ka khaana...no gym, no walk...teaching now for only a couple of hours a day!
Not left Seeya alone or away from me except for two hours just this Sunday when we went for a movie...
Not much of my mad blogging since the inspiration sources are not around!
Been generally cut off from friends for the fear that I’d just be cribbing again and bore the life out of them...
No time to even get threading done...not worn a lipstick in these days, forget about dressing up!
SSTTTOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOP!
So there...I go on my whining trip again!

However, thanks to my infinite amount of innate sense of justice-a Libran trait...I know I would do all my duties to the best of a person’s abilities...
And also have a hunch that in all probability and god being kind, I might even win a ‘Best-mommy’ award in future...
Every day my hyper active kid*certified by the doc* smiles at me with her eight teeth now or clings to me in the biggest of hugs and I melt faster than ice cream in sunlight!

But yet, I would never be half as good as my mom...or half as ready to sacrifice all my happiness altogether and never feel even a twinge of pain about it!
Isn’t that what motherhood is really about-the epitome of selfless sacrifice?

Anyways...what premise I reached on was...that we are all programmed in a certain way to be or not to be!
We are cut out for certain tasks and not for others, regardless of the fact that we may perform them with immaculate perfection!
Deep within each one of us knows what constitutes us and what can make us happy or less happy if not!

Like many people are not cut out for marriages!
They may have lived with their spouses for life n celebrated jubilees with much gusto. But to themselves, they know they were meant to be wanderers or free spirits...or they were meant to love more than one person in life...they were destined to be alone to be true to their intrinsic nature and inner satisfaction! They were so given in to introspection and mood swinging aloofness that often people around either did not understand or bother about them too much!
So some day they look out from the window and ‘sigh’ which nobody hears!

Like this friend pointedly n often asserts that he shall never marry!
He’s in his early twenties and I often dissuade him with my utopian ideas that marriages are good!

I quote my own example and enumerate compelling benefits of a happy matrimony that could turn the worst of detractors into believers*you know how relentless I can be*!
But with time I realize that maybe he is actually not!
He has a roving eye, is extremely cynical about good marriages, having seen some bad ones around him...is more of a loner and hence gets either too carried away by company or rather soon bored of it and countless other reasons!

My point is...
Just because it is a social norm followed through ages, it does not mean that it is supposed to be extended by one n all with a blindfold!
We must think twice before advising someone that ‘you’d get used to of that life in time’!
Let the person decide with his own subconscious in counsel.

It is not necessary for girls to get married at an early age...or marry at all till they do not feel ready and yearning for it!
I still have unmarried girlfriends I went to school with, who have rocking careers and good lives and no hurry still to walk down the aisle!
Why should we judge them...or give unsolicited advice of its after effects in later life?
If they are old enough to vote, aren’t they old enough to accept responsibility for their liabilities?

Neither should it be a matter of compulsion to have kids because you are “supposed” to have them!
Most people often look at kids as a retirement ensurance plan...
‘I want kids so that there would be someone to look after me in my old age’
Little do they realize that most kids now-a-days go away for further studies or better prospects of life n seldom return!
Want kids for ‘kids’ themselves...not for yourself!

I am slowly fitting into a role with 100%effort and undisputed dedication that has been bestowed on me for that’s how I am programmed...
Whatever life throws my way, I must adorn it in such a way that no finger can be raised against me!
People still quote my G n me, when they talk of an exemplary marriage!
But how many of us feel trapped in roles assigned to us?
Jobs that we detest!
Spouses that we care two hoots for!
Cities that cram our creativity!
A public image that we must live in even if it slowly makes us die?

Any landmark step of life...that can alter the way you are n how you live...must be given thorough consideration, deliberation n motivation before realization to remain truly happy in your skin!
Understand what is your true calling and if you are being moulded in the role that you may not be fitted for, would you do justice to it?

Know what you are programmed for and strive to fuse that in your life or realize what you truly are and hence at least banish some clouds of baffling doubts n uncalled for struggle!

Okay enough Gyan from Suruchi maata....hopefully a more cheerful post next time!
What have I realized through this vomit of my thoughts above?
-It is time to put a complete end to any trace of cribbing from today!
Full stop for full good! Phew!
I need a BIIIIIIIG hug now....time to wake Seeya up for that! :-)

The Thailand Mystery!

There is something very alluring about Thailand and I feel there’s a reason why I have not yet been to this land!
*Based on statutory warnings I guess: Highly volatile substances should not be kept in close proximity!*
Actually the only phoren lands that I have traversed are Singapore n Malaysia...the poor man’s foreign get-away or so I taunt my beloved with...boo hoo!

But just what makes Thailand such a popular get-away?
Now, you don’t need to be Einstein to know that!
But just in case, you were born yesterday*like me who was born only last year* lemme provide you some rays from my enlightment!

In the last two years, the influx of tourists travelling to this particular destination has seen an all time rise!
How do I, the smarty pants, know it?
Well, I ain’t no researcher or statistician!
But more than 15 couples in our friend n acquaintance circle have been here so far and some doing it as a yearly ritual!

In fact I tease a couple of them saying, last year they went for a fling n this year they are probably going to meet their offspring of it!
The third year would be the first birthday day celebration n so on...
*you know how I can go on n on...so I’ll spare you the details*

On a serious note,
Curious as to why only Thailand, keeping aside the fact that shopping is cheap n abundant...I was finally successful in my probing!

Some say they go there for the massages!
Now, now...I have nothing against massages and you are welcome anytime to gift me one at the nearest n most extravagant spa, to render me as your devout follower with lifetime validity!
But then those in Thailand are massages where you don’t just lay...you get laid*and for once...all the puns intended*!

The sandwich massage as I thought and as I discovered, were two poles of a stick*never mind, which stick!*
Me*minus enlightment*: Sandwich massage is when two people put themselves over n under you to give you a massage with...their hands*yes, in the name of sweet lord...I was THAT duh!*
Now please don’t ask me how the f@#$ did I fathom that ANY massage in such a way was possible?

Anyyyways...
Me *post enlightment*: This massage includes making you a sandwich but in more ways than one...it is everything a massage can be and everywhere it could be and more. The rest of it is kinda haaaaaw...so run your own imagination horses, people!

You can pick the women of your choice, nationality, colour, contour, age...
Yes sir...womEN, whom you’d like to provide you with the service n the services!
You can have fun to your heart n body’s content and come back to the hotel and relate the adventures to your spouse with all the frenzy and kicks possible!
I have even heard arguments to the extent of “She spent those thousand bucks on a Louis Vitton bag and I spent it on my body...what’s the difference? Both were seeking pleasure!”

My point is...
Why are certain things being readily accepted, without raised eyebrows or disdain, just because you are in a foreign land?
Had the same rituals been performed at an arm’s distance from your own house, it would have been termed as philandering and your character having gone through an ass of an assassination!
Some standards we all live in!

Second, why paid sex, as a form of recreation, is more likely to be acknowledged while a physical association like just a casual one night stand looked down upon as cheating?
Isn’t that just a matter of social fear and set norms then that makes us moralistic or otherwise?
We want to be technically correct rather than sensibly right!

Often still, cheating in body is considered worse than cheating in mind...
What sense does it make?
Whether you are physically cheating on your partner or mentally committing yourself to someone...you are any which way being disloyal!
You can’t claim to be “pure” after verbally being involved or physically having strayed!

Third, when one thing is right for the man, how come the same thing becomes a question of chastity for a woman?

Amsterdam n Thailand have provided a different flavour to the variety-hungry traveller n also the voyeuristic one!
It is no longer a matter of watching with a gaping mouth when a nude show is performed in an arena! It is a form of art!
I have heard stories of how shows based on unimaginable tricks performed by unthinkable body parts are a rage with the Indian tourist!
It has become a matter of pride and flaunting that you were a part of it!
Strip tease or pole dancing bars and the likes are now on the agenda of a city tour where such flavours are openly available!

I am not trying to be moral police here!
Heck, going to Thailand and not having experimented is like going to Thailand and not having the Thai curry!
Err...okay...I know that analogy sucks! But point gone home, right?
I am just openly wondering!

In fact I tease my beloved to go ahead and be a tad more adventurous...
We must try out things at least once before discarding them as useless, insane, or dumb!
Whoa, I was all out looking for massage parlours in Singapore that would have lady masseurs giving him a dose of some fun...though it’s sad for him I did not succeed despite voracious efforts!

But then I put a simple condition before him that always acts as a leash...
“Whatever you try out, expect me to do the same too!”
And that ends the story there!*diplomacy you’d say...I say nopes...its tit for tat...and never mind what’s ‘tat’ here!*



So...do I condemn or condone?
I really don’t know...lemme go n get some first-hand experience of “stuff” myself and enlighten you further!
Now you can’t expect me to have all the answers, can you?

Till then...to each one his own!
Let’s keep our judgemental caps off for a change and anyone wishing to sponsor my Thailand holiday for his upliftment via my enlightment...
Please feel free to email me with details and win a special mention in the next post...free, free, free!:-)

My Unfailing Golden Rules for Living-The Secrets for Standing Tall and Smiling and not Fumbling...

It’s a new year and the apt time for new beginnings...
So let me share with you some living mantras that help me go through the hum drums and the stumbling blocks that life throws at us every other day! I often find myself at the giving end of advice...how fruitful or otherwise though, my friends can tell better. But their smiling faces after my ‘gyan’ session makes me a compulsive guru of sorts, always ready to open my ‘gyan ka pitaara’! So what makes me tick? It’s actually not me at all...just a few tricks that just about anyone can connive!

These are no eureka discoveries...we all know of them...but somewhere deep if we merge them in the fabric of our existence, they do help us bear the worst of storms with infinite optimism and boundless courage.

Do not take the credit or blame for whatever you are doing in life...attribute it to God!
(Before going into any sermons of any sorts...let me tell you I am not religious...I spend barely 5 minutes every day with God at an average and at my convenience.) You just have to remind yourself each time: If I gave a brilliant speech that received a standing ovation...it was not my doing or intelligence that got me there...it was God generating the ideas. I don’t have to be vain, for my intelligence or beauty or power can go whoosh within the batting of my eyelids. Then again, if I got stuck at the very crucial presentation and knew that I would be reproached and accused...it would do me good to take deep breaths and tell myself repeatedly that “I” did not falter...it was god’s will and doing.
If I take a decision for my child after deliberating over it for hours and hours and yet it backfires...I just can’t and shouldn’t blame myself for the rest of my life. I did the best that I could...the rest and the outcome is never in my hands. I have to let go of “me” to be at peace with whatever fruit I get of my 100% consistent efforts!

Whatever happens...happens for the good!
We may not see it then...we may not see it EVER...but some forces are at play, in the backdrop or under the surface that are making us stronger or pushing us more fiercely towards attainment of what seems to have eluded us at the last moment. If not that, the belief is helping me bear my loss with less cynicism.
You may question here, what sense does it make in saying that the loss of a loved one is happening for our good? But then again, maybe it’s God’s way of preparing us to be self dependent for greater trials in life. I have failed in a career choice that I wanted with all my heart...but then who knows ten years from now where I think I am being pushed unwillingly...is my true calling?
What good is there in a child been molested...nothing at all...but then...it’s happened and what good is there in venting endless anger over it? The key is acceptance and not struggle. For in accepting there is peace and in anger and grudge, there is conflict and clash. Even little kids know which of the either traits send a negative vibe and from where is bouncing positivity.

What’s the worst that can happen?
Most of the times, we are in a mind churn due to fear. Fear of the past resurfacing or fear of our future getting damaged. We fear because we cling to what we possess...what we think we have earned through merits of our birth (our parents, the armour of a family), our efforts (the degrees, the status, the job, the wealth) and our good luck (beauty, intelligence, a good spouse, fame). We are insecure within for we feel life is what we possess...So we keep adding strings of our attachments which in turn keep adding to our complications and woes. Also what keep accumulating very inconspicuously here are our fears. What if I lose it all someday?

Oh so terrible a thought...I must work harder to earn more and secure my future...I must put more limitations on my children to ensure they are less and less out of my sight and thereby as I assume, more out of harm! I must ensure I look pretty to keep up my market value...I must have children to secure my old age...and I must grind myself and do all that I can to keep these things around me.

Have you just stopped for say five minutes and asked yourself a few questions:
What if I have an accident and my face that I am proud of is gone?
What if I suffer a huge loss at work and all my hard earned money just frittered in the blink of an eye?
What if my children leave me and settle abroad for good?
What if the love of my life betrays or my spouse dies on me?
....Will my life stop after this?
....Will I be on the brink of death?
I would move on...not that I’d have much choice...but then I would manage to gather whatever would be left to start up again. It may not be grand...but it could still be good. That’s the phoenix...that’s in us all...to gather life from the ashes...It’s just that we don’t realize that we possess that potential and hence muster in fears. And what if the worst of worst happens...I die only...so what? There would be another life waiting for me to take the body of it...to be a child again...young...spirited...sheltered...free...

God’s with me!
I don’t need to sit in the temple or visit a holy place to reaffirm or proclaim my faith in God. I don’t need to tell on the rosary each day or close my eyes as though I’ve been transported to a different world when I croon the words of a ‘bhajan’. I will not become a greater follower of God by donating blankets or food to the less fortunate, if I do it with the motive that this would do “me” good.
It would be my way of offering my prayers if I do not hurt anyone as I tread on the path of my living...if I perform my duties...if I remain polite and smiling and spread cheer, where there lacks a smile...my aim is just to be a good human being at the end of the day!
If I do these...I can be sure that God is with me. He knows what I want better than me. He has a plan for me that is more fool proof than my own (obviously for HE is God for just that reason) or than that which has been imposed on me by my well wishers. I know God’s with me...very firmly do I know it and tell myself repeatedly...and nothing bad can happen to me.

So next time if I go for a crucial work...just as I leave home...let me tell Him... “Chalo ji, time to go for both of us... “I” am not going there by myself or by my will...you are taking me...so better be there and handle it all, ok?”
Strangely enough our mind is easy to convince...it would actually believe whatever we ourselves tell it again and again. It’s silly just like us...So it’s just the matter of what we tell it really!



Less is more!
The more we run after ‘more’ of things that buy us joy...the less we get more of things that bring us joy naturally and freely. An expanded business means less time with the family...more dieting and gyming means less heavenly pleasure derived out of chocolates and other delicacies. More money means less satisfaction derived of the joy of saving little by little for a long yearned purchase. Less is more...Don’t run after money and fame...it’s elusive and a never ending marathon...always luring you towards them with the bait of more...yet robbing you without being noticed of contentment. So we continue to be restless thinking of what we do not have, without realizing that at the very moment we are losing little by little what we do have...that is peace of mind!

I have to put myself into the other’s shoe before reacting!
I find my mother-in-law completely unreasonable...how can she talk like this or impose her will...I feel my boss is insane...he can be so humiliating...we all have pressures...he’s not the only one...I feel my father is being silly for not letting me go abroad for higher studies...it’s my life after all...
Why can’t they think like us?
...why can’t WE think like THEM for once?

Let’s put ourselves in their shoes...
If I was a mother-in-law (not like who I am, but like who she is) and I had a girl married to MY boy, who seems to be wanting to let her will prevail...I, who am used to authority all my life and living a regal existence where people bow down to my wishes...if I were such a person who’s seen elders only commanding and not considering...wouldn’t I also be unreasonable?
A sudden wave of revolt, as such, would shake my secure fort that I have built with care all my life...making me more defensive of myself and more offensive of others...

My boss is mean but he has targets to achieve and his job depends on it...he’s seen bosses like how he is now...he does not know how to get work done with politeness rather than with severity...he sees me as a threat and so naturally lashes out at me...

So there...before reacting with an explosion...
I need to realize that there’s the need for rethinking our strategy of dealing with such persons.
Coercion should give way to empathy...and some reminders would give us the motivation to hang in there:
1. If someone’s being bad to me...it’s his loss...it’s the nature of his fabric...it’s his upbringing...it’s his limitations...if I feel it is not my fault...I bloody well tell myself it isn’t. So pity the other and not curse him.
2. I have to keep on being nice...or just do my duties. I don’t want that when my life is about to close...finger should be raised at how I behaved...I may or may not get a chance then to defend myself or prove that I reacted in a certain way because I was provoked.
3. Silence is indeed golden! The more I try to justify, the more I get caught in a web that sinks me deeper in the mess. If I remain quiet I let the possible moment of provocation pass and can react when I and the other person is calmer. I also rob my opponent of giving him twenty statements more to pick them us as an issue to argue all over again at a later point.
4. Realize that some people achieve fulfilment by mocking or taunting others! They feel lighter when they vent out all their frustrations on a soft target, when they cannot explode at the source that deserves it. As such, if we just hear it out and not let it sink in...it does both party good...he’s said it and gone, feeling lighter and I have heard it and passed it out...feeling my job’s done!
5. If I am not getting something...it is for my own good and maybe when I would get it, I might not be able to handle it! Like I said earlier...what happens by my will is good...what happens by God’s will is better. I think I may deserve something but don’t realize that I possess the ability and systems to handle it if given. So till the time is not most conducive...I just have to wait or not think about it and go with the flow...

So Happy New Year friends!
Please keep telling yourself to count your blessings and not your tears! I asked my the helper at my gym today if he had a good new year’s eve...he said, “Haanji ma’m...chicken khaana ko mila...maza aa gaya”. So less is needed to make us happy...don’t broaden horizons of expectations. For every sad moment that may rattle your mind, displace it with happy ones that brought you serenity. Erase bad memories of persons who walked into your life and whenever you remember them, think only of the laughters that they left you with! Try to see good in others no matter what...and when we’ll try hard enough, we would actually see something there!
And lastly please tell yourself repeatedly “I am too blessed to be stressed!”
And may the forces transpire to make it come true!