If you are Dating an Artist

Oh you going to get yourself into a lot.. Trust me a whole lot!!

If you are dating an artist, be prepared to witness the invisible

Because we tend to read between the lines, exist in spaces between the spaces

We will be vocal about everything and subtle at it, all at once

The same way we pour our hearts out on the paper or canvas?

Yes the exact same way

We will tell you upfront sometimes, what we are up to

But also want you to read us in the silence, something we do before starting an artwork

If you are dating an artist, expect the unexpected

We will take you on the rollercoaster ride of your life

If you are really making an impact out there,

You will sometime feature in some of our arts

Coz most of the times, we are just all about ourselves

We have a whole parallel world that breathes inside us

If you are dating an artist, try not to fall into frames

Because we don’t follow that regime

We work on vibes, and not otherwise

You might never be able to decipher if it’s really dating

Or just friendship?? And you will end up super confused

So leave that bit to us

We will take it as it goes, and take it slow

If we had an instant connection, brownie points for you

If we didn’t, it can appear out of nowhere, one day when you are almost giving up

But we also tend to have switches to the internal parallel universe

And yes, trust me when I say we can totally switch it off out of the blue

So keep us engaged with attention and novelty and pure emotion shit

Because you never know, when that switch goes off for you

We will love it if you take interest in our orgasmic artwork,

If you don’t we will be silent and maybe slowly cut off

If you are dating an artist, trust me you are going to remember it for a long long time

Because you are in for the best of what you have managed so far

We will open up the layers one day at a time

And every time you meet us, you going to discover something divine

If you are dating an artist, it’s going to look quite simple and normal on the outside

So far you are pouring love, it’s not going to go away anywhere

But we like the limelight both on the art and ourselves

Things will get complex, don’t tell me later I didn’t beware!

We will demand and ask real hard

If you are dating an artist, THINK hard before you go far

Another League- No time for (M)ARRIAG(E)

One fine day, when the muhurat is shubh and it’s a weekend, you exchange rings, commit vows and get married. For a lot of forthcoming days,  you have constant supply of new pictures for social media. Everything is great and then it starts settling down, you resume work, resume routine and resume the old yet more comfortable wardrobe.  Slowly and steadily, after multiple months you wake up from your marriage and realize it’s necessary to go and get some me time!

This ‘me time’ is different for everyone. For a lot of people like me, who are easily bored, this me time varies. Sometimes it’s a great cup of coffee by myself, curling up to a book and sometimes it’s going out there again, hanging out with strangers, get some fun and party real hard! And one fine day when you finally do it there are two grave realizations: One – you have a ring on your finger Second- You totally feel out of the place amongst the still buoyant, single bunch. And it’s HARROWING! This feeling – you used to rule this space and now you are just looking for a corner where another one from your league might come, catch up with you and you can feel a little better about not being alone in this – this feeling is harrowing itself. You feel old even if you haven’t touched 30s yet, and its bitter trust me. When people say “I wanna grow old with you” while proposing , I am like yeah, you will because that’s what marriage does to you It makes you feel real old on the inside. So you are thinking, oh maybe I am so out of the league, maybe I should make plans with my own league, people in similar life situations with a spouse and a routine, and yeah maybe I shouldn’t be talking too engrossed with the cute French guy right next to me – Hah! This is shit. I anyway had no intentions to get to know him beyond the geography and I am not on Tinder, I mean the spouse should just be capable to appreciate this fact alone. You might be even given the introduction sometimes “hey guys, she is just my colleague and we are not dating or anything and she has a husband” – I mean why on the planet would you just kill all my prospects of even having a goof conversation in the shadow of benefit of doubt?

It’s really another league for people like us or are we just cribbing for some attention- I am not too sure but (M)AARIAG(E) changes a lot of you and yes you fucking get old!

The only permanent Relationship

Harvard University recently ran this survey where they asked people from different backgrounds, socials, status and demographics to figure out what brings them happiness. After quite a few years of study, they null down to the conclusion that the only real happiness came from Healthy Relationships. These relationships are not just with your spouse but with everyone around you – your neighbors, colleagues, your house help etc. etc.

Recently I also happened to meet this elderly lady, in her 50s struggling real hard to smile since her husband passed away and even after 1.5 years, she cried in the first 15mins that she met me. Her only question with life now was – “Who will I cook for now?” and that put me thinking, this lady invested her entire life serving her husband, cooking what he liked, living the way he wanted, forgot herself to be with his side and now that he is off- she is shocked, what is she going to do now, because she killed herself long back with this marriage. She doesn’t know what hobbies she might have, her interests; she wasn’t even very particular about the food that she liked herself- she was basically nobody now! She also happens to have a son who is now settled in the US and is willing to take her with him but she wants to stay in her husband’s house, dwelling upon the lost memories. She doesn’t want to move on and I feel she might not be able to – ever!

We humans, we are in a relationship even before we are born- with our moms. First person to hold us in arms is our daddy! We come home from the hospital and find there is a sibling too or a dog or a cat for that matter. We are pushed into relationships before we know what it is! And this cycle never ends – till the time we breathe our last.

Now in addition to these ‘compulsory’ relationships, we go ahead and make some on our own. Friends, colleagues,  neighbors. We also go to the extent of giving a lifetime commitment and step into ‘marriage’ thinking it will be a Happily Everafter! But does it stand true in most of the cases? No. People get separated all the time, either by their will or because of others. People cheat, people lie and why – to save another parallel relationship – Now is that one forever? Off course, that too is temporary. They know it won’t get too far but yet they continue the journey. And they spend their whole damn lives becoming the way people like them; they are in a relationship with. And all this for what? – For “Happiness” 

And they do one more blunder, they forget themselves. They forget to make the relationship most important of all –the one with themselves. They love too much – but others, they change- and for others, they dress – for others, they basically do every damn thing – everything for others. Parents die, marriages break, friends ditch, neighbors lie, colleagues steal and yet we think this is forever ever? Hell No.

The only relationship which is permanent is the one you have with yourself, Rest EVERY relationship is temporary.

The relationship you have with yourself is an affair that will last till your last. Some learned ones relate this ‘yourself’ to their faith, their God! For them their faith is everything. Some are too much in love with the art they practice and creating the artpiece will only be a love-making for them! It depends person to person what they love apart from material people and that’s exactly what I am trying to say here. Love Yourself first, people come and go, but YOU will stay till you stay!

Make out to yourself, indulge in yourself, and love yourself!

Because eventually it’s all about you

I have seen the Sun

Sun is daily, Sun is routine, Sun is every morning, Sun is every date, Sun is every new To Do List, Sun is every anniversary, Sun is everything and yet we recite poems about Moon- why? 

Why is everybody gaga about the moon, all the poets, all the rituals, anybody and everybody who talks about love and romance, symbolizes it with moon- why? When all the passions are carried in broad day light- when its the sun who witnesses the real fire of love and longings, when its the sun who has only watched the two love birds taking strolls together, when its the sun who has kept away the clouds of suspicion from the free spirited hearts?

Have you ever seen the sun- like for real? Its fierce but its magical. It can blind you for moments but brighten you up from inside out. Take my advice, try absorbing that early morning sun when he is just warming up, not too hot, neither cold, just perfectly warm, try bathing in that light and all you will experience is Magic! The key with loving Sun is to maintain a distance, don't get too close, it will burn you, don't go too far, you won't get the warmth, just try and stand at just a best distance, that will help and he will show you the best of himself! And trust me, when he is at his best - you will forget about the moon, that's how beautiful he is, when he shines brightly with inner joy!

Acknowledge your Sun! He is Sun after all, very egoistic, won't be pleased by a romantic poetic verse. So challenge him to open himself to you. Embrace him by being ready for whatever might come. He will like that. Love him because there is nothing in this world that can reciprocate you like Sun.

I have seen the Sun, I have seen him in the eye, I have felt his warmth, I have loved him and he has loved me back even more. I thanked him for being there and he promised me to always be there in return. He told me that I might be the earth but he will gift me with shadows and that's how we will meet, because we are parallel universes. He is flamboyant, loves to boast of himself but I have taken him to be what he is, as he is.

Sun has made me feel the magic, the mystery and the madness, He has set my benchmarks high enough not to settle down for anything less. He has made sure I believe in mornings than nights. He has loved me in broad day sunlight- when he saw me crystal clear, my opened pores and freckled skin, he saw me and still loved me- loved me back even more. The Sun made love to me!

Make some room – Move On!!

For the co-warriors, trying to move on!

Stuck with some old relationships, people, moments, night long phone calls or over extended coffees with someone from the past? And the same doesn’t happen anymore and you know it might just never happen ever again? PLEASE MOVE ON!

First things first, the good news is that you are not alone in this. An average human has a life expectancy of 65 years of which the first half is when you start exploring the doom of a lonely world called love. By the time you hit your late 20s, you know it wasn’t love or anything even in the closer proximity. You argue with yourself in terms of analyzing if it was just infatuation, compatibility, comfort level or just a habit and maybe then just abandon the topic saying – You don’t know what love is! By the time you say this, you have gone through multiple (atleast more than one I am sure) heartaches and the whole roller coaster rides. And now, it’s time to move on.

We all have a favorite pair of jeans right? Which no matter how much it fades or even comes apart, we just won’t stop wearing them. Moms and others might tell you that it’s time to retire this ancient piece of fabric now but you just won’t stop doing that. Then over the time, you gain some weight, so naturally, the jeans stops fitting you. Conveniently ignoring your fatal attraction for the beloved pair of jeans, your body has grown with time- High time to buy new jeans!  So we do that – get out and search for days to get the same fit and comfort our favorite pair offered. After days of making those unsuccessful visits to various stores and coming back empty handed, we finally manage to bring home a new one. This new one goes right on top of the old one in the rack. But still, the old one lies right there, peeking through the old one. A few days down, you take the old one and try it out. It might even fit this time but you realize it has actually gone too ancient for you to wear it somewhere outside. You fold and keep it back! Trust me when I say, it will just lie there, idol, for a very long time. Time passes by and we keep shopping for more. And comes the final day when you realize that there is not even a remote possibility that your baby can be of any use to you ever again. And going per the theory of LIFO (Last in First Out) it silently bids goodbye to your wardrobe one day.

Question to ask yourself now- Are you shopping? Or looking like a beggar in the same old pair of jeans?  If not, please go out and buy a new pair of jeans. Make that much needed trip to the store. Make some room in wardrobe and in heart, let life offer you new colors and get on with it. It’s as simple as that! When trying to quit something (or someone)“Cold Turkey” isn’t always the best approach. REPLACE!!

Make some room- Move on.

Heartaches

If only, we could own up our own heartaches and continued loving, no matter what it takes......, how long it goes......., where it finally lands........!!

We are scared- of loving! We are scared just before sending that text full of emotions, we are scared to go out just in case the real heart matters slip out of a watery tongue, we are scared to sip coffees together coz we might talk out hearts out- and all this why? Because of “Heartaches”

Heartaches --- Ouch!  They come with every kind of love you know of! They will come and you can’t just ignore them. So should we just stop loving and having a real life? I don’t think so. Life is nothing devoid of love. Those butterflies in the stomach on a slight rub of hands accidentally, that is life; the feeling of caring for someone and getting the favor returned that is life; sharing nasty details from poop timings to how shitty the boss is, that is real life.  Should we just stop living then, just because it will, at some point of time bring heartache along? I definitely don’t think so!!

Hypothetically thinking, what if, we could just keep on loving keeping the worries at bay? Will it not bring consequences? Off course it will. You might have a hard time getting over it. You might even go on a sabbatical full of undesirable thoughts and insomniac nights. But won’t you get to think of the glorious butterflies then and smile a bit? Won’t you carry some beautiful memories forever? Then why not drop the ‘Heartache Phobia’ aside and live the moment- make the best of it!!

But wait, if you are already feeling too inspired by now, here is a little reality check. “Do it at your own risk” If you think you are man enough to deal with your heartache later on, then take the plunge because the one giving you those butterfly memories won’t be there to cry along. If you don’t think you are that kind of person- Sir, please leave right away! (But anyway it’s not going to help you, sorry to say)

Any which ways this world and our lives should never be short on love because this is the only thing which is our private yet shared. Don’t let the heartache stop you from loving. Don’t kill those butterflies just so soon!!

Beep Beep – It’s me, LOVE!!

 

Tasks are multiplying, new gadgets to be entertained, new news to digest , remain update, eat healthy, stay fit, stay cheerful, trying to leave a sparkle everywhere we pass by – there is so much to do but hours in the day remain the same!! Modern life and lifestyle has brought all this with it. And just when we were about to call it a day- booom…. “love” happens!!

Extra zoom shot of a switchboard #Kaveesha 

Love was supposed to be telepathy, a connection which existed beyond a digital beep on the smartphone. Well now, it is, what it was not!  Love is a beep these days. The more the beeps, the more the expression, the more the love and thus more the illusion. When cupid looked down at earth with faces dug in the phones, he must have thought of simplifying all the complex phenomena of love. 

Thus love became directly proportional to the length of chat history.

Let’s say, love is equivalent to the number of beeps, having said that, have we tried feeling the same love in absence of those beeps? If you do … congratulations! you might be in real love (or atleast the illusion of the same) but if you don’t, try this out – “Out of Sight, Out of Mind”

When love is quick and convenient as per uber lifestyles, recognizing the real one would be quite a task. Ask that love to disappear for a while or just switch to a feature phone for a couple of days. You will have some analysis in hand at the end of the day.

We are human beings with even shorter memory spans these days. What remains on top of the mind becomes the center of interest. In this situation, giving time to realize that cupid is throwing its arrows on you might be a bit difficult. Being in constant touch can illicit feelings for anybody – I will say again – “anybody”. Please don’t do that to yourself. Take eyes off that 5.5inch HD screen and lay them on him. He might be looking at you!!  But if he is also eyeing the phone, dude, you are wasting hell lot of time here.

PS- Also do the ‘Out of Sight, Out of Mind’ test before you get into a commitment, it might just open your eyes and save you from feeling stupid afterwards.

Please help me remember how it felt like being in love!

I am out of it currently.

Love used to special, warm and most importantly, gave chills in my belly. Now, it’s more of a routine, comfort zone and doesn't give anything to my belly anymore.

As a confession note, I would say: it has annoyed the bejesus out of me.

There are days when I don’t care about the heart-balance but there are days when I do, and desperately want to remember how it felt like being in love? Because I faintly reminisce that when I used to be in love, it was certainly a warm feeling. Not everything around used to be annoying, I didn’t feel the need to meditate or distract to calm myself down. Expectations were not mortified and dates were not just digits or fruit but moments! Now that I am out of it, I want to call it a phase and stop worrying about it. I like to tell myself that this all mayhem will pass and I shall reunite with the belly-butterflies. But remotely, I don’t think that’s going to happen.

Maybe I have saturated, even tired, of having loved so much in so many years gone by. Maybe I just need some break or change or just a neutral phase in between my in-love and not-in-love phases! Maybe it’s the consistency of the same presence or just the very comfortable comfort zone.  I am not certain of the solution strategy but certain that I would like to feel it all again!

Because at the end, love should live - And that’s all that matters!

"इश्क बदलता रहे कोई हर्ज़ नहीं;
इस मुकाम पे आकर लगता है के शायद उसका जिंदा रहना ज्यादा ज़रूरी था!"

Love in Social Media Times – PDA

PDA- Public Display of Affection: sounds cheesy! Right??  But sometimes it becomes imperative to do that!

With the digitization of everything and all of us living in our own small worlds, social media has become the new lanes where you stroll hand in hand by posting pictures or posting lovey dovey comments on each other’s posts and thus, the PDA!

Everything about PDA comes with a long train of criticism as well. There are tons of articles which tell you in how many ways the couples are just gross if they express love to each other in public. I have been part of that community as well, and more because I think, till then I wasn't getting any myself. 

Doing PDA in just the right limits can keep you off from social criticism as well as help to build your bond stronger.

·       With no ‘Good Morning’ messages ritual now, you wake up to a notification that your ‘louve’ has dropped a super sweet comment on your picture – not just admiring but how that sweetness has kept him stuck to you all these years- morning made right then and there!

·        Mutual friends and those reading every single comment of your pictures also get to know that the bond is going strong! This also goes for the secret admirers who are still secretly hoping for your break up.

·        Take it or not, real life compliments come rare!  In that case a well edited picture can help you get some much needed admiration :P  #selfesteemboost

·        Once you do any activity on any post, you automatically ‘follow’ that post and hence receive all the further activity. This might also give you about 5-10mins of discussion in your daily telephonic ritual especially when you have been in love for too many years and already drained out of topics.

·       It gives a sense that your better half is overall interested in your life – when half your life is spent sitting in front of a computer. And off course you can also get to know their other friends which will only add two more twinkles in their eyes that you care enough about them

·        You just keep feeling you are still in love!

But as I have also been a part of the hater’s community, there is also a little piece of advice

Word of Caution  

·         DON’T OVERDO IT! Love is not what is there for public display in your social online world but a little expression of it shows the commitment and keeps the life spiced up!

·         KEEP IT RARE! Keeping it rare will also keep the value of your compliment and the surprise along alive. Just doing it on every post will only irritate and you will lose that precious mental admiration in revert.

·         DON’T SPAM please for God’s sake!  People hate it when they are personally going through a rough love phase themselves and all they get to see on their feed is couples getting all cuddly – be human!

 So, PDA – because it’s as important as holding hands in public to make your beau safe and loved !!

PS- Once more I want to say – DON’T OVERDO IT!

A real relationship is boring, real-life and stunningly ordinary

A real relationship is boring, real-life and stunningly ordinary!! Yes that is a fact!

I have been into a relationship with a simple and ordinary man for more than 5 years and we eventually plan to settle down together because we have already given in so many years settling down with each other.

We have been opposites, real opposites with the extremes of liking for clubs vs liking for a cheap drink at a dhaba with Kishore Kumar songs in the background evening; love for all sorts of art in the world around vs love for a subtle “Its good whatever it is” attitude; craving for a life like they show in films vs sticking to real ground basic realities kind of routine; adventure & excitement vs the ultimate comfort zone!! The list can go on but I have been telling myself that “opposites attract” and that’s why so many years!

Like every product has its own Product Life Cycle (management theory), I think it’s a universal law rather than just management studies. During teens, those butterflies in the stomach just on the mention of that someone were love? After then dealing with daily routine issues and counselling each other was so! In between all these years, accepting each other for what they are became the practice! You go through a lot you see, from being the bud to the blossom- not only your bosoms change but a whole lot ‘new’ creeps in too. After several years of courtship, I might make myself think it’s the “stagnation” phase of our product but then I couldn’t have kept those butterflies alive all this long too!

So finally you wonder whether it’s really love-love or it’s just a habit (read practice) of being with each other. Let’s be frank here, after all these years, smallest of daily rituals like a phone call also don’t really matter ( I mean it’s okay if you don’t talk on a daily basis or don’t reply to their texts – the other can assume you are busy and doesn’t give much thought to it) I might criticize him for not having that “excitement filled” relationship but – if you are an avid traveler too, wont you feel like getting home after a while? Or eating out together for several days in a row will definitely make you crave for home made dal- chaawal?  (at least I do)

I think this real, basic ground, no adventure but contentment- kind of life is more real!  This – I don’t care how you look- I just know that I like you as you are – is the kind of attitude which can take me further and let me not crib over every inch I gain in future! An evening at home with the television might sound extremely boring but hey, I can be in my pajamas with a face pack on and cuddle with him and not care about the damn world!! See, lot of pros here too.

The level of excitement for a relationship is not real, what matters more is making peace with it!!

PS- I don’t plan on being the boring kind of better half. :P

Love and Other Affairs

Love Affair: Intellectual Affair: Sexual Affair

All three mentioned above are different, trust me! They are far apart from each other and distinctive too or exclusive in their own ways as I might put it!

We are humans and all of us possess heart, brain and hormones. All these three are just there to fulfill desires of each of them.

The sanest one considered socially is the Love Affair. It’s the usual one as we all know it, fall in love, feel emotional, feel attached, feel special, feel possessive, feel every emotion you know for that one person with whom you are not really scared to spend the rest of your life. Reciprocation is the key in this one and we are not judged for carrying forward this one. We do it since we step into teens and keep applying Trial & Error till we finally decide who that ‘one’ is. Generally this one ends on the note of marriage and there it goes away from your life!

The next level could be the Intellectual one. Here you don’t do anything. You just talk, just let your heart out. But you talk in every possible way, you talk with mouth (like normal people do), you talk with eyes (You can only do that if the other person is really looking deep in your eyes & admiring them too for that matter), you talk with heart and you don’t leave a thing behind in your heart or in your nostalgic lanes for that matter. You talk society, you talk philosophy, you talk of the stupid things you did as child and all those eve-teasing incidents which still sit heavy on your heart. You talk sense (well, mostly) and non-sense. You talk it all out and in return are being told that no matter how childish you talk, you sound so mature! You hear too (sorry I forgot to add that bit earlier) and you hear a lot. You hear things unsaid and you hear the rhythematic oscillation of their heartbeats. You hear what they are going to say next and you say it before they say it and that’s everything about this sort of affair.

In the third one, I don’t want to describe what happens but something surely happens which hasn’t been happening so far.

It might be possible that we have all three of these with one person or all three with three different persons. It depends on the capability of those other people; but if you are involved in all three of them, be assured you are capable of something extra for sure! Your ten percent might be somebody’s 100% and their 100% might be 20% for you. So it’s totally okay to experience all of these- ‘individually’ & ‘exclusively’ with different people.  As they say “Nobody is born perfect’ but probably YOU were and then it became an equally annoying job to find somebody as perfect as you..!! So go ahead.

PS- Started writing something earlier but had to leave it in the middle, would just add that patch here-

Sometimes we do what we don’t want to do and yet we do it.  Because it might be, that what we did, was something we always wanted to do , but we thought, we didn't want to do it, coz we  thought we shouldn't (Social Parameter Alert) do it!  

Better to do what you want to do, coz we are anyway not doing what we were supposed to do!  

#Love_Peace_And_Happiness_To_All 

We ALL fought, learned, changed, grew stronger and hoped!

We all are fighting, all day, all time. Some are fighting bad bosses, some fighting work pressures, some fighting bitter breakups, some fighting their dreams! Some are fighting with others, some without those others! Some with themselves and some have already given up!

We all fought!

But in all this process, we all grew up a little, isn’t it? We all learned to ACCEPT and SURVIVE!! We learned to deal with the feeling of being rejected, with the hopelessness of not being loved back, the anxiety of hearing the truth about ourselves, the effort of putting ourselves back together, and if there was no one in sight , even patting our own backs just to keep the morale high!

We all learned!

We started pretending, we faked ourselves, we got overwhelmed and eventually managed to pull off with a little more controlled behavior! Finally when we thought we got this mask of pretention for the war with everything, we thought we became so cool, but oops! In all this process, we changed, and we changed a lot..!!

We all changed!

Just like a soldier returns to his camp after that long day of guarding the territory , we got back home , to ourselves, to our real selves at the end of the day and thought what the hell we were doing? We managed a great face all through the day but hello! What about now! I myself know the reality and how am I going to fight that?  So, we wore another mask – the mask of strength! We soothed ourselves, did things what we really liked, being with people who loved us even when we totally ignored them, we ate the way we liked and as much as we liked, we wrote whatever crap to our minds but cooled it off! We looked horrible but felt wonderful!

We all became strong!

And then we all got ready to fight once more if we have to with hope of being prepared for the next war , keep our masks handy so that we are not searching them around if the war is on without the bigul, and exhaled “this too shall pass…” !

We all hoped for better!

ALL of us

Goodbyes are fun

I might sound contrary to the usual belief of saying goodbye with a heavy heart but trust me, all of them aren’t that hard on you especially when you really want to get “rid” of a fewer lot!

Goodbyes are hard when you are leaving home, a place where you are most of yourself, not faking yourself even for a second, not getting overwhelmed and not being judged. Goodbyes from those- are definitely hard. Goodbyes aren’t hard at all when they are about homecoming, waving a pity hand at everybody whom you hated or cursed even for a split second- they are fun, mad “fun”.

Being "stuck"

Every one of us must have had this feeling of being “stuck” at least for once in our lives and talking from experience, being stuck surely sucks!! So what have you tried doing in those situations (in the stuck situations), tried to soothe yourself out? How?  By thinking something good? And what rather whom did you think about – your people back at home, right!! Saying goodbye to those are hard and these, who totally took the crap out of you, ha ha, its crazy fun (do try it sometime yourself)

But fun is no free ride right? You got to pay for it and pay really heavy sometimes! Infarct fun is this very temporary thing that you already know will perish in some time  and still you want to stretch a little more than you deserve and then you stretch it so much that before you realize , either the band breaks or comes back at you like a boomerang slapping you hard! That’s the price of fun.  In case the band had hit you, “that” goodbye would have been fun (the getting rid of feeling). If the band wouldn’t have hurt you even a bit and got lost somewhere, that goodbye would be hard.

But one good thing about those “fun” goodbyes, they don’t give you pain except a lesson. You say them not halfhearted but fully aware in your conscious that this it, this is the bottom line and here it ends. You don’t carry back a hope and definitely no false hopes. They might give you not-so-good memories for some time but don’t worry, when you are in a stuck situation again, you will only think of the “good memories.”

So keep your goodbyes fun , and to those with whom goodbyes are hard, don’t say goodbye to them, ever, at all!

If pain loves you, love it back!

Have you ever tried on a new exercise (like yoga etc.) or got a very nice body massage? Did you also feel those small lumps of pain in different parts of your body which abruptly come out and you tend to say, “OMG, I never knew I had pain in this part too”. Let me tell you something, these pains do not occur because you press the body there, they have always been there, you were just not very aware of them! But when you pressed, they started flowing out!

Doesn’t something very similar happen to us, in real lives?  We are not even aware of certain pains that exist and we go on living with them, making them a part of our lives, our personalities. We smile and laugh and do everything that looks normal to everybody everyday but when an old friend calls up randomly pressing ‘there’, the pains start to flow out, and we say, “OMG! You are talking my mind out. This is exactly what is happening with me.”

Pain is a very funny word and according to me, very creative too. ‘Funny’ because it can disappear anytime it wants, remain hidden or make you look crazy in front of others. (It’s so funny that it reminds me of “DEVDAS” – the forever sad character from Indian Bengali novelist ‘Sarat Chandra’). ‘Creative’ because it has given birth to so many masterpieces of art, literature and poetry. (I mean what percentage of artists create when they are super happy, if I am super happy I would rather go party and dance my heart out rather than write a poetry)

So something which is so funny and creative, I think it (or at least a part of it) should stay with everyone! It’s just that, we should be aware of its presence in ourselves.

Have you read of Latent heat in school? Well I have and as I remember, it spoke of a heat which remains latent (dormant) unless we create some force which evokes it. Similarly, the pain is the latent heat in all of us. Now you brood over it or turn it into a force- that depends on you!

Discover the pain in you and either USE it or remove it.

Get that great body massage often, the pain will go. Talk about that great body massage often, and the pain will make a great art piece!

Confessions!

We do them and yet don’t, many times! It depends, upon the consequences- which we calculate mentally, before doing them! Less loss, ok, here I confess! Huge loss, which can’t be fixed- Alright, I am never going to do this one and keep it hidden like a precious stone of memoir thrown in the ocean!

Should I, Shouldn't I?

How do confessions originate- have we thought of it – ever? Well, they come from our will power! “Resistibility” is the word if I may put it aptly. Had I resisted before that moment, it would have never been that moment and hence no further thinking, no traumatic heartburns, no choking guilt and hence no confessions.

But as a matter of fact, we don’t bloody resist! MANY TIMES! A funny thing here is that even while resisting (or not resisting for that matter) we are calculating, in our heads, the fun we are going to have, the pleasure we will get if we don’t resist. So if we resist, we regret, if we don’t, we still regret! 

Its just that 

No resistance > Pleasure>Guilt>Confession>Consequences 

Resistance> No pleasure>Regret (Consequence)

So basically there is no way out!!

So isn't that better, to not resist, commit the crime, enjoy and then regret about it? At least you had the pleasure right? And then as per your mental calculation of consequences, you may further decide to or not to confess the same.

And let me just add to clear the airs, its not the confession which people do to a priest in a church or in a temple who don't do any harm in return to them, Its just an easy way of melting away the guilt  overload by not directly confessing it to the person to whom they have done wrong. Since they know that priest will just nod listening to them they go ahead and so called confess, but that is NOT a confession. A confession will be one if made to the victim , to the person who is in capacity to actually make you face the consequences. And if you think its too much if a consequence, chuck it, don't confess!! But try stop living with it, try to avoid their multiplication & resist at times! After all, we cant have all the fun right! 

But......I think I still don’t have a concrete answer to this one! If anyone reading this has, please do let me know. Confess!!!!

One Quarter Down!

I am completing a quarter today- wait, not the quarter of a tinted and spirited bottle but a quarter of my life- and its Gross okay!

Few days back I noticed one grey strand in my not-so-luscious wavy hair and it brought to my notice that it’s not far when I will also turn old and sour! And lately I have been an ardent fan of “Grey’s Anatomy” and it often occurs to me that I might meet an accident someday just abruptly, so I thought it was the perfect time to write my own will!

Will…?? Yes, well a Will! In which you give anything of your own by your own will – yes I am talking about that same will!

A few of my friend were amused at this idea and in turn asked me what do you have as such that you are writing a will and I answered them with an airy expression that “Not everything is about money  in life”! So here we go;

I have a (rather two) cupboards full of clothes- I would want each of my special friends to pick one dress which I ever wore with them and hang it in their cupboards, like the way it’s done in Brokeback Mountain movie- so that they can always remember me the way I was with them (and in the same clothe size). Same goes for the shoes and bags!

All my gadgets and gold and cash goes to my dear BF (he secretly expressed his interest in the same one day). Also I will let him take all the pending bills too!( Life Revenge :D).  My toys (yes I still have teddy bears and 13 dolls as my secret possessions) go to my next generation i.e. to the kids in my family.

And the most important thing- my DIARY (rather diaries) full of poems and my passion. They go to one person, a very dear friend who has always admired them – with the copyrights too! So that one day he publishes a book out of them and plays in the cash ;)

And rest everything goes back to my parents – don’t worry, despite of all above there is still much left in the room! And because they will be the only ones who would keep and cherish every small thing of mine close to their hearts!

I always wanted to have either a Catholic wedding or a funeral! Since I don’t have my love interest in a catholic, I wish to go for the second option.

Talking about my funeral –I would prefer to be buried in a classic chocolaty chestnut coffin with pink satin inside to lie on! And I will want all my friends to gather together – the dressing theme be obviously “pink” and everyone should make merry! I don’t mind if you all go merry-go-round but well that’s how it is!

But given that, I am not dying so soon and that life has to do a lot more damage to me before I can finally get rid off it, I assume to read this when I complete another quarter of my life- and may be just laugh it all off! May be I won’t be writing anymore then or I might be a very famous Bookie award winner; may be all my clothes would have retired by then and I may not be able to fit into them ever; whatever happens then will not be same like right now!

So I am just preserving all what I have right now – So that I can scroll down my blog 25 years later and have a few pink butterflies tinkling me!

Cheers to whoever read this!

-          Aakriti ( Kaveesha) , 06^th August 13’

PS- Since I assumed I will be very busy today, I wrote this piece yesterday itself! :P

Half Mesmerized

There are habits – old ones and the new ones, habits that we have lived with for years with and habits that we have recently acquired. Old ones become addictions and new ones become passion. Old ones are the ones we no more think about, they are like reflexive actions and the new ones, we long for them, we try to seek them – to get them into our systems.

Old habits – they are realized when they seem to be sneaking away , when one fine day we suddenly discover we are no more doing them or rather not doing them consciously , they are just happening – themselves- like an auto button!

New ones- we love them, we crave for them, we take conscious efforts for them and try to pull them – towards us and even if they are off the sight a second, we miss them – terribly!

So it becomes a war between addictions and passions! Addictions- something that we can’t live without and passions- something we don’t want to live without!

But passions might fade away if not nurtured, kept like a baby or even if not thought about for some time. Addictions have been there since forever. They are more like need of the body than the soul – after all we have tamed our bodies to be habitual of them. Passions- they rock our ecosystem – brains, hearts and souls. Most of the thinking goes in thinking about the passions. But if we consider the cumulative account of the thinking gone in both of them, addiction cannot be defeated by passion.

And then we are left midways, we are in a puddle of dilemma and have no idea which way to complete; we are almost mid ways both ways. We can’t leave addictions and are unable to leave the passion. We are left bedazzled, like a leg on one boat and the second on another – and deep down we know, this will certainly not take us anywhere. So basically, neither we enjoy our addictions anymore nor we can really do anything to fulfill the passions. 

So what do we do?

We enjoy only half the fun, we see only half the beauty and we feel only half the ecstasy.

We are left Half Mesmerized!

PS- Old habits die hard! 

It’s only you who is responsible for your “happiness”

Life consist of situations, decisions, choices and consequences and all this for what- “happiness”

We might be ruled over or dominated or even influenced or even emotionally controlled, at times, to make certain choices in different situations and thereby to sustain its consequences. Don’t let yourself suffer that!

Yes, I will say that again- Don’t let yourself suffer that! 

Our lives are not just about us , they are a complex mix of so many people around, our families, friends, people we fall in love with, people we have secret crushes on , people who are in love with us and we aren't , those we admire and those we hate but eventually it’s about “us” ! Whatever we do has a certain impact on all of these people but ultimately who suffers or enjoys is “us”!

True happiness can come only by the choices we make- uninfluenced and uncontrolled by any emotional trauma. Happiness which comes otherwise is only a satisfaction which comes by the sacrifice of making others happy!  We need to be able to differentiate in the two.

People whom I talked about above, these are off course important people but are they really going to be victim of the consequences? No! They will just stand by you, with sad and sympathetic faces but it’s only you who will suffer.

So, it’s essential to realize that the only person most important in your lie is you yourself! Nobody else is going to face the eventual outcomes. These people, it’s not their fault that they sense different consequences and try to influence your decisions because they love you. But, it’s equally important to realize that however deep they might love you, they may not be the right people to help you make the crucial decisions of life! Sometimes, there is nobody to think of your happiness because everyone is busy thinking of the consequences, at that time, make sure, you stand up for yourself. Make sure you do everything to save your happiness, irrespective of the consequences, irrespective of influences.

Take the call, decide for yourself and experience the real happiness – so what if it comes with a little consequence. At least it won’t be the side effect of sacrifices! 

Remember - Eventually its only about "you"!!

A letter to my muse

Missing you - right now!

And I am confessing- I have kind of a selfish motive behind! I am missing my muse- I am missing my writing!

I will not behold myself to tell u how I miss those amazing moments of ours where we sat for so long  and discussed point of views, relationships n poetry!

According to wikipedia, there r two kinds of love- ishq-e-haqiqi and ishq-e-majazi but I say there's one more kind of love which I have always called - an intellectual affair-- a love affair that goes between two minds rather than hearts!

Hearts are foolish beings! Minds are men whereas hearts are women.They don't think- they just know how to love, care and caress!! They are the followers like the ones which are seen in the herd of a cattle! They follow the mind like an innocent sheep. They are givers and always get all the sympathies of the world!

Minds- they lead!! Simple and straight! They apply logics and think of consequences! But what if they are lead by another one- will the heart refuse to follow? Never!

Such is an intellectual affair where over and above the hearts or bodies, the mist happens between the two brains who wander in the similar directions! The two in which both apply logics but similar ones - there is appreciation more than love, wit more than dialogues and 'connect' more than an actual intercourse.

We share the same frequencies if not telepathies, we are each others' muses and we both know that, we even have adapted each others way of expressions but it hardly matters! What matters is the same page on which we both stand like headers n footers!

Love is supposed to complement n not to supplement!!

I miss the laughter on those silly jokes which u cracked n I crashed; those adrenaline rushes which occurred when u said something I was about to say n those 'timing' factors which I may rest not to say!

At this point I am also thinking of our coffee meets- when I being a total 'tea-lover' was out there sipping hot coffee with you - just because you were a 'tea-hater'!  Because it was never the beverage but the company to me which mattered the most!

With sharing, laughing and admiring in eyes, brains & hearts- unsaid n yet understood things-- I am missing u!!

The Moment Before The Moment

 You feel like reading? At times, yes! Why , because you just want to relax, may be you just want to lie down and do nothing , may be you just want to live some other character right now, may be you have taken enough and you are taking a little more, to make it enough-  just enough!

That’s what happens when you read! Reading is a process which generally happens to people while it’s ongoing, while they are actually reading it – thinking what the author is throwing at them and just living the characters mentioned in those alphabets! To other few it may also happen while its going on and also “after” it, they may well lie down in their beds and think of the characters or may be the story or the beautiful visualization the author created there or the “outcomes” as everybody might want to call it. But to some (maybe I am referring to the clan of people, I belong) it also happens before, before actually picking up a book and start reading it! The process actually starts from there- just when you felt like reading, just before the moment when you thought of picking that book up and get engrossed in it.

The reflective smile - the "moment"

Any moment is generally called a moment because of the things that happened in those moments – but actually the moment is just before the moment – that moment when you thought of making the next moment a “moment” – when you “FELT” like doing it , what you did eventually !

That is the biggest urge – that is the line which we cross, that is the time when the human sense called “control” would have worked but at times – it just doesn't works out! It doesn't let any command of your mind travel to your heart and the rest just follows! That is how most of the moments become moments – in real senses! And of we control it, it becomes another moment, but it still is a moment anyway, right!!

So absorb the most of “when you felt like doing it “– because that is the real moment- and rest what happens or follows – trust me – it was all destined!

Live it up – the moment before the moment!