The Birth-day that became the Worth-day!

12 am- Here starts the celebration of getting older. The best friend (Shi) calls and after some 20 minutes of gushing, grinning and grooving, I accept that she is practically my boyfriend figure. Sometimes I'm overwhelmed by the unconditional love of my friends (Shi, Apy and Swa), who were actually more excited about my birthday than me.

11 am- I finish Mrs. Funnybones, a book by beauty with the brain Twinkle Khanna. I gifted this book to myself in order to survive my birthday with a relationship status as ‘a single girl’. I actually asked a few days back to some of my friends(Aks, Joe) that what should I gift myself on my birthday and got marvellous suggestions like, gift yourself a boyfriend. Well, I preferred the book over the boyfriend. It amazes me that how books attract me more than living beings. Well, Finishing this book makes me sad as I crave for more from Twinkle.

5 am- I reach the awkwardly awkward workplace to carry on an odd shift duty only to discover that I share my birthday with Katrina Kaif and Aruna Asaf Ali. Sharing your birthday with a Bharat Ratna
Awardee and a Diva surely makes you feel good about yourself. Also today, the beautiful state of Uttarakhand is celebrating Harela, a plantation festival. These little-little information are sufficient to keep me amused.

4 pm- Inspired by the go organic campaign, I plant a baby Hisbiscus Rosa Sinensis plant, only to be declared as a psycho by mom as I keep on checking on it after every 10 minutes. Spoiler Alert for future kids, you people are going to be blessed with a nagging and overprotective mother.

5.30 pm- Best friend's husband (Ash) calls with an unknown number and here starts whole guess-who-am-I game.  I confuse his voice with best friend's father's voice and call him uncle but later on get able to calm him down by saying that uncle has a magical voice.

6.30 pm- I get indulged in watching Wimbledon Men’s Singles final match. After the initial hiccups, my childhood crush Roger Federer gains the momentum and beats 28 years old Cilic with such an ease. The way he hops, yanks, jumps and scores aces so easily, makes me proud of my choice all over again. Yes, on the auspicious day of today, Federer manages to clench this deserving grand slam. He is a grand proof that age is just a number.

8 pm- I try to act surprised on receiving a truffle cake and beautiful roses by brother and sis-in law (shiv,Nan), as I overheard their conversation with mom about a surprise gift. A little while later mom manages to get this wonderful cake upside down and ends up giving me fuzzy logics like it’s all get mushy once it is inside your mouth, kudos mom!

9 pm- Four year old cousin gives me a compliment that I look beautiful and even plants a few kisses on my face, leaving me to wonder how fast forward he will become once he will reach my age. Also by this time atleast 20 persons already asked me when I'm going to get married.  A birthday is the most auspicious occassion of asking such questions, I guess.

11 pm- I am ending the celebration of getting weirder by my favorite thing in the whole world. I get stuck with inertia of rest at times and stop writing but when I get my momentum back, I realize how much I love
writing and will always do!

I think I’ve finally come to the terms of getting older.So, Happy birthday to me.

Oh life, dear life!

In a few hours, I’ll cross another milestone of my life. Yes, I’m turning a year older however not getting any wiser. Instead of wisdom,years just add on to my self-acclaimed esoteric theories regarding life and I think that it’s better to pass on this pseudo-wisdom, than to keep them inside me. So here I am,with few more such theories.

1. I admit that during last year I encountered a lot of humans, humans of all kinds, all tastes and all sizes. What I observed is, a person can enjoy the company of only a few among all the humans he/she encounters and I’m so weirdly weird in my choice of human beings. I’m not likely to like the company of a person who offers me a company without actually offering me a true company. If in the company of a human being I get nothing new and I remain the same person at the end of this company, it feels like a sheer waste of time to me. For being the person who can offer a true company to others, one should be open to new things and new views and should have a progressive mindset. I’m not saying that reading vividly is the only way to acquire this quality but yes, it is a quite effective method to achieve this purpose. Hence it is a good idea to be friends with a person who reads various things; he/she is likely to offer you a true company. And especially if you are planning to date a person, make sure that person is a bibliophile. For all of you who get disenchanted with things/persons easily (like me), this is a wonderful idea as reading makes a person, a brand new one, every time he/she reads something as reading evolves us. And I’m not exaggerating it in saying that if a person is not a fan of reading, I’m not even sure how to talk with that person! (You agree? Great! You don’t? Who cares! )

2. I discovered a brand new way of being young forever. The first and obvious method is to be friends with the 5 W’s (why, who, where, what and when) and 1 H (how), so that the child-like quality of being curious always remains alive. And the second and even better method (my patented one) is to be friends with people younger than you. So all of you who are turning (or feeling) older, discard your own friends (sorry, Shi) and be friends with their younger siblings (welcome S and U in my life!). Get adapted to their terminology; benefit yourself with their energy and Eureka! You get to remain young forever.

3. Two very wise people (S, U) made me realize that we do almost everything in our lives under peer pressure of family, society and our conditioning. Try to avoid doing things under peer pressure and if you can’t, at least make fun of this fact that whole of your life is being controlled by a thing called peer pressure.

Life may be hard, it is not a bed of roses, it is not a cake walk but yes, it is a lot easier if you keep on smiling. So smile, go on and always remember that if life gives you lemons, make lemonade and smile some more.

Marriage? seriously?

A few days back my mom showed me picture of a gentleman in his mid twenties and that’s when this conversation took place,

Mom- Take a look, how’s he?

Me- one nose, two eyes, two ears, hair on the head, normal, he is absolutely normal!

Mom- so do you like him, should I take it forward?

Me- excuse me?

Mom- c’mon, you’re not a kid anymore, all of your friends are getting married.

Me- Not now, ask me again after this century.

I don’t know why parents are so much obsessed with the idea of getting their kids married as soon as first member of their friends circle gets married. They are always like, “see, such a nice guy X has found” or “If you will marry too late, your kids will call you granny instead of mommy!” 

This ends in some random snaps getting waived in front of you every week, getting you convinced by any relative that visits home that it’s the right age to get married and making you wonder that why in the world you had to grow up! Once I was asked if I like someone else so that I’m so reluctant in this matter and I saw blank and shocked faces when I replied that I like too many people but none so much that I can spend rest of my life with them.

I mean, seriously, what is this fuss all about? Why can’t an individual lead a single life and why no one pays attention to the benefits of living a single life. Parents say that you need someone to share your life with, but why? I don’t feel like sharing even my cone of icecream with someone, spare life. They say marriage gives you children that provide you some motive in life, but who says I don’t have any motive in life? I have bigger motives in life than to stay up with a newborn for whole night, cleaning up after it and become a zombie till it starts going college.

In addition, God created me with some very special things that suggest I should remain single for whole my life, I talk while sleeping, I put my arms and legs on anything that is found in my close proximity, sometimes I throw things out of my bed in deep sleep. I’m an easy going person most of the times but sometimes I want time of my own. I don’t allow anyone to sneak in my room during those show-me-the-meaning-of-being-lonely times.Moreover I’ve turned into an over organized person recently and I often scold people who try to ‘help me’ by putting things at wrong places in my cupboard, a whole human being sharing my cupboard and ruining it’s decorum is far far away from the wildest of my imaginations. I can’t imagine anyone bearing with all these norms and that too when I’m not the progeny of any billionaire.

And I fear, what if one fine day I find out that the person I’m living with is a moron/ not-that-classy-as-he-seems-to-be/ a freak or what if he finds out something like this about me? Would he understand that I want to take a break from him/ never see his face again?

Well, I hope that if actually I’ll have to live with someone (The One), he never sees this post and I get more fascinated towards the fact that guys possess some cool stuffs (big comfortable shoes, screwdrivers, cool books and guys’ deodorants), he'll let me use occasionally and I’ll get someone who will listen to my monologues. I better do it fast before next century arrives and Mom comes again with a random snap!

And why should I fit in?

‘You should interact with people more’, she suggested.

‘Not this again’, I said.

‘And you are not the same person anymore’, he added.

‘Not this again’, I requested.

‘And this is how you are supposed to be’, they implied.

‘Not this again’, I screamed.

There is nothing that disturbs me more than the mundane and imposed things. How the things are and how they should be, how inappropriate I am to fit in and what should I do to fit in; these are perhaps the most unwanted discussions of my life. Hence, greatest of my fantasies involve ‘running’.

Running barefoot somewhere in Sonoran desert, running endlessly on an endless street while wearing a long floral white gown, running with the sea waves of some anonymous beach and perhaps running away to some uninhabited place too. I want to run away from every mundane and imposed situation.  

People say that you should face what disturbs you so that it will stop haunting you. But I feel that sometimes it is better to escape than to let a thing shred you mercilessly. Conformity is not a choice; anyway, as Rita Mae Brown famously said, “I think the reward for conformity is that everyone likes you except yourself”. So no, I would never conform to banality. I can bear with people not approving of me but I can’t bear being an alien to myself.

What are the not-so-mundane/unimposed things you might ask. Actually even I can’t answer that accurately as I’m still exploring it’s dimensions. But I can provide you a vague picture of what I think of it. While doing a certain thing if you feel that you would do it in exact same manner even if no one was watching you, if you do a thing with same passion even if no one knew you are doing this thing then that thing is certainly what you actually want to do. And what you actually want to do can not be a mundane/imposed thing, at least not for you.

A-not-so-mundane/unimposed thing enters inside you like a sea wave enters through a sea stack, it flows inside you thoroughly mingling with your whole being and when it leaves you, you are not the same person anymore. You evolve. You feel sheer happiness running in your nerves. On the other hand, doing a mundane/imposed thing keeps you the same person for centuries.

Dipping in the awesomeness of what your heart wants you to do is a blissful feeling. Once you will taste it, you’ll get addicted and this addiction would become the most beautiful thing of your life.

The cherry on the top of the cake is, when it becomes monotonous, you can try doing a mundane thing. You will realize what is your real desire and destiny in nanoseconds!

                                                                             

Beyond That Smudged Mascara ..

                 “Since a very long time (almost five to six thousands years), she was wondering what was missing in her life. Something was creating a void in her heart, a void which was sized greater than the ozone hole situated above Antarctica. A void so grave, that it endangered her whole being. A void that welcomed so many nights with smudged mascara and tears drenched pillows in her life.                                                                      

                                                                                        That void was created under so dark some circumstances that it turned even darker and refused to go. Those circumstances are irrelevant and they need not to be here in this post so I’m excluding them on purpose. That void gave her immense pain but that pain became her habit to such a level so that soon it became her lighthouse and her albatross simultaneously.

                                                                       

She wanted to fill that void but she found herself so weak to complete that task alone. She looked for someone who could help her with that. She was so desperate in doing so that she engaged herself in some abusive relationships. How were those relationships and what went wrong with them is also irrelevant here so I would skip that too.

                                                                                          

           All her life she was waiting for someone who could love her, who could support her when she had questions about her existence and who could take care of her. Eventually she found out one day that the person she was looking for since ever was none other than herself. She started loving herself and she realized that it was the most genuine form of love she ever witnessed.

                                                        A balanced mind and a healthy body were the results of that self love. The hardships and the lonely nights became her lessons of the life and soon she became invincible and that void turned into an epitome of confidence sized of Mt. Cotopaxi. She was an alpha woman now, absorbing and radiating more happiness than she ever thought of.’’

..

If reading this story made you feel like you can see yourself in the pre-change-protagonist, irrespective of your gender, it is high time you should take the same route as she did for a few reasons,

    1.     None other than yourself can help you. It’s your life, your struggles, your traumas and last but not the least, your story!

    2.     Staying in an abusive relationship means you can’t take a stand for yourself, if you can’t do that why anyone else would do.

    3.     Your body and mind are the greatest assets you can ever have. Be friends with them and they will stand for you always.

    4.     Life is too pretty to be wasted.

   

5.     Smudged mascara is hard to remove and drenched pillows smell awful the next morning!

So take care all of you lovely ones and stay happy !!

                                       

Perfect gift you ask? wait!

“Someone I loved once gave me a box full of darkness. It took me years to understand that this too, was a gift.”

-Mary Oliver

The other day I was wondering what could be a perfect gift to give someone. It may seem like a mundane question but then it gets difficult as you think about the possible viable options. The joy of giving is beyond all the earthly joys and hence this question deserves some ponder. So let’s analyze it.

Flowers, you say? The grand gladioli, creative carnations and resplendent roses! Yeah, flowers look pretty; smell good too but then what? See them wilting day by day and you will feel a certain kind of sadness around. They become more of a burden on the soul with passing time.

Certain gadgets, you suggest? Well gadgets are definitely attractive I would say with shiny outlook and various functionalities but in less than a month they would become obsolete and outdated with updated versions coming in market almost daily and in less than six months they would be replaced. So all of you pop-culture-crap-creatures, I say no to gadgets as well.

And similarly I would reject options like chocolates, perfumes and ornaments as they fail on some grounds.

A gift I feel must be an endless source of light, a heavenly shower, a basket of hopes or a beam of sunshine. But these things are beyond the ambit of human beings. I wonder isn't there something which includes all of them and remains within our reach too. I want an answer and this desire is so fierce that I look everywhere to find it. I look outside and then I look inside myself too and I find,

“I am not sure that I exist, actually. I am all the writers I have read….” – (Jorge Luis Borges)

Yes, a major part of me is what I've read. I can find the greatest of writers and their quotes inside me. This is a thing that would go to the grave with me and so the thought of the person, who introduced me to these quotes/ writers/ books. This makes a book the most awesome and dangerously beautiful gift at the same time. Times will come and go but some ideas, quotes and beliefs would remain with you beyond life.

And I’m certainly that weirdo who would want you to remember her with a deep seated idea in your mind that transgress time and space. So I’m sorry for the spoiler alert but next time when you are getting a gift from me you can save the adrenaline rush while unwrapping it by being sure that it is a book.

 Now, kill me royally!

Secret of ultimate happiness

‘The most important relationship in the life is the one you have with yourself. And if you have that, any other relationship is a plus and not a must’ – Diane Von Frustenberg

The world, we live in, is full of colors, music, vibes, hopes and possibilities. We experience and explore these things daily and this world keeps on bedazzling us with many more such things on a regular basis. Truly said, ‘the best of the ideas/motivations in life come through personal experience’. This whole scenario seems so perfect and beautiful, but it gets complicated as soon as the idea of ‘a-company-while-exploring-things’ enters in it. 

Man is a social animal. We need society for nurturing ourselves and with the society, the idea of a partner and procreation comes too in the picture. We are conditioned to get a partner and settle with him/her while approaching mid twenties (or thirties), blend our lives with them and live happily-ever-after. This whole system seems so easy and conventional, then why marriages fall apart and individuals involved in it suffer?

Well, there may be a hundred of explanations for this but I’m dealing with only one of them this time. My perception for this problem may seem alien or even way-too-advanced to you but then it’s what I observed and truly believe in. I observed that sometimes in a marriage/ relationship individuals become too much codependent and needy. So needy so that they need the other person almost every time to make themselves feel happy. The idea of happiness for them is limited to their partners and what their partners do for them. They keep on saying things like, ‘I’m nothing without you’ or ‘without you I can’t remain happy ever’ to their partners. They become so needy and load their partners with bundle of expectations. They lower their self esteems to a level where their ‘better halves’ are actually ‘the better halves’ of them. Lets talk some physics here, if we will place too much of load on a limited area only, the pressure exerted would be so higher that it will eventually make some dents in that place. Similarly too much expectations from a single person will lead him/her to retort and hurt you.

So now comes the solution part, first of all try to be self sufficient. If you don’t enjoy your own company you won’t be able to enjoy someone else’s company too. ‘You’ should become your best friend. Try to take care of your body and mind so that they take care of you, too. Invest your time, money and energy in yourself and you will get tremendous results. Love yourself, only then the other people will love you. No one wants to be with a partner who is so weak, needy or fragile. Do all the things that make you happy and spread this happiness. Yes, strengthen your relationship with yourself so that all other relationships will be a matter of choice to you. Follow you dreams, pursue your passions and buy some flowers for yourself, next time you return home!  

And lastly, be proud to be in a committed relationship with yourself!