Must Dos to remain sane...

1. Mind your own business. You do not run the show and have no control of what happens, give your best and keep going.

2. Read books. Read, read and read whenever you find time.

3. Make travel plans silently and take those breaks. You need them. No one ever regretted for travelling more or reading more in life I guess. Experiences matter. Experiences make life. Remember the time I went cycling in Goa or Leh...wow those stories are always fun to share.

4. Take breaks for family. No compromises.

5. Dont get overwhelmed by what people think or say. Who ARE these people? If they knew better they would mind their own business.

6. Blog often. :)

An eternal drag...

The world is turning into a very horrible place going by all the stuff one reads in newspapers. Seeing people acting so inhumanly is beyond comprehension. Sometimes I wonder if one should have kids at all and bring them to such a world and make them suffer so much. 

I had a wonderful childhood. My family filled me with so much love, hope and optimism that it makes me wonder if that is why I turn out to be so ill-equipped to comprehend the real world. It has always been a struggle being an adult. Somewhat depressing too. The more optimistic I seem the more the world has offered to show its not so nice faces and made me a tad bit cynical. It is not easy when people let you down, when situations are always adverse, when things dont go your way. Where does one seek solace? The world really isnt as wonderful as I had imagined as a child. Adults have real problems, bills to pay, work to do, and no time for fun. BORING. To the core. That is what life is. 

You have one problem. You overcome it. You have one more. This is during the good times.

Sometimes another problem shows up before the first one goes away. Sometimes a hell lot of them appear out of no where and you struggle and struggle and after you pass out from exhaustion they seem to go leaving you more cynical and far less fun than you once used to be. Sometimes the problems are not even yours. People around you dump them on you if you are the responsible sorts. Being responsible or having such an image is the worst. Life is not one bit interesting, even if everyone seems to be posting the fanciest pics on fb. Life is a big mess, an eternal drag. It is neither fair nor just. You suddenly appear one day and remain clueless for the rest of your life. You cannot live by yourself nor for yourself. You are taught as a kid to live by some rules. As an adult you are shocked no one else seems to be following those rules and the ones who really do end up losing in the game of life. 

Each day lived is one less day to live and you get closer to the end, whatever that means. 

Religious? Don't think so...

I sometimes wonder if I am really spiritual. I have a way of philosophizing life and making it easy to digest and be hopeful. But can I follow practices every single day and have a connection with the higher form of existence you would call God? I dont think so. I lack the discipline and the bent of mind.

As a kid I used to be clumsy with most things, particularly when someone is watching. During festivals, my mother used to watch over me when I went near the puja room so that I do not spill stuff and be careful and that sort. I somehow developed a dislike for religious things. If I needed watching over I would rather not want to be doing it. It is not like I dont pray or believe in God. It actually depends in the frame of mind I am in.  There have been times when I have tried to prove I can be religious and all, but truly I am not. I can concentrate and pray for a few seconds. Beyond that my thoughts drift to how that kumkum is making my finger tips dry and how I want to wash it off quickly, or all those flowers used for the decoration, that lizard on the wall, that dozing uncle at the far corner of the temple, how sweaty and uncomfortable the traditional dress makes me feel, then the thoughts go far beyond the temple and God to mundane stuff like did I pay that bill, was the geyser switched off, "oh I am already hungry..how long will this go on for" and what not....

They say as people grow older they become more spiritual or when people face difficulties they get more inclination towards God. I am not sure. Somewhere earlier I was making that effort to try and be religious, but that I feel is beyond me. Sometimes in difficult times I would rather drown myself in a good book than sit and pray or meditate. For me when I am happy I would like to read something, when I am sad I would surely want to read something. May be spirituality is not for book worms. On the lighter note,  may be because of all the spiritual books I read as a kid for a few years, I tend to philosophize a great deal. So it has always been about reading then...

If rituals are to be followed, it is better I understand why. If you want to pour milk, ghee, curd, tender coconut on the stone deity and hope to appease the God, I have no complaints. I can watch it and to an extend enjoy the sight. But if you expect me to be doing it, I wonder why. And I seriously question my ability to believe in such things and follow them unquestioningly day after day. That is just not me.  

Finally catching up with Potter...

Just when the Harry Potter series was getting started and becoming a rage, a friend suggested me to read it. She was actually my teacher in primary school, who became a good friend when I moved to high school :) I was trying to act like a big girl not getting carried away with reading children's books, like it was beneath me! Then I kept the book for a few days and returned it to her after a few false starts. Magic, wizards felt so childish.

So now in my 30s when I have no need to prove that am indeed a big girl, I started reading Harry Potter series on my Kindle and am hooked. Again it was a sweet friend of mine who insisted that I read them. She had read those as a kid and loved them. She is in her 20s and insisted that I would love them. We share similar tastes of movies and other books, but still I wasnt sure. She kept up with her recommendation on and off and somehow I finally budged and now am so grateful.

When am reading and someone asks me which book is it, I still feel a bit resentful to say am reading the series for the first time ever and so late. Sometimes people assume I am re-reading it and I gratefully nod in agreement.

The books of the series are well written, have a good flow, keep you engrossed and hooked.  The plot is quite strong, the language beautiful and very interesting observations about human nature and behaviour thrown in with wit and humor. There are all kinds of characters, lots of interesting twists, and disasters when you least expect. That makes for a good reading material overall.

As it turns out am younger than Harry Potter. So yeah, I feel good about that. Dont ask me how does that matter!  :) 

What life...

No one tells you as a kid what to expect from life when you grow up. As a kid you fancy that adults have a lot of freedom, can do anything with their lives, it is so much fun and what not...Then you grow up with all eagerness and find out it is not that great after all. Being a kid and going to school was far more fun.

You have responsibilities to live by, rat races to run, bills to pay, peer pressure to get more successful at work which sometimes you happen to be doing solely for the money, financial pressures to pay those EMIs, social and cultural pressures to get married and have children at a "certain" age defined by random people we call "society"....Really? This shit is what being an adult was all about! Oh my god, did I waste a good number of hours as a kid hoping to quickly grow up and have such kind of fun! huh!?

What about having some real fun and being happy, travelling the world, and living for myself, not for parents, spouse or children, just myself? What about it, where is that person I was so much confident of being when I started out as an adult?

Being at peace is so very vital for my being that may be somewhere I hide my disappoints by trying to love everything about the way life is now. I keep hoping for magic to happen and that dreamy eyed child in me is still so very hopeful that it breaks my adult heart to confess that this is all life may be after all.
Being an adult is the dullest part of life.

Now...

Being in the NOW seems like the biggest challenge and blessed are those who can just BE here NOW!

The rights and the wrongs....

Sometimes what seems like the worst thing to have happened to someone may after all not be all that bad....

...Like a politician convicted and sentenced on corruption charges may actually get the time she never got all those years (say - to think and introspect about stuff that were pulling her like a juggernaut). Or just enjoy simple pleasures of existence like pause and enjoy the smell of some filter coffee! 

...Or like an actor’s marriage falling apart may give him a  chance to introspect about why he chose infidelity or how stressful his pretentious existence was...

When something has to fall apart Murphy's law is bound to follow, if it is important to the person, one should take effort to preserve what matters.. although sometimes it may require more than effort...

if on the other hand one goes behind the “wrong” things hoping the “right” things can anyway wait, sooner or later it turns out the “right” things cannot be in the same place as the “wrong” things although the “right” things wouldn’t mind waiting…

It seems easy judging people of how they went behind the “wrong” things…anyone can fall for the bait of power, money or adventure…sometimes it is just luck (or the lack of it at the times these “opportunities” showed up!) that kept you or me from following them and therefore giving us our “righteous” positions to judge others when they falter at their attempts to pursue these! 

Time takes its course, Luck takes its sides and then it turns out that the "Wrong" was what had to happen and that was what was "Right"...Rights turn out to be not-so-rights and wrongs may turn out to be not-so-wrongs...things get turbulent and then there is peace, revealing true nature of things and changed perspectives...It is a strange world, it is all about how we see things...isn’t it?