Reality – SALONI'S PEN

SPACED OUT

Writing is a funny thing. You sit in your room and listen to voices and write everything down. Thinking about what kind of a person does that, I shrug a little. Cold weather, sun gazing back and forth underneath the cloudy sky, warm yellow rays wafting through the window of my room, beautiful yet normal resembling my lost yet unfaded state of mind.

Warming up my hands I sigh deeply and start to paw at my computer. After a while of click-click-click-click… clack-clack-clack, the rattling sound of keypad began to annoy me. It is past one hour and the draft is absolute rubbish. Every day I write something, fuss over it, proclaim it unworthy and delete it. It’s agony, and I’m getting nowhere. I could feel my fingers itching to write something, but what?

I am spaced out completely. It is happening a lot lately. Writing to me comes naturally but some days it doesn’t. Today is probably one of those days. I’d rather step into the office and knock out a dozen emails, which might still equate to 2,000 words than sit down and put pen to paper a 1,500-word article.

The human mind is a very polluted and cluttered place to be, so mulling over every thought feels so gruelling. None of it is spoken out loud or jolted down, all of this is going in my head. Rambling over the idea of what must be said and done first, I am snowed under.

Drop-dead the clock is ticking and there is still a lot to straighten out, but thank goodness for the bright rays wafting through the window of my heart. After continuous juggling and tossing my thoughts, I came to realize, maybe I am turning a molehill into a mountain and that anything great is not written overnight, or in a week.

So hitting the backspace key, I begin to write down anything possibly raw and random. Every time I find myself stuck in a situation like this that I cannot escape, I pen down every raw thought. On top of that, it is how I see through things, to gain clarity which is exactly how and why I wrote this article.

Write what disturbs you, what you fear, what you have not been willing to speak about. Be willing to be split open.
Natalie Goldberg

STAYING SANE

The pandemic of coronavirus has shattered the human soul.

It has changed life as we know it. Schools and offices are shut down, we’re restricted to our homes and the future feels very unpredictable. Why write at a stage like this?

For one, we are living through history. It’s a chronology. Future historians may gaze back on the narratives, articles, stories, and art that ordinary people are cultivating now to tell the saga of life during the coronavirus.

But writing can also be deeply therapeutic. It sort of heals you. It can be a means to express our notions, hopes, and joys. It can help us make understand the world and our place in it.

Let’s, go back to when this all started. A lot of folks were thinking: “It’s just 14 days. Things will bounce back to usual soon.” 13th day of the lockdown 1.0, I was eager, ‘Yayyy, the quarantine veil is gonna lift finally’ until I understood how COVID 19 virus has whirled the world upside down and every country is trying to combat the pandemic.

All things considered, it’s wiser to concentrate on the immediate and not get ahead of ourselves. This will keep us sane.

So, every one of us is quarantined and isolated in our houses. Students’ every day waking up early, taking online classes. Watching the lecture in sleepy eyes and sometimes “accidentally” falling asleep while listening. Folks working from home go from wearing ironed shirts and boxers in zoom meeting to struggling to find a decent corner in the chaotic house for online conferences. In short, their day is pretty much slated (It’s a myth).

Idle folks like me, have enough time to practice and develop a more positive mindset. There’s nothing dreadful about it. The brighter side to this is we have an abundance of free time and food on our plates to unleash our creativity during social separation (remembering to be grateful here).

As the line says “good food, good mood” and with a lot of time in my hands, I have been experimenting a lot with learning new dishes. Surprisingly, this period is about eating real food. ~~No processed junked food~~.

Made some of the best memories around the dining table this year.

My hobby now includes eating and also thinking about the next time I will be eating. The ending be like – I feel guilty for over-eating (every time).

Well, most of my other enjoyment would be in painting, sketching, writing, baking cakes (the same recipe), catching up with my leftover books, and rarely exercising (bought a yoga mat tho).

I never knew that I could paint 🎨 cause my hands tend to shiver! But when boredom hits you, you can pretty much do everything. So I started painting and it turns out that I’m not that bad!

Quarantine is and shall always be about goofing around the house, tiptoeing to the kitchen at midnight, and back and forth. Figuring out what you are gonna do after life is back to normal. Managing the work profile and getting a source of income for daily meals. Reaching out for needy people. Lying back with arms under the head – watching the room ceiling and think of how grateful we are for what we all have and much more. The list is very long.

Pandemic made us all do weird yet great stuff. Life during pandemic is full of stories and whether serious or funny, happy, or sad. Above all, we are enjoying our family lunch and dinner. Never in life, we are going to have these precious moments again, so embrace it.

It feels like it’s been months. But it has been, honestly, an unbelievable period. From being insane at first to becoming sane about the whole pandemic situation, we all got used to it in the end, started to be thankful for the first time in the longest time.

Tara Gandhi Bhattacharjee wrote in the article about “Cosmic Fury As A Spiritual Wake up Call” she says, ‘Human beings are certainly not the most important life in the canvas of creation. It’s human beings’ concept that human life is the superior-most. Even at the highest intellectual and spiritual level, humans can think and act within the limitations of the human mind. What do we know about other lives? What is their philosophy?” So, let’s not forget that every life is special and different. Value your surroundings.

We will get through this, one way or the other. With so much tragedy and treacherous politics, it can be hard to imagine a future. Even after the whole pandemic comes to an end, lives everywhere are back to normal, there’s a lot to worry about in this brave new world.

Like Pope Francis once said, “Let us all work together and do our best, for a future where every life respects the other life.”

Till then, keep going. Be kind to yourself and others around you. Take care fellas!

LITTLE REMINDER

It is tough to protest when life tosses you a curveball and you have no other choice but to let it go past you. You might want to take control over the crisis, no matter how hard or how many times you try, life just doesn’t add up the way you want it to. Things tend to fall in the wrong place. It becomes harder with every passing day to deal with the shit going on for the longest time. The chaotic state of mind and pissed-off chunks of your heart makes you anxious and nervous.

Sometimes, you get through and other times it completely consumes you.

Pain is the most realistic part of everyone’s life, but that doesn’t mean it’s an essential part of life. The pain and the endless agony, it’s going to hurt. There is no denying that.

PEOPLE AND RELATIONSHIPS

Hey listen, life will test you. But you gotta be strong. People close to you are going to hurt you, break you, and smash your heart into pieces. Your courage will be judged. Because when the suffering comes via loved ones, it costs too much. It costs you time and energy. It costs your mental health and sanity. It costs you all the emotions you have invested in the person.

At some point, you will consider what is indispensable to you. The connection or your well-being.

Try paying attention to whom your energy boosts and drops around because that’s the universe giving you a hint of whom you should be with. It is very disheartening and hard to choose yourself over any relationship (coz that’s what we’re taught from the very beginning, to stick with it and ignore the wronged). But you should know that you are brave enough to get over it and that you don’t gain without some loss. That all things come in two including pain and joy. When you realize that self-care retains more power than any of the XYZs, you are going to realize what is self-love. The first step to self-care is giving a shit about yourself.

Soon you’ll make peace with yourself for the first time in the longest time. You can search throughout the entire universe for someone more deserving of your love and affection than you are yourself, and that person is not to be found anywhere. You, yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe, deserve your love and affection.

DUNGEON AND ESCAPE

Some days, you’ll find yourself tamed in a shady, and gross place, a whimsical dungeon surrounded by dire predictions and shunned feelings. These feelings will victimize you, and torment you. Probably make you think like you don’t have any kind of access to the outer world. You will be too damaged to maybe fix yourself even if you got a chance.

DON’T GIVE UP. LOOK FOR REDEMPTION.

Deep down you know you want to escape from the insecurities that are holding you back, somehow you are too drained to notice that there is always a way out of hell. Especially when the mastermind is you.

Our feelings are very complicated, but they exist for a reason.

Like magic, life also has loopholes. There’s always a catch behind every freaking happening on this planet. You just have to be more vigilant, when you need one. The high walls of your insecurity and outlook towards life are what are keeping you to escape the dark side of yours. Let go of them. They are not worthy of you.

Learn to fly free. Don’t be afraid to let go. Once you find the tool to dismantle the high walls, there will be a ray of joy to start all over again. You’re meant to heal what hurts you, you’re not supposed to live in misery forever.

You can always start again. No matter how bad you feel, how hard you have hit rock bottom again, or how little energy and will you have left to keep holding on, deep down you know that recovery is possible.

Trust me, you’ll shine like a crystal on a flower.

LIFE AND CONSPIRACY

What I’m trying to say is life doesn’t work the way you plan it to be. Life hasn’t been the way I expected it to be. It is disappointing. I agree. Well, here is what I discovered over the past few years about life and since then I have been aiming to get a more accurate slant to it.

Life is what it is – cruel, tough, and impossible sometimes. Whether you like it or not, the truth is never going to change. But to my surprise, what you can change is your attitude towards life by investing in yourself.

Over the years, I have learned to let go of what I can’t control, such as relationships, jobs, college, etc. That’s not to say that it gets any easier as time goes on, but God did equip me with the tools that I need in that season. Some seasons, I can get through the storm without hesitation, and other seasons, such as the one I’m currently in, I find it hard to get through a single day.

I’m learning to make peace with life and so can you.

You Need And Deserve Love During All Time.

In the end, always know ‘Life is Intriguing and Challenging’.

You are so strong and capable and you can do this. Please do not be so hard on yourself; you have not blown up, you have not failed – you are given the chance to start over and recreate yourself and I know that you will get through this.

P.S.: You have made it out of gray places more times than you could ever imagine, so what makes you think that this time is different?

CAN I RENEGOTIATE WITH DEATH?

In memory of our loved ones when they pass

I know you’ve lost someone, and it hurts. The feeling of falling apart, like your heart is halted all over again just by the sudden rush of unpleasant memories. The sound of the heart being smashed into millions of pieces, sending chills over the body. And after so many years of getting over this heartbroken phase of life, one day you suddenly find yourself standing right there in the middle of every misery that caused you so many sufferings. You never actually get over the miseries that changed your life.

Dying possibly is one of those things that almost no one seems to want to do but everyone has to do eventually (someday). It’s difficult, even for grownups, to understand why this must happen.

Still, it’s quite a risky topic of discussion.

Missing my chance to say goodbye — and longing for her last words.

“For about a week after my grandmother passed away, I couldn’t cope up with the truth but always found myself going back to the last night I spent with her. She was sick and pale. Barely had enough strength to talk. Following dusk, we had our meals and sat with her – talking and laughing, trying to make her feel comfortable with the environment and herself. Around midnight we went to bed with happy faces. Little did we know that it was our last conversation. Eventually, the next morning, she never woke up. She suffered from cardiac arrest. Now, when words were spread about her demise, relatives began to pour in, some were offering condolences and some were sitting in silence. I went to the room where she was lying lifeless. I wanted to see her for the last time to imprint her face in my mind and heart forever. As I went near her, accidentally I happened to touch her hand and for a minute I froze there. She was cold as ice and corpse. I was in complete denial. Pretty soon I realized that death can, and often does, strikes without warning.”

I dream of her often and still miss her. It has been almost 7 years already, but it still feels like it only happened yesterday!

The last lesson that the old lady left me to figure out was Death. I’d never been through it before. I was 16 and, up to that point, my family had been intact. The very first faceoff with the disheartening reality of life was – death. I call it the season of misery. Though rain kept on pouring and hence, leaving no difference between the raindrops and teardrops.

Can I decide to forgive you? I’m not there yet, but I’m trying.

I see you come to everyone. Maybe it was her time.

Maybe in the spiritual world, we made this agreement with you. I’d like to renegotiate.

Here’s a thing about death that there are many things I do not know and may never know. But I do know that it will happen, someday, to all of us.

Can I renegotiate the way I feel about you, Death? Or are you my forever enemy? You’re the taker, but do you have a benevolent side?

It doesn’t matter. You took her from me, Death! You snatched her while she slept, happily packed to come to see me.

Damn you, Death! I’m angry at your cruelty. Why did you take her from me?

You left me in a miserable state, it’s harder to forgive you – I’m trying.

I was in a phase of panic and anxiety and feelings of unreality with intense sadness, which felt overwhelming. I even worried about my existence. It took me so long to get back to the reality of what we call life.

I mourned about almost everything I could relate to.

I know it’s important to let one grieve in their way. To learn how to work through grief. It takes a hell of a time. After all, it’s finding out who I am once again without the attachment to her.

Making peace with the nature of life.

Take care of yourself. With the loss of a relationship comes the loss of love emanating from another that one has felt all along.

I’m still accepting you, death!

When this happened, the best I could do is accept death as a fact of life. It happens, and I can’t do anything to change it. The truth about death lays plain the harshness of the grave… but also the true beauty of the life we already have.

Death, you made it harder for us to say our goodbyes, how do you do this to families?

Death, you’re the awful thing to ever happen in all of existence. But I believe no one should worry or wonder about it for very long. There are too many wonderful things to experience in the many, many years ahead.

Death – I forgive you. That’s me practicing.

Life is a precious gift we are unable to recreate once it’s gone.

No one is assured tomorrow. The only thing we can count on is today.

Therefore, in the end, I always have believed in’ Death takes the body. God takes the soul. Our mind holds the memories. Our heart keeps the love. Our faith lets us know we’ll meet again.

Category: Reality