Time

However hard I try to grip, time is like sand. 

From the outline of my mind, from the hands of the clock, with the unknown knocking at my door; it’s drifting away.

 It’s slipping through my finger tips. My ears and eyes are trying to take it in. It isn’t enough. 

And again with finite moments we aim for forever. But in these snippets of tiny moments I will find my infinity.

“The curtain parts and what has never been seen is devoured by the eyes. It’s distinct, abrupt, framed and it’s already a memory!”

– Roland Barthes

Saudade

Dil Bechara

Saudade is a deep emotional state of nostalgic or profound melancholic longing for an absent something or someone that one cares for and loves.

Do you ever wonder why dead people receive more flowers than the ones who are alive? Because death is an ultimate truth which reveals whom we would long for after they are gone.

Saw Dil Bechara today. It is not the best movie in the world but it nudged some really deep hidden strings in my heart.

Kizzie a girl suffering from Thyroid cancer that spreads to her lungs narrates an important part of her life. Carrying around an oxygen cylinder to breathe; and navigating the alleys of an approaching inevitable she meets Manny another cancer patient who lost half his leg to Osteosarcoma. The lad  woes her and us alike with his flirtatious vibe that  entraps a young boys fear of looming death.

The characters look so real that they suck you into their little imperfect world. The movies starts with laughter and speeds into the formidable end. Their love story is tender and innocent; yet so meaningful and exhilarating. They are two star crossed lovers trying to catch each other while they are both falling through the deep dark hole of death.

The story targets a young Indian audience  who relate to the insecurity, vulnerability, questions on love, life, fear of the unknown and death.
Even though it is a plot with incomplete background correlation; it ends too soon before one can soak in the emotional load of the movie. The music by AR Rahman knits the film lovingly with every note of happiness and melancholy.

However I know it will linger on in my mind for a very long time. It made my chest swell with overwhelming feelings; none of whom I could express. I think my viewership was shrouded by a void; that Sushant is no more.

His smiling face flashed on the screen at the end of the movie; and engulfed me with immense sorrow. He was a person with enormous intellect and charisma. I have not seen death closely. I am too young to do so. The irony was the closeness of his reel and real death.

It left me empty. His face exuded hope contrasting to the hopelessness he would have felt on the wee hours of the morning he decided to end his life.
It was surreal to walk through the movie with a flesh and bones person on my laptop and to then face the truth that he has now vanished into thin air. He is no more. But as John Green had rightly captured in his book “The Fault in Our Stars” : Some infinities are bigger than other infinities. A superstar won millions of hearts in his limited time with his electrifying screen performances.

This is not a blockbuster. But it sure has become a message of hope, love and rememberence of a beautiful guy; beyond his mortal shell.

The movie ended and I wanted to burst out into tears but I couldn’t. I choked and let out a smile with the hope that the star would be looking upon us. Will miss you.

Twinkle twinkle little stars, how I wonder what you are. Up above the world so high. Like a diamond in the sky.

Shine on. RIP SSR. ❤️

The see-saw of love and ego in the time of pandemic- words by a seeker of spirituality

By Sayak Kanjilal

Times are tough, and the entire humanity is collectively subjected to a challenge which has its own merits and demerits. We will remain observers to a spectacular change of the personality of entire humankind, probably more humble, more aligned with the cosmic nature of itself and more advanced to combat future global crises , of which this is just a beginning.

Humans need love, now more than ever. But the question remains

“What is Love? And will mankind be fully able to fathom its power?”

It is a flow of consciousness energy from one soul to another. Never mistake this gross body for the soul, it’s just a transient appearance, and there is an infinite existence behind it. It’s this transaction between two infinite energy sources that generates tremendous bliss, the energy sources are the souls. Hindrance comes due to ego, which mistakenly understands itself to be greater than the soul, and identifies it with the body mind complex. When ego is hurt, it tries to resort back by means of jealousy,hatred and violence which puts hindrance to the transaction of the consciousness energy between souls.So always keep that channel clear, by constantly checking the ego.

The question arises, how..

“Are we conscious of our ego? Or do we let it dissect our negativity?”

The misery in human life is always of finite duration, but we tend to make it infinite by repeating it again and again as a replay in our mind. The ego wants to finds different solutions to a misery that happened years ago, and hence the urge for constant dissection. This creates a host of problems; the most popular one being those of developing walls to defend yourself from the world, isolating oneself and creating deep revengeful attitudes, multiplied as many times as a situation of misery has been repeated in mind. Every time the ego wants to bring out a solution to an old problem, it creates new imprints on the mind , which are negative, as the dissecting element itself is negative.

Now the root cause of this is that we allow a situation of happiness to ruminate in our mind so many times, and derive pleasure from it, that unknowingly we create a habit pattern of allowing past thoughts to come in our mind and let the ego use them to derive pleasure as many times as it wants. We almost perversely use one happy thought of fame, or success, or conquest so many thousands of times to make ourselves feel better, that the mind loses its capability to discriminate positive and negative feelings ; taking in both good and bad situations from memory, like an autopilot.

The solution is to check ourselves from constantly bringing in one good thought of achievement or moment of glory to feel good constantly, to restrict the mind from this autopilot situation. Once this is done, the bad thoughts will also, in time, need our permission to enter our mind and involve with our ego.

It’s easier to combat this mind pattern by trying to block the perverted over-usage of good moment related thoughts than the bad ones, in-fact never try to combat the memories of bad feelings directly. The soft spot of mind is the memory of good feelings, that is the malleable zone.

The see- saw of ego and love can improve your quality of living with other human beings, and control the autopilot of your mind to generate more focus and stop amplifying miseries or happiness, both of which are blown to excessive proportions by the untrained ego.

 

May you realize the extreme gift of human life and crave to harness it’s fullest potential.

Self , Uno mismo, soi meme

The truth is that we all come to the world alone and go back alone.
The strongest relationship that affects all other relationships, is your relationship with yourself.
In a world which is constantly trying to make you the same , staying yourself is an achievement.
The way we treat our own self explains a lot of actions towards others.
When a mouth utters words of hatred , it only shows their relationship with themselves. The one who demeans another is dealing with issues themselves.

Something beautiful comes out when we realise our true self. And then when we fall in love with ourselves. The most beautiful person in the world is the one who is comfortable in their own skin, body and mind.

We humans are so different yet so alike. In our diversity in mindset, attitudes, characteristics, and existence; imagine if all of us embrace our own self. Then we bring something unique to the table. When many unique individuals can combine their skillsets, hardwork and passion ; culmination will be a masterpiece.

It’s not difficult to see more and more people hearing their true calling and following what they truly love as their profession. Well it’s the first step to success, self discovery.

Embracing your individuality is the best gift one can give one self and to the others around.

When we feed our own self with care and love, only then can we thrive. Only then can we pour affection to someone else, or let alone make another smile.

So well thank yourself for being your crazy wierd, awkward, self.

It’s the beginning of the greatest love story ever told.

-Ananya

The one’s who glow in the dark

In a world full of rats in this rat race, all are trying to be better than the other rat. Well tearing each others tails and fighting for that bit of cheese.

But well amidst this chaos there are those who radiate an energy which blinds the ever seeing eyes. There are those who see beyond themselves and motivate other to grow. They pull you up and make sure that the others achieve.

These are the leaders. They share. They care and they ensure growth. They motivate and cultivate leaders.
They have a vision to be someone beyond what the others around can perceive.

They don’t join the race. They become it.
They are flowing with enthusiasm and vibrancy.
It isn’t odd to see them glowing in the dark or helping someone in times of need.
They don’t falter to spread their skills and knowledge. They never stop at themselves. They take the community along.

These are people who display sheer sense of purpose and courage.

They learn to teach. And they teach to learn.

They don’t mind being wrong. But never support wrong deeds.

They aren’t everyone. But they are among us.

And if you are lucky to come across them you are bound to get inspired. They are sources of all energy and exuberance. They fight the negativity and uphold values of gold.

People don’t worship them, they aspire to be them.

They are the ones to change times. Because they once aspired to be changemakers. They set their own goals with a motto to better the world and the people.

They are our leaders.

Let it go

Let go
I have always had to say goodbyes too soon to people, places and plans.

It was never easy.

But I have always had these very different people come into my life with whom I have had very meaningful and deep conversations.

Those chance meetings opened the doors to so many stories. I think this is all it’s about, to grasp the moment and make most of it.

I think it’s not about forever , it’s about exploring the possibility that even small instances can inspire you.

Look for those moments which make you feel happy and enrich your veins with positivity. Don’t cling onto or drag those moments.

The butterfly counts not months but moments, and it has time enough. – Rabindranath Tagore

Just live life, one day at a time.Because at the end, it’s a race against time which is made of the plethora of colourful and grey experiences.

Noone is perfect but even a bit of you maybe enough to create an ignition. Create a spark with your true self and don’t long for forever. It’s okay to let go.

Something beautiful and exciting is waiting.

Don’t lose heart.❤

Why do we travel

So why do we travel?

The green carpet covering the soil
A lavender butterfly flaps around in a tulip garden
Your feet dipped in the waves of the vast ocean
The snow capped mountain ranges as far as your eyes can see
You are in a foreign city
Tranquility is all that’s prevails in that mind palace of yours

The new people and their unknown but welcoming faces
Oh they wear such strange dresses and dance to unfamiliar beats
But their smiles, oh their smiles; somehow bring you home!

Their tongues speak gibberish, their skin stranger than the ones you know
But oh if you look inside it’s only human

The ceaseless trails of the woods,
The lake ‘o so blue;
The tour guide tries to give a clue
To the bewildered mind!

The tales of cities
The domes of the churches
The king’s thrones
The historical nittygrities
The words that were knitted about eons ago
The Warriors and Goddesses
Seem like mirrors to a culture long lost behind
Why do they sound so familiar?
In a land so alien?
Are we all the same? Humans don’t understand.

So many movies and shows seen by the eye, yet
it’s all new!
The experiences, the memories and the beautiful scenary
Well it’s all out of the ordinary!

The feets that travel,
always unravel;
The adventures
And conquers the fears unknown.

The journey outward is just a begining of the journey inward!
Reverence for Mother earth
The diversities of the world
Oh so exotic and exciting
It’s all a fresh film for the eyes to witness
To embrace the exquisite
cultures, dialects and tastes!

We are divided by the borders
By mere orders!

But the laughter of a maiden
The kindness of an old man
The innocence of a blue eyed baby
The love for a fellow being

Isn’t it all the same?
So different.
But all the same.

We travel to discover;
Afterall we are only human.

A day in the corporate

The smell of rain and wet soil was refreshing. Though the traffic and the random splashing of mud on ironed and subtle toned clothing wasn’t such a delight.

Honk honk. Splash. Splash.

“Bhaiya wait cross karna hai’ wave to the drivers passing by. The shoes wet and hair like an aftermath of a storm. Phew! Reached office.

At entry flash id to the red capped guard. Entry to building swipe? Swipe the id from red to green.

The morning looked like doomsday but the view from the 9th floor Technology centre was spellbounding. The city scape, the tall building and the never ending droplets on the blue tinted glass added to beauty.

The wet umbrellas were drying on the extended artificial and air conditioned porch. The sun was nowhere to be seen.

The room lit up as clock struck 9 by automated systems when foot fall began.

The heels of ladies and boots of gentlemen entered the workplace.
And soon a silent dark place filled with the intelligent machines bounced into cacophony.

The power on button then the clicks and then taps on the keyboard made music.

Slowly the tongues rolled out and people spoke about work.
3 hours into work people started feeling drowsy when suddenly an automated voice rang and asked people to get up and stretch.
The detrimental effects of sitting for long hours include becoming a couch potato.

The eyes glued on the online screen and outlook mailboxes looked up and the arms stretched out to hug self. The spine was twisted and the elbows bent. Well the employees exercised.

Then the work started again and the murmur began as a pre alarm for the hungry stomachs.

The people with their lunch boxes or orders on their smart phones began leaving.

Swipe card exit. And walk through the roads as pretty as a tourist site or a natural park, well but it inhabits automated factories.

Have lunch and enter office again. Well? Are you drowsy? But your manager wants the report ready. Don’t worry. There’s a time for healthy break. Stretch. Breathe. And get recharged for the work.

In the middle of all the repeatation, I heard a ringtone. It was the Sherlock Holmes theme. Woah. I got reminded of college. It’s wierd how music is associated with endorphins and memories.

I smiled. Well tomorrow it continues again. Same rush. Same tension. Same hectic work schedule.
But I go on. And so does my memory card. I have a lot of space to store new things.
And I will keep on documenting.

Mumba,Maharashtra

The city of dreams – Mumbai

Saw a girl in the crowd, whose eyes had a story to tell. Heard the footsteps of survival on the platform.There was a juggle of happiness and existence. It was a race against time. A chain of struggle clung onto the spine.
The youth’s clothes spoke of extravagant fashion. The air smelled of freedom.
Yet someone slept on an empty stomach.
The sea gave the humiliation of my insignificance against it’s enormity.
There was a happy couple in front of a monument that had witnessed terror. Love had won the war.
The last train left the Central.
The city lights, the cars accelerating on the distant highway, the shimmering light on the river below the bridge, the souls that were tired yet, ready for a new sun ;indeed the city never sleeps.
Its alive. It’s Mumbai.

Yellow

She lay on the red carpet, so placid. She had fallen from the pedestal.

She didn’t cling on to the edge anymore. She was solo, yet mellow!
Had she been a rose,you would have picked her up! Your fingers would have held her close, despite her thorns! Her fragrance less, crimson petals would have kissed your cheeks. 

But there she lay! She was all yellow! 

Art

And I see art in everything around me. 

Especially in the things that are imperfect like this tree shedding leaves.