Prisoners of our mind….

What would you consider as an accomplishment?

Is it when you reach a certain stage in your career, or is it when you get a desired degree, or when you buy certain things you wanted or when you marry the person you love?

I mean what is it really? What should be our driving force? How do we say that this is where I want to be. I am asking this because I always feel that no matter whatever you have accomplished, at the end of the day there’s always that little something that’s not there, something you desperately crave.

There is no end to the wants of a human mind and life; and it’s not wrong too as long as you are not stepping on someone’s toes or ruining their lives to achieve your dream. What is a problem though, is making your own happiness dependant on the fulfilment of those wants.

I have the finest education provided to me that I could ask for. I have a very prestigious professional degree. Something, I am very proud of. I also had a successful start to my career, but somewhere along the line, circumstances changed and now I don’t. Sometimes I miss that hectic life, but when I ask myself very honestly, deep down my heart, maybe I am not too eager to go back to a life, which will be so busy that I will not have the willingness nor the energy to do things that I like or love.

All of us are prisoners of our own mind. We all say that we know exactly what we want from life, but I think none of us really do. It is up to us to break free of the shackles and enjoy the moment that we are living. Life does not work on planning it, it work by living it, day by day, and moment by moment as it is handed over to us. As it has been said very famously “When life gives you lemons, make lemonade” as there are no second chances in life, well generally :).

Too corny??!!

The long walk….. from anger to happiness

Anger is a futile emotion. It does nothing for you, just burns your heart and makes you cry for revenge. All those endless hours of plotting and saying the right things that should have been said. All the pent-up emotion an a seething rage which is more often than not impotent. Impotent  because nothing can be done be about it, if anything could have, you wouldn’t be angry in the first place. Anger is a result of events that have culminated with an end which make no sense to you. It may have brought satisfactory end to someone else but not the one who is angry.

The biggest question that I face is, how to channelise my anger. There are many self-help books,many gurus, and many counsellors who suggest different ways to vent the emotion, but nothing really works. When I am done being angry, I become tired. the exhaustion that surrounds me sometimes lasts for days. I have tried a lot of things, but nothing is useful. I have tried mindless TV watching, walking, cursing, writing down choicest of swear words and burning them, nothing works. Sometimes, I have to literally shout at myself to just shut up; to stop talking or shouting.

The point of this article is to find out something that actually helps me blow the anger away. I don’t want to stay angry anymore. I want to be at peace, be happy. I guess the only way is to let go. till that happens it’s very difficult to find peace. One should remember the famous saying that “That’s the best revenge of all: happiness. Nothing drives people crazier than seeing someone have a good f*****g life.” ~ Chuck Palahniuk, author of Fight Club and several other novels

I guess he is right, no matter what you do unless and until you are happy and content with yourself, you will not be able to throw the anger away.

Austen and me

I am a self proclaimed Jane Austen lover. I got hooked to the seemingly idealist romances written by Austen at a very young age, thanks to my mother, herself an avid reader. I would like to believe that I am an Austen purist. I have devoured hundreds of literature discussing the nuances of her writing. I have seen various movies adapted and inspired from her work and still my thirst for her stories remain unquenched. It always seems that she has so much more to say and we as audience so much more to listen or read through. Its never enough. She is the romance queen after all. I doubt there has been another writer who inspired so much of longingness for a Victorian era England and perfect romances, elsewhere.

The time period that she lived in was fraught with social issues. There were so many changes going on in the society and none of these were mirrored or expressed overtly in the novel of Jane Austen . The beauty of her novels, her writing was, I guess, the way she portrayed and understood basic human emotions. Emotions and needs like the need to be recognised, the need to be respected, the need to understand and be understood in return, and in addition to the all encompassing need to be loved. What Austen succeeded in doing was capturing human emotions that have remain unchanged in the ever changing social fabric. they remain unchanged through continents, generations, time and race. That is where people identify with her, they love her and they adore her. that is why she remains timeless.

Whether it is famous Mr. Darcy’s pride or Mr. Elton’s stupidity and vanity or for that matter Anne Elliott’s stoic acceptance of life as it passed her by, they all carry an easy familiarity, that we, as humans, generally relate to. We have all met people who have similar characteristics. She through her portrayal of such sentiments and her idealism gives hope that humanity still lives and will be there forever.

I salute you austen. You shall always be my ultimate heroine.

Writing again

 

Day after day, I sit infront of my computer, thinking of writing something. But what I worry about the most is, writing something sensible.

Well, I guess its safe to say, if you wait to say something sensible or wait to say anything at all, words will fail you. When writing or trying to express yourself, its bet to be guided by instinct, as I have been for most of my life. The moment I stopped being instinctive and intuitive, words stopped being my friend.

I am feeling free after a long time, I am able to write, to formulate ideas. It’s amazing to see what boycotting TV only for a couple of days can do to your intellect and imagination. I am swearing off the idiot box forever… or lets say I will try to swear off it forever ;).

The freedom of expression has often been hailed as the cornerstone of civil liberties and to think that it is robbed by a mere television might be over thinking on my part.But that is not what I mean. Television, in itself is one of the most celebrated and greatest discoveries of our time. it has made the world seem smaller, it has made a lot of things within reach, it has facilitated dreams and it has allowed people to  see things that they never would have imagined to see. where I have a problem from this amazing thing is that it has also turned the major population into couch potatoes.We watch television not to entertain ourselves but to merely pass time. We watch it because we have nothing better to do.Some people may argue that this is a very old problem and the newer one plaguing our society at large is that television has now been replaced by smart phones. I agree. I think as our gadgets are becoming smarter our minds are becoming stupid. I remember those idyllic days when I could recall the numbers of all my friends and family without ever having to look at my phone. I could answer simplest of questions without ever having to google it. I miss those simple times. With so much of knowledge that has been made available to us we actually seem more reluctant to absorb it or understand it, let alone to avail the opportunity handed over to us on a platter.

 

I realised that I was losing my power to think, to formulate and most of all my power to express my thoughts, a quality for which I took pride in myself. I wanted to regain it. I also realised that most of my time was wasted in watching mindless television. something for which earlier I never had the time. now that the time was readily available I did not use it. and suddenly it dawned on me that I always wanted to do so many things with my life and I had never been able to make time for it. Now i did have the time but I wasted it staring at my stupid phone and television.

I am not saying we should not utilise the technology and watch those awesome shows, all i m saying is that we should not lose our creativity in the process

it may seem that i am rambling on and on bout nothing in general but that is what i have wanted to do for the longest time… ramble on. So here I am, ready to make a fool of myself and write what I please and how I please.