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Dive Deep

In one of those weekly fights with my elder sister (when we were really young), for a change my mom had taken her side. I was furious and not knowing how to channel my anger, I put some home-made scrub into the back pockets of her jeans, that were hanging behind the bathroom door. That doused my anger immediately and I went about my days and forgot, until it was found out. I have surely been as annoying as an alarm clock to my siblings, more than they deserved and I didn’t feel even a pinch of guilt. (**Asian Sky shop moment- I am a changed person now). Maisie Williams (Acted as Arya Stark in Game of thrones) had a problem feeling her emotions and facing them, during a short period of time. On-screen and off-screen, she couldn’t get herself to cry.

Maisie Williams as Arya Stark of Winterfell

The internet gets truck loads of posts everyday, telling you- how to manage your anger and control it; not be upset and how to find true happiness; remain calm and not over-react; and there is a one-sided opinion. We are biased towards different feelings; branding half of them to be negative and the others to be positive. The downside to this partiality in our mind-set is that, we are never accepting to the situation at hand and resist it just to avoid the ‘defamed feelings’. 

This makes me think of the black and white symbol of Yin and Yang. We need both black and white to balance out our emotional self and feel whole. Never are we always happy or always sad; that’s unnatural. Even when we are happy we do have reasons to feel sad but we have more reason to be happy. Even when we are sad we do have reason to be grateful and happy, but in this moment we are acknowledging the grief. The curvy line in the symbol signifies that there are no absolute separations between the two opposites. Similarly, I don’t think there is a defined line as to our emotions and we can switch over when ever we want. 

Have you ever gone scuba diving or underwater in a submarine? It’s a strange experience. Underwater the same colours are seen as darker or as a different shade (watch video- link for the same). We breathe through our mouth and cannot communicate except using hand gestures, in a dive. Even time seems to pass quickly when we’re inside. There is very little thinking and more observing; we almost forget ourselves for a bit. Synonymously different emotions make us see the world differently. Like the colours, the same people we love become our worst nightmares; Time flies when we are doing something we love and it seems a drag when we hate doing something; Anger makes us oblivious to everything, shortens the breath and we can’t focus on anything except ourselves, while bliss makes us want to indulge in things around us, breathe with ease and lose ourselves in the act. 

Staying underwater for long is not comfortable for new divers. Its takes time to understand how to manoeuvre and handle ourselves. We are not born with this knowledge but it’s learnt. It’s obviously not a mandate to learn to be a diver, but I see more people challenging themselves and getting coached to be professional divers. Why are we not diving deep into our emotional needs as a person? Resisting the discomfort of new and defamed emotions will never get us through. Validation and judgements, try and scare us away from being open to feeling everything. If we want to learn how to manoeuvre and handle ourselves through every emotion, we have to dive deep. 

We should wish that better things happen to us, but if it doesn’t then we might as well, get to know ourselves in the worst. When the situation calls for you to feel sad, angry, remorseful, unsatisfied, guilty, fearful, hateful, pissed off, frustrated, irritated, anxious and all those under-the-carpet feels; you be ready to feel it, just as readily we want to feel the opposite. That for me is being vulnerable to yourself first. If you can face your emotions, you’re better placed to manage sharing it with others. 

If we all hide our feelings and don’t express it, we wouldn’t be any different from robots. Vulnerability is defined as – “exposed to the possibility of being attacked or harmed, either physically or emotionally.” However, being vulnerable is credited to empowering you and giving you strength. Contradictory? The crux of it is that, if you have been through the drama; and know yourself through and through— you know you can handle the worst that will be thrown at you. Knowing that gives you confidence and strength to be bare and not hide any part of you. This comes only when you have experienced the feelings (that we resisted); let it come and let it go, leaving you a changed person. 

To all the Hit-and-Run drivers out there- the seriousness of not repeating a mistake, is felt only after being ashamed about it the first time? The fire and rage to fight all odds again, comes so easily when you have faced your failures. I was down with some illness for a month and recovery took another; which got me really weak and drained. I felt the emotion strongly at that point of time; angered and frustrated not having trained for two months. Getting back in the game after the frustration of two months couldn’t be more sweet. Let us allow ourselves to feeling everything we can, to diving in deeper waters only to come out, seeing the same lands with different eyes. 

This is from the last season of the Game of Thrones.
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Reroute

One morning I woke up replaying an argument I had a few days ago and I lived with that thought playing in my head the whole day. This became normal after a few weeks. I couldn’t tell I was doing this, a few months down and it was habit before I realised. It’s a dark space to be in, I can see now that I’m not there anymore. Over thinking had become very natural to me and I didn’t want to call it depression. It’s a taboo, right?, to have depression and talk about it. I mean not everyone thinks it’s okay. Not even today.

From this dark space my mind could only operate like that, but from another view I knew I’m blessed beyond imagination. How do you decide in the worst second of your mood that you need to be seeing life from the sunny-beach eyes and not from some cold-cave-hollow-eyes(exaggerated)?  

It was the urge to live better and fulfilled but knowing what I deserve. Know your worth, that you deserve to feel good. My sister passed me on this advice she got -“if you know you’re doing the right thing, don’t let anything that anyone says or does affect you”. What does your conscience tell you? 

I think talking to her, sharing my space and taking help was the main thing. Need to know that I deserve better. Sulking, believing in the negative words voiced at you, playing victim, beating yourself up mentally, letting yourself think your life is controlled, it was all exhausting me and I could tell by the way I felt. I wanted better. A few friends heard me out, some pushed me away. I wasn’t giving up.

A while back I wrote about how I want to have a fulfilled experience of life and not just chase happiness. No emotions are wrong or bad. It’s the way we deal with it. Over time I’ve learnt to not resist any emotions. Feel it, leave the thought behind and just pick myself up and move. 

Do everything in my capacity to get back up for me. 

So it’s not like I’m mentally on the beach all the time, I still have rough moments in a day. I can choose to hold on to it and I can still add up everything that’s not happening the way I want it to. Every obstacle, everything that I’m being stopped from, every troubling incident that’s added to my memory like when you’ve added too much salt in your curry and you can’t take it out. Just trying to fix my curry as I pass every day. 

The idea is to not fix the curry, the salt is already added you trying to fix it is only going to make things worse. Just accept and make a new one.

Once I know I’m not able to think clearly I tell myself to “reroute”. Keep a list at hand -Dark chocolate(its magic), call sister, call a friend, take a shower, blare music, get a walk, Netflix, binge watch comedy videos (Sunil Grover) and read some inspiring stories online, . Not running away but just giving my mind some timeout, because when you’re emotional it’s not easy to tell the difference between sea breeze and cave chills.

So may we help each other in rough seas and pick ourselves up when there’s no one around, because who doesn’t like beaches.


Must Must Must watch this!!!

DO read! Very helpful! 

https://www.everydayhealth.com/columns/therese-borchard-sanity-break/ways-cultivate-good-gut-bacteria-reduce-depression/

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Just happy or human?

Are we all looking for happiness instead of a fulfilled human experience? Even as a baby when we cry everyone tries to cheer you up immediately. What about that part of the human experience? Like having to miss people, to be heart broken, to fail at times, get uncomfortable. Is it all not natural, like a part of the journey of life?

Its very important that we stop reading articles which says “10 ways to be happy” or “do this to have a happy life”. Situations are going to come which will throw you off your couch and make you feel really low. Chances are you’re not going to be able to make yourself happy instantly. To accept being in that place and be okay  because its a part of this experience should be the normal. Not getting anxious about your next bout of happiness.

I have been there and done that. Read some 10’000 quotes on happiness and how to be happy manuals. Its only going to make you feel like being unhappy isn’t normal. Sad and unhappy is also a part of human emotions. The sooner we accept it, we go through it and come out of it, the more human and normal it is.

May be when you’re not happy you’re just neutral, it doesn’t  necessarily have to be sad. Neutral is also an experience to take in.

Yes there may be research backing up the importance of being happy for good health and laughing and smiling more often. I just feel I can’t force laugh if something isn’t funny, laughing clubs isn’t my thing. If I genuinely feel its funny I know I can’t control my laughter. Why hide other emotions? If ‘LOL’ is a thing even “Crying Out Loud” should be a thing. Its only real that we treat all emotions with equal respect.

The sky is the same, the clouds keep changing shapes. I am the blue inside and my emotions are just like passing clouds. Imagine if the clouds never changed their shapes or moved. There would be no rains and the sun would just shine through in the same way everyday.

Everyday is different and we can just take it as it is. Happiness is being glorified but I would not fixate on the idea of being just happy.

“Openness means no conclusions – simply looking at everything the way it is.” – Sadhguru

I want to be every expression this human life can give. So when I’m actually happy I can relish it for what it is.

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