Accepting Vulnerability!

Hello there! It’s me again. Yes, I know it that took me quite some while to come up with this but I’m happy that I’m finally typing this out sitting in my couch! It’s not that I’ve been kept busy entirely with things and life but the truth is, I was busy thinking and recollecting myself; trying to find something worthy of reading and to be reflected upon. But then I realized the sole motive of this blog; it wasn’t something that was meant to portray ‘a’ me that I’m not, but to scavenge out ‘the’ me I have been hiding, from the world, behind the drapes of introversion and the discomfort of confiding into and banking upon someone in the recent times! For all those who know me, I know, this will come out as a sort of small concussion, making you think that I’m probably kidding when I call myself an introvert. But for all those who know me close enough, will know what this is about and what my mental state has been in the past few months!

Well, the good news is, I plan to change the status quo for this moment, as I decide to share a piece of my mind and me, with all of you, who have taken out time to read this. I decide to push this introversion out of me, this once at least, as I write this down, without any guards and sheath over my feelings.

To be honest, the recent times have been tough, challenging and testing to say the least. An identity crisis that almost dawned upon me nearly engulfed me as a whole and left an impact better left unsaid and not discussed. The helplessness and cluelessness about what’s happening around and why it is happening almost made me a captive of my own self; a self that was scared, scarred, weak and uncompetitive of living! I became someone who was apprehensive and paranoid, not about someone else, but about me myself! I know you all must be wondering what could’ve been such a thing that disturbed me so much; trust me, I’ve thought the same. Introspected myself, investigated me, asked myself a zillion questions a zillion times about what was wrong but failed to find an answer! Then why’s there this void that constantly growing bigger and deadlier, like a cancer, deep within my heart?

So to find an answer to this life impeding and irksome question, I decided to shed off my cloak of introversion and go out and talk to people. I always knew I’m not the only one who’s having trouble dealing with life problems. What I didn’t know was, that there’s a whole comrade of individuals and people who are suffering from the same crisis as I was. Some were doing better, some not so better! The next obvious question,

'What were the people, who were doing better with their problems, doing different from the others?'

I looked for the answer everywhere but I couldn’t find any at the start; till I started to connect the dots between how these people dealt with the problems in their lives.

Yes, they too were broken, scared, scarred, and apprehensive blah blah blah... but they still lead a better life than the other half that succumbed to the pressure. Why was that? It was a hard answer to find till one day I came across it and realised it was always there, kept right in front of my eyes, which I failed to notice all this time. There were these two things that connected them all together, that had an answer to all the mess and deluge of emotions! These two things were: one, Hope and other, Accepting Vulnerability!

We all know about how wonderful the thing Hope is; its healing power, the magic it can bring and what a difference it can make in one’s life. We’re all aware of it! What fascinated me more was the other set of skill set that I just alluded to above i.e. Accepting Vulnerability!

As strange as it may sound and no matter how much I tried crossing that off the list, it was true. What these ‘better’ set of people had in common was they accepted their vulnerabilities and weren’t shy of them. They took what came into their stride and accepted the fact that they are hurt, looked down upon, broken, scared and in pain. They didn’t just realize it, they accepted it too. That’s not a big deal to do, right? Everyone can accept that they are in pain and all. What they did differently was they told themselves something most of us fail to tell ourselves.

They told themselves:

‘It’s okay! It’s okay to be hurt, to be looked down upon, to be in pain, to be sad! It’s absolutely fine to not know all the answers to the questions that life has thrown at me! I too can be clueless and a mess, it’s a part of life! Yes, I’m hurt, I’m in pain but I’ll get over it! Yes, I’ll find the answer to these questions even if it takes times. I’ll go slow if I have to but I will eventually figure it all out!’

So I realized and found out, what these people did was, they ‘embraced’ their vulnerabilities! They didn’t embrace it to sit down and cry over them, they embraced them to work upon them! They didn’t succumb to them but took it in their strides as a valuable part of their lives. They made their vulnerabilities their strength. They told themselves that it’s important to feel this way too.

I realised that what happens with most of us is we do not embrace our vulnerabilities but try to numb them. What we fail to understand is that we cannot numb feelings; we cannot alienate ourselves from feelings things! That’s what makes us Human Beings in the first place; possessing the ability to feel things! And even if we try to accomplish it, then we not only numb feeling of pain, hurt, sorrow, grief etc..., we numb feeling of joy, happiness, acceptance and all the other positive feelings too. We create a hollow in our mind and heart. When there wouldn’t be any of these feelings, a void will start to flourish; slowly expanding in our heart, pushing the walls, making it difficult for us to breathe and live! The void is like an air bubble, clogging your arteries, waiting to explode inside of us! And no matter how hard we try to avoid or escape it, it would clinch us down, slowly gripping our mind, making us incapable of taking rational decisions! It’s like a deadly grip that’ll leave us incapable of living fruitfully and happily if we do not accept ourselves and our vulnerabilities and give this void a chance to be filled by positive feelings.

So for once, I feel it’s absolutely okay to feel vulnerable, to be human, to be seen; seen as down and out, to be in pain, in grief and out of sync, if we decide to embrace them; not to cry over 

them, but to work on them!

Vulnerability is not a low; it’s an opportunity to attain new highs, only if we open our arms and accept them!

Unprocessed Feelings!

A tarmac of black rolls out on my heart. A pile of unprocessed feelings clog my breath. I may have grown to be 20 but deep inside I still feel 5. Yes, that’s how it is! I still feel as small as a kid inside who wants to be careless and carefree, unperturbed and uninterrupted by the tides and ties of adulthood and responsibility (of acting like an adult).

I know the notion sounds kiddish but somewhere deep inside the little boy doesn’t care what the conventional notions and stipulations are, on which the modern world works and which this modern world inflicts on us! 

This article is not about how I want to act childishly or carefree, it’s more about the threads and knots of feelings that surround us. There’s so much we are holding inside that somewhere deep down our hearts we all are lost and garbled to an extent beyond repair. It is at this point of time that I see the actual appreciable beauty in the lines ‘Man is born free but everywhere he's in chains!’. 

The tarmac is turning so thick and black on the lining of our souls freezing us with its balmy with each passing moment! We all wear an invisibility cloak to hide who we actually are to present a fitting personality that we hope will blend in our surrounding trying to bring down the entropy of nature to make a perfect arrangement! I know that zero entropy symbolizes perfect arrangements with no asunder and imperfections but what this ideal scenario also signifies is the depravity and paucity of the feelings we have been suppressing and camouflaging inside. 

I do understand the concept of hiding feelings from the world just to rescue ourselves from the ambush and blitz that the world is so ready to shower at us but hiding it from the inner self killing away introspection is only making us more like robots rather than living Homo sapiens. That’s what the difference is between a human being and a robot, that we can feel things and emotions unlike them. Okay I am not saying that we should drown ourselves in the ocean of over thinking and stigma of sensitivity because all that’ll do is consume us by the stimuli of negative thinking and depression and suicidal thoughts in some cases but still aren’t we losing space for our real self in all this hustle and bustle of life? I guess this is not what I bargained for when I was a child working hard day in and day out to reach a place like this in my life! I never wished for a burden of unprocessed feelings and backlog of emotions to be put on my back so ruthlessly without prior knowledge of what my life conspires for me in the next seconds! The unsaid words, the feelings, the emotions, the thoughts with which I was born & brought up seem more like a mirage now. All these disciplines with which I was nurtured throughout my childhood sound so hollow. ‘Face the truth!’ ‘Never lie to yourself and never hide anything!’ ‘Do not fake things.’ ‘Be a good person!’ ‘Never think ill of others and never do anything bad with others!’ All these ideals seem like a slogan of some different era. It’s not these statements per se with which I’m trying to imply that how charlatan we have become but all I’m trying to do is draw a conclusion figuratively. 

I am in skepticism of what really is happening with me and life and the millions of feelings that I have been hiding away in the box of ignorance from such a long time. Facing them surely brings me pain and a frenzy of turmoil but what about not facing them? I evade them today, move on and march ahead only with a heavier burden to carry at my back tomorrow. Yes, the weight is manageable today but will it be manageable tomorrow is something I just don’t know! It’s like prancing on a doubly edged sword. I evade the feelings, I increase the burden which will eventually be unbearable someday or I face them, look them in the eye and be left broken and destroyed again to not be able to move forward for a significant amount of time. Decisions decisions! Tough one!

To be frank, I’m not that wise or smart or intelligent whatever you may call it, my grades don’t reflect my intellect! Should I go out, shed my burden fearing a break down or should I just postpone it all in a hope that one day it’ll all be fine? Should I take the risk of becoming a prisoner of my past by scavenging these feelings and emotions or should I depend upon the omens of the future who might never bestow their light upon me? Should I free my soul to find its own way or should I hold onto it and try to caress it and love it back? For now the decision is tough, for now, Unprocessed Feelings is all I have!

Speak Now!

Is there someone special in your life? Do you keep thinking about someone quite a lot of time? Does that someone light up your day or night? Do you dream about that person with eyes wide open? Would you like to be with them if it’s the edge of the world? Do you like their company? Do you love that someone? Have you told that someone about your feelings?

As you read these above lines, does a name pop up into your head? If yes, then that’s all I intended to do. So now that we have a name, we both know that how important that person is to you, right? Deny it and you’ll be lying to yourself. Go on whimpering that you’re not crazy about them but if all these questions brought only one name to your mind, then trust me my dear friend, you’re screwed! 

Undoubtedly, some of you may have come up with a slideshow of series of names and the images in their head. I must admit that you then have a really rocking life!

Anyways, coming back to where we left, have you said it to him/her?  You have? You haven’t? You did but the response was not what you yearned for? Or are you just happily committed to him/her? Or maybe just committed and withering by those daily fights and misunderstandings?

You’re afraid to say it? Thinking it might ruin the thing between the two of you.Well, I don’t know what the right thing to do is! Whether to wait for the right moment or to keep playing this wait and watch game forever. All I know is sometimes, that perfect moment might never come your way. Maybe the ball might never be in your court and you’ll be kept waiting for that golden opportunity. The things you’re trying so hard to put in place might never fit. Things might never be right! You’d keep waiting for things to settle down thinking in your head, ‘One more day and things will be alright!’, ‘I’ll take her out someday and open up my heart in front of her’, ‘I’m just in mess to deal with it right now’, 'He/she'll be with me if my destiny wants so!' and a million other reasons to hold your words back! It may work out for some, the gamble might pay off. But what if it doesn’t?

You think in your head that you’ll have a perfect date one day with that special someone and then you’ll present them with the garland of your feelings. You probably think saying it on the phone may not be the best idea to sort out a small tussle, so you’d wait your chance when you’ll see him/her in person. You think that probably avoiding the situation will put an end to it in a few days. Your perspectives may differ, your way of thinking might not match and you may pick up fights every single day on petty issues. But have these tussles and misunderstandings changed your feeling for the person you are thinking of right now? If you say you don’t know the answer, let me tell you one thing, you wouldn’t have been thinking of that person if you really didn’t know.

I don’t mean to push you or force you or persuade you to go and tell your counterpart anything, all I mean to convey is that if it’s in your capacity to tell the one you care so dearly for, seize the moment and don’t wait for the perfect one because no moment is perfect until you make it yourself by your actions. Don’t wait to hug them, kiss them or even bed them (if that’s what you’d like to do with them) the next time you meet them or see them. Don’t wait to hold their hand and tell them what they mean to you. Don’t wait for things to settle down because they never will settle down. Look them in the eye and make sure they know what’s in your heart and not what’s on your tongue for the statements differ sometimes! Do not leave things to their prerogative for they might not be as optimistic as you. Don’t keep words unsaid! Do not leave things to destiny for once at least! Don't relay all on hope just for once thinking they'll see it one day by themselves!

Don’t let these opportunities slip by for the regret that will come later will be very hard to deal with. You’ll be holding your head someday and will be thinking that why didn’t you tell them or made the move when you should have. The status quo is in your favor today my friend, it may not be so tomorrow; so make the best use of it before it changes! Speak  Now before it’s too late!

Half Engineer!

It still feels like it all started yesterday but the calendar on the wall speaks something else. It says 2 years have passed. Half the journey has been covered! I now realize that I’ve come down a long road. The memories are still as fresh as the morning dew though.

5^th August 2013, the first time I stepped into UIET, Panjab University.

‘It’s college life finally!’ I told myself.

It has been a crazy wild ride since. 2 years have passed like two months or as it feels like 2 weeks. It wouldn’t be an overstatement to say that these two years have pretty much showed me a demo of what life is all about. It definitely isn’t just about engineering for sure. That is the last thing we’re learning in this place! It’s about ‘the life’ we have learned being in college!

The first day in college. I still remember when I first walked into the campus. That rush of excitement, that tinge of nervousness, a little petrified, a little shy and what not! A plethora of emotions swinging inside me. With uncertainty of what’ll happen next to meeting and seeing new people come from almost all parts of the country with different cultures and different thinking!

The new found freedom of hostel life. Yes, something every college student 'should' experience once in life. The things learned in hostel are unimaginable! How strangers become brothers when we have to break some locks, how an India-Pakistan match becomes a matter of life and death in the hostel common room and what not! With hostel life comes the 'mess food'. Haha! All hostelers will know what this means. The dinner will seem almost impossible without a few curses about a few burnt chapatti or how bad the daal is! The late night cravings in that hostel room leading to hitting the places life PGI and NFS for late night snacks and paranthas! Night outs is something almost every hostel-er is acquainted! If you haven't had a nightout till now, you are NOT a true hostel-er! 5-6 friends sleeping in one room is more of an accomplishment rather than uneasiness! Borrowing stuff and never returning is the mantra in hostel! The hostel birthday’s with your ass being beaten to a limit where you cant even sleep on your butt is something we all have cherished!

           

The friendships! They say that the most people we meet between 16 years-22 years are temporary people in our life. It may be true, but yes it is in these 2 years that we’ve found some life long friends to keep who no one will ever replace. With almost the whole class being considered as a friend, from ones who’d just call you during exam to solve doubts to the ones who’d almost take care of every fucking thing that you have to do(assignments, files and tests). To the one’s who rarely talk but will never fail you when you are in peril, may it be when you get your face smashed in the very first semester of college or who may expect from you to support their allegiance in the upcoming elections and to those who may chip in to help you out in your day to day proceedings! ‘koi naa bhai, bike ka thoda hi kharcha hai bs apna facial thik karle pehle! xD’ They’ll come in all sizes with their own unique attributes which may sometimes be irritating but never the less, they’ll still be your friends! ‘bhai ke liye itna ni karega!’ ‘love you too bro!’ ‘abbe koi naa dekh lenge!’ ‘saale tu ch*tiya hai but jaisa bhi hai acha hai!’

    

The lecture bunks! One of the biggest achievement in college life is to make a mass bunk happen! The pride of mass bunking is something one can never get enough of! Though it’s an uphill task to make it happen as you’ll always have a nerd classmate for whom bunking is almost like a IPC 302 crime but nevertheless, you’ll still give your 200% to convince him/her with ‘Mat jaa yr, dekh koi bhi ni jaa ra!’

The spontaneous trips, movies and sukhna lake! It’s a normal class day and all of a sudden it turns out that one of you starts to feel a little notorious and a voice comes out ‘chalo kasauli chaltein hai!’ and in a flash of seconds all the class is emptied and WOOHOO here you go! ‘dekh yr kitna romantic mausam hai, chalo sukhna chale!’ ‘bhai imdb rating sexy aai hai bht, chor C ki class!’

That guardian senior! Believe it or not, we all have that one guardian senior we look forward to every time we spill some ‘raita’ in our college life. From general tips on how to score or nail a subject to the most personal advices, there is always a senior who knows you inside out and whose traits you always idealize! They’re your guardians away from your home! They are your Night’s Watch!

The first college crush! Haha! This is something that brings a big grin on everyone’s face! Remember your friends teasing you with the name of that girl/boy every now and then there’s a conversation about the opposite sex! Not only this, you still maybe are stalking his/her fb/whatsapp account every now and then no matter how much you say you are over them! The first college crush is always a cute memory! ‘bhai vo dekh bhabhi library jaa ri hai! Pakad le library me hi!’ ‘Bhai bhabhi aaj kisi aur ke saath ghum ri thi, bta uthwade saale ko?’ ‘bhai bhabhi hot ho gyi hai!’ ‘han han ab bhai se zyada jaanu pyaari ho gyi, dhokebaaz bc!’

The first college heartbreak! If you haven’t had a heart break in the first two years of college life, you have pretty much missed a lot! No matter how much it had hurt at that time, it all feels like a good laugh now! You become a butt of jokes among friends with the name of that boy/girl being called out to address you but it now all sounds funny! But these friends have always been there when you needed a shoulder! ‘koi naa bhai, nayi bhabhi dhundenge!’ ‘bhai train, auto aur ladki ke peeche kabhi ni bhaagna, ek jaati hai toh doosri aati hai!’

Exam time! ‘Bhai gye iss baar toh, bilkul kuch ni aata’ ‘bhai abhi toh start krna hai, aaj raat kaali karunga!’ Exam time are the most stressful times when the topper becomes the epitome of the almighty. ‘bhai padhade plz! Jo kahega vo karunga!’ ‘bhai important important hi btade bs, 50me se 50 thodi laane hai!’

   

                                                

The results! The grades which were sky high when we entered college are now hitting new lows. ‘bs iss sem pass ho jaun, agle se pakka padunga’ ‘hey bhagwan RE naa aaye bs, teacher ke pair padne padenge!’. No matter how rock solid the determination is to study hard the next semester, there’s always some sleep or a movie coming to spoil it!

Broken Friendships! As friendships were made, a lost came to an end. Some bitter, some mutual, some due to situations, some otherwise. Whatever it may be, we all have lost a few friendships which we never wanted to lose in these two years. Packs and groups which once felt like armours for each other crumbled to pieces when put against the test of time and character. Sometimes it was our fault which we failed to see, sometimes theirs! We all tried our best to give in the best we could but we may have failed. 2 years down the line and we still struggle sometimes to give our best to the people we want to see so dearly in life! Whatever we may say, deep down within, we still possess a small soft cushion for those friends who aren't their with us anymore and it won’t be an exaggeration that we may still have a small hope within of getting back together!

These 2 years haven’t just been about mere engineering! These two years have been about knowing life, knowing people, learning how to face life and situations in thick and thin! They have taught us how lovely life can be if we embrace it and how ugly it can seem if we decide to stay aloof!

Reflecting back upon myself, I could have been a different person, a better one no doubt! With a lot of wrongs that could have been avoided and a lot of new friendships explored! I don’t know whether it’s late for me or not, all I know is I have to be at my best! These last 2 years have been a learning curve for me, an unmatched experience! I would not call it a beautiful journey but I will surely call it a journey worthy of every minute! I don’t have much close friends but for me everyone is a friend who’d I’ll embrace with my arms open wide! I am not perfect, I've made mistakes, some really terrible one’s, but I’m willing to learn from them! These years have subtracted 2 years out of my 4 year course but have added something I will always cherish and hold close to my heart! With only 2 more years left, I hope the coming years may be even more wonderful as the two that have just passed with the different hues painting the canvas of my life and adding more value to it as I prepare myself for the gruesome world waiting on the other side of the road. Coming to the end of this article, I officially facilitate myself with the title of “Half Engineer!”

PS: Would end it with the famous RDB dialogue:

"College de gate de iss taraf hum life ko nachate hai..

Te dooje taraf life humko nachati hai! tim lak lak te tim lak lak!"

At the end, thank you to everyone, whether we now talk or not, whether we like each other or not, no matter what the status quo may be between us for making these past two years memorable and cherish-able! Take care!

Teenage Ends! :P

Hm. Last few hours left in the day. Not hours but minutes. The day is almost coming to its end and so is my teenage life. The clock will strike 12 soon and the date would change. A few calls and some whatsapp texts would fire up as soon as the clock would show midnight! To be really frank, two hours ago from now and I didn’t even care about what was happening; that it was actually my last eve as a teenager and the realization dawned on me that tomorrow I’d turn twenty and would not have that ‘teen’ as a suffix in my age! I was always a cribster and wanted to come out of this teenage period as soon as possible. I considered it as really unlucky and stressful time. I hated my life. I hated every bit of it. My mind starts to run down the memory lane as I recall all the sweet n salty moments of life about how things were and how they have changed over the period of time.  The reminisces of the past start playing like a record in the head! The memories of what I looked like in school with parted hairdo and a geeky look hovering like a bumble bee in stupid attires! All the crazy little notions and silly quarrels I engaged in with friends in the name of new found ‘maturity’. The new found freedom that came with the tag was always welcoming. I am still laughing my heart out over those memories! The infatuations I had developed in class 9^th on one of my seniors. You know that you are such a dork and will never make it but you still somehow convince yourself that she’ll be yours one day! From being parents good child to becoming a spoilt brat! The age has such an effect on you that you start to question each and every thing happening around! I was bullied and made the centre of a hell lot of jokes. Crying in the corner was an evident escape (as I said I’m a cribster)! The first love, ahh, magical eh? Every teenager comes across this silly ‘first love of their life’ in this period (same as me) where everything and everyone goes down the gutter as you swim in your own magical sea of love willing to be engulfed by it with all its might! All that matters to you is that ‘love of your life’ (jaanu, baby, shona and a list of never ending cute nick names) and all that it would take to make it work! Of course with that first true love accompanies the first heartbreak where you think you are left in pieces and will never ever be the same again! When you feel that life will never get back on track and you start losing everything you possessed. You start seeing things upside down not because they are that way but because you are hanging upside down with a blotted mind that you are correct and nobody understands you. Friends turn into foes, you feel your parents let you down as you feel they don’t care about you but only care about your falling grades (can’t blame them)! All in all life starts to suck in your head. You find yourself having even suicidal thoughts at time! Silly me! You somehow work out things and start to take one day at a time but still break down in the night and feel you can’t do it anymore! The studies front is also not that supportive. On the other hand, new feelings like jealousy, treachery and diplomacy start to conquer you. You just try your best to keep yourself afloat and not drown! You almost experience a small lifetime all together!

Now that it’s all coming to an end in a few minutes, I look back and laugh at a few things, few things still pinch me and there must be few I don’t have any memories about. But all in all, as I look back, I feel satisfied! I had a pretty happening Teenage life which was gracious enough to show me different phases, some green some blue. Teenage life helped me become what I am today. I do not boast to be a very great guy but I guess I’m not bad too! I’m a mediocre and trust me, I feel happy about it! I saw my highs and my lows. They taught me well. Happy moments came and went by, so did the sad ones. I did learn that no matter what, life goes on. It’s the most basic and universal law of nature! I learned some good qualities and a few bad ones too. The best thing that i learned in this time is that I need not to be perfect and any bad experience is not the end of life. It’s just a lesson. A lesson that will probably come in handy the next time any stressful situation knocks on my doorstep! It did take me a while to learn that life is meant to be lived and not passed! I know the realization hit me a bit late but it was still sweet. It did tell me that even today isn’t late to live. Just take life as it comes and it will be hard at times for sure. All you need to do is hang in there, bide your time and wait for the right moment! Till then all you need to do is fight it out, hard! As hard as you can, till the last breath! It’s a little cliché and repetitive, but life will knock you down, it’s on you to get back up or just lay low. Take time to stand up, no issues but make sure that you stand up! Take it slow, no issues, but make sure that you progress! Take it one day at a time, no issues, but make sure you live that one day and make the best out of it! Not every day will be as pleasant as you like, no issues, just make sure you make that day worth it! Life is best only when you build the crescendo, make sure you build it before the slump hits you, before that nadir hits you!

A toast to my teenage life as the clock is about to strike 12!

Two quotes from the movie Yeh Jawaani Hai Deewani:

"Main udna chahta hoon, daudna chahta hoon, girna bhi chahta hoon... bas rukhna nahi chahta!"

And

"Waqt kabhi nahi badalta, bas hum kharch hote jaate hai"