Phew....

I reached the big milestone in life... I do not anymore feel the need of teaching others any or all of my pearls of wisdom in life. And a lil surprisingly, my reaction to the realisation was that of immense relief. Its like there is an agenda hanging around conversations reeking of your saccharine enthusiasm in life and trust me there is nothing that puts someone off more than the fact that you are dying tell them how to make their shit better.

That was tough confessing but its done.

You know honestly... I feel there is something deeply cultural about this symtom... from the place I come from, everyone has it. Its almost like the way of conversations back there. And I am glad to have grown over it. So if there was a community called 'To each his own'on facebook, I'd be the latest member.

Halo of the shadow

I have been having this idea of writing this big big tome of a novel and all I need is a paid vacation to someplace shiny and warm for 13 months a year. Only because its gonns be a tourist spot and people are gonna come and go. No long relationships. I think time kills them, most anyway. I would selfishly only wanna know them till they are there... when they have all the time in the world and money for themselves. Its the best time to engage their faculties completely, when they listen and wanna be something bigger and different from their ordinary lives.

I want me to be the only constant in this brilliant laboratory of souls in human forms... though I wouldn't mind a dog. Have you ever imagined some place like this and how the rules of the game change. Suddenly, it does not matter where you are from, what your family did to you or you to them. You can come up with a fictional life and no one would care. Every one's just completely self-indulgent, and refreshingly honest about it... for they are on a vacation.

I've begun to dislike reading other people's blogs... my own too actually. Yes... I go and re-read my posts. To see if they carry the same emotion for me now as they did then. Mostly the answer is yes and sometimes I get cringy and uncomfortable at all the emotion I have laid bare for strangers to read. And I get bored with all the self-indulgence I see... I did blah blah blah... my life has... my passion is... I feel like... and you can very well turn around and say I din't ask you to read mine so fuck off for I can clearly do without your self-indulgent take on the issue. So to divert the whole matter lets see if we can answer the question of why do people write blogs? I do know its a mode of expression, but is it:

1. Blogs are like surrogates for conversations. In our worlds people use blogs to say what they don't have anyone to express to. sorry state. Not all probably, but most. And the remaining few get to be 'Blogs of note'...

2. Blogs are like surrogates for a desired life. You can weave threads into an anonymous story and put it out there for a larger audience. And experiment with what if that is how things really were, would the world have turned out for you? Comments or No Comments. and if any... what kind? Sympathy, love, curiosity, agreement...

I think I know my answer. You can find one for you and keep it.

The crawly in my blanket

'Before Sunset' by far has been the scariest thing I saw this week. For the minority who may not have seen this masterpiece, please do not do so. I have seen it several times but it is one piece of art that can fill me with joy, anguish and fantasy at the same time. The scariest part of the movie is when Jesse describes his marriage... he says how he started out wanting to follow this ideal self of his, rather than the honest self.. he thought that respect, admiration and trust were enough and if he could be this ideal version of himself it didn't matter who he was with. Love would happen... its been some years now and he is miserable. He feels he is running a nursery for his 4 year old with someone he used to date once.

U see I have been living with the same idea for several months now... that it is me that matters. I need to be who I wanna be and then it does not matter who I end up with. I'll be able to give and receive love nonetheless but this guy just scared the shit out of me.

Its funny coz over the last several months I have been warring with the realisation that love is that something magical... its that wrinkle in the bedsheet that fits perfectly with the edge of the mattress for it to be folded under. Its that snug exact length of an arm you would like to tuck around yourself while going to sleep every night. No elbow jutting out... no finger in your face.

I do not want to beleive that its an exact science. And its bloody terrifying. I have been swimming in what ifs... what if I do not find my crazy baby in time? what if he does not like my kind of sex? What if I can't talk to him like I have done with some people in my life... just the way one connects with random strangers at times...

There is another funny thing that scares me that I'd like to confess. My job entails I keep meeting my BU Heads. And somehow there is this one man who seems to like certain qualities in me. Like the fact that I listen. So to cut a long story short, I had a dissgreement with him on a decision he took and I made it clear to him... in the next couple of hours we met 4 times and each time we disagreed. He obviously enjoyed the intellectual jogging and told me as much. So towards the end of these couple of hours... he cracked a joke and all around laughed including me, and I responded with a wise crack and in that one moment... our frequencies were so in tune that he physically moved towards me... to slap my back or hug me, I don't know... I could feel my eyes widening with a mixture of fear and shock and he realised just in time that we had an audience and pulled himself back. I don't know if it was visible to others, but I was shaken a little. I don't think there was anything sexual in that sudden overpowering impulse he felt, but its scared me nonetheless.

I am scared of the way people can feel around me. And specially intelligent ones. They seem to have this need to be understood and I am someone who can listen deeply. Its a very tiring process trust me. Its very hard work... to listen. And I am making a pattern out of people talking about things they wouldn't have told anyone. I share snippets with some relevant others outside and they are shocked at people talking to me about all that stuff. Someone said it gives me a lot of power... but maybe... I don't want that power. I just want to be me. This whole adult world sounds and feels very alien to me most times and I don't know if I wanna play this game of listening and reaching deep any more. Honeslty... I get a sense of being violated. I get a sense that people use this ability of mine to be able to listen to them... so deeply sometimes I become one with them... their pain becomes mine and their anguish burns in my heart. It is difficult to explain to most people. And it all can be so horribly misconstrued by everyone. I begin to threaten people and the whole cycle of destructive behavior around me begins. Or they start projecting all their desires on me and expecting the world. I don't have all the talents in the world and I end up being blamed for that. Someone who could make them feel like heaven in the beginning is suddenly no good any more.

The only solution therefore seems to join them... and behave like I am just one of the many insensitives around and you'll get no different from me than from anyone else. It seems like an ok enough defense mechanism, which will so surely make me very unhapppy.

Anyway excuse me for this has been a desultory conversation. I just poured my heart out and it's splashing around rather erratically rt now.

Carry the notion back to me

Let me feel the mystery
Find you that histrory
to read it out to you
and see the dream dawning in your eyes
Will you write my dictionary
and translate for me
the unknowings and undoings
I'm meant to be.
I'll write you a poem till then
to fill the time within
as the sun burns its gold...
Will you help me find that window?
I can not see
Will you burst the bubble?
I can not breathe
The battle of me with me
Will you be my referee?
I carry my soul out each day
fearing it ebbs like essence.. away and away
I'd like you to be the custodian of my soul
and feel invincible
look down upon the world
all haughty, with disdain
So will you take my soul from me?
Carry the notion back to me.
Set me free
for enough if it left might not be.
the exhaustion of the violence of this world,
the cynical voyeurism eats away at me
I'd rather you would make me bend
set the ball rolling till
the string finds the other end.

The curvature of pessimism

Standing in the centre of the road.
feeling cornered by the cumpulsion of choice, a chore.
Which side to take?
The sky up above is bright and shiny
The breeze is light
The god damned noose is too tight
For I want everything blotted out of my sight
Would it be unbearable to just stop?
To not look, not sleep, not breathe or live.
To not have to answer any questions
or ponder galore on unrequitited lore
or be worthy of the question in the soul
to be or not to be or Am I just this or more?
I don't want to exist any more.
So I am laughing at the impossibilities
The ludicrous irony of intwined insensibilities
Yours with me and mine with yours
I just don't want the equation anymore.
For too much goes to nothing
Too many lenses for the light to filter
And each ebbs at its color
I'd rather not play the game anymore
To look fore, want more.
I'd just rather not be
Then wake up and find,
This nightmare is where each day will be.

Early Saturday and I have had a good night

I have had those moments when you come home and switch on the TV, which happens to be the significant other in my life rt now... and everything sucks. The serials are all too melodramatic... even the good ones are trying to give the really 'cry'ee ones a screw over. So finally you are bleary eyed and contemplating just how much you would love an enlivening conversation rt now. You are hungry and tired and hungry for that zing in life... that spark somewhere that makes you feel like your life just turned into a ferrari engine.

And they say that they are showing a movie called 'Love and other Disasters'... and the moment I see Brittany Murphy on the star cast, honestly I am put off. But well I just give it ten mins... after which I have to go to bed and sleep with myself. And I am caught up. I am truly really caught up in the whole thing. Its an amazing movie... I had this orgasmic joy spreading through me because it is specially a Friday night when you have nothing to do that you pray for such moments... that you'll get to see an amazing movie that will just turn all that you are feeling about life on its head.

and come out of it like you were with a friend and you just had a conversation where you got everything the other said and they knew you so well it was you they spoke of all the time. Brit humour rocks!! I wish life were like the movies sometimes...

And by the way... what is the most irritating thing on the telle these days? Guess..? Ok. Its this: 'This movie has been edited and is suitable for family viewing in India.' I wanna say Fuck you!! Its like someone's told me that here's your cake but I took all the essence out! Its like showing you the Monalisa without one eye. Its incomplete... every scene and dialogue is there for a reason. Its a part of the fabric. Its a part of the maker's dream and overall I think its just cruel.

Anyway, I hope that IPL world cup or not, they keep showing amazing movies. Also, will someone tell Star Movies to not show 'Double Impact' when they can't think of anything else? Its on everytime I switch to their channel now.

To talk of better things tomorrow brings Wolverine!! I am hoping it will again be one of those things that I can discuss with friends gesticulating wildly with over bright eyes! I love ze movies. :)

Poets of the Fall - Roses

"Roses"

I've walked the distance, I paid my dues
and tried to have a go at what I thought I knew was real, held no appeal
I've been to places, I've seen the tidings,
I bought a book of rules for every coin that I could steal
And so I came to gaze upon the stars, when they were yet unborn
And consequently, tear at my old scars, and the mask I had outworn

So when I'm crying alone
Yeah, when I'm cold as a dying stone

Grow me a garden of roses
Paint me the colors of sky and rain
Teach me to speak with their voices
Show me the way and I'll try again

I've heard the rumors, started fires, I sowed a sordid lot of plays for keeps for what I need, behold
the demons that I freed
I've tried my best at wearing the hard hat, but
healing doesn't seem to happen when you hide away the seed
And so I came across the medicine man, and he showed me what I'd forlorn
For if I'm stayed it happens by my own hand, and my own voice full of scorn

So when I'm crying alone
Yeah, when I'm cold as a dying stone

Grow me a garden of roses
Paint me the colors of sky and rain
Teach me to speak with their voices
Show me the way and I'll try again

Without you I'm nothing at all
And life has the face of a morbid game
With you nothing seems impossible
It all seems to fit the frame

So when I'm crying alone
Yeah, when I'm cold as a dying stone

Grow me a garden of roses
Paint me the colors of sky and rain
Teach me to speak with their voices
Show me the way and I'll try again

I love the song... see if you like it too here!

Felt taken for granted. It hurts with this one. Because just too much has gone into it. And the fear is that I am the one who has somehow made it ok for it to happen. That I have allowed it to happen to myself.

Slit wrists

The NEWS channels here have amazing TRPs. One among the plethora of frequencies scrambling to give you some piece of action is this 24 Hour horror show called Aaj Tak. This modern televised version of Manohar Kahaniyan repulses me to such an extent I can lose my appetite for days after an exposure greater than 10 Mins. So as I continue to out do all past pangs of morbidity, I dare myself to watch the channel. Well... there you have yours truly scouting the frequencies and landing on the desired one.

Guess what they are showing? Try. I said really. Try.

Its an interview. A 3 year old child sitting in a semi dark room so his face can't be seen is being patiently prodded and questioned by a lady whose voice could be better than them angels talking in your ear.

You see the deal is that this boy's father murdered his mother. So? Well the meaty bit is that the kid happens to be the only eye witness to the gory crime. He has seen his father kill his mother at the tender age of 3. He does not even understand what happened or is happening. He is struggling to frame sentences... says any word that comes to his head because he can't really communicate. Kids that age can't. He does not understand the questions so she asks him again and agian... painstakingly patient... prodding him to get into details of how his father pulled his mother or what was he holding in his hand when he hit his mother...

Human Rights Commission in this country must have died. And so must the ever aware junta who watches so much news or our fables activists. You see we create more hoopla when Richard Gere kisses Shilpa Shetty at an AIDS awareness rally. Our activists are up in arms demanding Gere's arrest and imprisonment. No one comes forward to protect the innocence of a child who can not decide for himself that it is not in his best interest to talk about how his father was killing his mother as he watched on... on the national TV. He must have been thrown to the wolves by money crazy relatives who grabbed this opportunity of making a quick buck. The television channel's TRPs must have gone up coz they play a story 200000000 million times a day to ensure everyone knows.

The irony is Aaj Tak has been consistently awarded the Best NEWS Channel award for 3 years now. If this is how we define NEWS as a nation... we deserve it. We who are overtly so snobbish about gossip and gore... are all glued to our TVs as they rape the innocence of a toddler on National TV.

I have written to the Human Rights Commission and am waiting for a response. I will let you know 'IF' something happens. I will also be leaving a letter of condemnation on this channel's site. And I wish there was some way I could tell that woman trying to gain the trust of that baby so he would open up and talk more masala, that she should just kill herself. She is no better than sick paedophiles who abuse children.

Lesson learnt. I'd rather not be informed than be inundated.

Answers don't answer anymore

It seems sometimes that all this search is in vain or I have some chemical locha in my head. It is just such a tiring experience to live, I almost wanna give up. I wanna crib crib crib and crib about life and how my boss sucks, and that my friends seem to all have gotten busy with their lives and I feel like I am floating... not really going anywhere. Its like a car without headlights... staircase without the landing in sight.

Writing like this..? No one wants to read someone's cribs in life. I know that. I mean our own lives have gotten so heavy to carry its just not possible to do that for some one else. Then I wonder if it would not have been better that I'd rather be a bird or animal on this planet than be human...

Some say I should be grateful for all the good I have around me. Clothes on my body, food on my plate and a roof on my head with a relatively high level of confidence that I will not get murdered tonight by some random burgler. And I still can't shake that heavy feeling in my heart. Its almost like I can't breathe all that deep that I want to.

It does not help that I have had a big fight with my room mate and her attempts at making peace sound even more pathetic as all I sense is some selfishness there. I distrust het to such a level that I can't believe she will do anything at all that is not motivated with some selfish concern. Not a great feeling to have for a person you have been living with under the same roof for two years.

I am a person who in any situation will first think about how the other person might be feeling. These situation might also be one in which I get rudely woken up at 2:30 AM and still feel what might have motivated the other person to do so... So if my boss says something really rude... I'll think may be he is not having such a good day or probably he is saying it for my own good... or maybe I did something to make him say what he did... I can get so deathly empathetic in such inane situations I can't beleive myself.

I now know that this does not come from some deep lack of self esteem etc etc... for many years that is what I thought. But now I know that this is not the case. I am just someone who has this process to relate to a situation... through emotions of the other party. Its all good just that most times it leaves me without a defense machanism. I take whatever shit people give me without reacting to it. Always giving them the benefit of doubt... thinking there must be a reason behind their bad behavior and that once I get to understand that... I will look at the situation differently.

Over the past few months somehow... my faith has gone considerably to the dogs. The faith that essentially all human beings are good at heart and we should not judge what lies beneath with what happens on the surface. I find myself turning into this cynical being who reads motives behind behaviors, because it has been made evidently clear to me that people will consider you worth your salt when they feel you have a patch on others in the worldly ways. So you need to be this smart soul who knows how to navigate through shark infested waters because everyone is looking for shortcuts. If you know the way... well you will have a lot of followers/supporters etc etc because they all can then ride on your back and make you feel good about it.

I somehow dislike the parasitism which seems to be the norm. To get to things quicker and faster whatever be the goal. And you are a looney if you don't conform. So if I offer something to someone with an open heart and a bright smile, they will take it for sure but keep waiting for when is it that I come to their door step asking for a withdrawl from the favour bank.

Another drawback to the situation is that I am overly sensitive to the vibes and undertones of conversations. I hear the undertones more than the words... need to or how will I read the emotions... My information gathering gets hijacked and I can't help reacting or not reacting to the emotional undertones...

I end up damaging my peace of mind and my confidence in my ability to take care of my own interests and protect myself in an adverse situation. So I have started fighting now. Fighting people. I tell them what I like and don't. Somehow you get a lot more respect that ways than when you'd take care of what others might need. You might be liked but most people will take you for a wuss unless proven otherwise.

World is nothing but all mirrors around us and these eyes actually don't show us anything but ourselves. I can't beleive for a moment that the other person could have any malice or some evil for me or any intention to hurt me with their words (except when angry). And others can't beleive that I actually don't want anything in return but just to be taken at face value because I mean what I say.

And if someone really bothers to listen, I am telling you all the time how I feel... But for that you will have to look beyond the mirror of your own self and really look at me.

To end it all... its just too tiring for me to have this constant battle with this world around me where I might not be taken for what I really am and am under pressure all the time to be something everyone else sees in themselves because that's the only thing that makes them safe.

I am an altruist. I am some one who will not shy away from sacrifice if I beleive that to be the way to go for higher good. But it seems this world does not need people like me. I am an outcast or am included only when someone wants to talk about all their deal... very very rare and few actually listen. And it is such a joy to be listened to. My actions are misconstrued... and then people walk around feeling smart they paid me back in a fitting currency.

So the only way to be is to hold back... not give or trust. Not have empathy. And play it safe. I so wish I could do it with the panache I see it being done with around me. I am so poor at the rules of this game and it seems this is the only one being played rt now.

To dream...

Would I rather dream and fail at it or not dream at all? Would I stay hungry and foolish or be the street smart kid who doesn't take risks? Would I be cloaked in my clothes as I walk out each day or stay naked at the heart? Would I look at you and clamp the door shut or would I stand on the door waiting for you to come inside, knowing fully well you may just walk past and away? Would I hold alight the dying candle and risk the dark forever or snuff it out and save it for a later day and time? Would I walk out in the woods on a cold dark night in search of the light of answers or stay back inside wondering but staying put and safe? Would I choose living a little or just a little living? Would I give my heart and soul or keep them? I wonder...

Goodbyes again

My parents are shifting to Bangalore. For good. For the fact that I have been living away from home for more than 10 years... shifting houses still feels alien. The first 18 were spent in Raebareli... a small obscure town in the state of Uttar Pradesh, made famous by politicians and R P Singh. Then a lil time in Delhi, then Lucknow and then Pune and then Mumbai. Of all these places that matter are Raebareli and Mumbai. Raebareli got to see the child, the girl... Mumbai has seen the woman... and I have not missed the family much here because they were just a Volvo and 4 hours away.

I am not sure how its gonna pan out now... that I will be seeing them once in a few months etc... bringing the visits down to some depressing statistic of 3-4 a year. Traditionally, the laws of growing up demand that I should rather be missing them lesser and lesser but our relationships have undergone some really torrid times and things now are taken far less for granted. We value our time together... we talk and laugh. We have so much fun together, it'll give any fun party with friends serious competition.

The person that I am, I don't have an army of friends here and some new gig to go to every now and then. So I am a lil worried about weekends and time by myself. In Chapter 18 of the novel The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde (1854–1900) it is written; "The only horrible thing in the world is ennui, Dorian. That is the one sin for which there is no forgiveness."... and I run the risk of committing this sin over and over again. I dislike the whole emotional experience of boredom. Its exhausting and risky.

Enrolling for weekend belle dancing classes was an attempt to give myself something to do over these scary spans of time. Sometimes I just wanna be like those people who have a gazzilion friends and really like to talk to people rather than put all my eggs in one basket with a fervent hope that it'll turn out just fine. Its really fervent this time.

Sis now being in NZ makes this whole feeling of being scattered and not together rather stark. Today I just wanna go back to that time so many years ago, when she was this small thing following me around everywhere and wanting to do everything like I did, eat only what I eat... and come to me for all confessions of childhood sins... seeking protection.

I might not miss Pune so much. The house there has many many memoeries, but last night Sis and I agreed that it'll never evoke feelings the one in Raebareli still might. She had got an opportunity to go back before she left for NZ. I knew exactly what she meant when she told me that she just stood there on the road staring at that one story house we'd seen built brick by brick... and cried and cried. I know I am going to have the same reaction if I ever go back. If. It'll take a long time before I can grow that kind of roots anywhere else.

Hmmm. Seems I am nostalgic. And looks like the mood is here to stay. I will be helping Mom n Dad shift... but they will be all packed up and ready to move by the time I get there. It hurts to know that many things like how the drawing room looked in the afternoon with sunlight streaming through the drapes... the chirping of the birds at sunset... Sis's room... the view from the window... the balcony and us standing there staring at the clouds is all only in the memory now. It'll all be naked and empty when I get there... without the paintings and splashes of color. I think I could do with a warm hug right now.

Amidst all the chatter...

I read posts and things people are writing and all I see is something or the other that they predict is going to go wrong with the world. Elections, greedy politicians (everyone is writing about this one, almost like we hate them now for winning)... the economy going to the dogs blah blah blah!

Please people just write about something nice. Write about something happy. There are too many people gunning for that impending doom. A lil effort on the side of sunshine would sure be of help. I don't feel like talking when all around me are so glum and gloomy (which some might say is a good thing now!)

Anyway, I shall therefore proceed ahead and tell you about something nice that happened today. A friend who recently got married sent across a compliment. You see, she being a chaste hindu brahmin was marrying a christian and as expected none of her family could bring themselves to attend the wedding (except her sister). We were invited and go we did... I broke my last record of money spent in a single day on clothes. Managed an ivory dress with a long flowing skirt made with some 6000 metres of cloth. Anyway, it seems I have managed a strong fan following at the party including the hubby dear of my friend. I danced some good old salsa with him and he really liked it! I have always wanted to date christian men and looks like we are finally getting there!

This also reminds me of the sermon that sweet old pastor gave during the mass... he was emphasising the importance of God and how his presence is there to keep us all together in the hard times. So he goes...
'You are like the wick and the candle and god the light... you two, my dears are like the seed and the plant with God being the fertile earth... like the two sides of lips of a zip, and God being the head of the zip in between....'
"How apt!" whispered my partner and I frankly have no recollection of what happened next coz we were shaking with laughter... and it took some stern glances from people around for my friend to curb the wild wild interpretation of how God would just love to be a zipper in between having a 'hard' time getting all the head he can! So gross and so God damned memorable!

This week has otherwise been good. Among other good things that happened were that my boss was on leave for a good part of it, which might be a large contributor to the general bonhomie. My sister earned a B in a test and did not lose it. I have a phone bill of 7 K this month and all for an A- she got on a paper last time. I have read 10+ cheap romantic novels this month. I have demonstrated positively obnoxious behavior with my room mate and her friends and gotten away with my way! I made some new and very nerdy friends. Finally realised that basically deep down I just hate banter! And discovered a fab gynaecologist in the city. Now what more can you ask for... hmmm?

So... Intelligence is normally distributed after all!!!

Well... The concept of normal curve says that for any phenomenon present in a large population, it is safe to assume that its distribution if plotted on a curve will take the shape of an inverted bell... also called the Normal curve or the Guassian distribution with love. It means that most people will lie close to the mean or average, and a few being exceptionally above or below it. Makes intuitive sense rt?

Now, intelligence too therefore can be assumed to be normally distributed. So what's the point?

You see, for the last hour and a half my dearest roomie has been going on and on about her martial arts camp at Goa the past week. The high point of the whole affair seems to be a rendezvous with a snake 'on the beach'... She gets into details of course (with no prodding needed). This snake on the beach happens to be less than a couple of feet long, Yellow in colour and a 'Cobra'!! She then went on to say how everyone was holding it and playing with the cobra on the beach when one of the black belt instructors took pity on it, picked it up by the tail and took it back home into the sea water!!!

Now, you need to go to any five year old, give them this story and ask them what they think of you?

As for me, I am pretty disappointed with the cobra and his absolutely blasphemous un-clanly behavior! So I am going to put him in the 'exceptionally below' the average in my books.

As for my roommate... well! I sure do live with some truly exceptional people! There is no way in hell I can find a category for her now can I?

My personality type

After taking those gazillion inane 'who, what, why and just about when' tests on facebook (pl don't think less of me for this!), I finally remembered some of my own HR gyaan and logged on to a site that gives one a taste of MBTI or the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator test. The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) assessment is a psychometric questionnaire designed to measure psychological preferences in how people perceive the world and make decisions. To know more about the theoretical aspects pl visit wikipedia. Anyway, to translate it all into simple English, Jung basically said that people can be rational (thinking and feeling) or irrational (sensing and intuition). To add to this, he said that these types can be expressed either in an extroverted or introverted fashion. Add to this you could either be Judging or Perceiving and you have the 4 pairs or by simple permutation and combination, 16 personality types. So essentially I lost you here rt? Fine! Lets make it simpler

4 pairs:
Extraversion - Introversion (how does one gather energy: within or without)
Sensing - iNtuition (How does one gather information?)
Thinking - Feeling (How does one process this information?)
Judging - Perceiving (What is your decision making style?)

and you will have more of each pair on all the 4 dimensions. So you will either be:

- an extrovert (deriving energy from doing things and meeting people) or introvert (deriving energy from thinking),
- sensing (Being able to see and articulate the reality, gather information from the 5 senses, data driven) or intuitive (driven by an inner logic, insights of the subconscious that can be excruciatingly difficult to explain to the sensing type)
- thinking (take decisions from a detached standpoint, look for rationality) or feeling (decide by empathising with the situation and people involved, looking at things 'from the inside')
- Judging (people who prefer to have matters settled) or Perceiving (those who would like to keep decisions open)

So guess what am I? Guess guess...
Well... I am an I(Introvert), N(Intuitive), F(Feeling) and J(Judging) person. To understand me better (talk about narcissism) I am attaching a few interesting descriptions I found on some other sites... This one calls my type a Counselor Idealist:

Counselors have an exceptionally strong desire to contribute to the welfare of others, and find great personal fulfillment interacting with people, nurturing their personal development, guiding them to realize their human potential. Although they are happy working at jobs (such as writing) that require solitude and close attention, Counselors do quite well with individuals or groups of people, provided that the personal interactions are not superficial, and that they find some quiet, private time every now and then to recharge their batteries. Counselors are both kind and positive in their handling of others; they are great listeners and seem naturally interested in helping people with their personal problems. They are the constant 'givers'. Not usually visible leaders, Counselors prefer to work intensely with those close to them, especially on a one-to-one basis, quietly exerting their influence behind the scenes.
Counselors are scarce, little more than one percent of the population, and can be hard to get to know, since they tend not to share their innermost thoughts or their powerful emotional reactions except with their loved ones. They are highly private people, with an unusually rich, complicated inner life. Friends or colleagues who have known them for years may find sides emerging which come as a surprise. Not that Counselors are flighty or scattered; they value their integrity a great deal, but they have mysterious, intricately woven personalities which sometimes puzzle even them.
Counselors tend to work effectively in organizations. They value staff harmony and make every effort to help an organization run smoothly and pleasantly. They understand and use human systems creatively, and are good at consulting and cooperating with others. As employees or employers, Counselors are concerned with people's feelings and are able to act as a barometer of the feelings within the organization.
Blessed with vivid imaginations, Counselors are often seen as the most poetical of all the types, and in fact they use a lot of poetic imagery in their everyday language. Their great talent for language-both written and spoken-is usually directed toward communicating with people in a personalized way. Counselors are highly intuitive and can recognize another's emotions or intentions - good or evil - even before that person is aware of them. Counselors themselves can seldom tell how they came to read others' feelings so keenly. This extreme sensitivity to others could very well be the basis of the Counselor's remarkable ability to experience a whole array of psychic phenomena.

So why am I doing all this? Just because I feel less of a freak now. I know that my type is rare ... just 1% of the human population. I know that I am an introvert so I don't have to get confounded by the 'feeling' aspect of my personality, which makes me wanna talk to people. I understand why I feel panicky when I get invited to parties!! I'll feel okay now when I am unable to explain the logic of my decisions to people... they just harass me and make me look like a fool and then in the end when I am proven right... beyond all 'logic' I'd like to add... I just cannot make them look bad by saying... I told you so! Also that though I am a decisive person I just dither most because I have some human considerations at heart!! So there.... I got me figured. Some atleast.

Scotch Bright!!!

I have a secret to confess. I love washing utensils. Infact the dirtier the lot the better. I love washing bathrooms too. And I love toothbrushes not just because I use them inside my mouth! So if you have been paying attention at all... I love to clean with toothbrushes.
Well... I told someone I befriended last year that the year before that I got bit by the cleaning bug so hard, I scrubbed away at everything with a toothbrush till I got a back problem. He laughed much at me. My sister has a picture of me... down on my knees scrubbing the back of the pipe under my wash basin with my ass looking all perked up for a smack! She is holding on to it for revenge if I release any of hers to someone of any importance anywhere ever. The only thing she wanted to know was... "Di... I get the cleaning and all but who will ever look "there?" Who even cares?". So I guess I am a certfied freak now.
Last weekend I took all of the utensils in the kichen and gave them a taste for some real FR brand soul-of-the-silver shine! After 2 hours, an environment-unfriendly amount of soap and detergent and 2 toothbrushes later... I was a happy soul. And every now and then when I catch a gleam from the kitchen rack, I sure return it with a toothy one of mine.
So if any of you ever get invited to my place for dinner, rest assured its never the bacteria that will kill you.

Reading for the week

I love classics. And Jane Austen rocks! I have just finished reading Persuasion and its been a fab read. The characters are brilliant and the simplicity with which Austen finely sketches the follies of human character, her astuteness and subtlety in bringing forth the silliness of our very many egomaniacal concerns, the narcissism that people with wealth and education offer suffer with, is just exceptionally endearing.

I have been impatient while reading a book and its happened after a long time... I was unable to take my mind off the plot... I was just as interested in what all other characters were doing as were the main leads. The fact that I'd know people very much like those characters in my life today is a trifle astonishing and I exclaimed several times 'What's new!' through the pages of a book written almost 200 years ago!

The same prejudices of race, birth, money are all just as alive today as they were then. It is just as often that the real merit of character slips from our fingers in an attempt to hold on to all that glitters!

If you do read the book, please pay special attention to the character of Mary. She is Anne's younger sister and it is through her that Austen has been able to so succulently bring about that nuantic perceptiveness of human foibles she is most famous for.

I am proud to say that with this one, I now own a collection of and have read all of Austen's work. The next focus point is 'Jane Eyre' by Charlotte Brontë, which I have been meaning to read after the seductive BBC book adaptation series that ran it on Zee Studio a few months ago. I truly liked the whole series so much I wished they'd never stop.

To change the flavour in between, I am also managing to be thoroughly engrossed by the management book called 'Hard Facts, Dangerous half-truths and Total nonsense: profiting by evidence-based management' by Pfeffer and Sutton. Pfeffer is God is all that I'll say, when it comes to management wisdom. I know of people who have his videos on their facebook profiles! Now you see!

This is one management book that has managed to make me laugh while I was reading it and think deeply (I'll acknowledge that this is a challenge for me most times... ) too. A very good read for anyone who wants to gain brownie points by talking sense in the next department meeting, specially if they involve discussions on hiring consultants or process improvement initiatives! Most other books in this field have not managed to hold my attention beyond 3.5 chapters... that'd explain the grades in B-School too now, that I think of it.

Anyway, I'll try and get some work done too this week to deserve the salary they are paying me. I hope you all have a good week ahead too!

Grazzie Mille

I have a stupid lil something called a counter at the bottom of my blog and it touched 1000 today. So as the title says in italian... a thousand thanks... to all who have come and shared this journey with me.

I am reading this book called 'eat pray love' by Elizabeth Gilbert. This is the book that inspired that small paragraph in a post a couple of posts ago. The story is about a woman who goes through a messy divorce, relationship shit etc etc to embark on a journey for a year. She decides she will go to Italy for four months and learn Italian. Then she will go to India and spend 4 months in an Ashram of her spiritual guru. The last 4 months of her journey will be spent in Bali, with a 9th generation medicine man... who'd once read her palm and told her she will come back to Bali. This explains the sequence of the words in the title of book as well...

So I am in Italy rt now now... and learning Italian with her. Till now my fav word as well as hers is Attraverisiamo... meaning Lets cross over. Its very symbolic for where I am rt now... this year, so few months old tho, has already brought in changes I never thought I'll see.

Other favourites are:
Perfetto: Perfect
Caro mio: My dear
Vaffunculo: Go fuck yourself!!! I have been saying this under my breath so many times in the day... its just the most delicious way of saying go fuck yourself!
Figolo Di Mignotta: Sun of a bitch
Stronzo: Shithead
Cafone: Asshole!

Some other interesting phareses are che bordello and che casino... which essentially means 'what a friggin' mess!!'. Hmmm... that rings a bell too now doesn't it? :)

I think its pretty okay that to celebrate my blog hitting the mille mark, I have tought you some cuss words in italian... A man once told me that was the best way to start learning a language. Shall keep you updated if I find any more jewels in the pages ahead, caro mios.

The showdown

Somewhere late last night I finally had the showdown that had been coming for some time... with my mind:

Me: I need to know why is it that you dredge out the worst of the memories for me at the most opportune moments? It really bothers me.
The M: Well... that's just me. I am a sick bastard.
Me: Well... I'd like to tell you that its not helping. At all.
The M: I do what I do.
Me: I'd like you to stop.
The M: I get bored. What do I do then?
Me: Stay quiet, for a change.
The M: That's boring.
Me: And 'boring' would be an insult to your existence rt?
The M: Yes
Me: Well I am bored too. Of your antics. Of the same repeated shows of failure, desolation and fear etc etc etc... that you keep playing for me. I am fine. I am doing fine. Absolutely. I don't know why you are always trying to convince me that my world is all wrong and that everything will seem like a teen slasher flick, bloodier and ghorier by the miniute! I don't understand why I have to believe that everyone hates me or will eventually end up hating me, someday.
The M: I give it to you because you want it.
Me: So I am telling you I am done!
... I don't remember much of what was said on both sides later, I was drifting in and out of sleep and shutting out very many distraction too... the Mr Mind here does a good job of deviating from the topic, when put in a tight spot. But I do remember sensing exhaustion on the other side. Not surprising, given that my head is a super duper production house of all kinds of drama items.

For whatever it was worth I slept well and am feeling much better today. I have smiled much and cracked a few good jokes since morning. Its the middle of the week and I'd like to keep this going. Mr Mind and I have just now planned a celebration too, if we reach the end of the week without a serious incident. Hope you have a good day and week too.

Rehabilitation

Okay... It is really tough right now. I am taking one hour at a time. Planning things to do every hour, so I do not have to think about 'those we shall not speak of'.
Its gut wrenching. I feel real physical pain where the heart is. It hurts like mad. I emotionally double up with pain.
The good news is I am doing it. I have managed it for the 6 + hours that I have been awake since morning. Its some time points in the day that I am particularly scared of. 9:30 AM, 2:00 PM and 6:30 PM. I am terrified of 6:30 PM. Its that point of the day, when I know that I am going to be on my own for the evening and lonliness is at its best dressed for the party ahead. Oh man! the games the mind can play... the excuses it can come up with to make just one call. It can come up with the most creative reasons for that one phone call. If nothing works... then the emotional red card of... "I just want to hear his voice... just one time"... Its like telling yourself that you will have just one more injection of the most potent mood uplifting drug you have ever had in life... just one and thats it.
The truth is it doen not work. You can't ever stop at just one.
So I have till this time, stayed with my mind. The poor thing needs help. I have been telling it that its the thoughts that control our emotions and emotions control us... like this deep need I can feel within rt now.
I have been telling it that love never means having to hold on to. It does not say anywhere that because I chose to love you, you have to love me back. It does not say that you have to do X, Y and Z in order to make me happy, because you love me rt? I can't hold a gun to anyone's head to ensure my happiness.
Someone wise has said: 'Do not fall apart again and again. It becomes a habit. Practice being put together instead.'

Okay. One step at a time. Just one step.

I think my colour is purple rt now

I have broken up. And its really hard. This is not going to be a post which makes one go awww. I hope it will make you see the way I do though.
I am not bitter, angry or bitter... to drive the point home. I have invested several years in this thing. And in the end I have decided that I will not be a victim of my own love.
The truth is that there is unbearable pain sometimes. There is amazing frustration of not having someone around who completely gets you. I feel like I stand here at the end of 27 years... not having anyone with a complete understanding of an unabridged version of FR. I feel lonely. Yes I do.
But everytime there is a voice within that tells me... hey guess what I know. I know everything and I will love you reckless till the end of times. It makes me grateful for the fact that there are two people, slowly growing old and mellow at home who wait for me. I want them to know they will always have me.
I think it was for this love that I will actually walk this path alone and be ok with it. There is a difference in being alone and being lonely. I choose to be alone.
The need within to show my pain and see that understanding in someone's eyes is very strong. I don't need pity. I just would like to tell me story and know that another soul can make sense of the language I speak in. Till then, I'd be happy to go look in the mirror every time I feel this. I read this in a book lately, that has come to mean a lot to me:

.... somewhere from within me rises a now familiar voice, offering me all the certainities I always wished another person would offer me when I was troubled:
" I'm here. I love you. I don't care if you need to stay up crying all night long. I will stay with you. If you need the medication again, go ahead and take it - I will love you through that, as well. If you don't need medication I will love you, too. There is nothing you can ever do to lose my love. I will protect you until you die, and after your death I will still protect you. I am stronger than depression and I am braver than lonliness and nothing will ever exhaust me.

So its begun. Wish me luck. I am hoping to do well. Through the black nights and stubborn cynicism, the cold I feel within and sometimes this whole feeling that I can't feel a thing. I would like to stop scribbling I'm cynical in my notebook. I'd like to be able to trust again. I'd like this voice in my head to stop predicting exactly how everything's gonna go wrong. I'd like to start feeling again. I'd like to feel enthusiasm. I'd like to go back to being the person who brought energy in the room she entered. I'd like to smile often. So here it is... the list of things I'd like rather than the ones I hate rt now.

Did I say wish me luck?

Blue has many shades

Life's been busy. The room in my head, where I live has seen some changes. Some additions... some deletions. A lot's happened, if you wanna know that is :). I got a new job. I am happy about the fact that I am not in the old one anymore... Being happy about the new one is an awaited possibility. Lets hope for the best.
I have been struggling against writing. Every day for the past some weeks I have lived sentences which I have not come put down here because I have not been sure. I started this blog with a purpose and that goal dissolved in time somewhere. And suddenly I was not sure of what I should write about. The fog's lifted and the answer is simple. I am just as confused but that does not mean that I don't write. So we move on... the blog lives.
The recent happenings have made life seem like its all whizzed past besides me. Sister's left for NZ for studies... Ma and Pa have learnt to video chat on skype. Ma has turned out to be the undiscovered internet genius in our family. Dad's not far behind. We all were running for the 'who cries the most"after" sis leaves' trophy and not surprisingly Dad won. Fathers do have a soft corner for their daughters, specially younger ones with a great sense of humour.
My bit of the story in all this is that I love her. I am crazy about this woman God gave me as my younger sister and hence put in special effort to fish out all her snaps from childhood out today. Mom and I have picked out some brilliant ones from there (funny hair, gawky posture, bushy eye brows, retarded smile) and I shall be posting them on a social networking site soon.
The new job's fine rt now... I am two inches apart still from hitting crazy. I was wondering why is it that I got this fantastic share of drama in my life... in the last organisation people were dying because the lazy humongous ass of my boss wouldn't work. And this guy I am with now wants a Nobel prize for initiatives in HR, if they ever have any for this notorious function. So work I shall have to.
Another slightly irritating aspect is the passion flowing in people for the company. I have really seen people with eyes brimming etc when they talk about the company. So no surprise I am extremely uncomfortable. I even checked the watercooler to see if some drug was being passed on to them here... Its a pharma company this time around.
The last organisation had no culture. This one's got too much and you've to join the madness or you are out! I am doing fine generally ... its just that everytime someone says 'our values here are such that....' I just wanna reach out over the table and slap them and say fuck you! Lets hope we can get by without an incident like that for some time.
Hope all is well elsewhere on blogosphere.

ps: ever wonder why all the words like fuck, suck, schmuck, muck, yuck, chuck, duck (in cricket .. and like in a sitting duck) etc rhyme with luck..? eh? :)

Across the centuries

I have been in conversation with Mr Nathaniel Hawthorne for some time now over 'The Scarlet Letter'. The writer has just introduced the setting of the story with a cheerful sketching of characters including his own around him for the benefit of the reader. It is quite lively indeed for I already feel that I know some of them or rather some people very like those characters at the Custom House in the old port city of Salem in America. This city is also nicknamed 'The Witch City' after the famous trials for witchcraft held in Salem and neighboring areas between February 1692 and May 1693. But I digress...

So as I said I have been in conversation with Mr Hawthorne and I am amazed with how 'on the same page' feeling I have with whatever he's had to say till now. The story is in its early stages with a lot still forming but here's a guy I am talking to beyond words and I like that. He's been expressing his frustration at not being able to weave a tale around a certain letter he's found in his new offices at the Custom House... something akin to a writer's block.


He says... 'it is anything but agreeable to be haunted by a suspicion that one's intellect is dwindling away, or exhaling, without your consciousness, like ether out of a phial: so that, at every glance, you find a smaller and less volatile residuum...' He then goes on to say something that was the clincher of the day for me. He expresses with lament as to how his offices at Custom House have given him a strong arm of the republic to lean on, but in bargain the strength of his own true character has left him and now he can at best be a good surveyor at the custom house and ceases to be a tolerable writer of poor tales and essays.


He points out astutely that many in his situation have had this enervating magic work on them and have lost this capability of self-support and held on to the struggle in a struggling world just about long enough for their own ruin. Once the spirit has been sucked out of them they are left to totter alone on life's difficult footpath in a vain hope that they may sometime be restored to its erstwhile glory.



What he has to say rings a bell and close too, for that is all I see happening in the world around me. One gets entrenched in the system, soon to find that all that was dear and close to you as a person once is lost somewhere in the struggle each day... and that you hold onto the struggle just about long enough to realize that the spirit has been vaporizing away and now there may be nothing left of it.


I have been living these feelings for the past some months now. I think it has been this valiantly desperate attempt of not losing my soul that made me quit the hellish job and glamor of being a consultant and to go on and be somebody in a smaller house rather than a 'personality' in so many others, none of which are mine.



I was not being able to get to Neverland for quite some time now and honestly it scared me a lil. So in an attempt to resuscitate the whole thing I have been watching 'Finding Neverland' with an almost religious fervor... this might sound crazy but I can watch that movie any number of times. I am in awe of James the playwright. A little in love with him too.



On another note I have laughed at Mr Hawthorne too because he feels so much burden and difficulty with a job that expects him to be at his offices for 3 and a half hours a day! I mean you've got to be kidding me dude! You are stressed with those hours? But I must not judge too soon... for all he may be saying, he's still managed to write this book and is a name to be counted in, in American Literature. His work is also known to have deep psychological complexity, which Wikipedia and I shall vouch for. And he is a good looking bloke as you can see in this picture here. He happens to be 36 years old in it. Cute isn't he?



So we shall continue to discuss the story and its characters, hopefully soon. Till then... a thought to leave you guys with. Have you ever wondered why a person who writes plays is called a playwright and not a playwrite? That's because the word wright is an archaic English term for a craftsman or builder (as in a wheelwright or cartwright). Hence the prefix and the suffix combine to indicate someone who crafts plays. The fact that its a homophone with write is purely coincidental!

I shall leave you to your reflections now and would take your leave!

And yes! A very happy new year!

Blood of Dreams

So I met her again today. She says she's got a new part in this TV thing. She was happy too and smiled much as she talked. Then slowly the conversation shifted to some other things... some subtle drops of her gaze as she went on gave me a feeling. I quite could not catch what it was. I don't think I caught on to anything at all for some passage of time. It was as if a feeling bubble had burst open somewhere within me... something that till then had been steadily growing but had been too transparent for me to see... what an irony! It only became apparent when it could not be contained any longer and burst open on to my conscious from the sub-conscious.
And then, I saw it. I saw it for a moment but it could not be mistaken... like the way lightning illuminates everything in a black dark night... and then you are blind again. But you know what you saw. I saw her soul.
It was empty. It was heavy. It had makeup on it. To hide the real thing... from the mirror every morning I guess. I asked her how she was... and she laughed at me saying silly you already asked me that. She looked at me laughing and stopped dead. She looked at me and said... 'What?'. I said... 'How are you... really?'. She knew. I knew. And for some seconds we went numb. Almost like her soul could just have been lying besides the napkin and coffee cups on the table. Just another thing to look at.
Then, survival took over. I could taste the restlessness and the misery around her. I could touch the mad rush of thoughts in her mind... telling her to take control. To stop it. Not go any further... how its never of any use to go down this path. We've all sold our souls and what we've got back in bargain is too important to let go of.
So I told her about my job change and the moment passed. I chose not to speak of the loneliness. Or she of how meaningless it all is at the end of all and everything. Beneath the spoken words were layers of sentiment of paralysis. Of this reckless inaction. Morbid darkness of our very human existence usurped by this pretence of civilisation. Clones of patterns of approval everywhere.
May be then... I should be happy about the fact that I find it so hard to fit in. That for days I cannot relate to nothing or nobody around me. Makes it all a little less violent for some time.

Get back on my feet... I do.

So its been a long hiatus from my dear blog spot. And I think he doesn't mind. I always did get a lot of space from this guy here. :)
So its been some thinking, some reading and some vegetating happening here all this awhile. So have discovered some new aspects to me... seen to it that I get to know the person I spend the most time with (me!) better. Seen to it that I like her and feel for her and ensure that her well being is priority with us.
So for all of this its been an interesting ride and I am glad for it. I feel this sense of peace within that is not so common to feel late on a Sunday evening. The battles and demons of the week to come quite often than not manage to poison this part of the week for me.
I see that the reason for it is hope. It is this idea within that the coming week is when I may just be putting in my papers and be ready to leave and move on. I am ready to move on, to take on something new and this time around I want to ensure nurturing for me in the process. I want to take a chance at finding inspiration and feeling my heart soar. Oh what a feeling that is!
I was speaking to Mom today and told her how I'd felt like this race car without head lights for some time now. I'd felt like I was going somewhere but not really sure if I was getting anywhere. I told her that good it happened so because now I know where I'd like to get to and the risks I am willing to take to get it.
I know that I cannot work or exist without inspiration. I need a higher ideal to move towards, to have meaning in whatever I do. Call me a control freak, but I need to know where its going and why. Call me an idealist, but I need people around me to inspire me with their own excellence. I am not ashamed of this dependence either now. I think in these past few months I have understood how deeply I cherish such people around me. I have come to fully recognise their power over me. You give me something striving towards excellence and you've got me hooked. You don't have spend an extra second motivating me... I'll fail that is for sure but I will rise up again and again and again... There is nothing else that makes me so happy.
A small digression. I was watching those CSI kinda stuff on AXN today and then the 'So you think you can dance' stuff. I was thinking why is it that I love to watch some of those movies again and again... why I like to watch these serials? I realised that no one in these stories is in a job they don't like. They are always at the top of their game and come up aces against odds always. Its the consistent excellence and the portrayed brilliance of what they do that I love. It is this touch of divinity that we all aspire for, isn't it? The search is to find that one thing within us that will take us closer to this goal. I realised that it is only true excellence that validates our existence to us. That in reality, another's opinion does not really ever matter. It is always our own. We may not be aware of it always though.
It is in this search that our true happiness lies and all that we need to and will care to learn. This is the path of the individual and no one else can walk it for any. The people who then really make a difference to us are the ones who lead us to this path. They are the ones who inspire and make us believe that its possible. They believe it for us before we can. True essence of love. The reason why we find it most in our heart to love in whom we see the greatest potential.
Here's to hoping that the year to come will bring with it ideas and hope, warmth and love and most of all inspiration to all of us. Make all of us get closer to our own divinity. Amen!

Deep dull red

I hate getting into the Bombay conversations these days and dear God as long as I am alive and same I refuse to call this place Mumbai! It sounds alien and so not home. I have been thinking about what home means to me for some time now. The blasts and everything that happened made me realise the emptiness of so much around me. To me home means safety, love, warmth and inspiration. And after all that has happened I don't feel any of these. I feel a dull pain within... like a constant inside. Does not change, does not go away either. Just stays. Its fear and anger and the sense of loss all frozen solid.
I think we can't really make our children wear bullet proof jackets when they go to schools. The idea that I may live in constant fear for my loved ones is to not live at all really. I want to go back to my childhood. It was somewhere a more innocent and safer world to live in then. I don't want to bring my children up in a world where I don't know where we are headed as a race. I see destabilised economies, people losing jobs and livelihoods, rabid people killing each other, greed and power the motivation and no real feeling... whatever there is is somehow just not strong enough rt now.
I feel upset to look at our contry and how vulnerable we are. The so lil confidence we as a nation have in our decision making... how we will never be regarded as tough coz we are always the soft nation to the world. My friends went on a tour of south east asia and came back determined they will not go anywhere looking for a job. They felt the backlash was too strong against Indians. I feel rightly so. We have chosen the leaders who run this country. And our nation's true character is reflected when the true colors of these people are exposed as soon as they get the invincibility of temp power. The lengths people go to to keep it is a chronicle of our debacle as a nation of epic proportions. And so much for the values we stand for.
We are like a diploma technician from a lower middle class income group, trying to make it too soon too big coz his diploma happened to be in Computers and its a skill in demand. We have risen too high by our own complacent standards... behaving almost like we never expected to achieve this greatness or to be known around at all. And too happy for it... all bursting at the seams trying not to show it.
My worry is if somewhere we have accepted that we were never meant to do a proper engineering in computer science and that we may becapable of more... the cutting edge work has been left for others. That somewhere we behave like 'koopmanduks' (frog in the well) and are too happy to see things have improved 2% over 200 years (exaggerated example). We sing the song of our own 'oh so unexpected' success so much that we have missed out on the real standards of excellence. We have reached a stage where just being able to think about change and improvement is good enough and justifies the greatness we feel. Like an autistic child learning to write. We talk too much as a country. We are so 'new money'.
We don't have any standards we follow. Our benchmarks are stupid and shallow. We don't do worldclass coz we don't believe we can. So cricket is the only sport that reall matters to us as a country. We have been world champions in chess for forever now but will never put this guy on a pedestral like Dhoni.
You see we are so typically Indian! We just can't appreciate any good we do... we always focus on what we din't do... the lack of confidence eating in to us making us a country of short cuts, corruption and bribes. This very lack of faith in our own ability as a nation, contributed to greatly by our leaders, utterly despicable standards of higher education, makes us want too much too soon coz happiness is so scarce in life here.
I was speaking to a friend today and realised that I have never before felt such a sense of hopelessness. I have always been a prennial optimist and thought that things will all turn out ok in the end. This feeling has been very important coz it defines me as a person and comes from a deep safe place within from where inspiration springs for me.
I have lost this place somewhere. I am feling truly cynical about this world and its people and the future of our race... Its a very strong feeling within and is a dark place to be coz I can't find hope. I have not felt something like this before.
And so I feel that the only thing I can control is my own life and happiness. I want to be as close to my family as possible. I love them and I want to focus on them so I can build as many happy memories as possible. I want to get inspired and inspire them to achieve more in life before it all ends. On a day like today, when I come back home and miss them terribly... with a nagging thought somewhere saying...who knows? this may be the last week I'll live... does not let me rest in peace.

There is blood on the streets tonight

I am sitting here infront of the TV. Taj is burning. Oberoi is burning. People are held hostage inside both these places. More than 60 people have died. 200 injured. Hospitals are making an appeal for blood. Attacks in 25 places. And its just going on... every minute a new blast... or some firing.
I am crying. I can't tell in words how this makes me feel... what this does to me. I feel like they are in my house, burning things I love and I feel so helpless. I have a stupid wish rt now. I want a Bruce Willis for my city. I want someone to come and kill all these people or just somehow lock them up somewhere. A friend's father has not come home and I am so numb inside I don't know what to do. Or say.
They are throwing grenades from Taj. They have attacked a hospital.
For the life of me will someone please tell me when did terrorism solve anything? Will someone tell me one example of it working? Will someone tell me how does one kill? Will someone tell me how does it make sense to kill someone who dint do you any harm.... never meant it.... someone who is just going home to kids. What do you need to be to take a hand grenade in hand and hurl it at women and children? Will someone please tell me how does one take a gun at hand and open fire?
I can;t sleep. I want to sleep and I can't. I want to scream really.... I want to fall on my knees and pray. I just want to do anything to make this stop because dear God I can't understand this. I feel so sad because they may have just killed the spirit I love in this city I call home and proudly so. I feel sad because its going to be a long time I am going to feel safe in my own home again. Long itme before I walk out of the door not dreading something bad. I have lost my freedom.... my ability to walk the roads of this place at night... trying to find me in its spirit. I want to go ask the Thackereys if the attackers asked who was a north indian or maharashtrian before killing them. It dint matter when they entered Leopold and opened fire.... How will I ever go there and not remember this? They killed people at Metro... I have memories there... I have outside Taj and looked at it with a smile... proud. I don't know if its still gonna be there tom. There is a car bomb explosion near vile parle flyover... There is firing at JW Marriott in Juhu... I used to live close by... Firing at Borivali. I can't take it any more.

The river's waiting for rains

Its been some time that I wrote and the break has made me realise how much I love writing... I missed being able to write so very often.

I battle fear of failure, yet another bout but this one's kinda solid that it refuses to melt away now for some good time. I have been trying hard to rise up in the conscious realm and ask myself where the fuck does this come from again and again. There are days when it seems to be the single driving force in life and then days when it paralyses me out of any action possible. It gets very exhausting to live life like a yo-yo... I feel like a pendulum wanting to just stay and swinging in one direction to other... being able to feel that peace of being centered for a small time before realising oh no... I am swinging again!

I just decided to write about it because I am not being able to talk about it to any person living. I am not being able to tell someone I am so afraid inside its wrecking havoc and I don't really know why I am scared. I'd want to be able to say it to someone who will listen to me and just be there... let me be afraid and be ok with it. And not send across that vibes of being impatient with the whole thing but just be there. I guess that person will have to be me.

'It ain't brave if you're not afraid'... so we'll see where it all ends. Ideas are forming and some vague answers pouring in from different levels inside me as I talk to you here... let me go mull over some and hopefully get a good night's sleep.

Dreams unlimited

So as I said its been a phase when there's been a lot of thinking happening. Its always happening with me but now there seems to be a renewed effort to take it in the brighter direction. And there is tremendous scope for improvement... but as someone said... you won't get to the big victory unless you celebrate the small ones on the way.

As I get to these elusive goals of life, I have had some small victories, some beautiful moments with me that I will like to celebrate with you here. Mid last week, the work stress was getting to me and I went for a stroll around the building. Nothing busts that uneasy feeling for me like a walk or sleep. I sat down on the ledge under one of the trees and for some time thoughts were like the shadows of the leaves above... shimmering, blurring in front ... no finite shape... undefined.

And then from somewhere an idea came... for some reason I was taken back to all the major instances of my career with this organisation for the last year.... I looked back at all the challenges and hurdles, client and colleague situations... and I realised I had found a solution to every single one of them. Later at times than what might be expected, but I had nevertheless. An even stronger realisation was how little help I had received from certain quarters it was expected from. And even though some problems still remain unsolved, I am onto a solution now. So I know I will get there. I don't know how right now but I will get there. I still get worried but I will get there.

I looked at things from purely my perspective, and I was happy. In this moment I chose to overlook what these people mirrors had been reflecting all this while. I chose to look within rather than outside in search for answers. I am happy I found them. In an instance a few other thoughts flashed past and I felt I was looking at the whole situation with a new perspective. I was placing a lot of importance on my own feedback and how I felt and what I wanted. I gave myself credit for all the hard work in the last year. I was not feeling guilty, for once... I hate introspections because mostly they are instigated by some feeling of guilt. I was happy that I was experiencing a 'happy introspection' for a change, right after a stressful moment.

I was full of hope, looked at the challenges in front, for which I know I will not get much support, but for once the thought did not make me nervous. It made me think... have managed it till now so will now on as well. For once I felt faith within, coming from my own feedback. Absolutely independent of what any one else thought. And it felt great!

The second victory came in a relationship with a colleague. I acted out of instinct, contrary to what every one else had been telling me. I had a conflict situation at hand and everyone I spoke to about it supported my cause and said how it was all so unfair. They were being good friends. I however did not take any advice I got. I took responsibility for making things better and went back and worked on the relationship. I listened before being listened to. I understood before being understood. I did on my own that no one had asked me to do. I sat dwn and took out time to list all the good things this person had and genuinely communicated my regard. We had to say something about everyone else at a team dinner and I took the opportunity. I listed down all of these and my colleague did not say a thing but her surprise was genuine. Its been getting better since. Not all mails are marked to boss. There is much less defensiveness.

And everyone else has been coming back saying I am doing a good job! I smile at them... the same people were giving me some totally diff advice some time back. But that's how things are... :)

Some failure is inevitable in life. This week I took out time to look at success. We indians are so conditioned to be failure focused we miss out on the lil joys of celebrating our success. So as I celebrate I an getting this feeling of coming full circle somehow!

To change the flavour, we are hunting for acco for sis in NZ. And my parents are absolutely ok with the idea of her sharing a flat with two guys! My jaw dropped and I was gaping at them like a retard... till my sister pinched me. Mon and Dad dint realise this ofcourse... they had already moved on to the next topic of conversation. I looked at my sis and she smiled back. Things have changed back here people... they really have! 6 years ago they would have disowned me and then shot me in the eye for having so much as thought about such a thing! Look at them now! In this part of the universe evolution is moving with the speed of light! And I am glad.

Live from Firangi Paani

Hi everyone...

I have been dancing like mad on the floor... just came back to take a breather and thought of this crazy idea of writing a blog entry from here!

I am getting a lot of crazy looks... like 'how could she open that damned damned thing within these holy walls'... but then! I will now be thinking about this and smiling to myself for some time to come so hell with everyone!

And this is going to be short post... but there's more to come soon.. I have been in one those phases.. you know those... the ones I keep slipping into every now and then... but then that's a story for another time!!

Till then... I'll go burn some on the floor!

Love!

Little dots on my map-o-life

We are losing H to marriage and hence decided to offer our condolences at Firangi Paani. I love that place by the way... Its such an 'oxygen'ating change after cramped I-can't-breathe-here-no-more shacks and Totos of the world. It also has the longest bar in Bombay. And there is so much space around tables you could actually play 'catch me or my balls if you can' around them.

So me decided to break the rules... to hell with the fact that it was an outing with office junta... and had mostly women in it... me decided to wear silk flow-on-and-hug-me upper, teamed with a denim mini... strappy bronze sandals and reckless spray painting of my fav Bvlgari perfume.

End result: H comes up to me and says.... "Hii... I am H****... have we met before?" I wink back and say... "Was that addressed to me or my legs?" He laughingly makes the eyes rolling I-can't-believe-you-just-said-what-you-did face and raises his hands in defeat... not that I mind.

And then what happens is very very nice. I had fun... after I decided to shun some people from my radar. I chose yesterday to spend my time with people who are simple. They might not be categorised as the most intelligent ones around... honestly very intelligent people psyche me in relationships. I chose to shamelessly dance in the aisles with this set of women and found the experience very satisfying. I chose to ask them questions about them and was so happy to receive simple answers not putting too much pressure on my processor. I was so happy I was welcome to spend my time with them without having an entry or exit barrier.

Also floating around is an idea of a ladies' day out ... the master mind of the plan wishes to hang out, drink...lech at men... even pick em up... generally perpetrate in every sense of the word and make it a memorable evening to say the least. Lets see if anyone has the guts to go through this one. Impress me please!

It was late by the time it all got over... and I was open heartedly offered a room in P's house, in case I was uncomfortable going back home. And the genuineness of it all was exhilarating considering we aren't the thickest of friends. Somehow I would rather be around this set of people than the ones who base their lives on the rational model... only that 'just rational' becomes very boring after a point.

I also saw a movie yesterday ... it was a lil syrupy... I wasn't over the moon with it but it had a strong message. The lady in the movie is dying and has 3 weeks to go. And the rest is about how she goes about reclaiming her life before she reaches the pearly gates. So she says the things she wants to, cusses, misbehaves, quits her job and blows every penny she has on living life king size. And manages to get everything an international socialite would call success... And the role's been played by Queen Latifa... She is black and about 100% overweight... wherein lies the true message of the movie I guess.

Today was spent in reading a book. Its momentous coz I have finally finished a book I started, in a long time. I read it for straight 8 hours till I was done with it. So its been a great weekend... full with the party scene and reading... TV and maggi... along with waking up only after afternoons. I am content and have not thought about work. Its so peaceful, I want to stay awake the whole night just to keep feeling like this.