Finding the expresso machine for my emotions

For the longest time, I believed that showing vulnerability or expressing one’s emotions indicated weakness. Emotional dependence, empathy, and emotional stability are all different aspects of the spectrum. I feared sharing my emotions would easily allow people to see through me and discern the plethora of thoughts and ideas brewing in my mind. I wished to be noticed, yet I did not want to be on display.

I’m someone who experiences a flood of emotions, even over seemingly insignificant events. A glimpse of a beautiful flower on my way to the office can keep me happy for the entire day. I can be disappointed if you forget to wave to me when you usually do. A disinterested response while I’m recounting the events of my day can easily annoy me. I’m nothing but a whirlpool of emotions. To be overwhelmed, to accept a compliment, to realize the subtle hints of mistreatment, to differentiate between love, kindness, and aloofness — never has it been easy to understand any of the complexities we keep adding to our lives.

I have struggled to contain my emotions and refrain from burdening those around me, constantly striving to strike the right balance in understanding what needs to be done. What I failed to grasp at the time was that, in my efforts to restrain myself, I wasn’t just limiting my right to express but also denying others what they rightfully deserve – whether to know how much happiness they have filled me with or how much self-doubt and misery they have inflicted upon me. Just as we tailor coffee to match someone’s preferred strength, we should engage with others, recognizing their worth and what they deserve.

Along the way, I learned that expressing oneself is never a crime. Crying in front of someone used to feel like the ultimate loss of strength, but now I realize smiling when content, laughing when happy, and crying when sad is just normal behavior. Do I not falter? Do I not have outbursts? Do I expect you to heal me without knowing my traumas? Yes, I do, but I am also a work in progress. I work towards healing, figuring out, and guiding myself towards a better future.

It took me a long time to understand the fine line between expressing oneself and unloading emotions on others. We all crave to be heard and seen, even in moments of silence or absence. But nobody possesses the innate skills to understand another without being told. I am still learning, and there are days when I don’t live up to my ideals and give up on my learning. I still fall apart while expressing myself. We each have our taste in coffee, and all we need to do is find the perfect roast of beans.

Navigating through reality and hopes

Recently, I was posed with a question: How can one recognize genuineness? It had me thinking. I am not someone who trusts easily, nor do I grant my trust hastily. For a long time, I have built walls around me and fortified my defenses like stone castles. I wanted people to prove themselves worthy of it. However, lately, I find myself becoming more welcoming as the walls have begun to crumble away. Reflecting on those thoughts, I found myself pondering whether genuineness is truly attainable.

Even if someone bares their soul or if we acquire superpowers to read people’s minds, I don’t think we will ever truly grasp their true feelings. We believe what we choose to believe. All we can do is try our best to identify facades and masks, but in the end, trust is a dance between hope and skepticism. Sometimes, we allow ourselves to take that leap of faith and embrace what is presented to us. It all comes down to the point when we choose to let go of all the questions and uncertainties and delve into what they offer, believing it to be true.

We hope, pray, and believe with all the strength we possess so that we aren’t disappointed. Despite thinking it through a million times, we still consider all the permutations and combinations before diving into that whirlpool of emotions. Ultimately, when we do, we do it with all our hearts. We never know what awaits us, but all we hope for is the dream we’ve lived a thousand times to turn into reality. A reality that we’ve promised ourselves.

Amidst all this, we trust, believe, and let ourselves get engulfed by the present. We might never be oblivious, but we put our guards down at some point, wishing to be nurtured and caressed. I guess we might never be able to realize whether something is genuine, but we choose to believe it to be. If it is ever genuine, our belief will be strengthened and will then become the cause of our happiness.

Chasing Perfections

Why are we always running in the pursuit of perfection? Does it even exist? I often buy things that bring me joy because they make me feel like I own those happy moments. However, I refrain from using most of them; instead, I securely store them, keeping them untouched. Why is it that I don’t use them? Am I scared that the wear and tear will wreck them? Why do we live in the apprehension of ruining something? Why does the fear of disappointment always pull us back from living to the fullest? In the dread of something unknown, why do we miss out on the joy that is present?

The books I buy are to be written in, the clothes I purchase are to be worn, and the emotions I feel are to be expressed. Why do I restrict myself? Why am I depriving others of what they deserve? Why wait for the flower to bloom when you can be a part of it right from when it is a bud? The only answer I have is that I may be afraid of bursting the bubble of perfection — an idea constructed upon countless expectations and demands.

Building a comfortable space around all those tiny things that make us feel merrier, we embrace them and leave behind things that engulf us with anger. Perhaps we are searching for imperfections to discover how much of it we can accept. As we evolve in life, so do our ideals and thoughts. While learning all these traits and decoding the silences, we come across those tiny moments of bliss that lead us toward our idea of perfection.

What I consider perfect may appear bizarre to someone else. The things that fill me with awe might leave someone else perplexed. Perfection is merely an idea, and we all have our versions of it. Sometimes, we borrow others’ ideas and spend our lives hoping to find them. Lately, I have realized that, for me, it is a wide range, a blend of genuineness, warmth, compassion, and peace.

Perfections are always bound to standards and expectations, but imperfections are free from all those norms. They evolve and take forms that we least expect, but to see them grow into something that we have always wished for is solace. I hope to explore new dimensions of joy and fulfillment, steering clear of unrealistic ideals. I sure shall make mistakes, but this time around, I hope not to be afraid.

Mosaic

As usual, I was scrolling through Instagram when a reel caught my attention. It was more of a gratitude and appreciation post for the friendships we all have in our lives. What struck me was this particular line in the voice-over. And, just as you might have guessed, I started thinking. Well, as long as thinking isn’t taxable, my will is my command.

We have come across a lot of people in our lives. Some turned out to be friends, and some turned out to be family. With certain people, it is an instant connection that helps us shed all our guards and insecurities. This group of people often fascinates me because it’s surprising how we feel understood and comfortable with them. Then there are the slow burners; we never know when they grew so close to us. We unknowingly start picturing them in our future, even while knowing the unpredictability of the future. They are so much a part of our lives that they have seen us grow into the person we are today. We often take them for granted, knowing they are here to stay.

Then there are people whom we once called our friends, confidantes, or even soulmates, who gradually fade into the realm of memories. They leave us with bittersweet memories. They are the ones who once made us happy and eventually taught us what we now call life lessons. In most cases, they will have no idea how much they have contributed to shaping the person we are today. Whenever they come to our minds, they bring a smile to our faces, tinged with a hint of disappointment. Then come the people who were so adept at creating pesky impressions. For some reason, we get this feeling that they are not the best for us and that they will mess up. They leave us feeling proud that our intuitions were precise.

There are also people we couldn’t connect with. I often think about what could have been if we had seized the opportunity to get to know them better or given them another chance. It’s nothing but a whole other loop of what-if scenarios. Then there is this set of people who just passed through our lives. All we would have had with them would be a few fleeting encounters. We don’t know them enough, but some of their actions or words may have touched our lives so profoundly that they changed our thought process.

I cannot forget any of these people because I carry them in my memories. I am reminded of one or the other every day. They give me perspectives; they let me introspect about why I am the way I am. My actions are a reflection of all the experiences I have had with these people. In some cases, they are burdens of the past, while in others, they are a sack full of wisdom. They are a part of me, and I honestly do not know if it is good or bad. All of this makes me truly resonate with the line from the reel – ‘I am a mosaic of all the people I have known.’

Memories brought by a pine tree

I was sitting on the floor, ready to listen to a talk when something caught my attention. There was a small window right in front of me through which I could see a few branches of a pine tree through it. It took me back to my school days when I used to look through my class’s window at the pine trees that stood on both sides of my favorite pathway. The environment at my school is just spectacular. Situated in the valley of Ketty, amidst many huge trees, wrapped with a misty glow is my school.

The pine trees in front of the hostel cottages, long roads with the canopies and flowers that beautified the hostel garden have many stories to tell. They had remained my companion for a long five years. Never did they complain or hesitate to put up with my insanity. They have heard all my stories and have seen me both dance in joy and sink in miseries. It was never a bed of roses. But it did give me a handful of memories to cherish for a lifetime.

The present that we never see

We are all part of a race to secure our future in a way or the other. A race driven by dreams and passions. Mistakes of the past remind us of our drawbacks and the urge to build a pleasant tomorrow rectifies the errors of the yesterday. The present is just a fraction of a second which becomes the past in the very next second. As the old saying goes, time waits for none and all we have in hand is that fraction of a second. All that we do in the present is to have a pleasant future which soon becomes part of the past as tomorrow is always the day after tomorrow’s yesterday.

There is hardly any living in the present as it all takes a wink of an eye for it to merge with the past. Even when most of the people proudly say, “I am happy that I have lived all my life without being bothered about the past or future”, get attached to the past that very moment. Mostly the justification of living in the present that we give for most of our actions is for the happiness and satisfaction that we would get years down the line while recollecting the days we spent. We continuously sow seeds for a fruitful tomorrow and nurture it with dreams and expectations. All of us fall prey to this running race at some point of life because at night we close our eyes with the hope to see the next day’s rising sun. It is never a mistake as this is how the journey of life is.

-unknown-

 

The battle of life

It is a battle that is being fought for years unknown. Though there were no bloodsheds many souls were hurt. I hoped and prayed so that my mind would no longer be a battlefield.

Each time I brought a new soldier with the armour of trust and hopes, my opponents fired bullets that pierced the armour and killed my soldier. It kept telling me that no human could be my soldier and that I could never win a war against reality.

Whenever I hoped that my soldiers would not be overpowered they happened to be pawns in the hands of reality. I guess its time for me to surrender but I wonder whether I would ever stop my quest to find one in the nearby souls.

-unknown-

Life as a book

When life starts seeming to be a book, each day would seem to be a page. Each image on it would be of someone whom we have come across in life. The words would be written with a non-erasable ink of hopes and desires.

When I keep turning the pages, a strong urge develops in me to turn them back though I know that it wouldn’t last forever. Each time I read those lines they seemed to puzzle me more and the words unwrapped to give me new meanings but the secret never flowed out.

I could see castles of future neatly drawn with desires. Neither could I tear those pages nor erase those words as I knew that they are the ones which constituted my book. Each time I unfolded those dog-eared pages some others emerged and kept me engaged.

I knew that it was necessary to keep me moving. I wasn’t aware how many I had left with me but I knew that I would never run out of my ink and that there have to be more pages for my words to be true.

                                                                                                                                                                                   -unknown-