Redundancy...thou art dear!

Its a given that an artist's inside is reflected on her outside endeavors. I am just the one who believes in keeping subtlety absent,when the obvious is glaring one in the face! Presently, many of my talents are feeling redundant, which in turn is making me feel similarly... NO COMPLAINS though!

What is unnerving is that in the very heat of my 20s, I am not supposed to be so satisfied with being idle. Sure, like many direction-less aspirants of my generation (the no. is fast dwindling!) I can be floundering around in life, doing not even a single thing that I truly want to...but being redundant is something our "Gen-Y" isn't very good at! We have to feel useful. We have to know that our life means something (see, we don't really believe in self discovery at the age of 30!). We have to know we had some dreams and we either lived them or we didn't. There is hardly ever any scope left for "may be(s)" or "someday"...

We want it, we take it(or get ambushed,trying).

And thus my wonder at the fact that I am so at ease with my (short-lived) redundancy. In fact I am quite liking it! Life has absolutely "No Demands" from me for almost a quarter of a year :D!!! Now at the beginning of this long coveted break, I could only imagine the stupendous amount of days I would have to be happily useless... then the time actually begins. Many of the concessions and liberties of being useful have to be given up...but What-the-Hey!, once you taste the utter lack of obligations after going through a (supposedly) highly demanding, professional course; its PURE BLISS!!!

It is understandable that a percentage of that feeling is coming from the fact that once life is going to restart, everything will be in its place (Yeah right, I made it happen!)...the sense of future security can put anyone at ease. But a major portion of this feeling of ecstasy over being redundant is coming from an accumulated need for a break, over the years...

Living in a famous-for-its-population (and mildly competitive) nation, one learns pretty early on that education and career building isn't going to be easy (especially when you are a Jack-Of-All-Trades-Master-Of-None sort of person). So of-course, adolescence is fueled by quotes like -

"beta ye do saal +1,+2 mein mehnat kr lo; fir araam hai"

"bete CAT crack kr lo, fir MBA toh apne aap hojani hai"

"Friends, I(a wannabe cool Prof at a B-school) assure you, with two years of smart work in your MBA, you will reap benefits throughout your life"*

*Conditions in corporate world are nothing like college, dude! I am just messing with you!

So one trudges on in life, putting in a little more of self in the process of becoming someone else. We lose time to chill and be ourselves...we harbor that grudge against ourselves for being all that useful, all our young lives! So when finally, the chance to be "FREEEEEEE" presents itself...it certainly is dear.

CHEERS!!! :P

Hasta la vista

Yes its weird that I always title the blog with some exotic word and what turns up inside is some "Desi" version of my world! It may be the same here, but the feeling isn't desi only...its very much exotic and commonplace at the same time...its very much everywhere...ubiquitous...yet there's nothing divine about it!

Now in any other language, its just plain...no spunk. I can give it a try really...

Phir milenge! (Mushyyyyy!!!)

Adieu! (Mushier!!!)

Dasvidaniya! (More like a tongue twister!!!)

May be my 'language of obsession' these days is dictating my affinity towards the title, but seriously...there is no better way to say it. Literally, "Hasta la vista" means 'until we see again' and its very commonly used as a farewell greeting. The style quotient obviously appeals to me as I feel it represents me.

Weirdly it seems like only yesterday that i said "Hola" to all my new friends...its equally weird that this brevity of time wasn't really felt so acutely while I was living two years of it!!!

But even with the style quo and all, a farewell remains a farewell...the hope of meeting again and the promises of 'staying in touch' are always soothing but they don't veil the transformation that life is about to go through. Dormant under our uber-cool exteriors, is a bubbling feeling of unease about "change"! So what if we all have seen one farewell too many...each one of them rocks us a little.

After all its not easy making friends (what with all the social networking to do)...its not easy to be all set for life's new challenges always ( truest grit is in accepting one's fear and imperfections)... its not easy truly enduring a phase of your life,gritting your teeth, but still wanting it not to end! My friends and I experienced it (with great gusto, if I might add). We cursed the day that put us in the situations we were in, but secretly we were gracious for the chance to get to know some of the most intriguing people ever.

With midnight pasta parties...Punjabi pop-DJ-on laptop-nights...nail paint fest with gal friends... series of knocks on the door when time is short for getting ready for a party... those series of Cntrl C - Cntrl V - Cntrl S, a week before exams...those trips to BIG BAZAAR for everything required for survival...those shopping bags of 1 capsicum,1 onion,1 tomato and 1 chilly (the chilly unceremoniously thrown in the dustbin,along with the polythene)...

Saying Hasta la vista not only brings back those memories but gives you the hope to build some new memories the next time around...It prepares you for the change and preserves what is unchanging about life, inside you...the bonds of friendship :D

Le Magnifique

In a small town quite nearby, lived a little girl. She was as small as the town but dreamed of becoming big and great one day and living in a place worthy of her grandeur. Wanting in many a factors that comprise the secret formula of success, she was unaware of the challenges life were to present. But to lose hope is not her!

Lets call her Maya (shall we?). Now as Maya grew, she became more and more sure of the things she wanted out of life - name, fame, money and love. In short she wanted it all and she wanted everything at her own terms.

Maya was a happy child...a talented one at that...a child who thought crying a waste of time...quite content with her own world of school and pals.

Maya wasn't the popular one, but never was the underdog either! Teachers liked Maya, but she never was the one who could become a teacher's pet!

Maya had few good friends and many ok-ok friends.

Maya thought boys were worthless and girls rock!

Many things about Maya changed with time but these stayed with her...they became permanent part of her nature, beliefs and character.

With time, Maya grew to be a decisive and confident person...fixed many of her character flaws (many still remained)...learnt about herself...her weaknesses she hid, her strengths she polished! Now a strapping young lass of 20, Maya decided to try her luck with guys too (after all how bad can be a sub-specie if it could boast of Johnny Depp as its member?!?!) So with a long long long list of qualities set in her mind, she wore her heart up her sleeve for the first time. But the thing with Maya is that even her sleeve is like her! So the heart never really got the chance of slipping out and falling for the first Prince Charming who walked by. The heart also never got a chance of measuring up every candidate for the quality control list that Maya had so naively prepared. Maya's sleeve did all the required calculation of a matchmaker and Maya landed a striking young lad ( a PERFECT match, if something of the sorts exists!)

So Maya now had one of the things she wanted in life...Love! For a while it felt like everything else was immaterial and Love is all that matters. But this is Maya we are talking about...She can not escape her name after all! So Maya decided to once again strive for having it all. Being Maya, is all about loving moh (Love) and maya (money), so predictably, the next goal in Maya's life became wealth. Now money is not an easy thing to come by if you are only good at things that don't really pay well in real world! Hence, Maya decided to go for "MBA"!!!! (dramatic music for effect)

This is where the story ends my friends...for this is where it gets too tragic to be told! (I don't want to call this piece Les Miserables instead of Le Magnifique!!!)

Obssessive about Possessing

"Possession"...I stumbled across this word by chance when I read about "Firebolt" being one of Harry Potter's most prized possessions in the Goblet of Fire. Back then my vocabulary wasn't even sound enough to understand what "vocabulary" meant! So obviously I would read my favorite book series with a dictionary by my side... Even so, the dictionary's description never revealed the true application of this word. With time however, it became evident that people rarely use it as a noun...its verb and adjective forms are so much more popular...and that too not with objects but regarding subjects!

Developing philosophies about life come at a very late stage, but what every person learns in the first 20 years of life is that you can't change anyone's nature. The less you hope to do that with someone, the less naive you stay and the more at peace are your relations with everyone who matters. So its pretty much around the first time you move out of "home sweet home", that you realize that 'nature' is what governs even one's artificiality!!! And the urge to possess stems from this basic human nature.

This urge soon matures into an obsession for many, when situations presents some forlorn subject of interest! Some people fight against it but most people find it intriguing...the exhibition of jealousy...possessiveness...the need to control... Its seen in mothers, fathers, siblings and friends. We all know how it feels to be on the receiving end of a possessive behavior and we all know how mildly amusing or thoroughly irritating it could be! But what we never marvel upon is that what encourages such behavior?!?

It can't just be the simple need to own...it can't only be the insecurities or lack of trust...it can't just be 'nature'! If everyone exhibits it, then there has to be a reasonable explanation for it...more potent and more satisfying than just 'nature'!

How come people try to possess other people and their emotions? How come it is forgotten that possessing is to do with inanimate objects and not with people,throbbing with life and energy? Personally I am a materialistic individual...possessions mean all the worldly treasures to me, no matter how grand or how inexpensive. But I have always considered human spirit to be boundless...one can't dream to possess it...one can only dream to know it in all its imperfections and one can only hope to achieve exclusivity with some of the pleasures a dedicated spirit can bestow upon one...

What I don't understand is how and why, people still dare to hope that they can possess another's mind and heart and actions and affections! Any feeble attempt to understand this obsession with possessing usually fizzles out even before it can illuminate the nook and cranny of human psyche in which the answer may be hidden...

Still brooding over it does explain one thing...one craves to possess what one desires! It may not be the tendency to control and own but the primal need to be owned and to belong to someone that makes people possessive...that makes people want to have someone feeling possessive for them!

Dream on...

Life doesn't give us, mere mortals, much options when it comes to dreaming... Along the long and tiresome journey of life, we choose our own frame of references and based on them we select the canvas to paint our dreams on. Colors of imagination fly wild initially (when we are too naive to be cynical)...then we gain what we so proudly call "experience"; and then those colors start turning to their own grounded versions... what remains in the end is a faint watermark of the vividness, dream world used to be once upon a time... for each of us!

And then there is the ultimate reversal of it all for some of us...living in our own worlds, some of us tame our dreams from the very beginning. Then at some point in life, the bubble bursts and the horizons of our little world expand drastically! It is then that boundaries of our dreams also start redefining themselves!

I am not referring to the dreams that dictate our lifestyles to be...or our career goals and other such mundane things... I am talking of the dreams we dream when we are sleeping...when our brain is at its primal best! In essence, those are the dreams that depict our true mental status; an apt reflection of our interior selves; what we are in our mind's eyes... Freud has given intriguing ways of interpreting these snippets of a person's self interpretation and has suggested exciting theories about what leads us to dream. I find myself wondering most mornings, what could have caused my mind to make some really exceptional mental images...but what I rarely wonder is "what if these dreams ever came true?"

Dreaming of food and supermarket aisles brimming with snacks when one is on a strict diet is quite cliche...but dreaming of missing trains or buses with relationship problems in real life...or dreaming of vacations on queer locations with mountains of work pending in real life...or dreaming of old school friends sitting in your office with no reason to explain it, whatsoever... The more random you feel the dream is, the more ingrained it is in the ups and downs of your real life...

Its like our dreams are our own personal "Mirrors of the Erised", depicting our deepest and most desperate desires, when we are at our receptive best! The fuel to drive one's intentions and subsequently, one's actions for all future endeavors is generated from these dreams only. So dreaming on is the only way to be...dreaming on can guarantee bringing you in touch with your inner self... dreaming on needs no interpretation, but a simple connection with one's mind and the ability to understand what your system keeps telling you... :)

When will my cheese move???

Stagnancy...one of the most feared words in the dictionary of the free spirited! Things lapsing into a routine, while desirable to many, is a horror to those who seek adventure everyday. Of course I am not talking about Captain Jack Sparrow!!! I am talking about the little Jack Sparrows inside us...the one that is unpredictable some mornings, the one that yearns for uncertainty and chaos for some part of the day, the one that knows that life is truly lived in such small daily adventures.

But what do you do when day after day you get stuck in a routine and find yourself becoming slave of habits? What when you want so much to change and you are glaringly aware of the fact that it will be a while before your "cheese" will be moved. The reference here is to a very popular book (Dunno why!) that compares our lives as complex individuals with mouse like creatures who find it crushing when their cheese is moved (changes happen around them). While one of them moves on and find "new cheese"(new meaning of life); the pathetic one stays back and merely lament and plummet into depression!

Here however, the intention is not to lament over the "moved cheese" but to seek its happening! True, its fun being comfortable with life...True, its always reassuring to get that feeling in morning "I AM IN CONTROL"...True, its awesome to laze around...

Alas, the heart yearns for something more, always!!!

For sooner or later, 'Comfort' turns to 'monotony'...

"I AM IN CONTROL" turns to "AM I A CONTROL FREAK?"

and 'lazing around' turns to 'utter boredom'!

So, one wishes for 'change'...covets transition... anticipates the adrenaline rush of many 'firsts' to come... urges the time to fly by...

Its not the inability to move on and find new cheese (MIND IT!!!)...its the obligation to live with the old cheese until it is moved...and meanwhile cherishing the sweet hope of welcoming the adventure that life will present soon...

And the sun followed...

In a race against time, one hardly gets the time to look out for one's back. The preoccupation with what is to come is too overpowering to give way to contemplation about what went by. For what is past is history and what is to come is the real mystery; and we all like "mysteries", don't we?! Not that this one here is an exclamation about some backstabbing Brutus, who didn't quite enjoy becoming history. Its about retrospecting itself,how things seem all funny and relatively easy once they are past... Its about not having the luxury to be nostalgic at times... Its about forgetting all those rungs of ladder that have been conquered... Its about 'moving on' the fast-track... Its about the undeniable anticipation of future defeating the sweet romance one does with one's memories in one's "tanhai"...

Just like while rushing on a road that promises a view of the rising sun at its destination,one hardly considers enjoying the pink beauty of the new born dawn creeping from behind; in these years of being full of excitement about future, one hardly has time for wisdom based on experience!!! Now it may come out as way too altruistic if I preach the importance of experience; for I myself am nothing else but a consumer. I love to consume what keeps me happy... (its more than choco-chip ice cream, folks!) Its a happy experience itself. Though it is important to keep track of one's past and learn continuously from one's memories; its equally important to keep a keen eye on the morrow...

And it is this hunger for novelty that leads one into unchartered territories. The desire to win it all by hook or by crook comes rarely but when it does, its not the 'magnificently approaching dawn from behind' that matters; its the first glimpse of the sun coming out from the tranquil fathoms of a lake that matters. I guess the shift in notions from beginning till the end only suggests the dilemma that presents itself frequently. Keeping a firm head on one's shoulders is appreciable and only achievable when one learns from the past...but its not until one learns to rise above the clouds and dream, does one has a chance of making the sun itself follow...and not just the dawn...