Still figuring things out...

I ended 2019 getting off of anxiety and depression medication and by moving house alone. I welcomed 2020 while I was at home with my family, but before I left for Nagaland, I had cried so much. I was so upset thinking that all the self progress I've made over the past two years (that I had not been home) would go to waste; that things would be the same at home and that people, society and situations would make me feel small, like I had always felt before.

I was wrong. I had a good holiday. Things had changed. My progress and change in perspectives stayed intact and it was much easier to deal with family and community related frustrations.

Yesterday, I landed in Delhi, and it was the most alone and scared I have ever felt in a long time. I am yet to figure out why I felt or feel this way, but I know I will, in time.

"What if who I hoped to be was always me?
And the love that I fought to feel was always free."
This song lyrics correctly describes the realisation that I've come to over the past few days. Maybe I've been reaching far too high for things that I do not even need and trying too hard for people that are not meant to be. I've been distancing myself from family and losing myself over people and love that come with conditions. I've been putting my sense of self worth over my level of achievements or my state of productivity. From now on I will try my best to not do that to myself, to value myself and not treat selfcare as 'rewards'.

I'll love myself and my family no matter the conditions or the situations. I'll work hard and aim high but not beat my whole existence up over not doing better or as well as someone else. I'll try to remember that things will work out as they always do and that happiness can be self made and not just be given to me by people or by means of approval and achievement.

I'm putting this out here, I'm still figuring things out...

As the year ends...

2019 has been quite a year!

Writing down a list of things that I learned over the months, and I know I would not want to forget:

Home is not a house, nor a person. It is not something singular, and as cliché as it sounds, it is a feeling.

Remember that the results are out of our control (do not be disheartened), but the effort we put in is.

I am not my anxieties.

Please take care of your Self. Give your Self attention.

People have their own share of reasons. Remember to respect them.

Heartbreaks aren't as bad as they may seem at the moment.

Our tone and our choice of words matter, so much. Please watch them.

Friends and Cats make everything better. Love can wait?

The political is personal, and the personal is political.

Growing up is fun. Find your priorities in the right place. Or maybe not, we still have time. :)

Glasses and I

I wonder what my glasses see that I do not notice.
•
Today I saw two people enjoying the Delhi summer/fall night, lying on the ground. In that moment, all the sky was theirs to see and all the earth was theirs to rest on.
Maybe the next moment, the city dolour would creep up on them. I hope it didn’t. I hope it doesn’t. •
I’ve gone through a couple of glasses since I started needing them. Some broke on me, some didn’t fit me well with time and some got too heavy after a while. Most of them are with me in their boxes, in a drawer that I keep opening.
Maybe the same goes with people I’ve met in my life.
Somedays I hope I helped you notice things you never noticed, other days I wish I stayed in my box. Most days, I’m happy you keep me in your drawer somewhere, still existing. •

Me

It took me years to find Love within myself; from growing up depending on my big brothers for friendship I never found with my peers, to latching onto relationships that — I thought at that time — fulfilled me.
•
“You look just like your Dad. If only you look like your mom you’d be prettier.”
“You look just like your aunty. Gain some more weight.”
“You have the gummy smile that your Dad has.”
“You haven’t grown any taller still?”
•
What are seemingly just normal remarks in everyday conversations affected me to the point that in my late teens, I hated everything about myself.
I did not like my face, so I grew my hair and hid behind it. I did not like my gummy ugly smile so I laughed a little less, tried to smile pretty. I felt little and short, so I walked painfully in heels.

Looking back, I cry and hurt at how unkind I was to myself. I was filled with bitterness over things I have no control over.

I punished myself for just being who I am. These days, I do it a lot less. I’m a lot kinder to myself. I cut my hair and love how it looks, I wear flats and shoes I love, and I smile the biggest smile when a picture is taken.
•
Sometimes I tell a friend, “It hurts”
“What hurts?”
“Life and loneliness and everything in between”
•
This dialogue happens only on bad nights, when I find myself longing for something or someone that will make me happy. I know this happiness is temporary, and this want for it, extremely unhealthy. 
On better nights, I am happy with myself, and all that I am: body and mind, joy and grief, anger and compassion, mistakes and forgiveness. I am so proud of how far the little girl at first grade, who got lost in town because her friend left her behind, has travelled to find her way back home.

Plastic Trees

I am not my mother. 

Precious flower

Living by the river

Tending to her plants

Making them flower.

Sitting below her trees

Singing to their fruits.

I am plastic bags

And polluted lungs.

Failed attempts

Desperate actions

Zero effects 

Reusable bags

Forgotten plastic straws

She will not be. 

Earth, Birth.

In pain, in vain. 

Carbon printing

As we lie waiting

Living while dying.