chehra uska hai ya koi mahtaab hai
chehra jaise ghazal chehra jaan-i-ghazal
chehra jaise kalli chehra jaise kanwal..”
~ Afreen Afreen Lyrics by the amazing Late Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan
It's crazy how we say the same things every year. How fast the year has gone by, how it'll be christmas time soon and before we know it we will be welcoming another year. 2016 started off a bit iffy for me, I decided to spend the time around holidays in Singapore, which is not a bad decision, had i had all my friends in town. Unfortunately I didn't and after heroically deciding on December 29th that I am going to wear my pretty dress, put on some make up and show up at Arab Street all by myself and party to welcome 2016, I chickened out. I couldn't get myself to go. Instead i walked in the rain on December 31st on my way back home, which was refreshing. Bought myself some amazing groceries and cooked a brilliant chicken curry, finally opened this amazing bottle of wine I had been gifted and put on a Bollywood movie and sat down on my brand new couch! It was brilliant evening, and I do that all the time on other days of the year, but it didn't turn out to be a very successful new year plan. After being told by a guy I had been dating, that it wasn't working out for him, maybe I should have chosen to do something that involves other people. Sigh. We live and learn. Year after year.
So lessons for this year-end (i know, it's still early!) :
- Don't date men during the holidays, because it's just the wrong time of the year to start something new, in spite of what Love Actually might tell me.
- Don't spend New Year's Eve on your couch, in spite of how tempting that looks and sounds!
As long as I stick to those two rules (yes, I've elevated them to rules now), I should be fine, or how we say it in India, A-ONE! This year has been a mixture of various kinds of emotions and situations, sprinkled with loads of lovely goodies, albeit some disappointments here and there. But then that's life, I never want it to be all sweet and not salty at all ;) My most memorable moments have to be the trips I have taken to Sri Lanka, Coorg, Bali, London, Italy, Toronto, impromptu London again(!) I love travelling, i really do. I mean, who doesn't. 60% of all my travelling though was for weddings. My dear dear friend got married and then I had a sister get married. And both of them were high school love stories, always a good thing to witness, leaves you with a little bit if hope and faith that love (as i would like to believe) actually exists. I don't know if it's Singapore or the times we live in, love just doesn't retain the same amount of magic anymore. All of course thanks to apps like Tinder thinning out the true value or meaning of what it is to get to know another person or the charm of bumping into your soulmate in life VS swiping peoples faces on a mobile phone. Where's the magic in that I ask? To be honest, as much as i loathe the idea of ending up on a matrimonial site or a dating website or have my face appear on a mobile phone app, I actually once did think about whether I should be giving it a try, whether I am being closed to a path at the end of which love could exist. And some of the men I have dated have been on these sites, so definitely there's quality on these things, but then I remind myself of the reasons why neither of those things worked out ! So yea after a few minutes of contemplating quote seriously whether I'm being stubborn and opening myself to the possibility of this nonsense, I go back to being stubborn and closed to it!
One of the things that I maybe should have blogged about (too late to do it now, unless I re-start my campaign!) is about running a weekly bake sale to support my charity : Friends of Tilonia. I baked every Thursday to sell bakes for this charity at my workplace and it has given me immense satisfaction personally and a little bit of pride that I could combine my hobby and my passionate stance on the education and safety of the girl child and women in India. I was trying to fit in another yoga teacher training, but I'm sure they would have asked me to leave my job if I had even attempted at that conversation with my boss. Anyhow, there's always next year for what I want to do.
The trip to Sri Lanka with my lovely teachers and my classes Pure Singapore did give keep my practice going and in good shape, although, exactly like how I acted in the new year with being comfortable on the couch VS heading out to the unknown, my practice sees similar trends, I stick to teachers and styles of yoga that are comfortable. Only rarely will I, in a fit of "I can do this too", will I sign up to a Hatha 2 or a Vinyasa 2 class and realise that I can actually do it (!). As much as i hate the phrase "get out of your comfort zone", I need to get out of it sometimes for my own good, and to know that the unknown or what looks achievable isn't all that scary, and that with baby steps, I will get there eventually. So, yay to signing up to more 2s!
My friendships have seen ups and downs. I reconnected with a friend after a year and I was glad for that happening. In my periods of sadness and hurt, I tend to go into my cave until I can strong enough to come out and face the world. And while i am in that cave, I don't need anyone or anything, it is my silent healing that strengthens me more than soothing words from friends. I never find their words soothing. Everyone has their own opinions and viewpoints and ways of dealing with things and I can never find comfort in the arms of my friends. I alone can heal myself. And I'm selfish like that. Unfortunately it's not something that can be explained to many people convincingly, and so I end up hurting friends. When I do come out of that hibernation, I go back to being the Leo that I am. My social calendar fills up again and my YouTube playlists see a "tune"around. I've lost few friendships in the last two years thanks to this. But again selfishly, I am ok with it. I did lose a significant friendship earlier this year, because I saw how it wasn't the loving and nurturing relationship it used to be, and that I was better off without it and I said Goodbye. I might reconnect sometime or I may not ever.
It's something I struggle with, the ease with which I sometimes let go of people. Goodbyes seem to have lesser and lesser of an effect on me and are increasingly not painful. When I was talking to someone about it, they said to me "Isn't that something to be glad of, that you're not hanging onto things?" I don't know about that. I have mixed feelings of the way it should be.
I also was disappointed in some other friendships, and went through a phase of "nothing in this life is supposed to last and everything is temporary", but while I overcame that phase, I still haven't been able to mend that relationship. Not because I hold a grudge against this friend of mine, but i just can't seem to give myself wholeheartedly anymore, everything comes with a pinch of reservation. Maybe that will change by the end of the year, who knows. Either ways, that was definitely a life changing moment in 2016.
My travels : sigh. London, you're so beautiful, I want to be with you all the time. Your sights, your food, your people, your beauty, the hidden magic in your streets, the history that hangs with your bridges, your seasons : everything about you is lovely. London has to be literally my favorite city in the world. But then some say, it's because I haven't seen New York. I'm not the biggest fan of the US and can't see how anything can beat London. I'm just biased about anything Europe frankly. Speaking of Europe, Italy blew my mind. And all I had been to was the south : Naples and the beautiful towns around the Amalfi Coast and the lovely Capri. I'm sure the rest of Italy is equally gorgeous, if not more. As beautiful as that trip was (especially because I traveled with two of my favorite people), it was equally damaging for my body. That much Pasta and that much wine, can never be good in the long run! Italy did leave me with inspiration for many many love stories, the first of which is coming soon in this blog (!). I need to start writing those stories again, they keep my faith in love alive! My stories and Shah Rukh Khan.
I realise this post has been a mixture of a crazy number of things, and I haven't even touched on everything that's happened this year! I mean, Coke Studio came out with Season 9 and my favorite song so far is Afreen Afreen. I moved into a new house and finally put up the crazy amount of art work I had collected from all my travels over the last few years. So, loads more to write about.
But if there's a theme i'd like to dedicate to this year or an intention that I've tried very hard to stick to, and thankfully successfully until now is Gratitude for everything. I started a Gratefulness Journal and in all my rant about mobile phones, I decided to start it on Google Keep instead of an old-school journal! But, hey! at least I stuck to my resolution (so far). It's literally one of the nicest things I have done for myself.
So adieu to anyone who is reading and apologies for the unstructuredness of this post. Promise to be a little more cohesive next time around.
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