May-BE

May be it’s a repetitive pattern of sorts. Or may be it’s the overthinking brain that says that. Or maybe it actually is, who knows? 

What we believe in or do not believe in is influenced by all our previous years of existence, how then are we supposed to find out what “messed” us up in good or bad ways? And what may be good for me may be bad for you? So where do we really meet? Do we meet like the sun meets the vast limitless ocean at the horizon? A place where we “feel” that they are meeting but it is only just a realistic fantasy! 

One question leads to another and before we know it the session hour comes to an end with both the client and the therapist feeling something about the session. One may think it was a fantastic session and the other may just feel a little more broken and torn apart, yet term it “overwhelmed”, a word she uses for both exciting experiences and ravenous ones too! It’s interesting, isn’t it, how one word means both good and bad? If that can be true for just a word, then what about people and their experiences? 

 

Then there suddenly pops up the colour gray, denoting in its presence all that lies in- between the shades of black and white, a place where the so called ‘good’ and the so called’ black’ simply merge together, making an all- encompassing being. Now you may call that being a human/ a heart or even a mind. Ah! The workings! 

The writings of a solemn mood are different. They make you question everything. While it may be ‘good’ in some areas but what happens when you begin to question everything, deeming your existence a big question mark!? See, how easily we put things into the ‘good’ and the ‘ bad’, never really letting the experiences be? Perhaps one reason is the discomfort some experiences lead to and that leads us to evading them, sweeping so much under the carpet, until one day the carpet rises to be a mountain! 

If you are thinking what I just wrote was in a melancholic frame of a mind, I’ll say        “ maybe/ maybe not”. You might then respond by saying that it is either a yes or a no. I’ll then say “ What if I’m currently living in the world of maybe’s? Isn’t that what the gray is all about? A place where the good and the bad meet, giving me a possibility of the both? You might then reply “ It’s a dull colour nonetheless, right? And then I’ll scoff at you, thinking what might be dull for you may be bright for me! But then what about the majority? What about the other colours on the spectrum? What shall you say to them or call them if gray is your brightest colour? Well, how about not naming them anything for once? Really? That’s absurd! Indeed it is! For sometimes we forget that name calling things and experiences becomes so innate in us, that we forget just letting them be! We forget just letting them be!

When "being" speaks to you ...

“Sometimes the choices we make do not speak of the rebellion we’ve been fighting with others at the surface level; they speak of having the knowledge we’ve always had, just that the enlightenment seems too blinding”

When one is used to “doing” all their life, “being” doesn’t comes so naturally. It calls for unlearning all the language you spent hours mastering and then expecting to forget it and start afresh. Additionally “being”, like always, never expects, it simply accepts and that is what it calls forth from within-you. That, my friend, is the most difficult part. It’s that part of you which whispers to you in your busiest of times and you very easily chide it off, like a fly which just interfered at the sight of your gorgeous meal. Yet, even as you choose to make it invisible, it stands there, waiting, not like a fly, but like a saint, for that’s what it knows. “Being” knows that it’s difficult for you to unlearn, to undo all that which the society expects you to do and follow. It accepts that unlearning shall take time, maybe even if it’s this lifetime. It accepts that there shall be innumerable falls than wins. It also knows that it takes true courage and determination to take a little look towards it because carving one’s own path requires passion, patience and valour. It knows you have all that in you, for if it was not the case, you wouldn’t have even talked about “being” that many times today. “Being” knows how you melt your self with the music of Piano Guys as you write this post; it knows how you saw the milk twirling with tea leaves into that pot of tea you made for yourself; it knows how amazed you were with the omelette you cooked for yourself which looked like one gorgeous delight, ready to dig your teeth into. It knows all this and more. It knows it’s not a fly to you, it’s a part of your conscious which as a matter of fact you often hide for reasons you are certainly not responsible. It often wonders why you embrace it and then leave it now and then. It ponders in your presence and also your absence. It’s there. Always. It knows how overwhelming it is for you. It’s alright. Sometimes we learn dysfunctional ways of adapting or governing in the environments that only bring pain; what’s more disconcerting is the knowledge of our whereabouts. It seems we cannot do anything about them, the truth is we can. All that we do need to do is to ‘try’ our ways out of those lessons which are now our habits. As they say, knowing is the first step. Maybe, just maybe, it’s okay to “let go” and simply “Be” because heavens have never fallen and neither will they unless we allow them to!

Happy Weekend Vanilla People!:)
Aakriti

Melancholia as we have known?

There’s a beauty in resting which we don’t always see

There’s a beauty in silence which we don’t always hear

There’s a beauty within us which often doesn’t judges

There’s a depth waiting to be delved into, only if we set ourselves free

I miss him; every bit of him. No, I never got to know him personally, but whatever I did made me fall head over heels for him. His humour, his tears, his expressions, his flawless screen presence and oh that smile. Every character he played was a real person somewhere. I wouldn’t call it “acting” for he would become that character. So beautifully would he merge himself that the boundaries seemed invisible. Then I wonder “Why did he do what he did?” As I write, I ask myself “Is taking one’s own death the answer to all the anguish one feels? Is that one switch that shall set everything free?” A part of me stands in affirmative, the other feels pained for it knows how difficult depression can be. It’s not just “get up and feel better”! Ah! You wish it was that easy! The meaning of illnesses often goes beyond their phenomenology. It’s a key to the past, for what happened and sometimes, also for what not happened. It’s grieving for the losses and mourning for the traumas (that which may not always be ‘big’ events). It’s a whirlpool of emotions that even emotions may not fathom.

Then some ask “What about the feeling of emptiness?” and I say “ Don’t we all have a space in our hearts that longs for something? That some “thing” which may not actually be a thing, but a moment, perhaps, or an event or a person or an interaction or a scenic landscape or simply observing someone be happy? Maybe, just, maybe, there’s a reason why that space stays empty for everyone. Something which cannot be filled so easily has to mean a lot more than the space it creates in the heart or the soul. To me it feels that it’s a symbol of the lives we have lived. More so, it’s like the empty spaces of every human being all go back to this one giant ball of thread where we all emerged from. The question now lies in the fact, what do you do with it? I say, let it just be. Just because we live in a world that continues “to do” something in no way means that’s the solution to everything. Sometimes, “being” is where the answer lies.

As for him, I will miss him every time I see him. Today I saw him as Patch Adams. Like always, he took my heart away and whatever was left off melted away.

Love

Mrs. Aakriti ( with effect from 18^th April 2016)

Be aware of old boxes, but try not to reopen them. Be aware of old patterns, but try not to awaken them.

The past two days have been immersed in the warm winter sunshine and a book that inspires me to write the like of it someday. Winter got defined itself, just yesterday and a day before. It felt neglected all this while, for it didn’t receive the acknowledgement of the wonderful month of December and the solitude it carries amidst the bone chilling temperature.

Today I gift my time, space and words, for that is all that I have. A walk down the memory lane of the year, that was, brings memories of the years that were travelled:

 I was a brook and so am the same.

 My existence, my darling, has not changed

For obstacles I conquered

And the ones yet to be seen

Shall be transformed through the power

  That you and I carry

As the year bids a farewell, wrapping itself for all that it opened in these 364 days, I wonder what the last five have left to offer?

Of all the moments I recall

The victories make me rise

For they incurred through the losses

Of time that suddenly felt lost

And life that felt bereft;

Today the sun shines

With its core with-in me

For the answers lie there

Where ‘I’ meets the ‘profound me’

With hope in my heart and courage in my mind, I stir forward, welcoming the divine, that has always been a part of all of us. Let 2016 be a year of expansion of worldwide Kosenrufu ( world peace, according to Nichiren Buddhism).

My wish for you this year:

The smiles are there to spread

For the hearts that carry strength

May you befriend your self

With all the faith that you have

May you reach success

For all the heights you see

May your health support your endeavours

That are waiting to come true

And may solitude be yours

Amidst all colours from black to blue.

Love

Aakriti

12.15pm

26 Dec. 15

The Growing Silence

The poems of this phase have been the best I’ve ever written. When my friends urge me to share it with them, I tell them they are too precious and sacred to be out in the open in the wild and callous world of internet. They need a heart as divine as they deserve, to carefully and gently place them on pages of a book with a gorgeous cover and a soul, for not any page shall understand their worth and not any cover shall envelop its existence.

At times when words fail, the rivers bleed with pain and  anguish, that is, for them to bear and for words to witness. The words sit by the river and simply try to be ‘present’; that’s all they can do. They feel helpless for being unable to extract the hydrogen from the oxygen, as the two have been intertwined for life. The words cringe, wince. They try to cry but nothing compares to the bleeding river. The words have a voice which the river doesn’t. The river hopes to turn its colours from black to red that it originally possessed. As goes for the words, to the outside world, they have only turned more graceful, poignant and charming as ever. Their magic makes people swoon and their effect stays like a lasting fragrance.

Between the spaces of the words and the river lies an abyss of great depth and silence. The Silence is exploring its own existence in its nascent birth. Ever since it stepped into this world, the cries have been shrilly and extremely painful to bear. At times, she simply sobs to sleep. On other times, there are sudden bursts of agony making her feel death was near. Yet the river would bleed from her eyes and she would still exist in an existence which felt nothing but absent. 

The silence has matured with time.  She’s growing.  She has begun to breathe with her own lungs. Her wisdom has given life to words. Times change: for a silence which was overbearing for her own self, she has begun to add beauty to others lives. As they thank her, she lives a little more. She lives for all that is yet to come and unravel itself in the most magnificent ways. She lives, with herself.