Thoughts/Verses

Invisible friend

Posted on by Archana K B / 0 Comment

3 am friend
Where art thou
You need to mend
Not the heart though

Mind is in dumps
Sleepy and lazy
They call us
Mental and hazy

Get up. Walk around
Make your mind
Is all they say round
So I never mind

Distraction
The pill I take
Immersion
In the game I fake

Longing is for the call
To speak up and talk
Judgment from all
Stopping from the walk

Poke me all you may
I may not budge
Continue, I’d say
Either way
It’s not a grudge!

Tweet and play
Is what I do
Time dwindles away
Reaching out today
Is all I could do!

Thoughts

Settlement contrast

Posted on by Archana K B / 0 Comment

Years of living outside Kerala in the metro cities being exposed to a different way of life, has now made me rethink my affinity towards the native home. The nature and the healthy food, with all round moderate climate, with people talking the same language as you, all looks tempting and all. The reality sinks in when we live here for weeks and months and not just for a vacation! Maybe my noticing abilities have increased over time owing to how much I miss the necessities.

The mindset of smaller town is akin to newer generation youngsters complaining about the generation gap with the older generation. Believing that doing laundry with bucketful of water and beating the clothes on stone is better than using a washing machine. Washing vessels is a chore to be done outside the kitchen by squatting near the well, thereby not messing the kitchen sink. Sleeping together with family means, to be subservient and adjusting enough to sleep on a rigid mattress, which maybe labelled as somewhere between a single and double bed. Some people having a superiority complex towards city life and apartment living in general, because there is no backyard or soil of our own.

There are some similarities too. The government offices require the same number of multiple visits and requests which can drain our patience. We still have to adjust with our existing constraints as change comes around rarely and we end up exclaiming, “here it’s like that only”!

These thoughts all started when I decided to accompany the other half to a nearby supermarket. I had thought of upgrading the broken kitchen grater and to introduce something called chopping board to the house. I ended up buying nothing. As grater was not favoured because of the unpolished looks and the latter didn’t made its appearance at all on the market racks. My humble attempt at latching in and adjusting with the changes around me failed yet again. And I resign myself to a virtual world till I muster enough the courage to shake things up again.

It’s quite disbelieving that, these circumstances and native living was favoured by ourselves at a younger age. Earlier, it was assumed that after earning enough for retirement, we would “settle” down back native with family and relatives. Now that our minds has broadened, I wonder whether we would choose that option for the future. I realise it maybe the conditioning and narrow mindedness of the childhood that made it all bearable. The modern mind welcomes a new way of life that can make the living easier and doesn’t mind spending extra on such appliances. And when you are open minded, you start looking for solutions to incorporate both traditional and modern requirements of our lifestyle.

The mind swings between the duality prospects of the future. The first option is to settle in such non city atmosphere with relatives and family nearby, missing out on the luxuries. The second option is to settle in a city, far from the madding crowd of ours, alone and isolated among a similar yet different crowd, with all the luxuries which can make daily life much easy. The decision making is hard. Which one do you choose!?

Thoughts

The Corona Year!

Posted on by Archana K B / 0 Comment

The corona pandemic has pulled us all down into a gloomy atmosphere but an unusual sudden death in the family has changed our life course forever. To drive across states amidst a lockdown with calling around for inter state passes and to be in quarantine while grieving was an event I still cannot believe we went through.

And now we cannot move back home as we are in containment zone, and next maybe triple lockdown, or institutional quarantine and such. The world is throwing around so much jargons for the future historians to learn.

Days go by. The end cannot be seen at the horizon. Yet time goes by like a like a ticking clock sending me warning signals regarding future I am yet to witness or regret about. I hopelessly moan without the tears, wondering at the pessimistic state I am in. Looking for a positive note to hold on and to get out of this messy mind without drowning.

It’s so easy for others to advice about the better days. Or to remind you of being grateful by comparing with the poor living under pitiful conditions. Or to keep saying “reach out”, “hold onto hope” etc. But to come out of a negative mindset is damn hard. Why? Because it’s hard to break our conditioning and to force ourself to accept the judgments which will be passed around, direct and indirect. Yes, you may get help not in the way you thought and not at all crafted to our desired perfection, and again people will repeat to be grateful for getting help as such, as there are many who lost their chances.

And when you think you are better, the weather changes again with dark clouds as in the times we are now. Wondering when the sun will come again, we engage ourselves so as to avoid the blues. But for how long? The “new normal” now includes not only pulling yourself up but also the loved ones, the elderly who fears the end of their life, and the children who are deserted in their safe homes.

When things go really dark, I cling unbelievingly to an old quote which says “The sun always rises even after a dark night.” The pessimistic in me always cringed about passing the dark hours fearing the extreme, but the hope to see the sunlight has always been helpful till now. Thus, being grateful to the universe as others remind me, I wait for the tide to pass, hoping to see you in bright sunlight once again….

Thoughts

Reflecting about 2019

Posted on by Archana K B / 0 Comment

Another birthday went by. Also another year is nearing its end. This year when I look back, unknown to me, the focus has been on love.

It started in January when I read the book, The Forty Rules Of Love by Elif Shalak. Every rule touched a nerve in me. It left me thinking about the principles and the ideals I follow. During the summer vacation, I went to live with parents for one month with their grand daughter. Every moment of their living reminded me of the changes in them and me, and in general the miniscule of life.

By the time I returned with a heavy heart, I had started onto the famous Harry Potter series (which I had set aside thinking they are kid’s books) which teaches various shades and hidden layers of love. With such an overflow of love, I turned loving more towards myself, indulging in art which I wanted to from long time. But the tide didn’t last longer.

At house, seeing the kid struggling with the enormous educational materials, it made me ponder on how they view the life and how it differs from our point of view. Recently in one of the tantrum fights, I caught myself from a higher perspective, realising how every human being is struggling with ego, starting with such young age. Every kid wants to believe themselves as right and holds onto their belief. It took me back to my age when I kept complaining how Amma never understands my point. I had to calm myself and also the kid, by pointing out that she is right but that doesn’t mean I am wrong. Now that I look back, I realise no kid ever points out to their parents that they are wrong, instead what frustrates the child is, the realisation that he/she is considered a kid and their feelings always being ignored. Again I could see the tussle of power between ego and love. Instead if love is to take over, the belief that the kid will learn on her own with time and experience, will help us to calm down and will enable us to give the kids a chance to live their way.

Recently I completed the book, Daring Greatly by Brene Brown, and I realised I could relate to it completely. Most examples in the book are so realistic and I could sense the shields and masks, which is talked about in the book as something which I wear in day to day life. But all these reading or the inputs I received impacted more on my mind than my actions. As much easy it is to read and understand these truths, it’s that hard to implement in real life. As my therapist says, acceptance is the key to the change. In other words acceptance itself is the change to bring about.

Maybe till the next birthday, the theme could be the acceptance and the long drive could be on the road to freeing my inner spirit…

Bangalore life/Thoughts

Call of the Abyss

Posted on by Archana K B / 0 Comment

Its here again. Every time it comes and drowns me in its deepest abyss. Then I slowly crawl out of survival instinct and start swimming against the tide. If not, I am sure i would be carried away to the cliff and would be pushed over. Most of the times this swimming against the tide takes longer time during which, I fizzle out of my energy and land back further my initial position. Yet I try. The human nature of survival is unexplained. The source of strength magically appears when we least think of it. 

For months now, the social media has been a distraction, an excuse for me not to hone my creativity skills(if any). Every day I would think, I would start practising doing the morning pages or attempt to do some DIY or learn new art of painting or crafting, but a tempting choice of glancing through the digital devices before the start, glues me onto it for the rest of the day. Apart from scrolling the feed and stalking other inspirational profiles, some for curiosity and some for art, music and other interests of mine, the feeling of posting something on my own has come down.
But on a few days when I could reign myself in, I did end up creating this mandala, which is my new love interest these days.

And then there is the watercolor and acrylic painting classes which tempts me so much, but the prospect of learning and then giving up, holds me back. It’s as if I have some serious commitment issues when it comes to productivity.  Can you believe I haven’t taken any photos too lately? For someone who did a photo per day for one whole year and gloated about it, this seems to be so out of character.

Yet I try tinkering around, playing with paints like the ones below, or completing some books(did I mention about Harry Potter? that deserves a full post!)

Some say music helps, but I wonder whether it would help the 8 year old at home, when I am blasting “In the End It doesn’t even matters” on the bluetooth speaker! The easiest way till now was to go back to roots, listening to plain old carnatic music with the violin and melancholy ragas, which can improve our mood so subtly that we would not know how long the music has been playing. But its hard to make the new generation (who talks nothing more than gonna and wanna), appreciate such old beauties.
How do you usually get out of “the abyss”?

Mélange – Random Tidbits

Summer Pink!

Posted on by Archana K B / 0 Comment

Summer Pink! .#flowers #gardenlove #pinklove #snapseed #randompic

Bangalore is famous for its pink flowers. Though I am yet to have one in my namesake garden, this picture is of a new plant I bought recently. Love how editing app like Snapseed transforms the simple image instantaneously. Reminds me of the Photoshop trouble we had to play around with, a decade ago, to achieve the same feat! Filters and photo editing apps have changed the dynamics a lot easier.

I wonder why didn’t I resort to this idea of doing photo-post once in a while now that there are easier ways to import from Instagram to WordPress. At times, we are so adamant of our ways like compartmentalising and perfection, that we end up ignoring both WordPress and Instagram. Silly, no?