Inspiration, Priority & My Calling!

Travel: Just reading about it, looking at the pictures of the gorgeous and varied landscapes moves me to plan my next trip. Right now, I am reading Shivya's Blog about how she quit her job at 23 and started travelling. It’s an interesting read, not similar to my story, but I bet most of us, stuck in the rut of 9 – 5 jobs, will find it quite appealing.

Its 16th Nov’13, 9:07 pm and I’ve just settled down after a working Saturday. Listening to Enya's Only Time for the past two days. I am hooked onto it. YouTube(d) it after watching Volvo Trucks - The EpicSplit feat ad featuring Van Damme. It’s just so surreal and soothing.

I’ve always wanted to travel. It’s been long since I last traveled; I don’t instantly recall my last trip. It look me almost a minute to realize that I went to Maldives this Sep around my B’day. I wrote a complete log about my experience here. Next, I am planning to go to Hong Kong and Macau, but that’s in December. I still haven’t applied for Visa and nothing including itinerary, clothes etc. are in place.

It’s been a busy week with a working Saturday. We got a number of pitches lined up and I am a part of one. If it all goes well, we (my colleagues and I) might go to Ranthambore next weekend and then attend a colleague’s wedding on the following Monday i.e 25^th Nov’13.

Just Alt+Tab(ed) window to check my blog submission status on IndiBlogger. Yippie! It’s approved! Does that make me an official Blogger? Maybe! If yes, then I am step closer to writing a book someday. #daydreaming.

At times I feel that my feelings and talks about travel are just fake and faff. With all this writing about my past trips and travel in general, do I tick people off? I don’t know and also don’t want to worry about it as all I am trying to do is write honestly about what’s going on in my head. And, incidentally, accidently it’s travel (well! most of the time)

Agreeing to agree with my feeling to not hype or write about travel feels natural sometimes until the next moment when I see a gorgeous picture of some part of the world or read a travel story or see some interesting travel video log, I end up realizing that travel is My ONLY CALLING.

I always beleived that I am a home grown, home happy material. There was no place but home that gave me solace. But thanks to a gentleman (just being a bit kind with my words) who vehemently told me that I would forget about all his bad words and wrongdoings if I were to go on a trip to London tomorrow. A taunt that was meant to show me down and prove me shallow did me a life time of goodness. It showed me MY TRUE CALLLING. I subconsciously realized that if there is anything that can make me forget any freaking pain in the world, it’s Travel!        

The best and first solo trip ever. Andamans hold a very special place on my World Map. 

I don’t crave for huge solitaries that I saw Sachin’s wife wearing on his farewell ceremony. Though they did stand apart and looked particularly huge (Apologies for obsessing about the stones, but I’d rather travel than wear them if I were to choose one between the two) Also, the idea to give Bharat Ratan to Sachin is just appalling to me. Is it some sort of added gratification for superbly talented? I feel he’d been reasonably thanked for all the glory he’s got the country, with his farewell and by the millions addressing him as GOD! Bharat Ratan is just going overboard. What does the award stand for anyway?

So, what inspires or moves me to travel? I don’t know. Would I prefer a well-made house over travel? I don’t know for sure. I would like both, but a lovely house would be nice AFTER a LONG VACATION. After all, I need a nice corner to showcase all my pretty travel pictures with lovely sunsets, beaches and adventures.

What Travel inspires me to do? It inspires me to work hard and even harder. I would love a job with NDTV GoodTimes or something on a similar tangent. Until that happens, I ought to do with my existing job. I ought to do it well(at least try) and keep a positive attitude so that my chances to get a good promotion with a decent appraisal increases proportionately, all while beefing up my monthly paycheck that will further empower me to visit fancier places and plan more trips to explore the world.

Having said that, I love Digital Marketing. If it weren’t for this job, I would have been dead by now. It lets me use my brain, interact with good hearted people and once in a while lets me use my creativity. I think, I would have been feeling stupid and wallowing in self-pity if I were in Fashion. Maybe I am not up to deal with the constant pressure to look good all the freaking time. Or maybe I have just gotten way too cozy in my trek pants, preferring them over a pair of navy blue high-waist cigarette pants paired with a pastel peach cardigan with a knotted neck collar and ¾ bishop sleeves and a goregous pair of sky high heels. 

Thanks to all the turn of events, I now know for the fact that Travel is "My Only Calling" and it enables and motivates me to be a better professional and a better person.

                Listening to Sinead O'Connor - 4th and Vine

Happy Tripping

-          - Rakshita
      
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Project I :: { The Third Person }

Many a times I feel it’s not me in the mirror. Have you ever got this feeling? I think it’s great that I am in a position to look at myself from a different point of view apart from my own. I know (or I think I know) what my actions, my words, my expressions look like. Spooky! 

23^nd Oct’13, it’s already midnight 12.52 am and I’ve just stepped out of a wonderful hot shower after a long drive…

It's now that I’ve realized that I don’t like to mince words anymore. I either speak or shut the hell up completely. I would initially think almost about a billion times (at a speed of light) before uttering a word or putting anything up on a public platform. I was worried about “what would people think of me” or “in what light will I be seen by my classmates or colleagues etc.”. Maybe, I was not in a comfortable state of mind that I am in now;  maybe I just cared way too much about everything; maybe I wasn’t sure if I will be accepted; maybe I didn’t know that it’s just me who has to accept me.

Now I stand outside my body, looking at me as a third person. 

Though I come across as a confident (maybe overconfident for some) every time I step outside my door, but I’ve had my share of identity crisis, the times when I was not comfortable in my own skin. It might be the age factor (late 20s do bring their magic in calming you down) or witnessing too much of good and bad of life in a short span of time or just taking lessons from my own mistakes, whatever else it might be, I don’t see myself in the same light as I used you until almost couple of years back. I am not as possessive about me as I was 5 years back and I try to not take myself seriously the way I used to maybe a decade back.

Blah! Blah!

Blah! Blah! Blah! Blah!

Are you still with me? You have all my love but seriously! Do better things than reading these rants of yet another blogger born out of nowhere.

Explore the world, start with your neighborhood.  Travel! If you don’t have a company, go alone.

Party and look at people! All kinds! It’s actually a lot of fun.

Laugh! Goof around! Be silly! Not everyone can be silly and it takes some special awesomeness to be insane.

And most important: treat yourself as third person and this world wouldn’t be such a burden.

Still reading? Well! Then I have an obligation to continue.

As I said before, in my previous blog post, “I” is important and needs to be given the first, but not all 

the attention. I try to look at myself as someone who either loves me or hates me. It’s an interesting exercise, just because it lets you understand the wrong in you and the right in others.

Not that, I bother to change much per others expectations (remember: you can’t make the entire world like or appreciate you), but it does help in getting a better perspective of me as a person and ease whatever bitterness, malice and maybe even jealousy looking to crop in the head.

World is an all Happy Place, you just got to change your perspective! It’s an easier thing to say, than to practice, especially when you are so scared that you decide not to share your thoughts, feelings and shy away from sharing your struggles at the risk of being judged at the hands of many and the unknown audience.

Like most others, I’ve too had my fair share of bad times. From family and personal losses, to witnessing good amount of criticism/ sarcasm (or maybe I was a tad bit extra sensitive) at every step of the way, I’ve gone through it all. Among all that, what hurts just a bit more is the statement like “I don’t consider you a competition”. You are forced to think and believe that you are not worthy enough and the person saying it is too good to even consider your presence. However, what you fail to understand is the fact that very same person might just simply be insecure or even jealous to acknowledge your existence.

I Accept: I am no saint but I am no liar either, so I don’t mind admitting that I do get a tad bit of sadistic pleasure when I see the person, who once didn’t consider me worthy her stature, still trying to figure out life in some corner of the developed world. Karma has its ways to make good with you and you got to enjoy the spectacle without trying to be a part of the deeds drama.

Feeling scared is easy; to not speak up is the easiest but waking up with a bunch of regrets is the toughest thing to go through. It’s when you risk everything, it’s then you stand nothing to lose and nothing can match that sans burden BLISS. After all, a homeless can only be this poor, what worse can happen to his home? What assists in having zero regrets is a promise to not treat you as ‘you’, but as a third person. To enjoy that extra freedom, you ought to be little less careful with ‘you’.

I am not suggesting to practice selflessness and I am not at all saying that it will get you a bunch of lifelong or hip friends to party with or will ease your zits or will make your daily job better; all it will do is, let you rise above the meager materialism and will get you extra serendipitous moments of happiness. You will be in a better place to admire yourself in the mirror (without obsessing about you) and amuse yourself with your antics and relish the offerings of the world and love of its people without feeling judged at every step of the way.

Being a Third Person in your own existence is ‘The Supreme Power’ that renders you fearless. I have met a very few ‘The Third Person’ powered people in my life. Did you get to practice the power yet? 

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Project I :: {On an Introspecting Trip}

They say, don’t use “I”, they ask me to get away from it. Do hell with all of you! My world does begin with an “I”.

“I” :: Possibly the simplest word with most complex usage. It’s blamed for all the evil in the world but is rarely used to evaluate self-worth.

{Rant} Have you ever noticed that some of the best or stupid or risky ideas come at 2 – 4am in the morning? Considering, of course, you spent all the time before that sitting in front of the idiot box and just staring at one channel waiting to fall asleep? It’s 3.33 am (I didn’t make that up) on 5^th Oct’13. I reached home today (mum’s place) after a light Friday at work followed by a meeting with friend. The Mother is sleeping next to me while I lay on my tummy to write this on a Microsoft Word (which I actively started using a little over 10 years back in 2003) doc named Project I. Anyhow, back to the topic:

What are we talking about “I” and why is it important? I am going to keep it very contextual, philosophical and a little personal because it’s about “I”. Wake up people! 

During today’s midnight session of day dreaming, actually night dreaming with eyes wide open, I was thinking about all that I can do with life. Just like the life of many others (in the most clichéd way of saying) my life has been a roller coaster ride. And past for me, is something that doesn’t bring much good, except some brilliant insights to be carried forward, stability in the thought process (without discounting on the capability of erratic actions and random decisions), knowledge of the many ways to potentially screw up an entire life and a word of caution to avoid these in the coming future. The most important thing past teaches is, to fall, muster up all the courage, stand  and walk, walk tall with your head held just a little higher than before, with clear sight of the ground below.

I pity those, who haven’t fallen in life, as they never got a chance to rise higher than before.

{Rant} On an unrelated note: I hate the guys with soft hands; I mean what’s up with you people; go easy on moisturizer and go back to doing some heavy duty lifting.

Guilty as charged. I love “I”; I am a self-loving, self-obsessed narcissist who despite hyper critical nature comes across as a confident lady with a hint (maybe a little more) absurd yet brilliant sense of humor. There! Narcissism spotted right there. I would also like to admit that I am guilty of not wallowing in self-pity and self-loath. 

P.S: Loving yourself doesn't discount your love for others, it just adds to it. 

Why am I, the way I am?

I am a small town girl, born in the city called Moradabad to a business family. All say I’ve got my father’s genes with tons of ambition and entrepreneurial traits. Thanks to my genes (or no thanks), I looked and dreamt different when compared with my siblings. While all my cousins had brilliant and fair complexion, I was an Ugly Duckling with a pale complexion; while their dads took them out for vacations, my dad was busy minting money; while they dreamt of inheriting export businesses or getting married into stinking rich families who would load them with diamonds, I dreamt of starting my own company; while they dreamt of bearing babies, I dreamt of going to NIFT; while they were pretty young things, I was a persistent rebel. 

I was different and I am different.

Till early 20s, I was living in a livable, yet my world, in the world where dreams still had sparks. For 22 odd years, I believed I could fly (how stupid of me?), when suddenly, on one fine day I woke up to clipped wings; wings clipped from so deep within, that the pain went numb. I could no longer fly; overnight all my dreams were stamped invalid. Like a piece of raw leather, I was ripped apart from my soul, cut, torn, beaten, dried in the sun, and then polished for the world. I was in a fancier place; I was in US, but had no one to validate my “I”.

I lost myself, I was no longer I.

I was lost for almost 3 big years, when one fine day, a mystical power reminded me of what my soul looked like, reminded me of the values I believed in and stood for. I realized that I wasn’t happy and all I did was, make good with the world, I was conforming and I was trying to be something I was not. I was chasing worthlessness of empty emotions and society values that got me no good instead they took away everything including my identity, my sense of belongingness, my hope, my passion, my family and most important, they took away my wings. You talk about the moment of self-realization?

That was my moment of self-realization, I was away from “I” for way too long and I was miserable.

And that was the moment when I got my soul back, I came back home, I came back to my people, I came back to hugs, I came back to being allowed to make mistakes, to demand, to dream, to smile and to talk without thinking twice about every single word that came out of my mouth. I was now free to try and fly again, I came back home. It was probably the toughest decision ever and I was scared to the core as I had no belief left in me. But the only thing that gave me courage was knowledge that nothing could be any worse. The worst was over.  

Where do I stand now? I am fierce now and I got nothing to lose no more. On second thoughts, I am in a happy place now, I am content with what I have, place I belong to, friends I gossip with and the guy I am in love with and with whom I hope to make tons of babies (day dreaming again). Is this is what “Zen” is? It sure does sound like it.

To me the most basic tool of survival is “I”, there is no world without “I” and there is no happiness in the world if “I” am not happy.

“I” can’t feed the world outside (bon-bon, my dog is an exception) if “I” am hungry and I can’t join in your celebrations, if “I” am miserable.

You say “I” is bad, I say, “I” is the only way to be. No matter how hard I try to make sentences without “I” it just doesn’t happen. After all, conditioning grooms you a certain way. So when all my adorable, absolutely chilled out friends say that I use “I” a lot and am self-obsessed, I agree with you completely because I am an identity, an Ugly Duckling who stood apart because of certain chances and choices in life and embraces herself for all that she has turned to become.

So yes! My world does begin with an “I” but doesn’t necessarily end at it. 

*All pictures are used for demonstration purpose only and blogger doesn't claim any right on any of the used pictures. 
©2013 Rakshita Kapoor

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