Differences

So many meanings, so many sides, yet does it matter that we're all a bit different?

People talk. I know as well as you do that at the end of the day your last impression will be the topic of discussion for everyone you may know. Now it's not like your life is that interesting but words have a funny way of making them seem so. Your actions define you up to the point of your last encounter and views change as if broken in an instant. Do people still hold onto the perception of what you were or could a few changes shift it all. Does it really matter if we seem a bit 'different'?

Change is inevitable but recognising a person for who they truly are matters the most. You could listen to every misguided view by those around you and build your choices based on their views; but wouldn't that make you a puppet to others opinions? Advice is useful but identity is something you create, not others for you.

Summers are always funny for me although I'd rather not say why. They're more of a reminder of the reason behind most of my choices. It's quite hard to be consciously aware of yourself as an individual though it is definitely something I'm grateful for. Most people don't really consider their views before claiming them as their own. Remember though, that once you create that perception it's very hard to break it from your head. You need to be able to let go once in a while, despite how difficult it may be.

I used to hold on so much to what I thought people could be. There was always this desire to see someone in the brightest of lights, envisioning them as an ideal rather than the reality that stood before me. Guess that made me a dreamer of sorts; forgive, forget and move on was a mantra at one point. Then life took over and after countless falls and nobody to pick me up, it seemed as if I was pretty much on my own in this big world of ours. So I held my ground for once and decided that this was my choice and I could change it if I wanted to.

There are people out there who are always going to see you as a tool. Someone to use? A person who won't say no? Friends till there's no worth anymore? When have you done something for someone without thought of gain? Given back more than what was worth?

So many mistakes, so many successes and yet so much doubt. We are after all human aren't we? Guess some of us are just a bit different?

When did we suddenly grow up?

Warning - Reading of this post may potentially waste away 5 minutes of your precious day filled with stuff which you planned on doing but probably will end up cancelling.

Okay so once again I've been feeling the mood to write so I thought why not tackle a little issue that I'm sure a few people have been feeling lately or least are itching to talk about. The past few weeks back home in Dubai and this last year in general has been a bit of an eye-opener for me. I got more interested in job applications than what my juniors were doing, swapped day long naps with an evenly (read 'evenly') balanced scheduled and weirdly enough stopped caring so much what some people thought of me. Arguments over stupid things seemed like an irritation that I'd rather avoid and in all honesty I got bored quite fast of what the entire world was up to. When on Earth did I ever start self-reflecting? God knows but I kinda like it. Anyway getting back to point of the ever impending change of our teenage lives.

I'm probably being a hypocrite for writing this but then, it's my blog so what are you going do? Still writing helps me think clearly so I felt it useful that I at least give this piece a shot.

So now for the few of you out there who are like me and seem to find life amidst transition what exactly are you feeling? To me growing up meant the freedom to leave the house at 1:30 in the morning, drive really fast to the beach and just sit down and stare at the ocean. Now typically you'd need a set of extraordinarily trusting parents and a car with an amazing sound system to basically blast your music into. It also meant the change of actually knowing what was right and wrong when it came to making decisions. I started trusting my instincts more and knew that the opinions I held, flawed to say the very least, were at least honest based on how I felt. Focus became an important issue and I desired to take more of life in rather than aimlessly watch the days fly by. True my daily routine got hectic, tiring and I often felt overworked, but I loved every sweat inducing moment of it.

In all honesty I wrote this post to challenge the minds of those who may be still within that cycle of leaving a part of their lives behinds and beginning a new one. What do you feel you need to give up? What exactly brought you down? Did the things you did matter so much?

So a friend of mine lately brought up this rather disturbing piece of news that I won't get into but it somehow drifted towards me turning 20 in a few months time. Now most people are genuinely terrified about entering a new era of their lives but to me it weirdly seems like a welcome change right now. Maybe it's because when I look back at the past 19 years of my life, the problems I've faced, the person I used to be and genuinely what I've become I can confidently say, at least to myself, childhood well spent.

Now if you can give me a chance to go through a bit of a memory trip, I have a little challenge for you. Take out a little piece of paper and jot down the numbers 10 - 19 on it. For each year write down one defining moment in your life be it good or bad and appreciate the fact that you're still standing after all of it. If you can do that, then trust me when I say this, it's going to be alright. For the younger ones, try and fill up till the point where you are right now and aim to fill each remaining space with a memory that actually will withstand the passage of time. For you, the greatest gift of all is what can be.

Well that's probably all I have to talk about right now. I mean it's not much but I kinda like how my thoughts seem to spell themselves out into words. It seems to make everything, a lot more human...

Till next time.

The Brilliance of Life, Understanding it... and other Shenanigans

I seem to enjoy posting at the most awkward of times it seems like. I mean practically most of you must be in hibernation mode with your nose stuffed into books as if they were providing you with life giving oxygen. Still it's been a while so I thought why not. Since the final term of university is upon us and with year one coming to a close I thought I'd look back at some of the things I've learnt and draw upon why they mattered.

For starters, I know for sure that this year I lost nearly half of my high-school friends to the unfortunate passage of time which slowly eroded any relationship that I might have had with them throughout our teenage life. It seemed saddening at first but then I realised that it was a necessary change to occur. We as individuals don't realise that sometimes we make friends to maintain the social convenience rather than actual mutual interest with each other. The so called 'gangs' we had as teenagers seems as if a thing of the past. Truth be told there was a lot of tension within those gangs and it seemed natural that after a while the ties which held us together slowly started to fade as we realised the insignificance of them. What was that irritating line in frozen ? Right 'It's funny how some distance makes everything seem small'. So with all of us so far away, the stress of trying to always fix things didn't come to me and I felt liberated by the fact that if things were meant to happen this way... then they happened for a reason. Not that I don't miss each and everyone of them though, the friends I made in highschool were a great bunch so it does sting that we've grown so far apart.

Making temporary snow cones - Like a boss

Another thing I feel I must point out is that university is a lot about balance. Honestly this lesson took way too long to learn but it felt good when I eventually did. I mean in all honesty it's all about bringing as much of your life's old routine back into your university life. Be it as simple as a game of football with your friends, or waking up early enough to actually have breakfast and lunch. Balance is an important part of our life even if we don't realise it. Bring back what was once good for you, take on those that improve you and discard those that don't. Most importantly I finally found a place where I can truly relax and feel as if I'm not simply living in a place that I'm here for temporarily but rather the potential for a permanent home. In all honesty I did rob that last line from one of my history lectures wherein the countries that the British invaded either prospered or collapsed depending on whether or not the migrants wanted to settle or simply rob the place of its resources. Funny how education comes up in the weirdest of places

Finally I felt humbled for the first time in my life to be a part of something so large and brilliant. University truly gives you the channel within which you can witness the world from a safe haven. Honestly I can come across as cocky, arrogant and even downright crude sometimes, but I'm learning to change, and one of the most important factors that caused that it is realisation that without the desire to improve, you're always going to be bested by others who do. You can sit on your laurels of the past and gloat about your glory days, but I'd much rather fall down multiple times, dust myself off and get right back up and face any challenge. Whether through life's successes, or personal development in the case of me, humility through gain and most of all a desire to keep fighting, this is a journey that I have yet to even reach the fork roads of. 

What I do believe though is that there's a lot more left to learn and I plan on cherishing every moment of it that I can. Summer is nearly here and there's a lot left to do. Till then...

Emotions - Do they matter?

Human beings are a complex species. We have no superior attributes that make us defining creatures and yet here we stand on the brink of reality pounded by reasoning behind our place here on this planet. It's strange when you think of it how we are one of the few inhabiting this place who actually feel inner pain. Emotions dominate our every step of existence and we often tend to mentally define ourselves based on how we feel. We judge, critique, and compare our perceptions of others in a way that seems crude and unworthy of our mental capabilities. Does it make sense to justify why we do what we sometimes? I wouldn't know; after all I'm only human.

These past few weeks have helped me reflect upon my past and the actions I've taken that have led me here. Having never been able to fully express myself I contained and confide my inner thoughts during earlier years, letting in only the closest of my companions. Here at university the inhibition to contain my personality didn't seem pressing enough to warrant the need for emotional control. I feel I grew a bit too careless and suffered the imminent consequences. True it did make me realise the downfall of fully expressing myself but I have learnt from my mistakes and will therefore never do so again.

Is life sometimes all but a game to me? The only reason we play it is to win at the end, so is the journey really that important? I sometimes think of the way I react as a game of snakes and ladders. A bad decision puts you one step down from your goal of happiness where as a good one brings you one step closer. True there are only so many bad decisions we can make before finally learning from our mistakes and moving on. In a way we evolve to reflect on our past choices as reminders of where we went wrong and how we've changed to resolve it.

I feel the more I write about it this, the more difficult it gets to express myself so this is where I decide that any more focus will only deviate this topic into disjointed thoughts. True people are given many chances to prove themselves time and again, but there will be a point sometime in the future where you'll simply give up and choose to live life outside the lines; some might say you're an observer.

Pushing the Boundaries

Okay so two thoughts. This post could be immensely insightful and talk about how people need to challenge themselves beyond the necessary and strive for success. Yet that topic is rather overplayed and something I find completely pointless to talk about, seeing as everyone wants the best for themselves. So today I felt that I'd talk about something I feel rather strongly about and what most people go through themselves when they simply... push the boundaries of friendship.

God that sentence was so overplayed it's not even funny. Still now that I've brought it up, you might as well sit down and listen.

They say the human mouth is incapable of staying shut for long periods of time (I should know) and when we speak without realising, it often doesn't bode well for us. Thousands of relationship have been ruined by a simple 'slip of the tongue', more so in today's day than ever. People all around are listening to what you say and therefore your every view, every word, every opinion comes under constant scrutinising by those you interact with. They dispel your originality, dampen your creativity and block you ingenuity. They are the barriers that hold you back.  

So now how does this all make sense with the what I mentioned in that cheesy first paragraph? Well more often than not it's your friends who builds those barriers. Shooting down your weird but often creative ideas are a given task set by all of those around you. Now while I'm sure that more often than not they mean no legitimate harm and are simply looking out for you. Still if that were always the case then I wouldn't be writing this article now would I?

There are moments, rare moments when you need to give yourself the final decision. Stick to your values for once and don't be swayed by what others think. Having friends is good, but having control of your own life is even better. You need to be able to instil that desire to accept the views of others but remain firm against your own. Simply changing yourself to suit those around you simply delays the chance to express yourself freely. As a person you're both the greatest opponent and greatest support to yourself. When you take to heart what others feel you become your own downfall. It's a bit like defeating yourself before the battle has even begun. I'm liking the expression 'motivational suicide'.

A few weeks ago I realised that despite coming this far in life I still have a lot to learn. I need to stand up for myself once in a while or I'm simply giving in to the idealisms of others. Life is unique to each individual and we should never compromise on our individuality or we risk losing the identity that we perceive of ourselves. There will be times when those close to you will break you down to the the bare foundation that you hold as your own; do not be set back. Get up and rebuild.

The time will come when the joys of life exist in a place that you feel at one with. When you look back and see how much you've grown and realise that you're happy.

The beginning of a new journey

Kinda weird isn't it?

I've been at university for nearly two months now and I'm finally getting down towards writing this post. Guess I just felt the time was right. So for now, forgive me for the sudden absence and perhaps read what I've got to say about my new life.

Nothing, repeat nothing prepares you for what life at university really is. Be it staying up till 4 am talking about god knows what or living on a diet of chocolate, I've seen both the best and worst of living an individual life here at Warwick. Let me tell you one thing though, you will never regret a single moment of it, that much I promise you. 

University is where you find yourself, honestly speaking. High school is your final test of strength, the desire to succeed pushes you forward and then suddenly you've found yourself amongst the most amazing people you'd ever imagine meeting. I thought I'd miss my family back home at dubai, my best-friend/brother and of course my amazing sister, little did I think that I'd be getting a new one here. 

My family here at Warwick is a lot like me, guess that's the benefit of college, you find your place with people just like you. There's Harsh, who despite all the rather disturbing jokes about 'fiery penetration' is one of the nicest people I've ever met. By nice I mean he's insane like me, and that is a quality I really value. I've got my clean-freak/ workaholic buddy Aashna who for the love of god needs to stop complaining about every restaurant she eats in. I guarantee you that wherever she goes, she always finds something wrong. Perfectionist complextion maybe! Still, she's part of the puzzle, and without her we're really incomplete. Finally there's  Lasya, my former roomie ( FYI her room looked like a South Indian bomb exploded right in the centre ) and drama companion. Lasya is really, really, really weird, and I mean that in the best way possible. She hates chocolate, so officially she can be listed as psychotic. She also loves to eat stuff then whine about it. I mean maybe it's a girl thing, cause my sister does that as well, but god people food is food. I would like to point out though that I kinda need Lasya to make sure that I don't go mentally insane over here, she's sorta my stress reliver. 

Yeah I suck at explaining, but that's my family in general, cousins and all will come later but for now we're the fail four taking on the perils of UNi together.

... And honestly I wouldn't have it any other way