Momentum

Sometimes you have to take advantage of momentum and get more done when things are all falling in the right place. That would mean taking lesser breaks and focusing. Sometimes you have to listen to your body and take longer rests but keep going one baby step forward. I have realised that you can’t make too many hard rules in life. You have to be aware of what works in the moment.

But when you are feeling at your best, when your physical and mental health are in place – that’s when you should keep going without stopping. The momentum could take you to places you had never imagined was possible to reach in this lifetime.

The Perils of “Taking”

I learnt a lesson through this heartbreak. I learnt that people don’t get into your lives by sharing your bed or by sharing troubles. Sometimes they get into your heart by lending a helping hand or by making you smile or by offering you a moment of being pampered even when you did not ask for it. I understand now why my mother did not like unnecessarily taking help from people. Someone offers you something they cooked. It seems harmless to eat it. But no, if they do it too often they will also have the power of withdrawing it and making you feel unloved.

I let this man drop me home on his bike, take me out for a walk or accompany me to the supermarket even when I was perfectly capable of doing these things on my own. These seemingly harmless little gestures hurt me the most when he chose to arbitrarily withdraw them completely after he found his new muse.

I think it is ok to accept gifts but if someone is making you used to gifts, then even the smallest of gestures will make you a captive of their whims. You may think you have no feelings for them but if they are making you smile, they also hold the power to make you cry.

If I sound cynical, I am cynical.

But I am taking a lesson from this. I could get used to gifts from myself. No one can take that away from me. May be not forever. But atleast for the next few months I want to get used to saying no to gestures from others. To rely solely on myself to find a reason to smile. So that when I let love in, it would be a gesture from me, not a risk I take to find affection or acceptance.

Purpose

There are people who are successful and really know what they are talking about. And there are people who are really good at analysing and making accurate theories. And then there is me. I draw conclusions from my experiences and write about what I learnt like it is THE truth. But honestly, what do I know? It is possible to draw a wrong conclusion. And it is possible that there are better solutions out there. So when you read what I write, read it with a pinch of salt because lately I have been changing a lot of my own beliefs and at times undoing the change and going back to my oldest belief systems (like the things I believed in, as a child).

Makes me wonder, what this journey is all about. I used to think we learn and grow with time but at times I might have regressed due to my experiences. Perhaps children know best because their minds are not yet corrupted and confused by the world. They are more in touch with their inner voice and we shut that voice as the child grows up.

So may be the solution is just to be more like a child. And speak to wiser people. I don’t really have the answer and I have been googling quizzes to understand my purpose. I know it won’t have any answer but i still do it because i am desperately seeking answers. I am trying to understand if there is any future to my life and if my life has any purpose at all. If there is any meaning to everything I have been through. Because some time when I was young, I would think I am going through all this because in the end it will all be worth it. I always imagined a prosperous future where everyone would say how proud they are of me. How I was so brave and persistent. And how they are inspired by where I have reached today. But in reality, where I am today is at the bottom of a new career after having escaped the controlled life I had with my narcissistic parents. I am making my way up in society and in a career that I always wanted to pursue as a child. But there are no extra points for life struggles. When a caged bird is left to fly freely in the wild, it doesn’t get sympathy, it gets attacked for being naive and devoid of experience. If it has to survive it has to start learning skills that a baby bird would have instinctively known. And so I am today competing with young people and children in the field of music (and mostly losing). And there is no other way really, I must be patient. I must lose several times and I may never win the race.

This path is comparatively better. It is a huge improvement over my life before. Infact it makes me happy when i don’t look at myself from the eyes of the society. But it is not inspiring. Parents don’t want their kids to be like me. In fact I actually had few parents tell me that they didn’t want kids to pursue their passion and turn out like me.

So yeah, no higher purpose here. I am just doing what makes me happy. Living my own selfish little happy life.

Validation

Life is a celebration of freedom if you are able to see it that way. I mean I want to say this. But what’s really on my mind is this. Life is a struggle, it’s a pain. On most days. On many days. On some days. This is that struggle between the part of me that wants to be positive and the part of me that wants to express. Both are important. I think expressing is important because it’s important to know what’s really on our mind.

But yes I want to be free and it’s possible. When we get rid of any fear we feel liberated and then we realise that anything is possible. Anything can be done. But in the course of living life in this society that fear tends to creep back in. And so it becomes necessary to be in touch with ourselves once in a while. Take a break from humanity, lock yourself up in your room, go to a village, mountains, whatever it takes. It seems like a dramatic step of escapism. Yet I feel, it’s not dramatic or extreme at all. It is actually rejuvenating and should be treated as a necessary periodic ritual and nothing more.

I say this, because today I feel the need for this. I yearn for human company to validate me, to make me feel wanted and needed and appreciated. I think this is an indicator of the fact that I have lost touch with myself.

Learning to not care

Should we write or perform for likes and praises? I have been guilty of it. Every writer or singer or dancer or actor must be. But what works in the short term, doesn’t always work for the greater cause of creativity or skill development. Many actors / writers have been known to wish that they were not famous, so they could be free to experiment. And writers often take the cover of anonymity and pseudonyms perhaps for the same reason.

Yet today it is easy to be famous. If not on national TV, we can be famous in our own social groups, schools, offices, friend circles, etc. While praises and likes from our friends (turned into fans) is a great motivator to keep churning out content, it makes us want to stick to what works. We may become skilled at being liked, not so much at the art itself.

I believe that the habit of producing content regularly itself is not so bad. It keeps us on our toes. We keep learning and improving. It stops us from becoming complacent. But to do so one must first learn to cut out the flow of both positive and negative comments. CEO of VaynerMedia, Gary Vee who has a following of 8M on Instagram, and has become a source of motivation for many entrepreneurs and artists, often talks about not caring about the opinions of other people. In fact he even believed that Instagram should take off the likes button.

It would make a lot of sense then to have a time for posting content and a different time for logging in again and going through notifications for that post. Just so that we can remember that we were not performing or writing for the sake of likes.

How to get what you want.

Instead of running behind something you want, try and make the best of what’s there in your present. May be you badly want Job B, but first do Job A really well. There is no way to Job B through escaping Job A. First be the best at wherever you are. And do whatever little you get of Job B like it’s gold. This is something I have been working on lately. To do whatever’s on my plate with utmost dedication. It’s not easy to do this. But prayer helps. Gives me the emotional strength to put this into practice.

I must sound crazy for putting “how to get what you want” in the title like I am some life guru. But I believe this is the secret to getting what we want from life. We chase some esoteric or complicated solutions. In the process, we sometimes forget the present and I believe the universe knows what we want and builds the way to it, if only we focus on giving our best to the present moment.

Space

Okay so I am writing this post in the capacity of a singer. But I think it applies to any one doing anything creative.

Honestly I couldn’t understand the importance of deep focus. I used to do all my vocal practices, scales, breathing exercises but with a lot of distractions. Would take breaks every five minutes to check my phone or watch some TV show. And I had convinced myself that as long as I am doing the required practices, it didn’t matter what I did in between to keep myself going.

But my attempt today to shut off all distractions and only focus on my vocal practices made me realise how important it is for the creative process. Not to mention, the time I save and the number of things I could do today despite the brief period of depression in which I kind of lost control and switched on my phone. I think being forced to confront your feelings of boredom or fear or past issues can have that effect. But it also made me come out of my default automated settings.

I started thinking about what I was singing and what practice I was doing. I thought about how I could do these things in a better way. I spent time listening to music and observing how each emotion is represented in the language of music by different artists. My mind had the space to think about all these things instead of being focused on mindless entertainment fed from TV shows or mobile applications.

And getting the space to ponder over things and being able to confront emotions and channel them into creation is so important for the creative process.

Look at my blog too. I wrote three posts in one day. Because I have been thinking about things, I have been struggling with emotions and I have been thinking of solutions at the back of my mind. And some of it found it’s way into my writing.

Basically deep focus gives space for us to be human. The difference between human beings and any other animal is the thought and effort human beings put into everything they do. That is what I was able to do with my music, thanks to the space I gave my brain for thinking without distractions.

I think I have made my point now. Hope it helps some people. Have a good day 🙂

Instant Gratification

The rush of dopamine is what many of us live for. I’ll admit, it happens to me, when I post something on social media. I wait to hear what people think of it. But if I am able to surpass the urge. Look beyond instant gratification and keep working. A bigger gratification would come. My way. I know that. That is why it is so important to overcome the temptation.

Saying NO

We have to say no. Have to say no several times. To parties, to people that only waste your time, to “opportunities” that’ll only keep you stuck doing things you don’t enjoy. And it seems as if you are missing out on something great because who would possibly say no right? But it’s almost as if the universe tempts you to fail. The moment you get resolved to do something it’ll present you with temptations. But if your resolve is strong you will say no. Otherwise you are fickle. And the fickle minded keep bouncing around reacting to people around them and blaming circumstances.