About 2016

Some say 2016 was such a difficult year.
Now that it's almost over, we can finally relax and as usual get excited about the new year. Make resolutions based on our failures and expectations, only to disappoint ourselves all over again. 

So I decided to rather contemplate on the soon to be past year 2016. 

How was it for me? 

What did I learn from all those experiences and 

Why am I writing about it? 

Well, one thing that i can't get out of my head is  ....

Life is not happening to me, it's happening for me! 

This year was no exception for sure. Everything that was happening for me gave me a sense of direction because I was truly lost in a kind of fulfilment.Satisfaction kind of makes you lazy. I had no intention of going somewhere yet I was happy doing my German integration course which I had started in end of 2015 and to my satisfaction I successfully completed it in my first attempt. I was so happy to know that I was getting back half of the fees I paid for this course plus I could actually speak, read and understand basic German language. It also make me feel less guilty for spending so much on travel this year. 

We travelled to Drachenberg, Strasbourg, Barcelona, Valencia, Girona, Bordeaux and India. 

How can I complain about the year which helped me travel so much and meet so many people I love :) 

Friends, Family, old and new acquaintances, it was all so perfect! It's almost surreal that we lived our dream in a way. 

Dream to travel with our best friends in Spain. 

Visit the great architects like, Antoni Gaudi, Santiago Calatrava's work and more than anything else, experience the crazy Salvador Dali in his museum. It was quite surreal ! 
Like a dream...

Until I could not open my eyes. The brightness was so painful for my eyes, it gave me a headache. It reminded me of migraine which is gone forever now and so is my Sciatica. But it was something else. My eye was red and it went worse from bad. After spending one week on medication and another in a Hospital, I was diagnosed to have inherited some eye disease called Glaucoma. It was all too sudden and shocking for me to digest, yet some magical source of energy was feeding me with utmost positivity and in fact gifted me a more evolved perspective to look at things. I could not be more thankful for this. 

One of the gifts that my Sciatica left for me in it's last days were my lost passion for drawing. It was almost therapeutic. This Glaucoma episode too brought out the storyteller in me. 

In fact I wrote a lot this year. Did a professional internship as a content writer and learnt a lot about the technique. I love how can control my passion by my spiritual awareness and channelise those emotions in a constructive way. I am so grateful for this.

Another thing I am grateful for is my Indian origins. I was so looking forward to go back to home this time. I was so eager to meet everybody back there. Although we received the news of my Grandmother's and my husband's Uncle's death, I was calm. It was destined anyway.. I was glad that they didn't have to suffer while their last moments and lived a long life to look up too. They lived a life of discipline and That's one thing I want to learn from them. I have already made a lot of lifestyle changes since a year now and after visiting India again I realised that it was all possible since we live in Germany now. No matter how much I love India, I did get enough of it this time. Also because  I stayed a bit longer this time. It made me face the harsh truth. Something that even I am uncomfortable to accept myself. That I missed my home in Siegen. It was not just my husband who was away from me for a month but that whole atmosphere where I have the luxury to be with myself. Follow a routine and also be myself. It's hard to explain that I actually feel like a rich person in a way who has many homes. Instead of owning one since I consider myself as a nomad who refuse to settle down. 

I have reservations about buying property and I avoid talking about it because I hate to argue with those who think otherwise. I am ok with people having their own opinions. Everyone should have one. But I am truly surprised at how much people become defencive and offensive by just some philosophical ideas. It bothers me a lot that I have to struggle hard to be neutral and positive among people I call mine. And I have concluded that behind their encroaching behaviour and obliging attitude, is their love for us. Yet it is indigestible at times. By them, I mean me. A part of me is like that. Refusing to settle down of satisfaction and aspiring for something or the other all the time. Not to cherish the process or goal but to run hysterically behind the ideas of success. 

I think this is the worst part of 2016 so far. It's not the experiences but the realisation that it brought forth. A revelation that  I am one of those but now committed to be otherwise. I am changing as a constitution of values and priorities. It is alienating me from rest of me and hence the pain. Pain of immature feeling of abandonment and at the same time a mature understanding of growing out of the limitations. It will carry on for sometime now,  I know. I will move away from the world that I call mine only to come closer to my true self that lies forever a mystery to be discovered.

I am sure that 2017 will bring such opportunities for me to unveil those hidden secrets within me and life.

Till then, the journey continues....     

  

Rebuilding Belief Systems

This Guru Purnima coincided with Ganesh Chaturthi in the background of recently occurred solar eclipse, lunar eclipse and the ongoing Mercury retrograde. 

    I might sound like an astrologer but believe me, I am not. I know very little about this stuff. All I know is that somehow it really affects our lives on so many levels that you sometimes wish you had a clue of what’s going on. If you don't, then just look back at your life since may be August end and first week of September. At least for me, it felt like 'Life is taking its job as a teacher too seriously and hence I asked Vighna Harta Ganapati Bappa (Vanquisher of obstacles) to treat me with some Modak (Sweets)' you all read that post on Facebook and liked it. So I thought I might as well share the whole story with you guys to make you all feel that you are not alone in this one. After all it feels so good to have people validating us and our experiences all the time. Yet it hardly helps us come out of it. In fact we start feeling like a victim after a while and that's not at all helpful in any way. Because by doing that we give away our power and are left on mercy.

    But my Guru's teachings come handy at such times reminding me that:

Your life is your Karma!

Only we are responsible for whatever is happening in our lives and hence we have the power to change it. Transform it into what we want.

Easy said than done! Right? But if we just try to take matters in our hands, the feeling of empowerment will wash away all that sadness and give us a new confidence to face life with high spirits.

    Talking about high spirits, we were travelling to Bordeaux last weekend and my confidence was tested once again. We boarded our flight from Dusseldorf and had to catch a connecting flight at Amsterdam airport. But then our flight got delayed by more than half an hour leaving very little margin for us to catch the connecting one. To top it all, I lost my husband in Amsterdam! ;)

Well, almost :) We got separate seats since we booked separate tickets while he was on a business trip and I was not. Such simple thing resulted in him getting off the plane before me and leaving towards the airport in a different bus. The bus I was in reached airport so late that he had already left for the terminal thinking that would be the last meeting point we can't miss. I thought the same when I could not see him anywhere walking past the entrance and one gate after another. I felt this small victory the moment I felt a sense of trust and faith filling my heart while I was talking those steps towards Terminal in utmost calm and composure. Believe me, this was not me a few years before. Those who have panic attacks will know exactly what I am taking about and I am not on any anti-depressants either. This is indeed a dream of a person who goes through such phases day in and day out. Such is the blessing of having a spiritual guidance in life. 

     When I reached at the terminal, I saw my husband arguing with the staff to wait for me. They were adamant and didn't want to wait for me and were suggesting him to book another flight or leave without me. Thank God I reach in time and we boarded that flight at last. A sigh of relief in such moments can hardly be articulated in words. But then that too was short lived as we found out upon arrival at Bordeaux that unlike us our baggage did not manage to catch the pace :)

Absolutely understandable! 

      What next? We were just discussing about it and to our pleasant surprise, there were other co passengers who approached us and guided us to file a complaint since they were also in the same situation.

This I call 'GRACE'! 

       We learnt a lot about filing a complaint for lost luggage manually and digitally. After that class we headed towards our accommodation. It already felt like a long exhausting day but we still had to buy stuff for tomorrow since all our essentials were in the lost baggage. While hunting for a general store in the central Bordeaux, a sense of calm filled me as I breathed in cool summer air walking past the beautiful old monuments and plazas. The sights of beautiful heritage architecture housing restaurants, shops and corporate buildings soothed my senses silently. I always fancied such neat, clean, quite crowded public places which reflects the quality of life that we deserve to life as a modern and developed society. It was then when I remembered yet another teaching from my Guru:

The external reality is a mere reflection of internal one. 

Indeed! This was was my internal reality as well and I love being this way now. In fact there is a reason why I am here in Bordeaux at this time. It's showing me something I needed to see. Apart from being world's major wine Industry capital, Bordeaux is a renovated city where nearly 5,000 buildings from the 18th Century's Golden Age are renovated and restored. Making it so beautiful that Victor Hugo once said, 'Take Versailles and Antwerp, and you have Bordeaux'. After Paris, it has the highest number of preserved historical buildings in France. The historical part of the city is listed as 'An outstanding Urban and Architectural ensemble' of the 18th century by UNESCO World Heritage list. 

    I am here at this time to do the same with myself. In fact it's already happening as if on an 'auto' mode and I am just an onlooker watching it happening inside of me. The old center of this city which once had black walls due to pollution was referred to as 'La Bell Endormie' (Sleeping Beauty) is now completely renovated and stands up to the reputation in French 'La perle d`Aquitaine' (The pearl of Aquitaine) It's time for me too to come out of my slumber and redefine, revive all that old past which is not that bad after all. It just needs some attention, care and presence of my own self. And once I am done mending them, they are going to look just as magnificent as these places around me. 

       Opening up to international crowd with it's long stretched river side recreational public places, where on one hand there is this majestic Garonne River and on the other hand these heritage buildings from 18th century. Bordeaux is such a mix of old and new, local and international, past and future yet living it's moments in now. I see such healthy, happy people skating, running, jogging, chit chatting here and there. Somewhere someone is playing music and filling the already beautiful vistas with beautiful notes. 

How I love Europe! and their culture of living life wholeheartedly.  

I am proud of my ancient Indian culture too but honestly today it has polluted to such a degree that we want to sometimes disown it. But that's not a very healthy way to be. I am now owning all that pollution inside me and cleaning it with love and care only to integrate my today's modern lifestyle so that I can co-exist with my own ironies and contradictions. I give up the idea of belonging to ether or and embrace the oneness instead. 

In that oneness I feel home. 

Even if it's temporary, this place, now, is me! 

In French "Seule la Fleur de Lys règne sur la lune, les vagues, le château et le lion"

Bordeaux: A new city which rules over the Moon, the waves, the Castle and the lion.

I feel arrived!

A Movement of Power

If there was one thing I could ask for and only one, I would ask for 

The Power of Love

For, I have experienced a very small particle of that we call Love.

Not from some person or animal or anything else but from the creation itself.

I have experienced the sweetness of being who we are.

By accepting others as well, I have experienced the stillness in the movement

I have identified the actor who puts on the masks and forgets himself

I have cried in ignorance and laughed in remembrance

At everything that hurts and haunts, I have had once

More drama, more stories and more surprises

I want to love forever 

Not this memory of forgetfulness but the remembrance of it

I want what I have already. A movement from to me

Powered by love. 

Insignificant, Invisible and Integrated!

I remember how few cities made me feel insignificant, giving rise to an ambition.

An ambition to conquer the b­­arrier of discrimination

The Buildings, roads, vehicles and the ever changing hoardings of Glamour,

Made sure that I nurture the greed of gulping it all

Not sure if anyone has ever digested it though

But taking more on the plate just validates the potential

It shows off when we’re in fact turned off

But never pays back

The Insignificance!

 I feel invisible in a place like this, soothing the hurt with a serene peace

Peace; which was almost the destination until I reached here

The nature, silence, consistency and simplicity are too overwhelming in itself

So satisfying, it just opens the doors of that we call inside

Not so beautiful though it still feels home in an authentic way

Calling further in the dark, it is the ultimate adventure you’ll ever face

And it becomes fun as you light every lamp on your way

Leading you to the unknown self

The Invisible!

I want to experience the integration, with everything and everyone

Oneness; that binds us in this separate world

The form, space, time and order; dividing ourselves further

Now is the time to sum it all, solve a puzzle we all have got

For we have seen it enough on this side

And the other waits for us inside. As we call it

A calling from both sides, like a falling back on ourselves

Or uniting all in oneness, eternity

The Integration!

Art on street

hehehehe.. I was looking forward to make this post for a long time now. Finally I do have some images to prove my point. So here we go. It's very simple. Let's start with the definition again.

A distribution board (also known as panelboard or breaker panel) is a component of an electricity supply system which divides an electrical power feed into subsidiary circuits, while providing a protective fuse or circuit breaker for each circuit in a common enclosure.

Coming from India I have a defination of the same thing something like this..

That's a bit of exaggeration though ;) But you get my point. 

And here are some of the Distribution boards found in Siegen. Yes. Those painted boxes you see along the neatly paved and sweeped footpaths are in fact Distribution Boards. Welcome to the developed world! 

 You got my point? I knew you would. There many more out there which I've missed to click due to laziness and forgetfulness. I should carry my  camera often to capture these things. Anyway, I'll add on to this list list soon. 

Journey of life

In this journey we settle down

for the idea of eternity

betting the now

for the future probability

Why we burn down

In the fit of jealousy

Why we turn cold

priding our philosophy

Why we hide hurt

Punishing ourselves mercilessly

Why we make our stories

Dismissing others conveniently

Why we love to hate

Humiliating love with morality

Why do we glamorise

Suffering Voluntarily

In this journey of life

What is our itinerary?

New Day

New is just a feeling. A feeling convincing enough to draw a line between what we believe has ended and what we imagine will start from here onward.

Now that I am done defining 'NEW' to myself, I would love to share how I attracted my inspiration for this new year to meet the targets I believe will be fulfilling ;)

This Granny! Oma as they call in Deutschland.

How innovative and creative this person who made it must be. I love how they even made that window on that steep rooftop accessible. I am sure the purpose might be 'being able to clean the window pane from outside'. After all they are Germans! and if you can zoom enough, you can appreciate the balcony which appears like a semi open workshop or a studio. With all kinds of artistic things hung here and there, it offers a cozy bench with some soft furnishings. And that copper chimney! How cute is that?

That tiny table on which rests this interesting stand holding all those empty glasses together. A perfect call for a great party. May be it was. After all it was 31st eve.

At least we had a great delight in catching this glimpse from Castle Park Siegen Upper Castle

You can see the whole Siegen city from here.

and Pay a little to zoom in the view.

That and much more inspired me to start my new year in a new way. Hope you too find inspiration all around you in abundance. As there is abundance everywhere and just a message to remind you what I remind myself,

YOU CREATE YOUR OWN REALITY WITH YOUR OWN THOUGHTS!