It has been a minute since I really sat down and wrote, and who knows if this would even see its completion. But I just felt like penning down some of the many things, or maybe all of it if I can recall them, that had happened since I got laid off from my job last year in March 2023. I will be going in chronological sequence in order to better job my memory and also have a better retrospective view of things.

apr ‘23

I was still processing the fact that I was unemployed. It felt unreal that I had been let go from my job. Everyone was asking me to take my time and also to start applying for jobs again. So I tried to start applying for jobs, but after about 1-2 weeks of applications, it felt pointless. I had no motivation to get back to a job, and more importantly I wasn’t even sure if this was the industry or role that I wanted to be working in. So I did what any normal person would do: booked flights to the US for an entire month. I did get some extra cash from the severance payouts so might as well make use of it to heal my trauma with travel.

may ‘23

I had somewhat come to terms with my reality, although I wasn’t really sure what is the next plan. I had started dating S during this time, although things were new they got pretty intense pretty fast, mainly from her side. I wasn’t really certain about this, although I did quite enjoy my time talking to her. At the moment I was just looking forward to my US trip. I was going to meet my childhood friend who was doing his master’s in New York, and spending time with him is always something I enjoy.

jun ‘23

Finally it was time for the US trip. I had one of the most amazing times travelling across multiple cities, meeting up and spending time with friends and family, spending lots of time with myself and reflecting on many things on my mind, having multiple “aha” moments, and overall just restoring the positive vibes back in my life. This trip was both therapeutic and enriching in a way that made me grow slightly as a person. It was also during this trip that I made the decision that I would take a one year sabbatical from work, and spend the time working on personal projects and things that meant something to me. As I was still single (unmarried and unattached), living with my parents without any major financial responsibilities, I felt that there could not have been a better time for me to take a break from work. And in hindsight this was one of the best decisions that I had made.

jul ‘23

The return back to home after a month in the US was a little jarring, but I was still riding the highs from the trip and having a good time. Reality soon started hitting me, as I wanted to make the most out of this sabbatical. However, I had no idea what I was gonna work on. I didn’t particularly have any idea or project that I was passionate about. One day, I decided to do some digital spring cleaning, and was clearing up some files and folders on my laptop, when I found a project that I had started on couple of years back during the infamous COVID lockdown. Something told me that this was the right project to be working on during my sabbatical and I decided to start fleshing out the idea as soon as possible. I had never really built something complex all the way till production, at least not a personal project. And this particular one seemed like a perfect 6 month project to work on. I was stoked.

aug ‘23

I ended things with S as it was not really going anywhere and I felt that she was not really ready for anything long term at that time. I also wanted to focus my energy on the projects that I wanted to work on. It was exhilarating, getting back into web development. I had not really touched it for years, as most of my work had transitioned to data engineering, so there was a lot of relearning to be done. It also felt exciting to work on something that I was personally passionate about: carnatic music. As someone growing up in Singapore to non-musically inclined parents, I struggled a lot to grasp and learn carnatic music in my youth as well as adulthood. But understanding it from a theoretical perspective allowed me to really drill deeper into the foundation and try to create an app or a tool that could help other carnatic music enthusiasts. I also tried to put out more music on my music page this month, having been inactive on that for a while. I clearly have a consistency problem.

sep ‘23

Another one of my good friends had decided to make the move to the US. It felt sudden but he told me it was temporary so I felt a little reassured that he was not going to be gone for long (spoiler: it was not temporary). Many of my friends had left Singapore, and it had become increasingly lonelier, having fewer and fewer people to hang out with. Not being the most sociable person, I’m really not good at making new friends either. But for now, focus is back on my app development, we can worry about friends later. At the end of the month, a bunch of friends flew out to Ho Chi Min to celebrate the bachelor party for two of my friends and it was one of the most epic trips with the boys. I really miss boys trips, the vibes are so different when their partners are also with them.

oct ‘23

This was a much more focussed month, I spent most of my time working on the app, as I was going to be travelling a fair bit in the coming months. I had also signed up to be a part-time coding instructor and was having training sessions for two weeks. One of the highlights though was attending the Yuvan concert in Singapore. It was my first tamil concert ever, and probably the first and only concert that I had attended that year. Being in such a crowd amidst such energy was truly exhilarating, and I really enjoyed myself with all the throwback songs that hit that tamil childhood core.

nov ‘23

I started teaching in end of October, and was taking daily classes almost every week till the end of the month. It was both energising and tiring, getting back into teaching. I had never really dealt with such a large class size in the past and that was most definitely challenging for me. But it was also fun to be back in the classroom and imparting some knowledge to the future generation. If there was one takeaway, it was that I could never become a full time teacher. I do not possess the energy levels nor the patience for that. At the end of the month, I flew to India to attend a good friend’s wedding. It was an unforgettable forgettable time with friends. Weddings are always special, although I’m not sure I would want something like that for mine.

dec ‘23

You might be thinking, why didn’t I mention anything about my birthday on November. That’s because I signed myself up for a week long yoga retreat, as a means of detox from all the partying during the wedding week. This week long retreat was not only for yoga, but also with daily ayurvedic treatments, healthy satvic food as well as lessons on yogic philosophy and spirituality. Being an introvert, this was really one of the best ways in which I could have spent my birthday week and I am thankful that I had the opportunity to do that during my sabbatical.

After the retreat I headed down to Bangalore to spend some time with some cousins there, and went back to Chennai to spend time with my grandparents and attend some carnatic concerts for the annual margazhi season. I also did something unconventional and volunteered at one of the event venues, getting the chance to meet some renowned carnatic musicians up close and personal, and also meeting some really wonderful souls whom were all equally interested in Carnatic music. I was not actively pushing my app idea at the point, but I was bouncing around the idea and having conversations with people to try and find a potential business partner in Chennai that I could work on it with.

At the end of the month, I headed up to Pune to meet up with my cousins for the new years. All of them are married and I was the 9th wheel there. Although I did feel like a bit of an outsider (these cousins speaking primarily in Hindi), it was nice to spend time and party with my cousins for the new years and reconnect with family that I had grown quite distant from due to the literal distance.

jan ‘24

On new years I returned back to Chennai, back to my grandparents’. I had never previously spent this much time with my grandparents in all these years. I had always been the “foreigner grandchild” who had been taken care of. But this time it was quite different. I had spent enough days with them to know the kind of life that they led, and honestly it was not a very nice picture. My grandfather’s health and mental health had deteriorated significantly in the last couple of years, and the burden of taking care of him entirely fell on my grandmother. But she was aging as well, and noone was there to take care of her. All her children were either overseas (my mum included), or just emotionally distant, which is even worse. Understanding their pains was truly eye opening for me, in ways I could not have realised or understood if I was just “visiting”, and I am glad that I had the time and mental space to share some of their pain and maybe alleviate it in some small ways.

While in Chennai I was also trying to work on some music. Had reached out to some producers and managed to connect with a couple. At this point I was still uncertain about my career or future, still being on my year long sabbatical. But that year was gonnna come to an end soon, and it was about time to start looking into potential options and ventures I could go into. Ultimately, whatever the decision, it had to make sense financially. Otherwise I was better off staying unemployed.

Since I had another month in India, I decided to plan a short trip around Tamilnadu to explore the ancient temples in these cities. I had never really been a temple person and never showed much interest in temples or religion for a large part of my life. But something told me I might not get such an opportunity again, so I decided to make the most out of my trip. To my surprise, my dad said that he wanted to join me and booked tickets to India to join me on my backpacker trip around Tamilnadu. Travelling with dad was another core memory, along with all the beautiful temples and places that we saw together. Maybe I will write another post exclusively on these two weeks and the many historically significant temples that we visited.

feb ‘24

I returned back to Chennai in time for another one of my good friend’s wedding. In this case however, I was the only friend from our friend group to be attending the wedding as all of the others could not make it. Nevertheless, I had an amazing time getting to know some of his friends from the US and really just enjoying all of the wedding festivities over the week. I wrapped up my India trip shortly after and returned back to Singapore towards the end of Feb, just in time to celebrate my other grandmother’s 86th birthday. Reality has set in again.

mar ‘24

Things were going pretty alright, and out of the sudden my grandma got hospitalised for her asthma problems. In the past she has had many asthma attacks, triggered by weather and various other factors, and most of these hospital visits had been pretty short lived. She would generally feel better in a couple days and be discharged in less than a week. However this time, after a week of hospitalisation, her condition started worsening and the doctors found that she had contracted dengue. Dengue fever, although something serious, had never seemed to be something life threatening to me in the past. However it was then that I found out that dengue in elderly, especially for someone like my grandma who was above 80, can be very VERY life threatening. So when her condition started getting worse, and she became weaker and less conscious by the day, all of us started to worry. It seemed like her time had come, and doctors were already informing us about the resuscitation plans.

Having been still unemployed at the time, I became the default caregiver in my family, spending entire days in the hospital sitting by her bedside and praying for her recovery. I was not willing to give up on her that soon, and I wanted to do every possible thing we could to make sure she has a healthy recovery. Dengue did not make sense, this could not be the way she goes. The entire month was extremely difficult on my family, seeing my grandma go from being perfectly healthy and independent, to being unable to even eat on her own or talk anything sensible. She became very weak and frail, and her mind had also taken a toll, unable to really remember things.

apr ‘24

Grandma was still hospitalised, but the worse was seemingly over, as she had miraculously survived dengue in a way that even the doctors found shocking. All of her vitals and blood indicators seemed to show that her condition was only getting worse, but her strong will and determination, and maybe some of our prayers and time spent with her put together had led her to beating dengue. However, that entire ordeal had taken a massive toll on her body and psyche and she had to spend another month in the recovery ward, learning to walk and eat and do things to regain some of her independence.

Many of my days were still spent in the hospital, and it had taken a bit of a toll on my personal mental health as well. There were days when there would sudden scares, her blood pressure might suddenly drop or her heart rate would start fluctuating, she would get a random fever again. Her body was still recovering and she was very prone to illnesses. Living everyday thinking that could be the last, while seeing other patients in beds beside her either in worsening conditions or actually passing on is a morbid environment. I only wished for her to return back home.

may ‘24

After the entire two month ordeal, I needed a mental health break, and planned a solo trip to Bangkok. I had never really seen Bangkok before, and tickets were cheap at that time so I decided to just get the tickets and figure out the plan later. It turned out to be one of the best decisions I had made, as the trip was everything that I had needed at that point in life. It was the first trip where I had absolutely no itinerary, and yet I managed to explore BKK in ways that noone else normally would. I know what you must be thinking, a single guy on a solo trip in Bangkok 😏 That is probably what everyone in my family and friends thought as well.

But to contrary my main takeaway from this trip was newfound love for Thai culture and Buddhism. Bangkok felt familiar in many ways and yet different. The city was full of temples, even tiny ones at the corner of every little street and lane, reminding me of Chennai which I consider my second home. At the same time, the number of cafes, restaurants and unique boutique shops reminded me of New York with its abundant variety of eateries and stores. Beyond that the efficient public transportation and malls reminded me of my home back in Singapore. Bangkok was perfect, and at the end of the trip I longed to be back in the city, and hoped to live there at some point if the stars were to align.

Exploring temples in Bangkok was also a daily routine, given how many temples there were around the city. I had never truly appreciated Buddhism as a religion/culture but Bangkok had changed my perspectives on it. I felt motivated to learn more about Buddhism and maybe even find ways to practice it in my life.

jun ‘24

After almost 3 months of searching and interviewing, I finally landed a job. Not only was it a job, but it was also a job that I resonated with. Having spent the last few months in the hospital, I had been seeing the gaps within the public health care sector, and I landed a role with the Health Promotion Board in Singapore, looking into public health data. At moments like these, I felt like the stars were finally aligning. After almost a year of unemployment, and trying to work on personal projects that didn’t really see the light and dropped off as the months passed, I feel like this job was truly a blessing.

I had also been quite actively dating (more of swiping) and had met up with a few girls whom I could see potential long term relationships with. Although there were many that fell through, I felt that I was increasingly improving on the quality of dates and becoming better at selecting who I was talking to. In some ways, I felt like I was getting closer to “the one”.

jul ‘24

I started work, after more than a year of unemployment. It felt weirdly sad to be leaving my life of unemployment, but equally exciting to be finally getting back to work (and getting paid). Starting a new job is always an exciting experience, it feels like a way to reset your life and organise it in a way that is more productive and aligned.

I was emotionally at a high. Life was finally starting to make sense, and good things were coming my way. I went to a couple of parties, Boiler Room Singapore being one of the most iconic parties I had been to. Having been disciplined for the last couple of months, focussing on health, fitness, caregiving and job hunting, I decided to let loose a little and unwind.

aug ‘24

I matched with G while she was in the US on a family trip. We texted for about a week and met when she got back to Singapore. That casual “tester” date was one of the best first dates that I had been on in years. I felt an almost instant connection with her. But me being the skeptic didn’t want to think too much into it, given how badly some of the other “instant connections” in the past months had ended. But I knew I wanted to see her again.

At the end of the month I also went to catch A R Rahman live in concert for the first time in my life. I had grown up listening to a lot of his music and was absolutely hyped to be catching a live concert of his. However the concert turned out to be very disappointing, with him playing songs that barely resonated with the crowd. Never really thought I would get bored during a Rahman concert but I walked out to the restroom multiple times due to how badly arranged the entire concert was, and how poor the sound and acoustics were done. G also happened to be at the same concert and our seats were also quite near each other. She said she saw me but I could not spot her in the crowd. Guess I will have to wait till our next date.

sep ‘24

G and I went on our first official date after about a week… to a cemetery. You must be thinking who goes to a cemetery on a first date. But as it turns out, both of us had a shared interest in the morbid and dark, and we both had never been to this particular cemetery, which turned out to be a beautiful date location after all. Afterwards we got some ice cream and chatted about a variety of things, one of it being this particular space that I use to pen down my thoughts and write on. I found out she writes as well, and she shared about her experiences that prompted me to write. Once again, it was one of the loveliest dates I had been on, and I was starting to really like this connection and chemistry that we shared.

A couple of days after, my grandmother got hospitalised again. Her health had not been the best since she got back home after her dengue episode, and recovery was very slow. She had not been eating too well, and her general energy levels were pretty low. This time round however, she was feeling mostly fine and just wanted to get a particular water secretion on her legs checked out, and was admitted for monitoring. I visited her after work as usual and we chatted, and as always she asked me about my marriage plans. I comforted her and told her not to worry and that it will happen very soon.

Two days later, the doctors called us up at 4am, asking the family to come down to the hospital as her body had been shutting down and they were trying to figure out what was happening. Despite all the tests and machines monitoring her, they could not figure what was wrong, and also afraid that taking any action might only make the situation worse. The recommended course of action was to remove all life support and administer some painkillers to facilitate her passing. After a very short discussion, we agreed this would be the best for her and decided to go forward with the doctor’s recommendation. Shortly afterwards, at approximately 4:14 pm, she passed.

Everything from there felt like a blur. Two days after the funeral I met up with G and had a lovely time at Gardens by the Bay. I kissed her for the first time. A week later I flew to India with my family to complete the final rites for my grandma. I don’t think her passing had really hit me even then. I came back to Singapore and spent the rest of the month serving my reservist obligations.

oct ‘24

Things with G were going really well. I planned an impulse trip to Surabaya with her. I was going to ask her to be my girlfriend. It felt really soon, but it also felt right. Everything about her felt right. She checked every box and more. We went on plenty of dates together, both equally enjoying each others’ company.

Surabaya was magical to say the least. Every moment with her felt surreal and yet completely natural. It did not seem like we were travelling together for the first time. The level of comfort and mutual understanding we had seemed like we’ve known each other for years. On the full moon night (it was a supermoon as well) before we hiked Mount Bromo, I asked her to be my girlfriend and she said yes. I cried tears of joy.

nov ‘24

The new relationship was going good. Every moment spent with G reassured me that I was with the right person. She complemented and contrasted me in so many ways, and yet we were similar in so many other ways. Getting into a relationship after almost 3 years of being single felt a little strange initially though. I felt like I was giving up a part of my identity or individuality. And maybe she struggled with that equally in the initial weeks as well. But as time passed, we started to value each other more than that individuality and I think that was the most telling sign that I was with a person that I could be with for a long time to come.

November being birthday month, I had also planned a short trip to good old Thailand. Ever since the Bangkok trip earlier in the year, I longed to go back to return to the country. Unfortunately G could not company me on this trip so I ended up going solo. Nevertheless, I enjoy solo travel and it was still a very memorable trip. Maybe not as great as the BKK one, but I still had a good time. I got myself my first tattoo as well, from a random shop I found while walking across. I finally felt that I was in a place in life that had a sense of permanence and meaning in it.

dec ‘24

G introduced me to her parents. She had already told them about me before I left for Thailand and I went over to her place for lunch when I got back. It felt soon, but it also meant that she was serious enough about me to let her parents know. It was a nice afternoon talking to them and just hanging out. I was slightly nervous, as always with first impressions, but I think it went as well as it could have gone. I’m not sure when is the right time to tell my parents about her but I think I am going to give it a while more, and maybe do that in the coming months. I’m not ready to get bombarded with the wedding talks yet.

G left back to US for the second half of the month, and the distance + time difference was quite unbearable. Usually I’m one to adopt the “out of sight, out of mind” approach, but I could not do that with her. Not being able to meet or even talk when I wanted to made it very difficult, but I took it as an opportunity to spend some time with myself and just recalibrate myself for the new year. The upcoming months are going to be interesting, and this was the first time I am looking forward to the new year. I feel life is about to change in some big ways, and I am excited for what is to come.

You’ve probably heard of the age old saying, when life gives you lemons… make a lemonade. Or something along those lines. Never really got what’s the point of it but essentially it’s a way of saying when life gets hard, figure out a way to make the best of it and take it easy.

And then the other day I saw someone share this.

So apparently lemons aren’t even a thing at all. Life never gave lemons. We made them up. We made up all the problems and the solutions.

That’s all. That’s the entire post.

Welcome one and all to the annual birthday post (that was missed in my previous birthday due to personal reasons such as existential crisis). Much has happened over the course of the last year, so let’s get started without further ado.

life updates

To be honest much of it has been quite a blur as we are still globally navigating through the pandemic that is Covid-19. Borders are still mostly closed with the exception of selected countries with low cases. Singapore just hit over 5k cases in one day, while simultaneously announcing that they want to open up travel to more countries by the end of the year. But who is even keeping track anymore.

For the entirety of the last year or so most of the restaurants were only allowed to have two people dining in at any one point in time. And while more than 90% of the country has already been fully vaccinated, the cases have continued to climb.

I have not travelled out of the country since Jan 2020, which was quite important in the timeline of events as Singapore had its first case while I was out of the country. And since then things have only gone downhill. I missed three weddings of people close to me. One of my best friend’s wedding got cancelled. So many people lost their close ones to the virus, thankfully the ones I care for are still safe and alive.

But somehow amidst such a gloomy global outlook, I find myself most at peace right now.

So much has evolved, within and without, and I feel at a much better place mentally and spiritually than I have ever been in the last 5 years.

meditate, don’t medicate

Sometime in the mid of last year I went through a drastic mental breakdown. I had just lost my job as my previous company did not wish to renew my contract amidst the concerns of the pandemic. On top of that, the worries of the pandemic and having to stay at home 24/7 amidst a lockdown with a family that drained at my mental health day to day put me in a state of despair and depression, absolutely stripped of my identity and any ounce of understanding of who I am.

I had decided to quit learning Carnatic music, which prior to that something that I placed at the utmost top of my priority list. I had prioritised it over family, work, relationships and what not. And I came to a point where I saw no point in pursuing it any more. So yea you can understand the kind of drastic mental change I was going through. Conveying this to my Guru felt like a full blown breakup scenario, with unhappiness and voices being raised on both sides.

That wasn’t the only bridge I burnt. So many others I started cutting off from my life. Any ounce of negativity…BLOCK. Any vibe that didn’t sit with me…FUCK OFF. I was drinking quite regularly as well, while locked in my room, my only place of solace and solitude. I had started smoking again after two years of quitting cigarettes. Of course I couldn’t become a full blown alcoholic while living with my parents, but even I got concerned with the way I had started dealing with things.

So I took the bold step to book an appointment with a psychiatrist, to get myself in check.

Coming to terms with myself and taking action on my mental health was huge for me. From my past posts you would have seen how much I believed that the mental health industry was a sham and people were just whining about issues that they didn’t want to deal with.

But it took me 28 years to realise what a terrible mental state I was in for most of my life. I must have been depressed and anxious for a large part of my childhood cause honestly I feel so dissociated from it I have barely any recollection of it. I have felt isolated and anti-social for a large part of any scenario that I can recall deep into my childhood. Parts of me learnt to put on a persona that was sociable but it mostly drained me and took a lot of external substances to keep me going. My self esteem and confidence have been kept at bare minimum regardless of anything that I had achieved in my life. After years of trying to live with these monsters in my head, thinking I will outgrow them, I finally did something to fight them.

Obviously a single 45 minute session was not enough to outline my entire life history but the doctor immediately prescribed me some anti depressants after the first visit. To be honest I don’t think he did much of a deep analysis of my mental condition (these government hospital based mental health professionals are known to be pretty shit) but I kind of went in open to the option of trying out medication.

It felt like a huge step to take given I was going to start taking daily medication that will be affecting my already unstable mental state. But at the same time I felt maybe this was an option I haven’t considered amidst all the other means of self medication I had tried in the past. At least this is legal and prescribed by a doctor so if anything goes wrong I have someone to blame (lol).

Looking back I think it was one of the best decisions I ever made. I probably will have to write another post going into the detailed journey with anti depressants, but in short I had never felt better in my entire life. In some ways I started discovering what I am guessing normal people would feel like on a day to day basis, without crippling anxiety and a constant stream of negativity running through their minds. My moods were a lot more regulated, I was better in social situations, my dating life got better, work life got better, relationship with family got better. Overall mostly pros and quite minimal cons. Of course this was not achieved purely through meds.

i’m coming home again

Sometime early this year, I also made the massive decision of moving out from my parents’ place.

Yea I know it sounds crazy. Leaving aside the social stigma of moving out in an Indian household, why would I be willingly spending close to 1k every month, money that could easily be saved for future investments? Why would I be fracturing my already fractured relationship with my family by distancing myself from them? And more importantly how am I going to deal with the 1001 questions that my friends and relatives are going to be asking me about this?

Well I had my reasons. Personal space is something important to me, and I felt that even though my parents have gotten much more chill over the years, I didn’t feel comfortable entirely being with them. In some ways I felt like I needed to constantly put up this front with them in order not to upset or disappoint them for the person that I am. And as I mentioned earlier, amidst the pressures of the pandemic this started taking a real toll on my mental health. Moreover I wanted to have the experience of living independently. I wanted to start doing laundry and cleaning and cooking and doing dishes and all the things I would need to do to live on my own, as I have been so dependent on my parents for most of this even at my age. And I wanted to do this before the reality of marriage and a cohabitation lifestyle kicks in.

So all things considered, I took the decision to find a place of my own. The search in itself was daunting, having to look for rooms and housemates with whom I would be comfortable staying with. Being the idealist that I can be, I was considering so much into making sure that the moving out scenario outweighs the stay home scenario. Thankfully I happened to chance upon a lovely apartment with a spacious room and friendly apartment mates. I was moving in with 3 other girls…yea another “woah” I hear it already. But for some reason my gut instinct told me that it’ll be comfortable and peaceful sharing the living space with these girls. And that gut instinct was spot on.

Very soon after they became like sisters I never had, being able to share and do things together that I’ve not done before. They taught me how to cook and soon after we started cooking meals together. We would watch shows together, talk about life and love, laugh about the silly things we do while navigating through this pandemic as well. And I was also absolutely in awe of how incredibly independent and strong these girls were, working in a foreign country alone, away from family, and doing everything to create the life that they want for themselves. None of them were from any form of privileged backgrounds, and were all not leading life in any way that was considered to be conventional. I guess that could be the reason I fit right into this place that became my home.

caught in a bad romance

I fell in love, once again. Almost from the moment that I met her. The attraction was instantaneous and overwhelming. The rational mind told me to take this slow, but the romantic in me wanted to dive deep into this endless pit.

I’ve come to realise I’m very much a romantic when it comes to relationships. I tend to idealise my partners, overlooking their flaws and red flags that they may exhibit, seeing them to be the perfect fit for the flawed me. I guess we all do that in small ways towards the people that we love and care for.

But in the case of this relationship I was quite pragmatic from the start. I wanted to make sure that I was not repeating the mistakes from the past. I was wary of my own biases and tendencies and decided to consciously take things slow without letting it burn fast and die. In fact, as tempting as it was to get into a committed relationship as soon as we started dating (she very much wanted that as well), I made sure that we would date for at least a month before getting into a relationship.

And man those first few weeks were incredible. I had felt like never before in a long long time, absolutely sucked into it, and constantly just thinking about it. The infatuation stage is something I had thought to have grown out of but clearly it made a comeback in a way bigger than ever before.

And she was incredibly comfortable to be with, as much as a closed book that I am, she made me open up so much and share so much of myself with her. We were both discovering so much about one another and it was becoming so consuming, that I started to see some parallels to a toxic relationship from the past. So I started applying brakes in the relationship, consciously withdrawing myself from time to time, and slowing things down. I wanted something sustainable, that would not just burn out after burning bright for a short while. I was seeing someone after almost 2 years of being single, so it was something long term and serious that I was looking for in a relationship.

But as far as my luck goes, me and long term relationships can never go in the same sentence, so as beautiful and amazing as the relationship was, all the red flags and flaws that I was ignoring started to bubble up over time and explode in the most dramatic of breakups where she erased my entire existence out of her life and left me to rot.

so yes, we are now back to square one. but surprisingly I have been handling the breakup pretty well, at least in a much more healthy way I’d say. I guess it was easy for me to be the “depressed” guy in my past breakups, given how I was already in a depressed state of mind. But given how much better my mental health has been, I think there was a lot more resistance to go back into that depressive state. I guess this too shall pass and maybe one day I would find a love that would last and be by my side as much as I want to be by theirs. No expectations, just living life for everything that it gives me and taking it in to the fullest.

all this bread so yummy

Work had also become a huge part of my life over the last year. So much so that it took away time from everything else that had been a priority in the past.

I have been thinking a lot about what I want my career to be about, given I had switched jobs almost once every year since I graduated. Having worked a multitude of different roles, from user experience design to web development to software engineering to teaching to data engineering, I feel like I have jumped through a variety of skill sets that make my resume look like a Shopee homepage with a whole bunch of unrelated recommendations.

Nevertheless, I have learnt to make the most out of these experiences, never getting particularly comfortable with any of these roles at any point. The goal is to become as adaptive and absorbent as possible, learning to learn things fast and thriving in whatever role that the role requires me to be. At the end of the day I need a job in order to maintain my artistic ventures as they are most definitely not paying the bills.

Somehow I have yet to really consider a married life. Finances and priorities might shift once I am in a committed marriage, particularly an arranged marriage which would not give as much room for a customised lifestyle (not always the case but potentially the case). Let’s cross that bridge when it comes, and till then maximise my skill sets and abilities, and learn maybe a thing or two about running a tech company, and make as much bread as I can.

we’ll see what’s ’bout to happen next, okay? 

I guess that’s pretty much it. Not a very exciting year, but most definitely one that I felt much more grounded and connected with myself in. I definitely wish to create and collaborate more next year, this year had a few exciting collaborative projects but there is room to push for more creative work. I hope to take fitness more seriously as well, and workout more consistently. Just the usual things nothing too major… maybe get married or something who knows?

Till then keep glitching!

This is a writing from a travel journal written in 2015. Digitising for posterity.

Do you remember what it felt like when you were a child?

The days of care-free play and nuisance. The days of little mischiefs managed, and little secrets in boxes. When you were a child, everyone was good; there was no evil. We could play with everyone and the biggest enemy was the uncle who would ask us to keep the noise down. Our dreams were spectacular and massive, we were ambitious to the moon. Nothing was impossible. Be it a sportsman, scientist or a rockstar, we were unstoppable. We knew it was going to happen one day. We didn’t know how or why but we were certain it will. 

As we grew up, slowly but surely, this certainty and belief that we had in our dreams started fading away. We start getting mocked and laughed at for dreaming. “All of that is not gonna happen in the real world” we are told, repeatedly. We get punched and beaten up a couple of times and all of a sudden, people aren’t good anymore. Throw in a couple of heartbreaks and failures and the dream just depletes into a faint distant memory, no longer a part of you. 

With no dreams or goals to guide us, we start listening to all the non-dreamers and their formula for success and happiness. Get a stable job. Start a savings account. Plan for retirement. Find a good partner. Have a child, maybe two. Do it and you will find happiness. This will fulfil all your life’s desires. And we follow it, not knowing what other path to follow. How bad could it be? For advice coming from such experienced and senior individuals.

We mindlessly carry out everything that leads us to success. Get good grades, go to a good college, get a good job. But all the while, whilst telling ourselves that we are happy where we are at, that inner child hidden beneath the tiers of doubt and disbelief is crying. The child cannot let go of those magnificent dreams that she once had. Whenever something remotely close to that dreams comes into your lives, the child smiles a little. Whenever it is baking a cake, or dancing a little dance in the room, or screaming out loud in the shower.

Sex, the most celebrated yet taboo act, is one of the most primal and child-like act that humans engage in. We let go of all inhibitions, all need to maintain an adult-like professionalism, while engaging in childlike play. Explains why we love it so much. Same goes for the vices of alcohol and drugs. All these acts bring us to the mental state of a child, the all-loving, ever-curious, ever-dreaming child.

Ironic isn’t it? We engage in all these superficial acts that simulate our senses to believe that we are child-like. But in reality we engage in nothing that pleases our inner child. Our everyday lives revolve around trying to fit in with society so much so that we ignore and ditch the child within. We forget how to love, we forget how to learn, and most importantly we forget how to dream.

What now?

I’ve already done all this to get to where I am right now. All this talk sounds fancy and great to read but I’m not giving up all these years of hard work. Who’s gonna pay my bills? Who’s gonna support my family??

Yeap okay I got that you have all these concerns. And neither is this gonna change overnight. You became this person through all these years of work and effort and clearly all that has gotten you somewhere. But remember that child within? Talk to him or her. Ask her why she’s crying. Ask what can you do to make him smile. Connect with your inner child and you will figure exactly what you need to do. Talk to him everyday, and maybe one day he will start laughing again.

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Reflections

I found this while I was clearing out my room and throwing out old things, to make way for some new. I’m not entirely sure when I wrote it but I have a vague memory of writing it while travelling on a train in India sometime in 2014/2015.

Although this was written in the past, reading this felt like it was written for the present me. Every word struck such a chord and resonated so deeply. As if my past self knew I would end up in this state of monotony and purposelessness, and decided to write this to pull me out of that state. Especially at a point where I follow no religion or philosophy, it seems only right that wisdom has to come from no other source but myself.

Reading this made me want to listen to my own advice, from the past, in talking to the inner child. I have lost him already, no idea which part of myself he even exists in. But I need to find him and tell him it is gonna be ok. And find ways of reviving him, feeding his soul. Thank you my past. You were a wise man. I hope to gain your wisdom one day.

Keep glitching.

Remember in 2012 there were all these conspiracy theories going around about the end of the world. And that according to the Mayan calendar, 2012 would be the year of doom and gloom. The great apocalypse. We even made a huge blockbuster movie about it (complete with the standard America is the centre of the world narrative).

People had been stocking up on food and building underground shelters, just to prepare themselves to survive the apocalypse. Some even went as far as to imagine it would end up in a zombie apocalypse, stocking up on the gunnery as well (still not illegal). The world was prepared for the worst.

But nothing happened….yet.

Well it turns out, the Mayans might have made a typo. Because 2020, was THE YEAR OF THE RECKONING.

Welcome to 2020

MAN what a fuckin year it has been. What started off with Australian forest fires killing koala bears and Kobe Bryant dying, soon became a massive global pandemic that led to nationwide lockdowns and curfews, closure of all retail outlets restaurants and bars around the globe, complete travel bans between nations, hurricanes and earthquakes, riots and looting through the streets of America across every state, death of hundreds of thousands of people across the globe… AAARGH HOLD THE FUCK UP. TIME OUT!!!

And we are only halfway through. Exactly 50%.

It’s hard to even process and digest all that has been going on across the world. Not to help that the media is keen on constantly portraying the negatives and keeping people on the edge of their seats. You think the news is bad wait till you go on social media. Social media has always been a medium for people to scream for attention and get it whenever they wanted it. But with all that is going on around the globe, it has become harder and harder to get that attention. So instead of shutting the fuck up, people start to scream louder. Make their voices louder. Make their opinions wilder. Make their problems bigger. Cause how else can they compete against the attention that is given to the thousands of death and destruction across the globe??!!

And that started giving birth to some of the craziest and wildest conspiracy theories that you can imagine. People started believing that the global pandemic (CORONA) was actually an elaborate scheme by elites across the world to oppress the masses and buy back control of the free market. Some believed that the “virus” itself was not a virus but a genetic mutation caused by radiation from 5G mobile network towers. People actually started burning down mobile towers and destroying public and private property purely based on these unconfirmed theories.

You would think it would be the Trump supporters and Karens of the world that would be buying into such theories and telling their neighbours about it. BUT NO. You have highly educated individuals in fields of science, research and education who supported and backed such theories. Forget the rest I had friends of my age who were absolutely sold that the coronavirus was an elaborate hoax.

With all that insanity going about on one side, the world got shaken by another hit, this time one that was a lot closer to the hearts of the masses. George Floyd, an African American man, was brutally killed in the hands of a police officer, with video footage of him struggling to breath and needless to say, it spread like wildfire. Protests and outrage sparked across the nation, fighting for justice to be served.

What started off as peaceful protests soon became violent displays of frustration, with many rioting through the streets, looting various prominent supermarkets, leading to the good ol President declaring a war against the people.

As if we weren’t already in a crisis, shit just got way worse.

The #BlackLivesMatter movement took the world by storm, and protests were happening across the globe, not to mention every single state in America. The people wanted justice. And eventually justice was served in the form of arrest of the police officers involved in the killing of George Floyd. While it might have just been a move made to achieve peace with the masses, it was a positive signal that there was action taken.

Chaos outside, chaos inside

Whilst all of this was going about around the globe, I have been staying at home (mostly cause I’m antisocial, but also cause the government told me to) for the past few months, barely leaving the house once or twice a week for some exercise and fresh air.

Thankfully the company I was working at had very flexible work arrangements, and we had commenced working from home from as early as February this year. Many companies have had zero infrastructure or arrangements for a work from home setup and that made it impossible for them to transition given the necessity. Soon enough, even schools started closing down and moving towards a home-based learning model, giving their parents extra worries amidst their own transitioning work arrangements.

It was a period of intense deep structural and cultural changes. People were forced to stay at home, and some were not adept to that kind of change. My own father, refused to go a day without leaving the house. He would find reasons like going to the market, or the bank, needing to run errands or buy groceries, or simply “exercise” (never seen him exercise in years) just to get out of the house.

While the idea of staying at home is not that bad, not having the option of going out is the issue. Staying at home 24/7 meant a great deal of change to most people. Many, without realising, have found comfort and escape in going out to various places on a day to day basis. We have had an abundance of options for food, shopping, leisure and recreation. But having those options stripped away, people found themselves having to deal with some real issues that have been swept under the carpet for eons.

Who has time to introspect and deal with issues though… Let’s make some dalgona coffee instead (still have no idea wtf that is). Or how about some Zoom yoga! Hold on let’s get on Houseparty first! Time to finally start learning to play the ukelele and posting it on TikTok. Oh there is a new show on Netflix about a gay man with 180 pet tigers, you NEED TO WATCH IT!!!

All sorts of oddly creative trends started popping up all over, just to deal with the “boredom” of having to stay at home. Social media became the only source of social contact. Zoom became a household necessity. And toilet paper became a scarcity.

Where do we go now?

While it is only halfway through the year, and most of the year has already been spent sitting home on Netflix, there seems to be hope.

Many countries have started lifting their lockdowns, and have returned to normal operations, with stores and restaurants finally being able to open physically. Schools have also started to open up, while most still try to enforce safe distancing measures quite strictly.

Singapore has been doing quite a splendid job in flattening the curve in a short period of time, and setting up infrastructure and technology to aid in further contact tracing once everything has been opened up. The government has provided masks for all individuals and made it compulsory to wear masks wherever you go. All malls, restaurants and physical outlets now have a check-in check-out system that enables tracking of the individuals there at any point of time. Soon enough, there are plans to rollout a physical device that all individuals will need to wear, that can easily detect and trace the individuals that have come in close contact with you, and be able to warn individuals if anyone were to get the virus.

Airlines are expecting to resume operations towards the end of the year, and people have already started booking flights for their long needed vacation.

While most of this is in the hopes that the virus should not make a comeback, we are still in the process of finding a vaccine that can help ensure that things can truly start returning to normal.

In the time being, we have to adapt to this “new normal” and figure out ways of overcoming the struggles through our daily lives.

There is much more to write and talk about and I could go on and on. But let me end this here, on the note that maybe in some ways, the world needed this. We needed this hard brake during the constant acceleration over the last couple of decades, so that we can recalibrate and shift gears into moving forward more sustainably. I needed this, personally, to be able to sit with myself and rediscover what were my priorities. I might write another post about my personal journey through this, but I feel I haven’t hit any significant milestone yet to document it. Might just write during the usual birthday reflections. Either way, I am glad to be on this journey right now, and I am feeling a sense of optimism and hope despite the bleakness and uncertainty of the foreseeable future.

Keep glitching.

Hello again. It is the time of the year for my annual birthday writing.

I literally have not written anything at all this year. Damn adulting really took over huh…or maybe I just haven’t really been motivated by anything enough to write about it.

I guess in the past writing used to be form of an outlet for me. A way to get out my thoughts in a way that I could make sense of them. Sometimes it was due to an interesting thought or theory that I might have come up with. And sometimes a way for me to vent certain frustrations. So I guess in a way I have found other memes means of dealing with my own thoughts and frustrations and did not really need to be writing.

But to be honest, I haven’t really spent time thinking deeply about anything in particular. No thought has particularly lingered in my head long enough for me to write about it. Nothing has really bothered me for a long time. Nothing has hurt me too much. Nothing has impressed or amazed me either. Nothing at all has really caught my attention.

Is this what adulting is?

Status Update

Hmmm where shall I start?

I guess let me start with the most significant thing that happened this year:

Another relationship ended.

At this point people are not even surprised. Somehow it is almost a part of my identity that my relationships don’t last. Some bothered to ask how I am doing and all, but it seemed like most couldn’t really give two shits about it. Ah well people don’t give two shits about most things either way, what is another of Rama’s relationships in the grand scheme of things.

In fact, even I hardly gave two shits about my own breakup. Well, yes I was looking to marry this girl at some point the next year. Yes I did plan for a future with her, for maybe a good 5 years down the road. Yes I did have a wedding rings board on Pinterest. Yes my heart was broken when she ended it. Yes I did start having major anxiety ever since. BUT one thing that helped me deal with all of that, is my strong grounding in nihilism (as well as better mental health, which I will elaborate later).

The fundamental belief that there is absolutely no meaning to anything in life, serves as a reminder that life is too short to let the trivialities of it affect how you lead it. We are constantly trying to find purpose in order to excel in something and we tend to forget how caught up we get in our own narrow realities unable to see the bigger reality.

Striving for excellence is important. But having a firm footing in reality is equally crucial. The only way to climb is to climb with others. In no way should we step on the heads of others in trying to reach for the stars. Growth should be organic and stem from honesty, experience and hardwork. There are NO SHORTCUTS.

And while we might tell ourselves that this is our life and we get to set the rules and live it in the way we want to, don’t forget that we are a tiny speck in this vast system of a universe and the amount of autonomy we have over our thoughts and actions are quite negligible. The far wiser thing to do is to surround ourselves with individuals who push us and make us grow out of our comfort zones and are also happy to spend time and share the ride with us.

Personal Growth

That being said I think the amount of personal growth in the last one year has been incredibly significant. I do find myself to have become a lot more mature in my thought, actions and decisions. I have also very little patience with people and things that do not sit right with me. “Fix it or forget it” is my mantra. There is no point thinking and overthinking things that have hardly any impact on your life. Certain things might have slightly greater impact, nevertheless action is much more valuable in any situation than unnecessary thought.

Another significant part of my personal growth is setting boundaries. I used to be really bad at setting boundaries with others. Especially with those whom I loved and trusted the most. I always believed in giving myself entirely to others in order to form the deepest most meaningful connections. While I had formed deep connections, my kindness has also been taken for granted, abused and disrespected. And while it is important to give love and be kind, it is equally important to ensure that certain lines are not crossed and the love and respect is mutual. The moment it is not, it starts to become toxic and damaging to both parties, and will lead to much hurt and disappointment.

And lastly, having better mental health. I have not touched the topic of mental health in the past, mainly because I knew too little about the topic to be able to talk about it. I also had a very strong opinion that the mental health fad was just some marketing bullshit (which it still is to some extent, just look at the number of wellness apps and programmes). However, in the past year I have learnt to truly understand the state of my mental health.

There was a moment earlier this year, where I suffered from a horrible crippling migraine while alone in the land of Bangkok, unable to even eat a single meal without throwing up. I was doing a solo trip, in the hopes of clearing my mind and gaining some clarity on the things at hand that were troubling me at that point in time. Little did I expect to be lying on the floor of my hotel room in pain struggling to gather the strength to walk to the toilet. While the experience was intensely horrifying, it gave me a strange insight into my general mental state.

I came to realise that for a large part of my life, since childhood, I have been suffering from anxiety and depression. While these terms are a lot more recent, I feel like I have unknowingly been fighting it for the longest time. While I still do struggle with it, I have become more aware of it, to know what to do and what to avoid in order to help me deal with that state of mind.

I have previously dealt with it through all sorts of external stimuli, from cigarettes to alcohol to weed to meditation to music to sex. And I have been equally addicted to all of these, yes meditation included. And this is the first time I am dealing with my mental health without going to my vices, through healthier more sustainable means. I have been exercising, eating healthy, intermittent fasting, having regular sleep schedules, and regular social interactions with deep meaningful conversations. All these take effort and do not provide any form of instant relief, but they have made my general mental state far less volatile and a lot more stable. Might do a seperate post on this at some point if I feel like.

One last little point that I am proud of is my physical health. I had gained tremendous weight in the past years while I was going though some shitty phases, and I have managed to lose significant weight and also am at the peak of my fitness since my army days. Long way to go but proud of where I am at right now in terms of my fitness.

Areas for Improvement

One thing I need to do more is allow my mind to wander more freely. I need to stop bombarding my mind with information and give it some free room to think and imagine and create thoughts. I need to be more of a creator than a consumer. I would say social media has become a significant part of my life and while being seemingly connected with other individuals is greatly enticing, I also need to spend more time creating more valuable connections outside of social media.

Discipline and time management is also another crucial thing I need to work on. Currently, a large part of my day is just work and some relaxation, apart from the days that I gym and go for music classes. I should start waking up earlier to devote some time to vocal practices. I also need to be more wise in how I spend my commuting time. While it is easy to waste it away on social media, I should be more mindful of how that affects my energy levels in general.

Lastly I need to work on building more meaningful positive social connections. Currently I do have some strong social connections but I realise I can be quite a bore of a friend sometimes. I feel like I need to start being more empathetic again and connect with different individuals on the levels that can relate to them. I should also try actively socialising outside my circle of friends whom I am comfortable with, and also reconnect with friends and acquaintances from the past, who I suck at keeping in touch with.

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And that is all on the annual episode of Rama reflects about his life on his birthday. Apologise if the writing is not as coherent as the past, I have admittedly gotten a little rusty. Feel like there is a lot more I want to write about, but it is time for me to catch some Netflix and chill. See you again next year.

Keep glitching.

Avid readers of this blog might know that I have a habit of writing a post prior to or on my birthday every year. I have been doing this for quite a while now, and I think I wish to continue this. It seems to be a good way to introspect towards the end of every year, and also forces me to actually write if I have not done so in a while.

As I write this, I am suffering from this horrible flu and sore throat that I have had for the entire week or so. I was hoping it would recover by the time my birthday comes, as I wanted to indulge in some birthday vices. However, it does not seem to be getting better at all. But I do know it will, so it’s all fine.

How do I know it will get better? Because everything always gets better. 

If there is a single word which could describe the entire year of 2018, it would be:

Recovery

This entire year has been a process of recovery and healing in many ways, small and big. This year started off in probably one of the worst ways ever, and I was sitting in one of the deepest and lowest pits in my entire life. 2017 was a vibrant year with many things happening. As much as it burned bright and fiery, it also extinguished as fast. I was doing so much at once, juggling a crazy amount of things in my life. Everything started taking a toll. My mental health, physical health, relationships, energy levels, moods and general purpose of living. Nobody knew the amount of shit that I was dealing with, and nobody would really comprehend it either.

I had burned out, with hardly any energy to do any of the things that made me feel so alive in the past. But this burnout was not only because of 2017. It was an accumulation of all the years before as well. Everything I had put myself through had led to this eventual point of breakdown. And I knew with certainty that there was no easy way around this. If I did not take the time to mend myself and build myself up slowly, I would just deteriorate into one of the countless mindless zombies that society has so successfully bred.

So I got rid of everything that was draining me of even the smallest amounts of energy. And only kept the people and habits that would contribute positively to my energy pool. As simple as this sounds, it is one of the most crushing and debilitating processes ever. To be actively bringing about so much change to an already volatile system is a make or break situation. You need to be extremely careful not to end up in a state of chaos and destruction, despite having intentions to great peace and harmony.

So I carefully withdrew myself from everything: social media, social interactions, random whatsapp groups, mailing threads, my job (twice), and most of my ‘friendships’. I took all that away and focussed only on the things that would provide me with the strength and courage to move on with life.

First on that list was:

Music

Specifically Carnatic music.

Over the last two years or so, since I found my current Guru, I have been increasingly motivated to learn and absorb as much of the wealth of knowledge that Carnatic music had possessed. In the juggling of the hundreds of things that I had in the past, I had never ever truly dedicated myself to pursuing this artform. Many times in the past, most things came easy to me, so I took the same approach with this, not thinking it would be too hard to master this artform. However it started hitting me that this traditional artform required way more than the occasional attention. I needed to devote my entire being into learning this artform.

Most do this while young, practicing and mastering the artform in their schooling days where there was generally more time and energy to do so. However, me being a lazy ass, and never really having any drive or motivation to do so, had spent close to no effort in my younger days towards practice or mastery of anything. Being a working adult, this became an even more impossible task. I rarely had the time or energy to be able to dedicate my “entire being” into this pursuit of knowledge. So I needed to resort to making some tremendous sacrifices to make it happen.

Firstly, I cut off myself from listening to any other genre of music except Carnatic music. This was one of the greatest personal sacrifices, as I have a very vast and expansive taste in music, ranging from rock to hip hop to orchestral cinematic to electronic to jazz to Tamil pop. Having to put a hard stop to all of that, and listen to only core Carnatic music (not even Carnatic fusion) made it very painful for a long while. However I forced myself to stick to it, giving myself the occasional cheat days of listening to Kanye.

While it was very challenging initially, even depressing sometimes, as music often had given me the dopamine needed to keep myself on a high energy level, over time I grew to start appreciating the nuances in Carnatic music. I found myself getting slightly better at recognising ragams, and even be able to sing and replicate sangathis which I had not been explicitly taught before.

On top of this, I made it a point to dedicate myself to practicing almost everyday. Instead of what used to be happening only during class time, I started consciously setting aside time every morning to practice and train my voice and singing. This was also extremely challenging for the first month or so, as vocal practice can get very boring and tiring, especially when you are repeating very fundamental exercises instead of practicing nuanced compositions or improvisations.

This meant a lot of sleep sacrifices, social life sacrifices, and the occasional hits of FOMO. However, there was a greater purpose ahead, in revolutionising Carnatic music, that I have a strong personal belief in. I knew that if I were to want to make any significant impact in the landscape of music, I needed to equip myself with the necessary knowledge and skills to venture into that landscape. Otherwise I might just get swallowed whole and disappear off the grid entirely.

Health

My health, both mental and physical, had also been something that I have always neglected. Due to metabolism of my youth, I always assumed that my health would never really take a big impact if I were to slack off a little. Since I ended university, I had hardly exercised at all, gaining a crazy amount of weight over the years (going from an S to L size). And after all that laziness, trying to get back in shape and lose that weight became another Herculean task. I was also falling sick a lot, having an episode of flu/fever almost every month. This was not at all sustainable, to be taking so much meds and being so inactive at such a young age. My health was clearly deteriorating and I definitely needed to do something about it.

So the first thing I did was to sign up to a gym, that promised to give a complete workout in 20 minutes, using only bodyweight exercises (mostly). This sounded like something that I could use, given I did not want to lift weights and build any more muscle mass or get any bigger. I wanted to really just slim down and lose all the mass that I had gained, and just be in a generally better state of health.

I started hitting this gym around twice to thrice a week, completing 20-30 minute high intensity workouts, hoping to start seeing some difference in body weight. However there really seemed to be barely any different more than a couple of months down the road. I started feeling healthier and more energetic, but my weight had not really dropped by much. I just kept at it, and started introducing the occasional runs. So far there has not been any significant change in weight, but I do see myself slowly getting back into shape.

All I know is that I have to continue prioritising my health otherwise I will just end up a fat fuck.

Finance

Money matters have never really been much of a matter to me ever, as I always have been able to keep within my limits and save reasonably well. However, since I started working, I had been spending excessively on unnecessary things, to accommodate my lazy and docile lifestyle. This meant taking uber more than taking the train, just because I want to sleep in a little more. This meant getting alcohol on a weekly basis, sometimes even more than that. Eating out at expensive places. Online shopping for random things which I probably would not even need or use.

All that started taking a hit on my bank account sometime the mid of this year, and I felt like I have not actually been actively saving or investing. Since then I have been trying to be more conscious in my financial decisions, trying to think twice whether I really really need something before I spend on it. So far this has helped to a certain extent, however I do need to start very seriously looking at either a pay raise, different job, or side hustle in order to keep up with the level of things I want to invest and spend on.

Love and Relationships

I think with my loss of faith, and general trust in people due to many failed relationships, I started withdrawing myself from trusting anyone at all in any kind of relationship. I became extremely sensitive towards even the slightest most unsuspecting negativity in any kind of relationships, with co-workers, friends and family. This made me quite distant from most people, always needing the space for myself.

I don’t think it was bad for me to be withdrawn and introverted. But it went against my personal belief that we are a product of the people around us. And if we are unable to form strong trusting bonds and relationships with the people around us, we are pretty much useless.

However I knew that I had to firstly love and trust myself before I could do so towards others. So a large part of the year was about me finding myself, and finding the trust in myself, that I was capable of executing what I wanted to execute, without the fear of being a fake or a fraud or an imposter. Only then could I trust in others, that they trust in me as well.

So I was okay giving up a good paying software job, to go into teaching. It was a good way of rediscovering myself. There is something about working with children that teaches you a lot about yourself and your nature. They see through your lies and ask you questions that you would never think to ask yourself. And through that process, I got more confident with myself, and also increasingly more confident in the relationships I had with those around me.

I knew that I had always used to pride myself on adding value to those around me, and being “useful”. However, I discovered that this necessity to be useful was the core reason for most of my toxic relationships in the past. It was okay to not be useful. It is okay to just be a person with his or her own needs and wants and just existing in that realm. You don’t need to constantly be productive or to add value to the lives of others. If people support you even when you are “non value-adding”, you know these people are the ones who truly care for you. If they don’t bother, you don’t really need to bother either.

And in those little ways of discovering myself, I rediscovered my ability to love others. And man had I missed that. Loving others is such a beautiful feeling. Not being useful to others but just loving them. Letting them be in their imperfect form and watching them, and feeling happy for them. I never thought I would be able to love again, given everything that crushed my understanding of the concept itself. But now I know that love is the one thing that matters. Pure, unadulterated love. That is what truly matters. It is the fine balance of making sure you care for yourself, and also for others. That is where love is strong, healthy and impactful.

Reborn

So in a way, turning 26 has been a year of recovery, renewal and being reborn. In many ways I have changed to become very different from the person that I was over the past few years. But these changes are not superficial changes, they have been changes that allowed me to find the core of myself, and build myself up from that core.

In knowing that, I have nothing but excitement for the future that lies ahead, for I know that I am capable of facing anything that might come my path, as long as my anchors are strongly and deeply grounded, and my morals are unwavering.

The following was a photographic set that I exhibited recently. 

[foogallery id=”185″]

It was bliss.

Everything became distant, out of sight. Silence had engulfed me. Eyes closed, I could feel my heartbeat, pulsating through my body, creating ripples in the darkness that surrounded me. The gentle cold currents were caressing my bare skin, tempting me to follow them, and drift weightlessly into the eternal bliss.

Amidst the oblivion, something called out my name. Was it my time? Did I need to leave? Just a little longer, I craved to stay in this state of bliss. My mind, body and soul, felt like one. The loneliness was comforting for once. Is this what life should feel like? Or is this what death feels like?

Keep me there, consume me. Let me be lost in the threads of your weaving. Let me find myself and lose myself, again and again. Let me discover the workings of the universe, within myself. And then let me find you, or let me never.

I took one last moment, before rising above. And in that moment, I saw it in their eyes. The same truth, imprinted in their souls. The same bliss, that they all realised and yearned for.

In that moment I knew;

I was not alone.

Of course, given the title, there would be no need for explicit disclaimers, but I would still want to put one up in case one of the easily offended generation takes offence of this post. Not like anyone even reads this blog anyways, but still with the internet being the internet, you never really know. Anyways here goes:

All ideas and arguments expressed in this post are absolutely personal to the author, and by no means representative of the ideologies of any groups or communities. 

Now that that’s out of the way, shall we begin?

Where did it begin?

Well it probably started when I was conceived into this universe, being named “Siddarth”, and then ending up with the name “Ramakrishna” due to some miscommunication that my dad had with my mum. Despite the mess up, it was interesting that both names that I got were prominent human religious symbols. I was born a Hindu. Or more accurately, born into a Hindu family. And Hindus impart the Hindu ways of living onto their children before they even gain self-consciousness.

I was introduced to God as a child before anything else. I was taught as an infant, to put my palms together and close my eyes in prayer, everytime I wished to connect with God. In Tamil, “kadavul” is the word for God. However, since that might be a little hard for children to grasp, they simplified it with the child-friendly term “umaachi”, which stuck with me through my entire childhood till the recent past.

Umaachi was like a friend, more than a God to look up to and worship. He was almighty alright, but he was also down to earth. He would listen to your problems, your worries and emotions. He lends you an imaginary shoulder to lean on, and tells you that it will be okay. Sometimes he jokes around with you, sometimes he gets a bit serious. He was never one that I feared. More like a friend I valued and respected.

Every time I erred, I would go to Umaachi crying, my hands in prayer, apologising for my mistake. Not in fear that He might punish me. There were higher chances of my mum punishing me than Him. But rather in embarrassment of myself, that I had disappointed the expectations that He had on me.

The relationship I had with God was close and intimate as a child. I would have conversations with God, sitting in the prayer room and talking to Him. Whenever I felt fear, I sought out to Him for comfort, and I just knew things would be alright. Whenever I felt happy, I shared the joy with Him. If I was sad, I would cry to Him. And He would always listen, and make the right things happen at the right time, making sure that I was alright.

God was my (imaginary) best friend. 

Through my teenage years, God was always a part of my life. Never once did I think to question the existence of God himself. I wouldn’t say I was extremely religious, but being born into an orthodox Brahmin family (the vegetarian caste of the Hindu religion), religion was very well intertwined with my life. I never went to the temple often, but I performed daily morning prayer rituals for 20 mins before going to school. This consisted of a good 10 minutes of silent meditation within the ritual. That’s right, I was meditating at the age of 15 when other kids were masturbating. I think I could attribute the strict discipline I had in those years, to my overall calm and collected nature in my prime teenage years. While others would make rash impulsive decisions, I was always the “wet blanket”, coming up with rational reasons why we should avoid doing something stupid.

A Whole New World

Till I was in school, God was still a part of my life. Quite significant part I would say. I would pray everyday without fail before going to school. Sometimes after I come back from school, if I got home early. I had learnt the Vedas (ancient scriptures in Sanskrit) and often took part in mass prayer chanting rituals. As I mentioned, being in a religious Brahmin family naturally made religion a very integrated part of my life, without me having to make much of a conscious effort. It was second nature.

However, that second nature slowly started to evolve, when I got out of school and entered the army. Army did not just mean spending a lot of time away from home, which acted as my sanctuary for religious activities, but it also meant exposure to thoughts, ideas and people, that I had been guarded from for many years of my teenage life. It was a partial breakout, out of the disciplined lifestyle (more than the army) that my entire life had been.

Alcohol, music, vulgarities (new ones), cigarettes, clubbing, nightlife, regimentation, authority, relationships and many other experiences opened up a whole new world to me.

Having been brought up in a primarily academic oriented environment, home and school, my years in the army were absolutely eye opening. Many ideas changed and evolved, while many other newer ideas started to form as well. I started reading more non fiction, growing my knowledge in various topics from astrophysics to economics to business to philosophy and even human psychology.

During those two years in the Army, I grew a little distant from God. I was not a non-believer, but given I wasn’t too actively religious before, the lack of involvement in religious activities made me not think about God too much. Over time, I had stopped my daily prayer rituals and started indulging more in the newfound pleasures of nightlife and alcohol. God made a guest appearance now and then, but those were carefree years. Not being bound by the strict rules of the household, I truly explored a different world. Of course my morals were still strongly imprinted within my nature, but from a conservative, my mind started to open up.

Those were also the years of my early exploration into philosophical ideas and frameworks. I was still a Hindu at heart, so I delved more into the ideas that Hindu ancient texts spoke about, particularly the Vedas.

My dad being a strong believer in the ideas of Swami Vivekananda, introduced me to some of the works written by him. The topics touched a variety of religions, from Christianity to Buddhism to Islam and primarily Hinduism. The ideas however were very modern and avant garde, never once criticising another religion. Instead it took a standpoint to compare the approaches of each of these religions, the similarities between them, and where Hinduism stands amongst those ideologies.

These texts gave me a very fresh perspective on Hinduism. Hinduism was no longer about going to the temple and praying to a couple hundred Gods. I was never really a temple person anyway. Non of the ancient texts and Vedas spoke about any of the Gods that Hindu Temples worshipped. Instead they had Gods for fire, water, wind, earth and the all unifying Brahman (not to be confused with the deity Brahma). The Vedic ideas of Hinduism were more profound, taking a more holistic approach to life and religion.

I was very drawn to these ideas, though momentarily, as they made me rethink the whole concept of the religion of Hinduism.

Lost in the World

More than a year after my entering this new world, I experienced the single most transformative experience of my life.

Heartbreak.

I went through my first breakup. And it was brutal. Naturally being an introvert, and not having that many friends that I was able to trust, I was very alone and lost during the entirety of the breakup.

Being lost is kind of a blessing and a curse. It was a curse because I would not know what was good for me or bad for me. It was a blessing for the same reason. Basically I was completely open to anything that were to come my way. This is a dangerous state to be in, but at a point when your ego is at its lowest, lines are very blurred.

So there I was completely alone and lost in this mental space that was void of any familiarity. Nothing in this world made sense. The world did not function the way that I thought it did. And that very realisation shattered my reality.

It was in this state that I made some new friends in Uni who changed me for life. A large part of who I am today is owed to them. And I’m thankful, for both the good and the bad that came into my life at that point.

One of the best things that happened to me at that point was meditation. I found a friend in Uni who was starting up a small meditation club, and invited me to join. I decided to give it a shot, as nothing was really stable in my life at that point, I figured why not try meditation. To my surprise, it came absolutely natural to me. In retrospect, it could potentially be attributed to my meditation practice in my teenage years. However after years of not meditating, most newbies would find it hard to quieten the mind and sit still for a significant period of time. But I never had any issues at all. I could sit for 30 to 45 minutes continuously, entering deep meditative states, without any discomfort at all, feeling absolutely energised at the end of it. It was transformative. I had many surreal experiences when I meditated. It gave me this sense of calm and peace that nothing else was able to provide. More than anything, it sparked my interest again in spirituality and religion.

It was with these group of friends that I went on a trip to Bali, where I had my first drug-induced psychedelic experience. Good ol’ shrooms was the substance, and my mind was the subject. The experience was ethereal. Out of the world. I meditated while tripping, and my mind brought me to places that I never knew existed within the mind. Since I already had visual experiences with meditation without any stimulants, the psychedelics greatly enhanced elevated the experience. It was meditation on steroids.

It was at this point that I experienced something so phenomenal, that I became religious once again, stronger and more convicted than ever before. I started parading the ॐ (Om) symbol, wearing bracelets and ear studs with the symbol, and even hanging up the “Om” in my room. I was convinced of a God. Not one of the many idols of Gods that Hinduism possessed, but a single all-encompassing energy; the “Om” was the only thing that I connected with, at a very core level.

Om lies at the very core of the foundations of Hinduism. As Wikipedia states, the Om “refers to Atman (soul, self within) and Brahman (ultimate reality, entirety of the universe, truth, divine, supreme spirit, cosmic principles, knowledge)”. It was beyond what conventional Hinduism advocated and practiced, it lied at a much more philosophical level, almost at a personal level.

Ahaṁ Brahmāsmī, I am God

It was not much after this, that I happened to chance upon this book called “Vedanta: The Voice of Freedom”, which also happened to be one of the most transformative books in my life. It was in this book that I discovered the Hindu school of thought known as Advaita Vedanta. Advaita is the final episode in the journey of Hinduism, one of self realisation and spiritual enlightenment. It was the only non-dualistic school of thought (Advaita literally means “not-two”), stating that the self and the all encompassing Brahman were one, and that with this realisation, the soul will be liberated within one’s lifetime. This was in contrast to most other schools, which believed that the soul could only be liberated beyond death.

As the subject matter suggests, it was not something that could be easily comprehended or digested by most. It was no surprise that this was not a very popular school of thought, as it rejected the conventional Hindu practices and ideas of idol/multiple God worship completely. Most would not be able to relate to the idea of a non-dualistic God, as the idea of God itself was something external. Neither could I comprehend the ideas of the Advaita completely. However a fundamental part of me strongly connected with these ideas, and I was certain that I was heading in the right direction.

Ahaṁ Brahmāsmī was the core principle of the Advaita. “I am Brahman”, or simply put: I am God. This core philosophy changes everything about how the world functions. No longer was there an external force that was rewarding and punishing us for our deeds and sins. Everything was a result of our own thoughts and actions, and that of everything around us. Brahman was everything, everything was Brahman.

I am other than name, form and action.
My nature is ever free!
I am Self, the supreme unconditioned Brahman.
I am pure Awareness, always non-dual.

— Adi Shankara, Upadesasahasri 11.7, [5]

And the path to this realisation was only through acquiring of knowledge, in the right ways, without being subject to the biases and errors that our minds were commonly subjected to. “Correct knowledge, which destroys avidya, psychological and perceptual errors related to Atman and Brahman, is obtained through three stages of practice, sravana (hearing), manana (thinking) and nididhyasana (meditation).” While I had already been practicing the first two to some extent, the last one had been a recent practice, and it was necessary for me to consciously continue it in order to further discover the true nature of the Atman and Brahman. 

The Illusion of Control

Over time meditation became a part of my routine. I would meditate at least once almost everyday. My lifestyle had started changing tremendously. I embodied the self-discipline that was advocated to attain this enlightened state. I had completely given up my ill-habits of smoking and drinking and even the occasional joints. I started waking up proper and attending classes on time, completing assignments, and being more proper a student than ever before.

Meditation gave me control. Control over my thoughts and emotions. Control over my anxieties and fears. Meditation allows one to take a third person perspective in understanding one’s self, and become fully aware of the thoughts and emotions that pass through one’s mind. The quiet that people attain through meditation is not so much of silencing the mind as much as it was allowing the mind time to make noise and eventually it running out of things to say and becoming quiet. And all through this noise, as the meditator, we sit and observe these thoughts, analysing ourselves and our thoughts and actions.

While it certainly gave me a sense of calm and peace, it also made me more distant from others in my life. The deeper I got in touch with myself, the more distant I grew. I hardly hung out with any friends, spending most of my time alone. I figured this was why monks had to leave their families and societies and go into forests in order to truly achieve deep states of meditation. It was a lonely process, and the further you went, the lesser you could connect with others, knowing that they do not see nor understand the things that you saw. It was a process of self discovery, and discovery of the beyond.

A couple of months went by, and it got increasingly harder to maintain my stability within this state. The mainstream does not tell you about this, but there is a dark side to meditation. The opening up of the mind brings up strong sense of euphoria as well as keeps the mind in a state susceptible to deep depression. Everything is balanced and you cannot have the highs without the lows. And the deeper you get into meditation, the darker your thoughts can become.

What started off with me attaining a sense of control over my life, came spiralling to an overwhelming sense of loneliness and fear. I could not sustain much longer alone, the flame started to flicker, the fear of losing my sanity became imminent. The illusion of control was melting away.

Personal God or Devil?

As I was in this void of emptiness, struggling to sustain this flame of mine, there was a month of extreme transformation and enlightening drug experiences, where I think my mind craved company and social contact so much that it became attached to those whom I was talking to/ relatively closer to at that point in time. Some of these were my university friends whom I would then spend a lot of time smoking up with. Some were external friends, one of which then became my girlfriend. Some were older friends whom I reconnected with.

I was flooding myself with contact and company. Suddenly my dynamics had completely changed internally. I would feel low in energy while I was alone, and high in energy when I was with people. This was unusual for an introvert, especially one who puts in effort to avoid social interactions. I think I feared and despised that loneliness so much to the extent that some deep psychological change had happened (aided by some neural rewiring substances), making me more sociable and quite selfless in my social attachments.

However, the level of selflessness coupled with unrealistic expectations and faith in people and humanity led me to some very toxic relationships with all kinds of people over the next two years. From my girlfriend, to friends and even my employer, everything became an unequal toxic relationship.

Essentially, in retrospect of course, given that I had struggled to keep my internal flame sustaining while I was alone, whatever I had built back was entirely reliant on others. And while this made me a very humble and giving person, it slowly started to suck the life and soul out of me, making me incapable of giving to anyone at all.

Due to the kind of experiences I had within these relationships, my self control and state of calm slowly faded away, turning me into the very kind of person that I would hate. I became pessimistic, and people-hating. I grew into something so ugly and disgusting, I could not recognise myself anymore. What set out to be a path of discovering the personal god, Aham Brahmasmi, became a path of discovering the personal devil.

I hated myself.

A Universe of Selfs

It took me a lot to realise that I needed to get out of this self-destroying spiral, where I would do bad things and hate myself for it, and do even worse things, and hate myself more. It became a horrendous cycle, where I lost all self-worth and self-confidence. I lost the will to continue, as I saw no value in my existence. Thankfully I never went to the extreme of wanting to end my life. I had the will to live, I just didn’t know how.

So I started getting rid of everything and starting from scratch. In software engineering, when you cannot identify the cause of a problem, you start taking away everything and building it back part by part. Once you start building it and testing it at every stage, you will begin to discover where the problems lie.  A lot of times the bugs are never too apparent. Only when you strip down the program to its bare essentials will you be able to detect them.

This is where I started realising the fundamental problem in my life: I had surrounded myself with toxicity. And the reason was not others. It was myself. I had let it become that. And I let it get there by not ever taking time and energy for myself, never putting in effort to my own light, entirely depending on the light of others to keep me alive. Of course this would  work well if everyone else was equally selfless. However we do not live in a world of the selfless.

We live in a world of selfs.

Sorry not ‘world’.

A Universe of Selfs.

This was one of the biggest, most ground-shattering realisations that I’ve ever had.

That we as an individual, are at the core of the entire system of the universe. And without this individual element, the world, or the universe will not be what it is.

Everything in this universe is programmed to ensure its own survival. From the animate to the inanimate, everything is a self. Everything sustains itself. And everything else exists in a way that accommodates this self. Nothing can exist, while being invisible and non-obstructive. Every particle needs to establish its existence in one way or another, and everything else needs to acknowledge that existence in one way or another.

This means that every self will need to exert its individuality for the betterment of the whole. Because the more the self acts as an individual, the better the rest of the selfs become aware of this self, and the better they are able to coexist in harmony. Remove that self exertion, and it becomes very hard for the other particles to be able to be conscious in the way that they acknowledge this particle. This holds true from the quantum level to the cosmic level. Everything is an interaction of the self with its system.

Zooming back in from the abstract to something at the human level, the idea is that every individual is autonomous and independent in the way they perceive the universe and express themselves. Every individual is unique, and every other individual needs to accept and behave in a way that accommodates this uniqueness. At a societal level, in modern societies particularly, this might not seem very true, as we as a society seem to constantly emphasize on the need to be “normal”. However we see that this holds very true within our closer interpersonal relationships, with parents, friends and partners. This is the basis behind every relationship advice telling us to be transparent and open with our closed ones. The idea of transparency and openness is nothing more than the idea that the self needs to be fully expressive of its individual nature.

Apart from being open and transparent, the individual also needs to accept that his relationship with another individual is not necessarily indicative of their relationship with him. This means no matter how much you have invested in a relationship, how much you love them, how much you have shared with them, how much you have tried to give in to their needs and wants, or how much you have sacrificed in order to make them have a better life, they can choose to walk away at any given moment. While meditation and self-discipline Gurus would claim that a detachment is the answer, there is no amount of meditation, discipline, self control or mind control that can allow you to change the decision of another. The other will always decide as an autonomous self. It could be influenced or swayed, but ultimately the decision is still independent, and no amount of frustration or anger or sadness or manipulation can convince a mind that has made its decision.

And likewise no amount of external factors can manipulate a decision that was made in the depths of your mind. Every decision is a byproduct of your independent neural network, tirelessly working through the probable outcomes of multiple scenarios, evaluating past personal experiences, factoring in the good and bad decisions, and extrapolating them into future outcomes, making sure that it makes a wise decision for the sustenance of the self. You define your actions and decisions through every other action and decision that you have made. And while it might seem like every decision is a conscious logical decision that you have made, every decision is merely an output of the interaction of billions of neuron (selfs) within the mind, that makes you believe that you are in control.

We are nothing but an inter-connected + intra-connected network of selfs. 

There is no God(s). There is no meaning or purpose in life. There is no end. There is no beginning. We are just a bunch of particles floating around, knocking into each other, aimlessly. 

That, my friends, is the truth beyond all truths.

So where is God?

So if this were the truth, then why was there a God in the first place? Surely the great sages and enlightened souls in the past must have figured this out. Why then did they all still preach a God? Why did so many generations of people on Earth believe in a God (or multiple ones)? Why are there still billions in this day and age of science and technology whom fight and kill each other in the name of God? Why is there still a God? And where is he (or she)?

Well to be honest, nothing that the ancients said about God was wrong. Every description of God is fitting for what it is. God is the supreme ruler of the Universe. God is omniscient, omnipotent and omnipresent. God is within and without. Brahman, Allah, Yahweh, Jehovah,  or Shangdi, they all represent the same monotheistic almighty. The only issue is that as humans we used to viewing entities as wholesome singular elements. However God is not an element.

God is in the gaps.

What do I mean by gaps? Imagine all the selfs being orbs in a liquid. All aimlessly floating around. God lives in the gaps between those orbs. God is nothing but chance. Coincidence. Luck. Fate. Whatever you wish to call it. All that lies in the gaps. God is what creates that random encounters or interactions between these orbs. And while the orbs are independent and autonomous in its decisions, the history of its interactions with other orbs also influence the way in which the orb behaves, and the direction that it will end up moving towards. Therefore, the coincidental connections of random chance encounters is what we call meaning or purpose in our lives. If things go our way, we thank God and celebrate the greatness of the almighty. If things go bad, we get angry, annoyed and frustrated, increasing our piousness or simply accepting that God has better plans for us and made us go through suffering to learn a couple of lessons. Because of all the random elements of the past influencing and determining our present and future, we as humans try to connect the dots and find meaning and purpose in these elements. And because all these interactions are neither predictable nor consistent, we call it God.

If it were all up to chance and randomness, how is God omniscient? Imagine a super-computer simulating the interactions of atomic particles in an enclosed space. We have computers which are able to accurately map and predict such behaviour. This illustrates one point, that true randomness does not exist. Randomness is merely the complex interactions between multiple autonomous variables. However, as there could never be a super computer simulating a reality to the extent of the one we are living in (if there is  it would be highly likely that we are living in it), there could never be an all-knowing all encompassing entity. Chance and randomness will be the supreme ruler of us all. That is our God. That is whom we have been worshipping for millenia, waging wars and killing lives for. Going on long diets and trekking trips for. Being good and killing “evil” for. All for this unknown variable called chance. And the brilliance of it is that God can never die. While chance and randomness exists, God will exist.

As hard as we can try to understand and comprehend that chance or randomness, we are unable to. There are way too many factors involved in determining that randomness. So our enlightened ancestors decided to tell people that this was God. That everything was the work of God. And how He designed this universe for us to live and revel in. And all we have to do is follow the rules of the ruling state, sorry I mean God, in order to enjoy the greatest luxuries of life and the afterlife.

That’s about it.

That is what God is, and why there still exists a God, and why there always will be one.

The End.

The End?

Is that really the end? Are we fated to be stuck with Gods and religions for eternity? Will this war against religion continue till the dusk of time? How can we ever win this war?

I’ve good news. All hope is not lost, and there is still hope of a better future. One without God, and people living in harmony without the need for an invisible man in the skies. And we already see that shift slowly taking place across many countries all over the world.

As we become more connected as a global civilisation, breaking the many geographical borders and boundaries that have entrapped us for centuries, we become more understanding of the ideas behind religion, and behind other religions. We begin to understand how some of those values resonate with the fundamentals of human interaction, while some are just ridiculous rules that make no sense in the betterment of society. These realisations will increasingly make people either more open and accepting, or closed and defensive over the long held beliefs of a particular religion. Let’s just hope that the majority is on the right side (which is left).

Strong advancements in technology, particularly in the field of artificial intelligence and machine learning (yea I know you’ve heard enough of these buzzwords), can also deeply contribute to our understanding of the human mind, and how it learns and interacts with other minds. An accurate enough mapping of the human mind, and the ability to simulate such interactions virtually, might show us better that chance and randomness aren’t really that unpredictable, allowing us to better understand ourselves and operate in a way that maximises our cognitive capabilities.

However, God is necessary for these changes to happen. Until we come to a personal realisation that life is indeed inherently meaningless, and be okay with that reality, we need a support system for the millions and billions whom are hoping for a better life, and striving day and night in the name of God. God is needed for the change to happen organically. Ex-prisoners are the ones whom give talks about the importance of being mindful of our actions. Ex-drug addicts are the ones whom can give good advice on staying away from drugs. Likewise, only the ex-believers can become non-believers, live that life with conviction and give a good and clear reasoning behind the shortcomings of being a believer.

The ancients were right.

Only through God, can we attain true enlightenment and liberation.

~

 

It’s already April??! Is this year flying by or what?

In the span of 3 months so much has happened. So much.

I’ve quit my job. Twice. Yea that’s right worked 3 jobs within 3 months. Released a major music project, which was one of my personal bests. Performed 2 carnatic concerts. Attended couple of other really fantastic shows. Took up 2 significant photography projects, after more than a year of hiatus. Travelled and did some scuba diving. Finished a fatass book about human history. Became an atheist/nihilist. All in the midst of getting through one of the shittiest of breakups.

Guess the last line explains why I had so much happening in my life. Not being the most social of people, a lack of a partner gives me incredible amounts of time for myself. This has been both good and bad.

Good because I finally got the time and space to connect with myself, and build back the relationship with myself, which I had neglected for too long. A good understanding and relationship with the self is crucial in the building up confidence and clarity in a world full of rotten egos that constantly try to sway you. In many moments of just sitting alone in a cafe reading a book, or simply walking around listening to music and observing people, I experienced very strong connections with my own nature. Even my relationship with alcohol has improved tremendously, with nothing to hide I drink and get drunk and enjoy it instead of fearing I might humiliate myself. I have had so many conversations with just myself, out loud. My thought processes have gained clarity purely through such conversations with myself.

Bad because on some days it can get fucking lonely. Horribly depressing and lonely. That too with the absence of God to comfort me (newfound atheism is quite a bummer), shitty times can get really shitty. Especially when you need to put up an “I’m okay” front at home otherwise you get a million questions from your mum. Or a million other questions if you’re not home and come back late cause you just wanna sit somewhere outside for a while. I guess it is good in a way where it forces you to not spiral downwards, like I’ve done in my hostel days.

Nevertheless, some days you just wanna be sad. Soak in that emotion. In the loneliness. Let it consume you, completely. Welcome that darkness, that old friend that never left. For a few moments, you experience that helplessness, lie there accepting the harsh realities of life. And then you just pick yourself up back, wash your face and get back to life.

Moments like that connect you to reality, to the reality of life. To the temporal nature of things, and your eventual demise. It brings clarity to your existence. Makes you understand yourself better, and a little more about the ones around you.

I wouldn’t say I’ve gained clarity on life or my purpose or anything. I’m still lost, relatively. But minimally I know what I don’t want. I know the things that don’t deserve to be part of my life. I know which toxic environments and relationships to detach myself from. Even if it means risking the chance of going unemployed, losing a friendship or going broke. I am clear that my state of mind and being holds strong before anything else, and anything that is not helping with that growth is not worth investing into.

For the first time in my life, I have put myself before anyone or anything else. I always used to value others and their respect and relationships, putting myself after them to be the better person. But right now I don’t give a fuck. If you owe me money better pay me up, I don’t give a shit about losing a relationship over 100 bucks. If you owe me an apology, you better fucking apologise I’m not going to try and fix things. If you can’t provide me what I want, which usually is not much, then don’t waste my fucking time.

Just know that even though I might be lost, unstable and imbalanced, you ain’t gonna ever get the chance to walk over me.

In the past I’ve always believed that competition was stupid. Why compete with one another, when we should be helping one another achieve what we want to. Well the reality of things is a little more nuanced. Of course we should be helping one another, but we should also only be playing to winning. Otherwise, you might as well get out of the game. And the reason is because the ones who believe that everything is a competition, are the ones who are running the game. So the only way to change the game, is to beat them.

With everything in life, there is always a winner and a loser. And sometimes it is clear when you are on the losing end of a battle. But that doesn’t mean I’m going to let you win without a fight. Destroy me for all I care, I will still put up the best fight I can, and do everything to win.

Should be getting to sleep now. Next topic will be a much more detailed explanation on the choice of atheism, how I got there, and how it has changed my perspectives and behaviour.

Tata.