Woes of an Overthinking Mind

Living in the deep canoes and burrows of an over-worked overthinking mind, writing an account of the fundamental woes makes perfect sense.

Overthinking is like the pestering, itching skin of winters, it is like a bad addiction which is not visible to people around us but deep inside it is hampering our peace of mind, our growth, and our happiness.

One of the common phenomena of an Overthinking Mind is thinking about the Other. Now, literary thinkers might want to debate on the subordinate and secondary status of the Other, but, for the Overthinking Mind, the Other is above Self.

With constant thoughts and anxiety about the Other’s thought for each millisecond of a second, we practically live in the minds of the Other. Our lives are not ours but of the Other and collective Others.

Each activity we undertake, each word we speak, each action we perform, we don’t think how it would affect us? Instead, we think how the Other would perceive it and this gruesome task is not over here, we analyze it, we build a complete novel on it. We assess their take on it, how would it shape our image in their minds and this goes on and on till we are preoccupied with another act of ours and the perception of Others on it and this goes on and on.

This post is to put it out to the world, what it is like living in such a mind. What it is like scrutinizing each thing you do and not from your perspective, but that of the world.

It is not easy, and there is no end to it, however, the realization of a possible solution dawned on me and it’s time I share it with the world, with people like me.

It goes like this, whenever you have the urge to go on the dreaded ride of self-exploitation, just stop! Yes, STOP. What is done is done, and the reaction of the Other is not in your hand, it is arbitrary, it is like the unforeseen future with endless possibilities and we are stuck on just some of the many. So, it is time to stop.

It’s like the roll of dice you don’t know what number would come up and neither can you control it. Then why go through the gruelling affair of something that doesn’t even exist.

When we can’t stop the Other from building their perception why are we stopping ourselves from doing what we want? Why are punishing ourselves for our instincts, when we are clearly valuing and blindly accepting the Other’s instincts on our actions.

Write that message, post that picture, say what has been bothering you and stop, stop before you think what the Other would think, thinking about yourself instead. With the new year around the corner, this is one of the crazy resolutions I have given myself and to the world of beautiful minds like me.

Why not to say Sorry?

We all live in the modern age, the fast paced modern age, where each day is a new trend. Of the many trends of our time, “Sorry” is the most trending!

On an average a person says sorry at least 8 times a day, and this is the lower limit! Yes, that’s around three thousand times a year.

Without a hint of doubt I can say that you’ve been either at the recieving or the giving end of it for most part of your life.

The word in itself was not made to have negative connotations, actually it’s one of the golden words: sorry, thank you, please… But, is it the same today?

I feel like the word is doing more harm than good. It’s the most harmful and useless word, the use of which should be refrained.

“Sorry” is like a stain remover which rinses us of guilt for whatever it is that we did wrong and absolves us of any feeling of being wrong. It’s like “Sorry” is the fastest bullet train to redemption minus any feeling or guilt.

The sad part of being a human is “To err”. There’s no way you can ensure that you are right always, and that you aren’t hurting anyone, or that whatever you do or say is always correct! However, the good part is that we always have the opportunity to grow, learn, updat, become a better version of ourselves with each mistake.

But, do you know how that happens? There’s no magic or rocket science behind it. It’s actually pretty simple, as simple as breathing! It’s actually “Realization”, that makes it all happen.

The moment we realize we are wrong;the moment we feel the guilt, that moment is the trigger which makes us understand what went wrong. And once you know that, you can pretty much fix it and make sure it’s not repeated! That’s how we grow.

But, today, Mr. Sorry has become the best friend of everyone! We are hooked to him, we have made him the part of our lives, we use him, we never forget him, and we would never ever abandon him. Till death do us apart! In return Mr. Sorry promises to take away all our guilt, shut the door to any realization and devoid us of any learning!

Or, maybe Mr. Sorry is being exploited by us filthy humans. We use him as and when we want, we have ravished him of his meaning, left him with nothing, only a soul less, meaningless word.

We use sorry as an easy-to-use shot to make ourselves immune to any and all guilt. We hide from responsibility behind the shadow of “sorry”.

It’s time that we realize and stop just saying sorry! Sorry won’t set things straight, it won’t undo your wrongdoing, it won’t stop the hurting.

Realization is the real deal, we need to stand up and own our mistakes, accept our faults and understand where we went wrong, so that we don’t just know it, we improve it.

The problem is we are looking for salvation outside, while everything is inside! Our happiness, sadness, conflicts and resolutions, everything is inside us. So is our redemption, we just need to accept! With acceptance comes acknowledgment, and with that we let go of whatever it is that we did wrong, and that’s when we are truly sorry. We realize and we accept.

Maybe we are running away from our own flaws? Maybe the idea of being right is so ingrained that we fail to accept that we might be wrong too? And that we can still grow!

Let’s not stop growing, learning and evolving. We can’t stop making mistakes but we can make them right! It’s time we bring back the meaning to it!

The Fault in our Dreams?

Standing at a point, at the junction of floating in the faraway world of reveries of future and the dawn of reality, aims and ambitions make you go through this question again and again and you ask your own self where are we going wrong? When life really begins, freshly out of college or after completing studies when you finally have to come face to face with reality and the brutal real world the dreams stop visiting, they do it gradually, and slowly until you are left with nothing but the real world outside, where actions have to be taken and dreaming won’t serve the purpose and so leaves quietly…

Being there at that standpoint of the reality, I couldn’t help but wonder is our ambition the fault in our dreams?

There are all kinds of theories out there, some push you to activity while others toss you into the passivity of predestination… But the one thing that happens is that deriving conclusion can be a legwork! While growing up we all dream, have ambitions of doing great in our lives, achieving the goals, earning the best, we all have ambitions, but, are those the ambitions the reason of our unhappiness?

I sometimes wonder at ambitions of my own self and ponder over the whole point of having one when apparently some dreams and ambitions are too big to be true, is there anything like that? When reality thwarts those ambitions and crumbles them down, what’s left except sadness and disheartenment!They make us go out of our boundaries and constraints and apparently to those unachievable targets which turn us into a shooting star and does more harm than good! The whole crisis that the modern man faces is actually due to their ambitions, they want to go up and this makes them restless, tensed and the whole life is spent in this modern crisis of the modern man! It does not let us be content or happy in our own lives that we live and disturb us psychologically, physically, and emotionally. Makes us go against the social order, the class order, and challenge the accepted, makes life troublesome, endless struggles and full of dissatisfaction…

It seems to me like the “Fatal Flaw” the “Hamartia” of the modern man just like the classic tragedies, the protagonist has a fatal flaw which results in the downfall or the tragedy. Well, ambitions seem to work the same way. Is it good to have ambitions? Is it bad? Should we abandon all our ambitions for a “happy life”? Is it the flaw in our dreams?

I probably don’t know the answers for I myself am looking for them. But I know one thing for sure if we won’t have ambitions we won’t have any driving force to get out of our living conditions. What would push you into working for something better? True, it can make you unsatisfied and sad when not realized but the present conditions don’t make you happy anyway, hence, the ambitions! But yes, only ambitions won’t solve the purpose we need to pull our socks and work in the direction that ambition gives us! That’s my take on ambition you can share yours, perhaps you have got a better answer to the questions we have every day! If not anyone, the answers to these may help your own self.

The Anti-hero

If life’s a film, then the most celebrated “rationality” is that exemplary protagonist who is celebrated unquestionably! And if there’s a hero, there ought to be a villain, and here comes the nasty villain no one wants in their movie, “Life”, irrationality, the quirky, weird qualities’ goon that is shunned from the movie even before it is seen.

But what’s amusing is that life cannot be without this “anti-hero”. We all have two sides rather more than two sides if we go into the details and that most certainly doesn’t mean that everyone is deceitful or a hypocrite, no, not in the least. We all have a quirky, and an irrational side which we beat down to the deepest, and darkest corners of our self!

I couldn’t help but wonder, why is rationality and always logical, and “normal” the undefeated hero? Yes, it is important and required but why is it the autocratic ruler of our self? Why are we all ashamed or afraid to be different, to be a little insane, to be irrational, to be our own self, unapologetically, and unabashedly? we are not always obliged to make sense or to feed to the intellectual, normal, society and our self, we don’t always have to impress others! Impress yourself, satiate your quirkiness and weird self you think people won’t like, first.You’re not always expected to behave with the utmost sanity, without even realizing the silly, stupid, goofy, weird, and quirky self is dying! We are ashamed of it to even accept it as our part. Why don’t we embrace the twin of our hero, the anti-hero? Perhaps we are too afraid to be out of the “normal” when actually normal is nothing but the consensually accepted norms. There’s always a squeaky voice that asks you to do something that your hero, won’t permit, and thus, we shush it down and compose ourselves to the “accepted” side of our personality!

What scares us more often than not is that people won’t accept it and we would be a fool even without the wacky red nose! This anti-hero is actually that goofy element that makes the movie of life entertaining, agile, and, well, enjoyable! Stop being afraid of that quirky, weird you, if you’ll embrace it then only others would, and those who don’t, well, aren’t they too dull and monotonous anyway! If we kill this anti-hero, we kill the fun! Let’s all embrace this silly little side and make life fun.

Be the happy, quirky, weird self. Unapologetically.

The tale of being a grown up!

The most difficult thing to do is to try and sleep when in the middle of the night, out of nowhere you are stuck with a random thought which wouldn’t let you sleep! This time it was about being a “Grown up”, “An adult”, yes, the reaction after reading the preceding lines would be, oh again the same old topic, oh it is usual, yes we know it… and so on. Well, wouldn’t blame that, since it actually is the one thought that everyone, every single person gets once in his or her lives. But, it is quite difficult to suppress your feelings of expression, after all, history knows it, the insuppressible need of expression has landed many in trouble!

The one thing that is so heartbreaking about growing up is “reality”, oh yes, it hurts like a motherF… all the “fantastic” thoughts and beliefs and ideas, on appearing in the battleground of life as an adult, fail! Yes, people, lie; yes, to that extent; yes, it won’t always be a happy ending; yes, the good times won’t last forever; yes there are more misses than hits; yes adults cry too; yes forevers are actually not forever! When those ideals and ideas are failing the test, in reality, you see that it is not all hunky-dory and bright and shining always as you always dreamt of it.

All we secretly desire when we are little is to grow up and finally be an adult, and all we secretly think when we are an adult is that when did we grow up? when did we get “so adult”? When did we grow up so much that we don’t even have time to watch our favorite series, to catch up with the lazy noon nap…

When we finally step in the shoes, we see the world like an enthusiastic all positive with all the high spirits we have, which fade real soon! We realize we got to deal with everything on our own and boy, there are many of them! You get to know it is not a fairy world and the moral fables and tales you grew up with are nothing but a farce. And there’s nothing wrong with it, for it is just a phase, where you are too shattered and everything seems nothing but a big lie fed to you since childhood, but, it is a phase. Soon you will find the meaning again and even sooner you’ll lose it again. You would know that even though you are now free to do what you want but you will also realize the responsibility that freedom will bring along. The world would become so scary that you wouldn’t want to face it, and be a part of it anymore. But, soon something would cross your path that would restore you back into the game. You would learn to let go and know that it is not always painful and actually, that is when you are the real adult. When you are ready to face your shit and take care of it as well, that’s when you are an adult! When you aren’t scared anymore that’s when you are an adult.

“Small issues will be small and not the hype, moving on happily will be your type, and that’s when you know you are ripe”

We feel bruised, hurt, and vulnerable all of a sudden, we cannot get to terms with being “unprotected” in the real world. We walk, we run, we stop, we fall, we get hurt, but the best thing about growing up is that we stand up again! We HEAL! Yes, we become strong, the slightest pinch that would have made us cry for hours now mean nothing, the biggest falls we face and still we are back on our feet, that, is the beauty of growing up!

We learn, we upgrade, we move on, we move high, and low sometimes… yes, it is difficult, yes, it is horrific, but trust me, you’ll go through this… and that’s what being a grown up is! We’ll get through everything and rise above all! And with time we’ll have a bulletproof armor around us too (metaphorically, though)! Here’s to being an adult and loving it!

Converting preaching into practice?!

We all are a big fan of preaching and we all have, at least once, been on the preaching side of the situation and oh! what we become then! And being into one such situation, while preaching, it hit me, why are we so good at preaching and not practicing? I couldn’t help but wonder are we putting all our preaching into practice?

It’s a known and established fact that the one with the best solutions is generally the one who is with the maximum problems! And that is true. The moment we step into the shoes of preaching and the advisor, we become the sane, all-knowing problem solver. Somehow being an advisor and a preacher is always easier and we all are best at it. But, when it comes to practicing, are we so efficient?

Days of thinking and after many rounds of “intra-brainy” debates, I think I’ve found a probable reason behind it. When we preach something or someone, we are distanced and the personal bias is removed with all the personal barriers, we become the objective person who views from the objective vantage point angle. And then we become the unbiased advisor which is easy because we have an objective, detached, and unprejudiced reading and thus, giving valuable words of wisdom becomes pretty obvious. We distance ourselves and the moment we are not personally connected to it, we become stronger, rational, aloof, and neutral, hence, the perfect advice comes out. Yet when we come to ourselves in a problem, it feels like being in the eye of the cyclone and we have no clue what to do and how to because it’s all happening and moving so fast. We are clouded by all our personal weaknesses and, all our wisdom, well, goes right out the window in a bag with all our rationality.

However, I feel somehow all this can be solved too. For there is a solution for every problem including this one! So, next time when all us wise preachers are in some trouble we ought to practice what we preach! The wisdom showered on others while being a preacher to them can very well be redirected to our own selves, because, hey, you are the same person who had the astute preaching going for others, you can do it well for yourself. The only trick needed here is, be the distanced objective reader (which you are while preaching others) for yourself. Be distanced and view it objectively, detach yourself and let your rationality work for you. Trust me you will the best advisor for yourself and then practicing what you preach would not be a far cry!

The company of self

Company has been an important aspect of our being human, we are social animals and being in a company is, therefore, an important aspect. We are always with someone and want to be too, but, being in my recent social “detoxification” phase I realized the importance and the need of being in the company of self! I couldn’t help but wonder the value of the most important company ever, of the self!

The importance of the company of others is highlighted already when we say a man is a social animal, that says it all! Moreover the fact that “you are as the company you keep” also drives the idea home. Everybody everywhere focuses on the importance of being in a company, being with someone, but I fail to find the same emphasis put on spending time with oneself which is much important than how ridiculous it sounds!

I believe we are a complete universe in ourselves which we don’t even know about and how would we know when we don’t spend time with that universe laying hidden in us. When we are in the company of others, we somehow forget ourselves. What all we think then is, how we are being perceived. We hold ourselves someway or the other, we dictate ourselves by the judgment of our company. We are embracing them in the process and our own self is neglected somewhere. True, we need the other to define the self, but that’s to describe ourselves and not explore ourselves.

And after dealing with so many people and so many universes inside each one of them, our own self is overwhelmed, it gets buried under that and perhaps that’s why it takes as long as the complete lifetime for many to explore themselves. There’s a need to cut-off from the hustle-bustle of the social circus and be with our own self. We go out with others to know them well, how about spending some time with yourself and getting to know yourself better? Sounds pretty novel and interesting to me! After all, we need to know our own self first before anything else and get comfortable with the idea of being our self. Explore our own self, know us a better, go on a date with yourself and love and embrace your beautiful self, and all your relations with others would change! Give this to yourself!