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One of the things that I was thinking really hard about was living an authentic life. I do not want to live a life dictated by society or others as much as possible, I would like to live a life that I want to live, you know.
So every moment of everyday I am asking myself is this bringing me closer to an authentic life. Is this action moving me forward or bringing me backward?
I want to focus my efforts towards bringing more yoga, and meditation into my life – because the more I focus on myself, physically and mentally, the more I feel myself coming into my own.
I am trying to get up at 4am every morning, and going to sleep at 9pm, so I can do some yoga or meditation in the morning. Lets see how that works out, I will modify it if it gets too strenuous. I find the morning hour to be when I work best, so I like getting up, doing some journaling, some yoga and meditation and doing a bit of reading, while I eat breakfast, after I shower and wear something pretty and funky.
I want to eventually become a travelling yoga instructor for a while – that is what my efforts right now are concentrated towards. I have already bought my real-estate – I want to focus my finances towards savings and retirement. Savings are going to be used for travel – when I leave for my next one to two year stint abroad.
I am going to teach as much yoga as I can in the next months, and I am still debating over whether I want to get a second job, so I can make some extra cash and save that as well. I find that I need my weekends to recuperate, so I would rather not put too much on my plate.
I am going to Burning Man, in August with some amazing people I met and made friends with in Thailand, absolutely great. Excited about that.
I want to go on a trip with my sister, to the grand canyon, because she’s leaving to Ottawa in August, I want to spend some quality time with her.
I have bought a digital voice recorder, a used one, and I am going to start recording some of my thoughts on there, and then, maybe put them on paper, see if I can publish them online somewhere in some yoga or spiritual journal.
Family and friends are definitely going to be a ongoing focus.
But also, I am going to majorly focus on myself, in terms of pampering myself – massages, buying a nice piece of clothing (something really different and long-lasting) one item per month, taking bubble baths, etc. I find that I have been giving too much of myself, which is causing me to be depleted and rundown and that is showing in my face with dark circles and I dont like it. I want to concentrate on myself and nurturing myself, with good food, not missing meals, eating well and healthy, eating every few hours to keep energy up, drinking smoothies with chia seeds in it.
I also want to start living creatively – dressing differently from what I always just put on, trying to meet a different kind of people, doing things differently in dating, not saying no to the guys I would normally say no to, not having rigid rules about random matters that I have in my head.
I have read some amazing books, and I want to keep on with that, but not just read, actually apply one item from each book into my life, so that I am actually using that knowledge, not just putting it in my head.
There’s some other stuff in my head – about being more connected to my body, my emotions and feelings. I feel like I am totally disconnected from my emotions and from reality, especially when it comes to being in relationships. I discount the reality of matters, and just focus on the love that I feel for the person. Nothing else matters anymore. That is something that will take a few tries to work out, but thats something I want to focus on.
I feel a lot of energy surging through my body due to the trip to the yoga retreat in Thailand, and I want to keep that up, by associating with people with the same aspirations as me, and removing negative influences from my life.
I want to also improve communications with my family – I feel like everything I do is so contradictory to what they want from their life, that I never talk to them about anything – but I want to try and change that slowly. I am totally disconnected from them as well. I spend too much time in my head, I want to spend more time in the physical world, in my body, in my environment, in my family relationships as well as my friends’ relationships.
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Living An Authentic Life
5 05 2012Comments : Leave a Comment »
Tags: authentic, Family, goals, Life, rules, society, status quo
Categories : Family, Fitness, Life, Money, work, Yoga
Sleepy
22 05 2011I’m so sleepy right now. I think sometimes that in my twenties I should go out every weekend as much as I can, dance my ass off, while I still have a great ass. Anyway, I was supposed to go to This is London nightclub, but the truth of the matter is that I hate that club. Most clubs are pretentious and snobby, but this club takes it to a whole new level. There is no getting in there without a guest list, as there are so many people who want to get in there. The cover is $20, which is extremely high in my opinion. We are going to be spending money in there on alcohol, why charge us an exorbitant amount to get in?
The people who come to this club are beautiful, skinny, well-dressed and ready for a good time. I have gone there and gotten the numbers of several guys out of which three actually texted me the next day, weirdly enough. Still, I do not like this club. I do not feel like going back there tonight. I will be going on my own, as the rest of the people who are coming are already downtown drinking it up. I hate standing in lineups in Toronto on my own, I do not mind doing that in random places like Bangkok, where I have no choice, but here it seems dire. I will be dancing with random people and making friends which I do not mind, but today it just seems a tiring choice. I would rather just go to sleep.
It was such a beautiful day today. Gorgeous, sunny and bright. I spent all of the day outside getting my Vitamin D on my porch swing, and I was so lazy. I did nothing. I mean nothing. I couldn’t even move a muscle. I just laid down, and was languid.
I just wanted to share with you what I am going to do on my long weekend. Which is a big nothing. Really, I got nothing planned. Is that sad? I am not sad at the thought of doing nothing, isn’t that weird? Before I would be unhappy if I had a weekend with nothing planned, I had to have something to do every weekend otherwise I felt useless, old, boring. Now, I am happy with the inactivity. I work tomorrow for a few hours, we have a family gathering tomorrow night, and Monday I do some chores, sit at home, spend time with family.
I hope you have a great long weekend. Happy May 24! Cheers!
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Tags: clubbing, cover, Family, nightclub, this is london, time, victoria day
Categories : Family, Relationship
Finding balance
1 05 2011I love my parents. I really do. Being in a nuclear family away from all of our extended family in India, living in the Middle East, I am close to my parents, extremely close to my siblings. I love them, but I cannot be the daughter they wish for me to be. I was hoping to have a balance of things, do all the things I wish to do in my heart, and still make sure that they are happy with my choices, but that balance is not to be. It is hard finding balance in life, it is hard enough without the external pressures that are constantly intruding upon you from your parents, family, friends, colleagues, media, role models, universe.
I want to live a different life. I find marriage to be such an antiquated boring way of living life. Of course, my parents have an argument for that. Right now you are young and hot, you are fine. As soon as you are old and ugly, no one will want you and then it will be hard for you to find a partner. Then, you will regret not finding someone then.
I find the modern view of success to be harmful to everyone around, environment, universe, self and family. My parents feel the only way I will ever find happiness, or be able to help the other poor souls on this planet is by becoming successful. My father says, you cannot help others, if you need help yourself. If you are poor, who are you going to help? The best way to help others is by becoming a millionaire, and then giving away your wealth, like Bill Gates is doing.
I believe the environment needs help right now. There is waiting, there is no debating whether global warming is happening or not, there is no later. Right now is when we need to start working on helping Mother Earth. My parents, especially my father, doesn’t see anything wrong with the way we treat the environment. He believes technology will always find an answer. There is nothing technology cannot do, he says proudly.
As you can see from the examples above, we are from opposite viewpoints. It is hard finding a balance, finding a meeting point, when we are so far apart in space, we can barely see each other.
I do not want to lose my relationship with my parents. They are important to me. But at the same time, I refuse, refuse, refuse to bend the way I want to live my life to their way, so I can keep our relationship intact. I refuse! I am going to live the way I want, without fear of criticism. I refuse to relent to pressure.
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Tags: balance, conflict, Family, Relationship, technology
Categories : Family, Life, Relationship
Accomplishments over the past year
18 04 2011Okay, I have some thoughts to share with the universe and with my readers of course. I’m really happy with the way some of the thoughts I have been putting out in the universe have been received. They are getting accolades and that makes me very happy indeed. I just realized that I will be reaching the one year anniversary of my return from my trip abroad at the end of the month, April 26th. It is crazy how fast time has passed. It feels like just yesterday that I was on a beach in Goa with Ritz, just chilling and getting burnt. And now its been a year since that event, more than a year, and yet, it feels like moments have passed.
I was thinking about last year, and what I have accomplished in that year, and I feel proud of myself. I have managed to put in almost 15k into my loan repayment, without actually having a full-time job, which in itself is an amazing accomplishment, I must say. I have this feeling inside of me, oh, I cannot pay off my loans, unless I have a full-time job. That is a stupid feeling, a weird feeling, an unnecessary feeling, and that is the reason, I do not believe in it anymore. I do not need to have a full-time job or a high-paying job to pay off my debts. I am doing great the way I am going at it right now. In one more year, I should be almost at the end of the debt-paying journey, which is kind of a feat, I believe with a server position part-time that too.
I have made some great new friends, Carly, Michelle, Zina, Tom, Anna, and I have made friends with a politician in my backyard which is nice. I have learned a lot about politics and gotten involved in my community. I have read at least a hundred books in the past year. I have gone out a great deal and partied it up in my twenties, as I wished it to be. I have been going to yoga since I came back from my trip, so I have been going to yoga constantly without any breaks for about a year. I have taken a bartending lesson, which helped me with my getting a physical, movement job. I have been spending more time with my family and loved ones, which is nice.
I have been using cash only for the past six months, and using my credit cards only for rare online purchases. The cash is king idea is so helpful to people in debt. It has helped cut down my spending by 80%. I feel uncomfortable now putting anything on my credit or debit card. I use only cash that I have on me. I don’t even carry my cards with me anymore, they sit at home in my purse. I have cut down on my personal belongings. I have given away all the clothes I do not use, and I have cut down my cosmetic jewelery garbage by giving that away to a craftsperson. My life feels less cluttered, in every way possible. I have cut down as well on the number of activities that I say yes to. If I feel too overwhelmed I just say no. I do not try to do everything.
I have finished writing my first book about my travels abroad. I have grown my hair so it looks nice. I am in the best shape of my life with yoga and eating healthy. I am learning more about where my food comes from to figure out whats in it. I have been using fewer chemicals in my home and body, less product, and less cosmetics. More natural. The only product I really use is eyeliner. I use a natural eye cream, cocoa butter for my body lotion, aveeno naturals for my face morning and night, and lipbalm. I use natural coconut oil for my hair to make it soft and condition it.
Looking back, I feel good about this year and what I have accomplished in it. Onto the next year and a lot more good stuff to come.
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Tags: accomplishments, book, Family, friends, goa, goals, happiness, india, Travel, year
Categories : Fitness, Food, Life, Money, Reading, Relationship, Travel, Universe, work, Writing
Argument over values
18 04 2011My parents are very mainstream in their beliefs, and that has worked amazingly well for them, propelling them to the higher rungs of success over the last fifty years. Of course, they are going to assume the same rules apply in the new world, but I disagree vehemently. The rules of the jungle have changed. A good job after a good education isn’t the key to happiness, even though it might be key to variable success. And what could possibly be more important than happiness?
I was in yoga class yesterday and the yoga instructor believed that unless you are pushing yourself over the edge and always growing, you are not actually living. I wanted to get up and yell out, that is so not true. This has been fed to us over the hundreds of hours of advertising and schooling, by which we are taught the rules of the jungle, but it is not true. We are conditioned to believe that, because then we are a good working part of the cogs of society, of an industrial society wrecking havoc on their environment. Just because we are growing and pushing ourselves, doesn’t mean we are happy. Sometimes, pushing ourselves again and again, is like beating our head against a steel door, absolutely useless. It doesn’t result in anything, and it causes us to feel guilty and self-loathing because we are unable to get the results that are expected of us.
I also realized that I have to reexamine my money beliefs. Money is important, I know that. It is necessary. It is absolutely needed for the basics in life, food, shelter, clothing, heat, water, and time with friends and family. It is good, and needed. But the thing I argue with my parents is that, I do not need a lot of it. I do not need to be a millionaire, I do not need to be a billionaire, I need just enough. Enough to take care of myself, and enough to be able to travel around the world, and do the things I need to do. I do not need a lot, I need enough of it. I know my parents come from a different mentality, they were poor when they were young, they always feel like they never have enough money, even if they were millionaires, they would still feel like there’s never enough. My mother said, that she doesn’t have enough money to give to others. I got angry at that. We have so many family friends, who spend thousands and thousands of dollars on gold jewelery. Absolutely useless jewelery that sits in the bank’s safe year after year. But they complain that they dont have enough money to give to the needy. That annoys me.
I am not the paragon of humanity, by any far stretch. I am a normal selfish, prideful, egotistic, rude, and other weird qualities-filled human being. I have my good moments and more than that, I have my bad moments. I haven’t given money to the needy in two years, since I had my last full-time job. I give one or two dollars here and there to the homeless people I pass. But I give time, I try to give time to the endeavors around my community. I try and give what I can, what I do have.
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Tags: argument, community, different, Family, giving, Money, needy, parents, values, volunteer
Categories : Family, Life, random, Relationship
You dont have to go it alone
14 04 2011What is this urge inside modern human beings to go it all alone? Why do we feel like we alone are carrying the burden of everything on our shoulders? Why do have a hard time accepting any kind of help from any other mortal? What is wrong with the scenario, where we believe we are the only ones experiencing a certain kind of dilemma, when thousands others are probably in the same situation as you?
I am the prime example of the go it alone human being. I have this need to do everything by myself. Why should I ask for help? That will just make me seem weak and no one wants that, do they? Some examples of when I should ask for help, but dont, are
- when I am applying for jobs, asking others for references or asking them to give your resume out to the HR person in their company is a good move.
- when I am dealing with a bad relationship filled with trauma and heartbreak, the best thing to do in such a situation is go to your friends and pour all your anger, frustration, sadness out.
- when I am dealing with a bully at work, the best thing to do is talk to your boss, and the people around you to see what they think you should do, just the fact that you are spreading the word about the stupid bully could make them stop.
- when I have an ailment that is kind of embarrassing, the best thing to do is to talk to someone, a doctor, a specialist, your girlfriends, and most importantly, your mother, there is a chance they have been through something similar to you, they could tell you better what is going on than the internet.
- when you have a big event in your life coming up, like a beauty pageant, or a convocation, telling your loved ones is the best thing to do, you get thousands of hours of support from them, you get monetary support if you need it, without asking, and if you need any other help, they will mobilize their friends and their friends’ friends to ensure you get what you want.
- when you have a dream that you have been harboring for a long time, but you are afraid to talk about it, because it seems too big, bigger than anything you have ever dreamed, impossible in its bigness. That is the time, you bring in the big guns, your family, your siblings, your friends, your supporters, the people who will support you through thick and thin, you will be there for you when your audition or your dance off doesn’t go as planned. You need them there, do not go at it alone.
These are just some of the examples of when you shouldn’t go at it alone, I’m sure there are others like weddings, pregnancies, abortions, illness, emergencies, and so on. Remember – DO NOT GO AT IT ALONE, Rally your supporters and you will come out stronger for it.
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Tags: alone, dream, emergency, Family, friends, illness, not alone, support, weddings
Categories : Family, Relationship
Co-housing
5 04 2011
I have been reading this amazing book by David Wann, called Simple Prosperity: Finding Real Wealth in a Sustainable Lifestyle. I absolutely loved the book – it has amazing information on how we are affecting the balance on Earth and in Mother Nature and how there are people all over the world, trying to live differently, reducing their carbon footprint, making their living carbon-neutral, in different ways. One of the major things I took out of the book was about Sustainable housing. I consider myself an environmental nut, and I know my family considers me somewhat of a recycling nut. I bring back Styrofoam cups from a restaurant we would go to, to recycle them at home. But I know that the housing that I share with my parents, that is owned by my parents, is highly unsustainable. I tried to do little things like recycle as much as possible, keep the heat down, only use the dryer and washer at night, plant a tree to increase the shade in the area, grow a vegetable garden, but I know there is much more that can be done.
I liked the idea of Co-housing that David Wann advocates for in the book. It is an interesting way of living. I especially like it because it brings back the feeling of community into the world. It feels like you have your own space, your own house to get back into when you need privacy, but that you are living in a joint family, where everyone living around you is a family member or a friend. You actually know the people who live around you, communicate with them, eat with them, play sports with them. You share resources with them, they help you out when you need a hand. There are so many ways Co-housing is better than the way suburbs are built nowadays. I could give a thousand examples in which if we only knew our neighbors well enough, we would have saved a few dollars and a lot of time. For example, yesterday my car battery died. I called CAA. If I knew any of our neighbors, we could have asked them to jump start our car. If we lived in co-housing, we wouldn’t need to ask, everyone would be there around us, asking us questions, asking if they could help, helping without being asked. We spent $50 for a jumpstart, when we could have just made stronger bonds with our neighbors in a co-housing community.
In addition, suburbs break down the balance in nature that is around them. They use up too much of the land to build the sprawling neighborhoods with no access to proper transit, cut down trees that have been around for hundreds of years, and use up a lot of resources to build and to maintain. Our heating and cooling costs for this huge house are astronomical. We cringe every time we have to pay the bills. It is a source of pride to my parents to live in a mansion like this, coming from where they were born, in the slums of India. But of course, it is not sustainable at all.
I would like to propose something. I am going to live in a co-housing setting in Canada. I used to always think I would like to live in downtown Toronto. That seemed really cool to me. Living next to all the happenings. And I might still do that while I am in my clubbing years, but after that, I believe I will find a nice co-housing setting to live in. I was researching some options and I found there are loads of co-housing in British Columbia, but very few in Ontario.
One that I found was GreenSong. Another one that I liked was Eden Mills, where the village is going carbon neutral. Check both of these out and let me know what you think.
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Tags: carbon neutral, cohousing, community, eden mills, Family, friends, green, greensong, housing, suburbs, sustainable
Categories : Green, Life
Technology and loneliness
5 03 2011I am sitting on our couch on a Saturday night. It is raining outside, and it is comfortably cozy inside. The fake fireplace is burning, and I am snuggly under a fleecy blanket. I have a great book on my lap and I am reading, listening to the tap-tap of the raindrops against the window next to me. It is a quiet, unhurried, small existence, and I am happy with it.
I am thinking about an ad I saw. It was about a typical American family like ours. Everyone is on their own laptops or iPhones. No one is communicating with each other, they are all in their own worlds. A lot of nights the whole family will be at home together, but in separate rooms, watching separate televisions and/or on separate laptops and cellphones.
Technology is amazing, I’m not dissing it for sure. Having traveled in places where there was no electricity at night, or even during the day, or running water, I am all for technology. Heat, Light and Running Water is crucial. Without it, you feel lost as a human being. But I find that Technology is definitely driving us apart as family members and human beings. We do not have conversations, we do not play board games, we do not have family game nights, we do not sit on the dining tables and have dinner together. We meet each other for a few minutes in the morning at the door while we are speeding out the door, or a few minutes at night when we come to the kitchen to grab something to eat. Otherwise, we stay locked up in our rooms, in our nests.
I found that I was spending so much time on my own in my room, that I would get antsy if someone came around to my room, and sat down next to me on the bed, or stood in my room asking me a question. I would get antsy if I came downstairs from my room and saw everyone sitting there in the family room. I was definitely absolutely avoiding spending time with my parents in the family room. I would leave the room the instant someone else came into it. Why did I get that way?
Even now, I have to force myself to sit down and stay in a room when there are others in there. But weirdly enough, after all that forced solitude, I feel lonely and alone. I feel like going out and being around loads of other random people in a bar. Is that really rational? A rational way of spending my time? I definitely do not think so.
Technology is definitely making us feel lonelier, because we let it divide and conquer. We need to be cognizant of the fact and make sure, we spend time with the people that matter, without the added accompanied electronic devices.
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Tags: alone, Family, loneliness, lonely, technology, time
Categories : Family, Relationship
Some thoughts on life
23 08 2009I have never been the proponent of the saying, ‘ Life sucks, and then you die.’ You must have heard of that one, its an odd one, isn’t it? It must have been written by some crazy pessimist. But I have always tried to be an optimist, tried being key. Its always hard isn’t it? Sometimes, people try to be optimists, by having no expectations at all. I wont expect anything, so then I will not be disappointed. But is that really a good way to live? I dont think so. I think you should have great expectations, high expectations, but expect 90% of them to fail. 90% of them will bomb, and you should expect it to bomb. One great example is your birthday. Isn’t that just the biggest expectation of all? The older you get, the less you expect, but you still expect. If it wasn’t for my family, my birthday would be just another day in the book. Should it be just another day in the book, should we really celebrate one more year passing us by? Maybe we shouldn’t celebrate that particular day, but every single day that we are living, But thats another debate for another day. I have never had a good experience with birthday parties. Some bdays I have had no one show up, with me standing there holding the birthday cake that I bought and the balloons that are slowly losing their helium. Some bdays I spend too drunk to remember what happened, and then wake up with an ugly hangover. The best ones are those where I spend my night holding my friends’ hair out of the toilet bowl, while she proceeds to puke her guts out.
I wouldn’t curse someone else with the birthdays that I have had. This year was the same. But my family pulled through for me yet again. I wonder what I did to deserve such amazing family. My sister came with me to my birthday and we partied it up like it was 1969. Or 2000. It was amazing, there was booze, there were good-looking guys and there was flirting galore, my kind of party. I danced all night, I looked amazing and it was a hit.
Which brings me to my other relevation (the first being no more birthday parties), never ignore your family. Oh sure, you read the lines and said, I never do that. But think about it. Remember that time in college, when you fell in ‘love’ for the very first time, and all you could think of was that guy, day and night, night and day. Every thought of yours was for that guy (or girl). I made that mistake as well. I was in a relationship haze for 2 years, all I thought about was him, and I ignored my family and friends. Stupido! Molto Stupido! I just slapped my face against my hand as hard as I could. I realize now, that there is a priority list in which you should hold everyone dear to you. First comes you, yourself, and I. You are the most important thing to you, because no one will care about your dreams as much as you will. If you dont put yourself first, you will resent everyone else, and spend a lot of your time complaining. No one needs that. Put yourself and your needs first. Second, is your family. You should put your family on a pedestal, especially your siblings. They are your only link to your past, and they are the only ones likely to stick with you. Stick with them like glue. Third, comes friends. Seriously, guys come and go, but friends stay forever. You will rarely see a guy sacrificing his friends for his girlfriend. Its usually the other way around. We girls, need to learn to do that as well. We just have to.
Last, but least, comes the guy. Take care not to give to him, more time or energy that you can afford to give, after you have given to the three avenues above. It will exhaust you. You are not superwoman, no one is. No one expects you to be either. Here’s the list again for easy reference:
1. YOU
2. Family
3. Friends
4. Partner
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Tags: birthday, Family, friends, guys, Life, relationships
Categories : Life, random
