reflections

I deeply miss scribbling in my Notes app or in my journal about the softness of mornings. I miss taking the extra minute to taste the crispness of night, the crinkles of laughter I share with my friends when we’re out, laughing too loudly for our own good. I miss taking the time to reflect in writing, rather than the elegant scribbling that happens in my mind alone.

I wonder how this happened- where did the time ago? I don’t know if I feel shame(?) or if I even feeling anything towards having not written practically anything towards the middle of the year. This os what happened: this is me. My brain shifts into survival mode and amid the coronavirus and lockdowns in particular that now may seem like a faint memory, my reflecting in writing seems to fade. Not because I don’t have thoughts or emotions that need to be vomited onto paper. Not because I don’t consider writing a part of me (Debatable: writers write, non-writing writers are called…? Fill in the blank at your own risk). This is a brain dump of sorts. Why have I stopped writing?

Was is because I took on a research position and all I do is read, write and analyze? Was it because I lack inspiration? (This I’d argue because I found much artistic stimulation from music and even photography since I’ve put down the pen.) Drowning in my work and social life. Was it because I am trying to explore, and my ruminating brain voice is afraid of writing because writing forces you to frame the lingering truth?

Whatever the reason, I have been barely writing these rambles, which are my favorite sorts of pieces. I have so much to say add I hope you are patient enough to listen.

Sometimes i wonder what my life would be like if i was more attunded to the world rather than my thoughts. Wouldn’t i be happier?

Easier to digest. Less intense. As much as i love people and connecting with them. there are these moments when i feel so lonely in a crowd, in a group of stomach-deep laughter. Of course, i laugh and enjoy myself. Of course im happy. But sometimes i feel so deeply divorced from myself. Whoever that person is. Or maybe i fall deeper into myself in such moments?

As a teen, i thought these feelings of disarray would merge. But this part of seems to grow in size and morph into a shape i do not understand.

the adulting series: part 2

Once when I was fifteen, I cried while watching Peter Pan because that’s all I did at 15.  But that was nine years ago and I don’t cry anymore.

*

I can’t help but go through my Photo Library, and watch my brother’s birthday party in the past five years.  Back when he was 14 and shorter than me. Back when he still had some baby fat hanging in his cheeks and his teeth weren’t held by a train track of braces. Back when I was still in college and  and it snowed once so heavily in late January that the city turned quiet. Back when I thought that this world will make sense and my friends will always be my friends and that I had everything waiting for me. 

Listen, I can’t help but go through photos and notice the way my mother’s face was softer and gravity didn’t take lend it’s hand and my brother was once slim and my other brother didn’t wear baseball caps to hide the hair loss. I can’t help but notice how five years doesn’t mean much but God, five years can change the world.

I look at my college pictures with my over-plucked eyebrows and I was bird, and 10 kg lighter. Just another year waiting to open, to bloom, to stretch in the palm of my hands. Yet, time is so different now at 24. Next year, I’ll be 25 – that a quarter of century and some may call this a quarter of crisis. But look. Once upon a time, five years didn’t mean much. Just meant another school year, another routine, another thing to reach for. But suddenly this is mine and I can’t help but think why time hold so much meaning, and so much loss.

I need to remember to take more photos of Mama laughing  and we need to go out more and hold what life has to give. Sometimes I think that this is the last time I’ll be here and when I come back, I’ll touch everything that once was in different skin. Maybe in five years I’ll be married and have a baby to hold in my arms and I’m afraid I’ll forget to watch the time.

the adulting series: part 1

I’ve been thinking about loss lately. What it means to lose.

2019 is wrapping up and while I’m not a major fan of New Year resolutions, I’ve been doing some reflecting.

The end and the start of this year felt like a bowling ball tossed into its lane. Rolling and rolling into a curve while I watch along.

*

I’m realizing that a big part of being an adult is loss.

Life-long friends, family members, work spaces and even parts of myself. Parts of me that I’ve worn and no longer fit. After all, being a young adult means that things are constantly shifting. And I’m the type that’s always looking forward to what’s next. I’m truly grateful for all that I achieved and for the beautiful things that have happened to me on the way. Yet, I can’t help but think of the buildup of all things that aren’t here anymore. Yes, there are new things now. Some new things that I adore deeply.

But there are things that are gone and things that are going.

I’m realizing that a big part of growing, of adulting is grief. Grief, not mourning. Grief for the things,  for the people  you thought were constants. Grief for the time when life, friendships, and goals were simpler. Grief  for moving forward which means abandoning what hurts us more than what heals us, despite the closeness of it all.

I once thought I was a tree, anchored with the love and warmth I sprouted under. The soiled hands that planted me with patience and nourishment. I thought my roots only grow deeper and my branches soar higher as life would pass on. Now, I realize that being a tree is impossible. Maybe I’m a leaf in the wind, finding home in puddles, pipes, on stairs and alleyways. Maybe I have no home except where the wind takes me. Maybe that’s what it means to be an adult.

Things i am Learning:

  1. People disappoint. People are disappointing. People you love dearly disappoint. Everyone disappoints, including me.
  2. Stop treating everyone the way you are. Treat people the way they are. Remember, the way you process the world and react to it is not the same way others do. Recognize who and what you’re dealing with.
  3. People care about their self-interest. This goes without saying, but when you are so accustomed to being the “better person” that it’s built in your DNA-you become oblivious to how self-interested everyone is.
  4. You don’t owe anyone your energy. This includes your heart and most intimate thoughts. Just because you are a burning lightbulb doesn’t mean you need to share that light with anyone. You have no obligation to heal anyone other than yourself. Protect your energy. Protect. Protect.
  5. Please. Please learn to stop over-sharing. Learn to stop explaining.

scribbles that make sense

 

i think i know why i am afraid of writing my thoughts. 

writing gives me a place to feel. there was a time in my life where feeling was dangerous and so i abandoned all feeling. survival takes priority over self-expression.  i forgot how to write. or so i’ve convinced myself.

*

today i woke up and thought of you. i thought you were here in the room with me.

maybe you are the reason i am writing tonight. maybe i am afraid of writing because it reminds me of you.

*

so here i am again. redefining what it means to write. maybe there are parts of my identity i don’t want to write about… parts i don’t have to face. writing forces me to look everything in the eye, including myself. to slice and inspect. to think and label. the anatomy of my emotions and most intimate thoughts. maybe i don’t want to write because writing is too intimate, which is the very reason i once gave in defense of writing.

i don’t want to be honest with myself all the time and i guess that’s why i don’t write anymore. this is my most honest confession .

Warning, if anyone is actually reading through these, prepare yourself for some depressing shit-series ok?

Confession: I feel like everyone but me is happy and successful, living vibrant eventful lives, achieving their goals and i am just.

just.

simply. on hold.

“I think I’m destined to be unhappy, to be depressed, to have mood swings. Destined to feel deeply, be extremely vulnerable, feel every emotion to its fullest, be highly sensitive. I’m destined to never truly find happiness. In people, in the things I do, in my life. I’m destined to be like that because it’s in these times I am the most poetic, the most creative, the most “me”. ” 

quote i just found on tumblr subhanAllah. i truly feel like this is what i am destined to be- too in my head and almost on the verge of something great, just never there. Sure, anybody who has taken basic psychology will tell you that this a limiting thought, but these thoughts do exist and dictate our thinking.

Anyways,  i know this thinking is haram, as we accept what Allah has decreed for us, but sometimes i think: why is everything working so smoothly for xyz whereas i am just a circling in a spider’s web?

I don’t understand. I know based on my faith i should be patient and realize that even if i don’t understand, Allah (SWT) has chosen what is best for us. That I believe- my iman is just shaky lately.

Everything about me is an earthquake.