SELF ACCEPTANCE

The Dark Mirror

Looking at the mirror you see a reflection looking back at you.

You look at it more closely and you find the minor flaws the mar your presence.

You want to look away but they have you in their grasp totally controlled and absorbed.

You look back. Will they still be there or perhaps they have disappeared. Magic. You want to believe. Its a wish that is wished by each human being that breaths on this planet.

Can you hide them behind a mask or some very affective concealer that you get in the market. Ofcourse you can and You do. Then..... in the night when you sit in half light trying to look away from the mirror that lures you with hope of satiation......you give in.

Eyelids flutter with anticiaption as you flirtingly look at the shadowed mirror

playing hide and seek with your own image. You are sizing up your oponent staring back at you from the transparent glass. You are waiting for him to make the first move. You wait but nothing happens. There is silence around you.

Within you there is a storm. Breathing, smouldering,bellowing. A few more moments and you would explode. Time is getting heavy now and you cannot stand the mystery anymore. You need to know now ! its okay if nothing is left with you but accute disappointment.

You are ready to pay the price. In one swift motion you turn. You are standing face to face with you. The scars hit you with the force and sharpness of the december wind and you are gasping for breath. You immediately look away and close your eyes. The ugly will go away. This time you dont.
You look at yourself as you never have before........ with acceptance.

Blanket of faith

Faith is a blanket that will always keep you warm. I wondered a few experiences ago whether
I did not have the strength to face life without it. There was a answer to my my every question
in the kind infinity I look upto which the world calls God and I call father. Was I ready to face life without his assured presence. Could I dare think about this cosmos without his weaving it
creating every thread that binds every moving and living particle in this revolving, evolving
breathing universe. For a moment I did, He had given me the strength to take up every challenge that was thrown my way. Did I have the strength to challenge the very core of my
existence. I did for a moment and he did not let me question my existence further. He smiled
at me and let me know that he is there looking at me,standing by me and holding my hand.
We says god tests us. But we dont realise that we test him every moment of our lives and he
does not complain he patiently assures when we get lost in the fog of doubt and reason.

Grids

I remember reading in a magazine how Karan Johar the badshah of cotton candy romances does not believe in the institutaion of marriage. Glancing across those pages I wondered what inspired him to create fairtales he did not believe in. You need to have some corner in your heart which beats at the tune of a soft fragrance or a fading memory of a enchanting glance.

The hope of seeing a sunset cocooned in the arms of love hearing the thump of your helpless heart dance on the dune of lazy Waves.These threads which weave the existence of romance in a life that struggles to steal moments of magic from a routine listless life.

The question is whether it makes sense to expect to see a idea materialise into reality. Agreed that life is stranger than fiction, but how often do fairytale romances become a reality in life.I have started asking myself that question. Maybe at a stage and age in life when I am finally begining to attach logic to a dream that I had safely guarded.

The travails of a romantic teenager have cotinued to be a part of a matured woman.Here in may lie the hitch. You need to leave behind the yesterday and try and live in today. Finally I seem to have shed my dreams and accepted the truth that dreams and reality exist in the same dimension one in our existensional grid and another in our subconscious.

Our life is a struggle between these two forces the strongest wins.
You either spend your life working compromises to make reality livable or you spend your life a hopeful,rigid dreamer waiting for perfection to find you one day.

Phir

socha tha ke asoon ab sath chod denge,
lekin kal daman bheegane palkon par
dastak dene aa hi gaye,
raat ke andhere pe chupke se takiye par apna
sir rakh kar mere galon ko sehlate ched hi gaye,
unki ane ki ahat sirf mere dil ko sunayi deti
hai, yeh rab ne dua kabool ki hai,
dard seene mein uth kar so jata hai,
unki mooh dikhai per apni zindagi waar jata hai,
gumnam kisi kone se mujhe chedne aye the woh,
wapis chale gaye hai phir,
marte huye mere dil ko
zindagi de gaye hain phir,
woh na ate toh kahani kuch aur hi hoti meri,
shayad dard ke ehsas se maut dauddi chali ati
phir,

Me Narcissist

This is the first time I am trying to write when there is a smile adorning my face.
Though I cannot gurantee the fact that this discourse or thought presentation is going to make a tug at your heart. Its a attempt any how.I am accused of being bitter and pessimistic in life.This is a attempt to prove that wrong. I can be happy and glad and merry,I could take my merriness a little too seriously and go merry go round the mulberry bush( eeesh)
Though every moment that smile is plastered on my lovely recovering from two pimples face,I am scared that I will again find myself standing at ground zero. There I think I am in very dangerous territory possibility of slipping into depression land.Therefore I think I will concentrate on telling you about my happiness. I am happy about being given attention without having to ask for it or fight for it.I am happy about being told that I am beautiful,I am happy about the effort taken to make me feel special.
Well I guess this post is going to reflect the narcissist that lives in me. He makes me complete.
I have never denied his existence, the opportunity never came to showcase him.Today it does and I am very proud to present him to you. Resplendid in a garb that has every colour of love weaved into it. He stands there blushing like a rose and smiling like a dew drop. Beautiful and divine.

A gift from a father to his child

There is morning at the end of the night.A fact that every individual across every spectrum of age and class knows.It is with this one truth that every human being lives his life and dies.Every night is spend waiting for day and every day is spend in the anticipation of night.As I was waiting for my night to end I must have reminded myself this fact a million times.With it I reminded myself of gods eternal grace over my life.Then too at times I floundered and saw myself cursing the gift of life.Helplessness and disappointment can be the most destructive of catalysts.Yet in the our when the night seems the most dark and these two draconian invaders are knocking the walls of your sanity to pieces.
There is a thin rope of hope that you hold on to.
The hope that takes birth from the womb of faith.You suddenly look up and see that glittering rays of gold are blessing you with their light.That moment night turns to day and before you know it you are basking in the glow of truth and love. The first rays of morning, the first eaves of corn, the first calf of the season ,the first child of a mother.Every first is a blessing of god.Expressing his abundant love for you.A mark that tells you I am there to hold your hand and walk the extra mile.In times of intense pain I hold you in my arms and try and ease it away. In my arms you sleep when you cross every difficulty I am there to bless your life with a smile a gift from a father to his child.

Subah

Subah ho gayi,
Ek naye daur ka agahz ho gaya,
Kal rat ki chandi mein humne har khwab udadiya,
Shayad abhi kisi door pariyon ke des mein kisi
Khoobsurat pari ke pas mehfoos hai,
Reh gaye hain kuch aks, thartharate apne ap se
nazar churate huye,ek pal lagta hai unhe bhi azad kar du,
hath uth bhi jata hai,
lekin muthi khul nahin pati hai,
zidh pakad leti hai,
Dhadakte huye dil ko mana nahi
Pati hoon,
Har kar who kuch khwabh sirhane
Rakh kar so jati hoon.
Ke shayad kal ki subah ek suhani shyam
Mein tabdeel ho jaye,
Aur mein inhi khwabon ki chunar hodh ke,
Dhalti dhoop se sharma jaoon,
Aas toot kar bhi barkarar rehti hai,
Ajeeb si kashish hain uske husn mein,
Harte huye insane ko tootne se thamb leti hai,
Lekin Lagta hai ki haqeekat ki thand mein abhi
woh Pighalne lagi hai,
Kuch hi pal ji rahi hai,
Zindagi ke badsurat sach mein tabdeel
Ho jayegi.
Aur phir sirf reh jayegi ek dhoondli si
Yaad,
Door kisi parion ke des mein saans leti
Mere khwabon ki,
Ek zamane mein khoobsurat mere aas ki.

Photo Credit http://www.flickr.com/photos/ladybugsleaf/50193929/

Maya

Love and lost, believed and broken. It’s a existence of was and now,
It’s difficult accepting life as a pendulum that swings between these
Two extreme entities. Perhaps this is the reason the call love Maya an illusion. Because that’s who she is. A make believe world that you weave around yourself keeping you snug in days of lonely barrenness and emotional poverty. A state of bliss and surreal satisfaction. Its just A matter of time till the sun comes up and eats the dreamy mist in a fraction of a second. Suddenly you are woken up to naked reality. The thin muslin that you had covered it with is torn into a million pieces and you are forced to stare at the scars that mar the face of perfection. Love is perfect human beings are not. In this world of infinite uncertainties and pain it is this illusion that we want to spend our lives in. Then starts the journey in search of a mystic illusion a lie that you will buy with a thousand truths. You search for the ever elusive Maya.

Morning Light

Truth and Justice are dead my reader,
What have you come here to see?
A body that’s becoming colder day by day,
Because it lacks the lying ability,
When the price for dignity is paid in dollars,
You see respect bend its knee,
A lone warrior stands in the docks,
Staring at his destiny,
Dripping in blood of every hope,
Of every dream that he had seen,
Yet as he walks towards the Golgotha,
Carrying his cross of success with him,
Tomorrow stares and him and spits on his
Face for throwing it away for today’s honor
and self esteem,
Worthy or not my reader is he of this humility,
A man who lives a life of righteousness can never
Be accepted in this society,
Take away from him the right to live take away from him his soul,
Break him into a million pieces; take away from him his strength
Of yore,
Then what the night is upon him and nothing is seen in the dark,
He shall yearn for a little bit of assurance and sell his honor for a
Spark,
Wait my reader before you think that this is the end for this man,
I forgot to tell you that this is a night and will pass into
Morning light.

A Complete life.

You are a image,
A reflection in still waters,
tanslation of the inner desires,
of wants and dreams,
thoughts chained in minds recesses,
flow into your countenence,
A aura that is so real,
sometimes there is no doubt about your existence,
you are there for me to touch and feel,
I search for you in faces that I can see,
In a smile that lives and dies in a second,
Today wants to believe you Tomorrow knows that you will dissolve,
A dew drop that lives in the dying darkness of the early morning,
disappears in the daylights first curve,
I shall hold you close for the few moments that you live,
you are my reality,in this world of fakes,
In your arms I shall find peace,In those few moments,
A complete life I will live.

Fight For a Woman's Modesty

I wonder If journalism will ever go back to being about justice.I wonder If a journalist will ever go back to reporting just the facts and not fiction.I wonder If news will be about stating the truth than providing infotainment.
The helpless face of the ten year old Asma splashed on the television screen in
the studio and I looked at the pressure in the newsroom to get celebrity reactions and interviews.Stars who have never travelled in a borivli fast after 10p.m when the women's compartment turn's general.Or has crossed the elphinston bridge after 11p.m.
Trp's is the buzz word.The reason why You ask a celebrity to talk about a common man's problem.A actress traveling from car to carpet will wax eloquent on the trauma of beingharassed by roadside goons.Or a starlet sitting in her AC make up van will talk to you about the emotional pain and helplessness when your modesty is outraged on the road in front of everybody.
What is very difficult for me to believe is that a viewer who is a comman man
prefers to see fake sympathy and understanding than the realistic appeal of the common citizen.Your friend,or you mother,or your aunt.
Every day thousands of women get out of their homes to earn their daily bread,pursue a eductaion or travel to care for a family member or friend.Hundreds of them compromise with their self respect and peace of mind and even physical harm.What we need to fight for is security for this woman who walks on the lonely road at night to buy last minute groceries to feed you.Who takes the 12p.m local in the night to save money for your education.Who waits back in college late night to study in the library to save your money.
It is for this woman that we need to pick up our cudgels, it is this woman's voice that the nation needs to hear every bureacrat, every politician and yes every man who looks at a woman as a object of ridicule.

When Mahesh Bhatt made Me Smile

It’s been four years now working in a news channel. My job profile as a program coordinator has involved interacting with a lot of celebrities trying to get them on the Various prime time shows. Every time that I have picked up the phone and punched in the numbers of these stars my heartbeat increased to a zillion per minute.
I was a mere nobody and they were known by the world why would they pick up my call
let alone talk to me. The very first celebrity that I have interacted with was Mr Mahesh bhatt. Now when I look back nothing much seems to have changed. The same blue or black shirt, spectacles perched on his nose and a smile that at once puts you at ease.
He was a successful director and a personality and every time there was a issue that nobody dared to talk about. This man never turned his back. Not because he needed his face to appear for a few minutes on national television but because he cared.
Great men are not made by recognition but their ability to keep their head on the shoulders and their ability to make a effort even for the most inconsequential human being.
Mr bahtt had once told me that “madhu you cannot control everything.” but this did not mean that he refused to try and make it to the spot where I was hoping to get a signal for my satellite van. He walked down six floors came out of his building and walked even more to the spot where I had set up. Despite all this effort the interview did not go on air.
I readied myself for a volley of insults and reprimand. What I got in return was a message saying that “even perfectionists fail sometimes”. I messaged him back saying” sir thank you for being nice to a nobody like me. ”He messaged me back saying that “nobody is a nobody you are good at what you do and I am giving you a ovation”.
His movies are not hits because they have a astounding star cast or lavish sets or foreign locations. They touch the human heart. The man still thinks like a common man, the pain, the helplessness the dreams and the aspirations. He has not forgotten what it feels like to live a life of averages. You cannot portray emotions unless you can feel them.
That day bhatt sahab not merely transformed a very scared nobody into somebody but made me realize that it takes more than hits to be a star it takes a heart of gold.

Stand By Me

Stand by me my love,
As the sun sets behind the hills,
when the wind is blowing hard,
and your heartbeat is growing faster with
every rustle of silk,
stand by me my love,
As you hold my hand and walk the extra mile,
when you hold my breath with a look in your eyes,
Stand by me my love,
As you hold me tight in your arms,
when the fire that glows in front of us,
lingers in your warmth even at dawn,
Stand by me my love,
As the day turns to night,
When I am holding on to your arm as I obliviously lie.
Stand by me my love,
As I trust you with my life,
When today turns to tommorow,
And I share your silver night,
A wind is blowing across the mountains,
it brings with it a frangnance new of a new tommorrow
and a promise of a life for you.

Decisions are always difficult in life.The fight is between what is right and between what you want.Sometimes you wait endlessly hoping that your wait will morph into what is right.I guess the act has a timeline when you approach the very end of your security blanket you realise your feet are getting cold.That moment is when you start thinking about the time when it wont be long when you outgrow the warmness of those black threads.They say that time ticks like a time bomb.I have never been able to understand the similie.Today as I find time crossing the road and staring at me,I stop and at the moment where I have stopped,I realise that time is no longer my friend.From now on He is my adversary.From here on its a race against each other.Its a fight to win.He is not going to give me a moment to ctach my breath

Aj pyar mar gaya

Aj pyar mar gaya,
jise itne dard se kisi kone mein chipiya tha,
Aj usne mere samne dum tod diya,
ek kavi ne apni haqeekat kho di,
ek ashiq ne apni zindagi,
insaniyat ne apne jeene ki wajah kho di,
aj pyar mar gaya,
asoonoin ka mazakh aur vishwas ki dazheeyan udadi,
aj zindagi ne zinda rehne ki wajah tod di,
khoh kar bhi ehsas tha jiska,
pyar pe fakar tha uska,
aj pyar ne apne chehre se chunni faikh di,
apni badsurat shakal dikha di,
ab kya afsana aur likhe hum,
us din ko aur kya bayan kare hum,
AJ pyar mar gaya,
apko uska janaza uthane ko bulate hai hum,
uski mazhar pe ap bhi do phool chadha do,
do asoon ap bhi baha do,
kabhi wapas na ane ke liye chal diya hai woh,
badnam zindagi jine ke liye chala hai woh,
wida karo use matam karte huye,
Aj pyar mar gaya.

In nothing

In moments of death I find Life,
In flickers of loss i win,
In A hundred questions I find a answer,
In Infinity I find the end,
In today I look upto tommorrow,
In my tears I find a smile,
In depression I find hope,
In madness I find sanity,
In hate i find the refelction of love,
In disappointment I find opportunity,
In weakness I find strength,
In ashes I find a phoenix,
In the desert I look for a oasis,
In emptyness I find space.
In this life that walks alone on a path full of thorns and a few roses,
I find holding on to the softness of a tender life that lives for someone
unknown,unrecognizable.

Juilet Dies

Often I wonder whether I have got the definition of love right.
I guess you define love with your first encounter of unrepressable emotions and flowing hormones.When it doesent matter if you have to compromise on things like self respect and mental balance.I guess love is a kind of a madness .The helpless juliet as she sits next to the corpse of her beloved Romeo is the perfect expression of love at its majestic bloom.The inky oblivion above is a mute spectator to the death of hope and emotion.
As helpless as the beauty beneath its wings.
Drops of stars trail down sparkling with the intensity of pain that is shooting in the bosom of the fair lady.The night is accusing itself of causing its sinister shadow of darkness to envelope the light of love.A fight for togtherness,a battle nearly won and then lost to that fatal moment.
When love is shown a mirror.
She realises that her reflection is nothing,but a mysty shadow of nothingness.
She stands there searching for love to stare back at her hold her gaze and take her on a walk on a bed of roses.Where reason stands still and hope takes a flight of fantasy.Standing there till her legs go numb and her heart beats with a intensity that threatens to steal her breath from her cold numb frame. But wait she must till the end of eternity and even then the warmth of love will evade her.Her gaze is turning into a rock and her expectations are being captured in her glistening body.They are expensive diamonds her dreams.
There she will stand forever lost in yesterday evading today and forgetting tommorrow.
Can there be a hell greater than the one in which she rots now.Where she cant live nor can she die.A situation that is written in books and essays lives in the life of the one who loves.Is there not any penance that lifts this veil of turmoil from her life,I will walk till the corners of the earth and cross the seven seas.If only my love holds my hand once again and looks into my eyes and professes love eternal.Let my heart skip a beat once again,let me want to live in his arms forever, let me feel his heart beat next to mine dancing to the rythum of its beat.Let him hold me in his arms and let me die in contentment.
Alas I stand looking into a empty glass frame.With bitterness seeping into my soul.Slowly dissolving into my inner being and transforming the sweetness into a potion of hatred and destruction.The process is leisurely,taking it own time slowly rubbing the ingredients of pain into every opening in the soul The burning sensation murders every expectant flower of feeling and lays it to rest on the shoulder of hope.There she stands stripped of every garment of blush and bloom,shivering in the cold of loneliness,a icey breeze sends her gasping for breath and she tries to bring some warmth from the recesses of memory when she was basking in red and pink.The picture is very hazy and the face distant.
The colour of love is hers finally as it escapes her body and spills into her palms,
looking into the glassy eyes of her life she finds her dreams fly on a rainbow as the coldness is replaced by the warmth of the nectar of life as she sprays
it on her concrete frame infusing the blue with vivacious red.

As you lie in my arms,
A sigh escapes my lips,
A hope of tommorrow dies in todays dreams,
If you could just live for a moment more,
I would die in your love and live in eternity forever more.

Realization

what do you do when you are standing at that point of your life where there are no crosroads.You can see just one road that goes on forever.
You stand there staring at the dirt track hoping that by some miracle there is a small track that opens up and you have the hope of seeing yourself walk on a path other than the one in front of you.Seconds tick away and you can feel the dust slowly climbing over you like termites.You realise that its either disintegrate into nothingness or start walking towards a destiny you dont believe in.The choice between the body and soul is a difficult one.
Most of the time the choice is not yours.You dont have the strength to take that kind of a decision.Its taken for you.All that is left with you is a question the answer to which is sought by every human who goes through the realization of pain.A essence that is born out of the helplessness of man.

Kal Aur Aj Ki Kashmakash

Kabhi lagta hai ki zindagi aj hai,
Phir thodi der mein khyal ata hai ki kal bhi hai,
aus ki boondon mein suraj ka chamakna,
lahron ka ake phir laut jana,
do pal ki zindagi hoti hai has kar chal deti hai,
jhod jati hai aj ko jo aj ko kal ki himat dati hai,
har pal jo kal mein shamil hota hai apni hakeekat
bhoolane ki koshish karta hai,
hakeekat thak ke har jati hai apni arzu se,
zindagi ki jeene ki khwaish se,
shayad kal aj pe hawi nahin hoga kal ki arzu aj ko mita nahin degi,
dard ki pukar aj mein ghol na degi,
ehsas hai sirf khamoshi ka, andheri gheraiyon ka,
choote choote dam kyon tod rahi hai,
hame bulakar sath kyon jhod rahi hai.,
andhere ache lagte hai hai apni kokh mein hamein cheepa late hain,
janam lena jhahti hoon in andheron se,
cheer ke nikalna chahti hoon in ghehraiyon se,
phir kal se thodi si bheekh mang raha hai jeene ke liye thodi si dua mang raha hai.
khoon ka dariya ban rahi hai hakeekat,
asoonyon se bheeg raha hai daman,
kuch aur boondein baki hai girne mein,
us lal rang ko aur bhi gehra bananeki chahat mein.

PictureCouretsy :http://picasaweb.google.com/Varun.A.Kedia/Vision/

Journey

Its amazing how sadness motivates me to write.
I guess how much ever I deny it I am a sadist.I am writing today and I am not happy about it.Life is like a desert and happiness is like the oasis you meet on your journey.The sooner I accept it the better.YOu cannot stop your journey and stand by the water forever.You have to keep on moving "there are miles to cover before you sleep."The biggest mistake that man makes is to believe that the oasis is their destination.Its when this belief blows away in the desert storm that you wake up to the reality of life.Your feet become heavy and your will dies.The warm breeze drains you of your strength to go on.But you have to.There is no choice but to carry your cross.You are the chosen wanderer who does not have the permission to stand constant.The only thing thats consistent in your life is you.The rest are moments of clouds who shelter you from the scorching heat of life.They come and bring a moment of relief.You smile with a sigh and before you know they move to another place in the sky and you are left staring at the grinning sun above.
You are born alone and you die alone.Your whole life is spend in trying to garner people arround you who can give you the most sought after commodity COMPANY.You cant live life without people thats impossible.But you should live life without any expectations from them.Its this expectation that leads to disappointment.A feeling that leaves you with a void.A emptyness that is more cold than solid ice.
You are a human and expectation is a living testimony to that fact.Sometimes I think when god threw adam out of eden it wasnt death that was his punishment it was the seed of expectation