Friday, July 27, 2012

328

I've raved, ranted, vented and left so much of my 25 year old baggage on this space. I still have a lot left. I hear it's something that never really ceases to exist. Baggage happens whether you like it or not. Whether you want to carry it and how is what perhaps differentiates you from me and us from the rest of the world. 


With every passing day comes a new challenge - a new confrontation. It could be about the freedom I have as an adult or the roles I'm supposed to play so effortlessly or the duties and responsibilities I'm supposed to take on or the career choices I need to make as my journey progresses. It can be about anything and everything, including stupid petty things. 


On deeper introspection, I find that I seem to be living my actual adolescent years now. I say this not because the adolescent in me ever died and went away (I don't think any part of our history dies and goes away. We just evolve from what we were. More on that later.) I just think that the steam seems to be setting itself quite free at a time when things should be settling in. But then again, no one really settles; especially not now. That's why I'm such a huge fan of Erik Erikson and his theory of Psychosocial Development. I keep going back to this not to show how much I love psychology and some of these theories (which I do very much, FYI) but because they make so much sense. Not that this is some weird knowledge/theory class camouflaged in this post but I brought this up to help map where the hell I am. It strikes me as obvious and oh-so-stupid-for-not-arriving-at-this-earlier that we're a sum of a series of parts that role out every single day. 


I learn that we're each a bloody awesome collectible of our own personal tissues/paper napkins sprawled with scribbles, thoughts, doodles and nothing sometimes. Each day, every person we interact with, contributes in not just making us who we are but also making us realize who we are. This is not a lecture and neither is it a preaching ceremony. This is my white board and here I am, penning my thoughts down on something that has struck me right in the middle of this existential vortex I'm submerged in.


There are certain events off-late that have brought about such weird and drastic changes I never thought I was even capable of feeling. When you're faced with a sense of not giving a rat's ass, not caring, being nonchalant, being abrasive and being everything you feel so shitty about being, because at 25, you're expected to be a certain way, you figure that your life is up to something - that perhaps you're bang in the middle of learning a lesson you need to learn. It's one of those impromptu things that life springs on you without you even knowing. And before you know it, you look at yourself in the mirror (and I, at this blog) and you wonder who the hell you're really looking at. The change seems drastic, the difference seems incorrigible. 


You never thought you'd become this way - stone cold and uncaring - just like your parents told you the big bad world would be. You think for yourself because at this age, there's nothing I want more than to be for me, to live for me, to look at only me; because you know what? I've got the rest of my life to think of everybody else. It makes me wonder when and how and why I got this way. Why 'me' became so important. I am a me girl. Strongly. And they call these Scorpio traits. Call it whatever you wish to, but this is what it is. For the moment at least.


And at the end of almost every day, I rewind and replay everything significant that passed by. I reassess, review and figure that there's so much I can do differently. A large part of me also chalks out plans for what I will do in my future when these same circumstances are to arise again. I think of various permutations and combinations on how to tackle this better. While that's so far ahead without even the remotest guarantee of surety, I learned something today.


I strive so hard to explain the concept of letting go, especially to ma. I have these million dreams and I'm bound in more ways than one - many out of choice as well. I realize that a vast component of growing up is the ability to let go. We keep talking about how important it is to stand by and let the person you love, walk on their own feet. We talk so much about letting go and standing by in the wings as the show unfolds. We talk so readily about catching someone when they fall. But damn is that difficult to do. 


And that seems to be the current exam I'm in the midst of. It has been the hardest thing to let go of people and watch them from the wings as they walk on. I know that the next time I vow to do something different from what ma did while bringing us up, I'll be back to square one. People we love don't hold us back because they don't want us to succeed. I just learnt that why they hold on is simply because letting go is the biggest test anyone can face, the biggest fear anyone can live with, the biggest risk anyone can take. 


Letting go just means that you don't get to be in control anymore. It amounts to letting the reins go. It summarizes everything we're so scared of - of being without control and of being alone.

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