Generation today

Sometimes the best feedback on our life comes from children....we get an unadulterated (no pun intended) opinion. While watching some photos taken by me of my sister and brother-in-law, I commented to my niece about how nice they looked in the photo. To this my 7-year-old niece, Zahraa replied," my parents really love each other." I turned to her, smiled and said, "I know, but why do you feel that?" Her answer made me realise how secure & happy she was. She said, "I know, coz they are always smiling at each other!"
When I mentioned this to my sister, she told me that that this compliment ment a lot to her coz it was made unconditionally to a third person, by a child and without any prompting.

Most of us value and crave for appreciation in our professional and social life, from friends & colleagues. we work hard to make people admire us. we say the right things, do the right things all for others. We work so hard for others that we forget those closest to us.....we forget our family. Friends come and go, jobs are lost and found, but family is what sustains us!

Relationships shouldn't be defined by who does what or how much or who owns what, but by the love we share & trust without condition....like that realised by a 7-year-old girl sitting with her aunt looking at what defined her life so far.

A new world

Its been a year & few days beyond my last blog. Guess a lot has happened since then, some good some not so good!
I currently am visiting family in the U.S of A, and finally getting to meet my niece and nephew....the nephew whom I had not met till date! Shows how the years can pass u & so many people by.
A month of vacation still left & I am already wondering what I shall do with all this time on my hands. The agenda for today comprised of visiting Zahra's soccer practice and a joint venture to create a friendship band....we both got kinda bored after the first 1/2 hour!!!
I discovered after a long time, my family, who was always there, but for whom I was lost; not for a year but for many years.
Its good to be back.

Past Patterns

Everyday we learn, we grow.
Every time we forgive, we love.

A universal truth is our tendency to hang on to our past; to memories both good & bad. We miss the times we have had, but we forget to savour the time passing us now. What is reality is here and now. And yet, we cling on to our past as if our life depended on it. We clutch on to all that emotional baggage, forgetting that the trip is less tiresome when we travel light ( being of the female species, I do empathise with fellow women travellers...in reality & meta morphologically...we do love our designer luggage, emotions included!).
We literally apply the blanket theory to every past fear, insecurity & experience we have, smothering security we share today.
I love quilted blankets made from little bits & pieces that would otherwise have got discarded. The end result is a beautiful piece of work, in complete harmony, that we snuggle into at the end of a long day. Life is like a quilt; made from a whole lot of different pieces, stitched in place by many hands, taking a long time to create. And this is our security blanket, our cocoon. Then like a seamstress who has lost her sense of pattern, we start to weave in ugly stuff; stuff from old patterns that, for this quilt are just unco-ordinated pieces that don't fit. We hope to improve the pattern, but basically end up screwing it up more and more. I think at some stage we misinterpret what is supposed to be our security blanket & then very systematically throttle every thing today with it.....slowly, with agonising precision.
Its not others who let us down. We are our own worst enemy. We fail ourselves by not letting go of the realities of yesterday.
If I live, it must be here & now,
If I think, it should be free from past thoughts,
If i experience, let it be the pleasure of newer ones,
If i love, let it be for this reality......
....... & not for the "ghosts of christmas' past".