Grace & Gratitude

"You never know your limits until you push yourself to them"   Last night my friend reminded me "You were going to post a blog every month, what happened to it?" Today after hitting my new maximum pace, I am here to write 'on running'. It's really difficult to remember when I actually started running. As a 10-year-old the maximum distance I could hit was 200 meters at a great pace. As an 11-year-old, I absolutely hated running. At 600 meters I used to get blackouts. The thought of running even just 1 kilometre used to be one of my worst nightmares, and the idea of running 10 kilometres was out of my sight. It was the CoVid time when I ordered a new pair of running shoes and just went to a nearby park and started running. That was the beginning, which came to an end really soon. After diligently playing football, I discovered my untapped potential and stamina, realizing that I was no longer experiencing blackouts. However, my football sessions abruptly en

It's only been two weeks since I arrived here, and I swear my life hasn't been as eventful as it is now. Some things have happened offline, and some online, but this city has turned out to be a lucky one for me, at least for now. For the past few months, working from home had put me in a sweet comfort zone. Coming to Bengaluru felt like stepping into a completely new world. When I landed at Bengaluru airport, all I remember was being anxious and scared. While working from home, it was all "Eat. Code. Sleep. Repeat." But here, it is about meeting new people, pursuing new hobbies, networking with people from different domains, and most importantly, exploring my area of interest. The excitement of meeting new people made me nervous initially, but I eventually met some amazing people and had great discussions with them. Some online friends became offline friends, and unfortunately, it was the other way around as well, but that's how it goes. I started pursuing my inte

(Originally written in December 2022) It's been a year since I started this blog. I made many resolutions for 2022, one of which was to post four blogs each month. That was my excitement, but when I hit reality, I wrote one blog each month, and sometimes at the end of the month, it was posted. That gave me a lot of relief. I always wished to write about my breathtaking experiences here this year, but there weren't many. Most of the time, I was only at home. Hopefully, next year will be more adventurous than ever. My gratitude list is not short, and I am thankful for this blog as well. Through it, I was able to write my thoughts and connect with some nice people. One of the best experiences of this year was going on a solo trip to Rishikesh, staying in a hostel, and being without my phone. I met and helped people, hiked, roamed, rafted, and made some friends. To summarize my best experiences, I learned to ride a bike this year, graduated from college, started my first job, met a

I never had wanted this day to come when I would write something about imposter syndrome. This is something I have been dealing with for a long time. This is an example of how childhood problems hit back harshly when you are an adult. Even if you are open to letting them go, they still drown you in themselves. The imposter syndrome makes you believe in yourself less and less, day by day. And then the day comes when you take a major wrong step just to avoid failure, even when you know you can't fail. And the fear of failure smiles silently from the corner. No matter how hard you work and how much you achieve, you still feel like you are zero. The solid inner voice comes from inside that you are the dumbest person, and even after shunning it n number of times, it never leaves. And then this fear makes you do the things you never intended to.  If you know you are dealing with this, then maybe talking with other people may ease it. Getting counselling is another option if you feel noth

I remember the days when the electricity in my town had a load-shading schedule, and then whenever the electrical power was cut, most memories were made. With my mother and brother, I used to sit on the outside porch, mother in the middle and we both on her left and right, waiting for a new story. My mother is one of the best storytellers. She inherited it from my grandfather, who used to sing melodious hymns and also was a great storyteller.  My brother and I had different choices for the stories. I used to prefer the warriors, and he wanted more peaceful stories. The stories of Shivaji Maharaja and other Freedom Fighters were my favourite, while he liked the anecdotes from Panchatantra. Sometimes I wonder if that's why I have a warrior-like personality. Okay, that's another story for someday. But, yeah, that's the reason we both are filled with very much patriotism.  My mother had perfect ways to make us love the country, its culture and its language, which we often ignor

I thought that the Work-Life Balance was probably the new hot keyword in the era of interest until a few days ago when I realized everything was messed up. Especially working from home and at the same time maintaining the house chores, your hobbies, your extra work can become a nightmare as soon as you can't see boundaries between them. So, here I was, filled with stress and anxiety, expecting more to do in those 24 hours and then unable to do it and so get stressed again. This cycle continued for a few months in a row. I ultimately had given up on my everyday To-Do list. And just the false hope that I can 'do it all' tired me.  There was quite enough time to do everything, but the mental fatigue and the urge to run, and not just to run but run fast, made me look at everyone and stop at your place.  I even didn't stop to look and fix it. I kept running on the treadmill. Until the last Saturday when I got sick and had to fix it. And the previous week was super-productive