le début

I think it’s time. Time to start sharing these delicate, and somewhat vulnerable, inner thoughts with the rest of the world. For the past few years, as I try to heal in therapy like most younger millennials, I’ve been using writing as a way to create space for me. Space for myself to veer into territories unknown for me, following my own instincts for (sometimes) the first time, ever.

Anthropology is a subject that continues to fascinate and occupy much of my free time - and most times, creeps into my booked time as well. It’s been illuminating learning more about the history of the human experience. And that organically dovetails into thinking about your own experience and family relations. There’s something about the first major death that happens to you - and how that impact reverberates downstream to so many daily little decisions. I lost the only grandfather I knew - someone who instilled strength, resilience, and a good dose of stubbornness into this already stubborn Taurus. He was the patriarch of our family, a fiercely independent 93-yr-old who insisted on continuing to do his own errands, continuing his involvement in the local community board, and ensuring everything is running tip-top shape for those around him. While in the last few years, the reigning dominance has been shrouded by new concern from those around him that he is taking on too much for his age, he should rest, etc. that they say to keep those that have the privilege to age in a box, aiming to chain them to dependence - but Tata (a south Indian term of endearment for our darling grandfather) did not subscribe to that, he refused. He taught me all the big secrets of life, and in his passing he might have taught me his biggest lesson yet - through the past four months since his passing, my entire lifeview has shifted. I’m looking at every interaction, relationship, moment of sorrow, joy, amazement at intricate architecture, feelings of the warm sun on my skin at sunset, and realizing the dichotomy of the miniscule to massive perspective of the human experience.

We go through the seemingly banal everyday existence and forget that there is so much more to existence than this human life. Yet, there comes a privilege we have in being a conscious being during this lifetime - able to receive stimuli, to then send chemical reactions through our bodies, illicit an emotion, to then shift our perspective, ultimately impacting our opinions and our lifeview. And get this - we receive 11 million stimuli every second. Every. Second. 11 million. And we are only able to actually perceive and respond to 40 of those 11 million stimuli. Think of how much more is around us at this very second that you just aren’t able to successfully perceive right now because, evolutionarily, we haven’t progressed enough to take in everything. And yet, with just being able to take in such a miniscule amount, we are able to learn and grow so much with this life. It is astounding. And it’s instances like this that feel ultimately like the point of this lifetime - it’s an intrigue as old as art.

Even in this life, it’s hard to even encapsulate how we are fully feeling - at least within linguistics. I had a conversation with a friend about this topic recently - the idea that linguistics can only encapsulate our thoughts as well as we are able to express ourselves within the guardrails of that language. Sometimes there truly are not enough, or maybe even nonexistent, words to express oneselves. It’s how some say ‘love is just a feeling’ or when everyone around you is getting married and you ask them how did they know their partner was the one they answer with a simple ‘when you know, you know’. There are just some emotions, feelings, reactions, or energies that when trying to express via language, it somehow falls short of the vastness of those human experiences.

This is where art comes in - and how I’ve only recently, at the ripe age of 29, have started to really appreciate art, in more forms than what I had previously associated with ‘art’. More than the largest museums I’m privileged to live near, more than the critically acclaimed films nominated for national awards, and the latest album from an acclaimed singer. But now art is everywhere. Art is everyday. Art is how we make sense of this life. It’s a patchwork of those called to the higher energy source, able to express themselves in such a gifted way, those of us privileged to witness and absorb their work are lucky. There’s lots to the creation of meaningful art - you intentionally create the space to tell your version of creativity, whatever is making its way through you (you, as the vessel) works through every inch of the artist. The creative source creates such an impact on the artist that the receivers of art are mesmerized by the way the artists’ internal questions and lifeview speaks through their art. We all have our lens on the vastness, and once you’re awake to the reality of it all, it’s hard to not desire a deeper dive into what this is all about. 

Once you realize how fleeting this whole opportunity is, this opportunity of being a human able to perceive and rationalize thoughts and emotions - you tend not to sweat the small stuff as much. There’s so much more we can cultivate and create and question and wonder and gaze in awe at. This life is too vast and mysterious for us to waste it away in thoughts or emotions or habits that undermine our ability to connect with a higher power, the creative source. 

Thanks for taking the time to read through this, if it resonates I would very much enjoy hearing from you.