Posted on February 26, 2015 in The Life And Times

Travel-Time

I upgraded WordPress and now the alignment of things in my not-so-carefully-crafted theme are messed up. I will fix this, someday.

I have been working out of an office that is a few seconds away from my house. I don’t exaggerate, it’s definitely less than a minute away. I once sneezed on my way to office from home and sprained my neck for 3 days but that is the only eventful thing that has ever happened in those few seconds. As a consequence of this proximity I’ve had a lot of extra time. Time not spent travelling. Time to have sleep, read the news, exercise, learn new things and ponder about a lot. While I did sleep and read the news and exercise and learn a few things, I also pondered a lot of it away. I spent plenty of time doing these things at the same time, which makes me feel like a lot got done but that usually isn’t the case. The worst is all that time I spent deciding what to do next because everything was available.

This brings me to my point; the importance of Travel-Time. When travelling, your activities are restricted. You can read a book, small articles on your phone, talk to people, plan things out, and maybe even reply to an email or two. You can listen to music and really listen to it. There is, of course, such a thing as too much travel-time when you find yourself exhausted at the end of the day with not enough time left to do all the other things you want to. But there’s also such a thing as too little travel-time. Travel-Time is a little like shower-time, but less meditative. There’s more to distract you but there’s also all the city passing by to look at for inspiration.

I’m going to have a lot more travel-time in the near future and I’m going to make sure I enjoy it. You should make sure you do too. I know most of you have quite a bit of it. Read more, flirt with that person you like on Whatsapp, tell someone you love them, plan your day, plan your life. Smile at a stranger. Listen to the lyrics of that song playing on shuffle for the first time. I promise to do all of the above. I also promise that I’ll try to make a list of all the things I want to come back home and write to you about.

Posted on March 23, 2011June 17, 2012 in The Life And Times

Time and its measurements / An argument against thinking ahead

You live most of your lives like you will live forever. You will spend today knowing that you are not going to die tomorrow, or this week, or this year, or before 2020. There are, of course, exceptions to this but I’m reasonably confident that they aren’t reading this blog post. Most of you are not in denial about death, but you’d still prefer to think about it as an event in the distant future that you do not need to concern yourself with now, or anytime soon.

When was the last time you felt truly proud of yourself? When was the last time you experienced exaltation or absolute contentment? When was the last time that you felt happiness in such abundance that you couldn’t contain it? How long did it last? When was the last time you felt an overbearing need to act on something? Did you? When was the last time you were struck to your very core by the anxiety of losing something you loved? When was the last time disappointment sank all the way down to your gut?

I sit here in front of you with my folded electricity bill covering the top right corner of my laptop screen. Why? Because I was reading a book and I wanted to keep myself from knowing what time it is so that I don’t feel sleepy and I could read it for longer. The experiment seems to have worked well because although I don’t know exactly what time it is now I know that it’s somewhere in the vicinity of 4am and that’s longer that I would have read if I’d been reminded of the time all throughout. Not to mention that I would also not be writing this blog post.

If you didn’t know what what time it was or what time you had to wake up in the morning then would you still sleep rather than continuing whatever you’re enjoying doing so much? If you didn’t know what the name of the next day of the week was or how many days it was till your birthday then would you still put yourself through the gruelling routine of today? Maybe if we didn’t use these measurements of time to reason things out we’d do things differently. And yes, not being able to quantify time would lead us to more irrational decisions, but our decisions can only be as rational as the assumptions of our objectives and morality that they’re based on.

I want to try for an unknown interval of time, to not count time and see how that works out. And I want to ask you, are we living or are we dying?

Posted on October 14, 2010June 11, 2012 in The Life And Times

Day 59: ~Two-thirds

Time flies, and we’re only here for the blink of an eye. This Monday it suddenly felt like I have too little time left in New York. I have less than 4 weeks left here now. And though I’m already prepared to go back in that much time, a part of me wants to stay here a little longer. It would upset me if I have to stay here longer at this point though. I’ve already planned going back and I don’t like it when things don’t go according to plan because then I have to make new plans.

I could live here, someday. I don’t think there’s many places I could say that about. The only reason I won’t be able to live here is because I can’t leave my entire life behind and start over. Starting over sounds like an exciting idea but it’ll be harder than it seems. If I could take some of the important things and some people with me, then that would be a different story.

I don’t really have much to say today. I’m sleep deprived. My clothes have been lying in the dryer for days, there’s more stuff on the floor of my room than on the table and everything’s a mess. And I couldn’t care less to clear it up because in just a little while I’ll have to pack it all up into suitcases.

Posted on March 30, 2008June 11, 2012 in The Life And Times

Drive

One night, he had no idea what he was doing. He had no idea why he was doing it, what he should be doing, where he should be heading or who he is. Is he pretending or being true to himself? He had no idea how he looked in others’ eyes. He had no idea what he was going to do the next day. Whether he would wake up at 9, or sleep the entire day away. He had no idea what he wanted to do. Neither his instinct nor his inertia of routine had anything to say about it. He had absolutely no idea who he was. What he’d been so far could draw no conclusions toward that.

Now, he knew he was going to sleep though. He wasnt anxious, he was at peace. It wasn’t even that he didn’t need to know, it was beyond that. He was happy not knowing. He was glad. The lack of answers, all the questions gave him something. They gave him a reason and a drive that had been missing for a while. Curiously missing. They gave him a reason to want to be awake after he woke up the next day. Because he would have to go looking for the answers. He knew the answers wouldn’t come soon, and he knew it wouldn’t be a reason to celebrate when he finds them. He just knew that he had to look. More than he ever knew any of the things he had no idea about anymore.

He thought he realised something about himself. He thought he realised that he didn’t adapt to change quickly at all, something he always thought he did. He knew he didn’t want to realise anything. He could sleep now. It was time for it. Without looking forward, without anxiety, without a planned defense against forseen boredom. Tomorrow would be a whole new day. And so would the day after that. Not just hours ticking away, counting that which can’t be measured. A whole new day, the way a child would look at it. Like a book by an author he hadn’t read. Like a new gizmo to reverse engineer. Like anything that is whole, and not something forced to take its place.

He knew that tomorrow, he would be driving.

And when he opened his eyes the next day, he already knew it. He knew it before he looked at the scribble in black ball pen on his left wrist that was the one word: “drive”.

Posted on September 25, 2007June 11, 2012 in The Life And Times

The consequence of inaction

Theres times when everything seems wrong. Not wrong particularly, but like your life is spiralling out of control. and you have no clarity on what you should be doing. Days go by like cars on a highway and every hour that passes makes it more certain that every constituent of your current life will fall apart.
I still don’t bother too much. I’m waiting for answers to fall from the sky. They don’t. only raindrops do. Clarity won’t come to greet me along with the sunlight the next morning. I’m not afraid of it all falling apart though, at least i know that much. On the other hand, fear might solve the problem. I never used to question things so much. The truth is, I need to get up and get going. The only burden i feel is of the consequence of inaction.

I hate knowing a day before it starts.

I’m done talking about me.
We’re all falling through time, eventually to hit the bottom. Doesn’t anyone feel helpless?
Take a deep breath. Exhale. There goes a part of you that you aren’t gonna see again.

Posted on September 20, 2006June 11, 2012 in The Life And Times

20-Sep-2006

I can’t sleep, because there’s too much going through my mind. Again. Finally!
There are some things you just have to wait for. You can try writing every thought in your head, but it won’t work.
Thoughts are like tiny colourful wisps of light. You can try catching them in your butterfly net, but it won’t work. You just have to wait until they align themselves to form something worth photographing.
You could also say that your head is like that gigantonormous box with a gazillion watch parts (and new ones being thrown in all the time) being shaken around. You’ve gotta wait until you get a watch.
Putting it directly, I cant write when i want to, I can write when I have to.
If you ever want to, and don’t have to, I suggest you go explore something new.
Go look for answers to all your questions, and don’t worry, you’ll never run out. The answers will come tied to more questions. That’s if they aren’t questions themselves.
Go find out why things you think should work don’t. Go find everything imperfect and unideal and take your shot at fixing it.
The world’s big enough to entertain you for many lifetimes, and its right outside in front of your doorstep. Or outside your window.
Creativity’s born out of randomness, and a large portion of randomness is not knowing what you’re going to do, or why you’re doing it. And randomness cant be bred with a plan. So quickly finish off everything planned to leave room for that which isn’t.

Time isn’t like water running down the drain, or sand in your fist.
It’s like a new blank page, everyday, left for you to fill.

To finish off, I’d like to say that I’m back. Lost as ever.

Posted on October 25, 2005June 17, 2012 in The Life And Times

TIme

Time is relative.
The length of a fraction of a second is proportional to the amount of adrenaline in your veins.
The length of a second depends on how little there is to do in it.
The length of a few minutes depends on how far away my current state of mind is from what it was to begin with.

I can’t think of how it works for larger intervals of time.
A week ago feels like yesterday.
Two months ago still feels like last year.
and this morning feels like four days ago.
Tomorrow, it all rearranges.

I miss my computer. The one in front of me right now is half a decade old and can’t react fast enough to my typing.
I feel just the same, life should type slower.
I want to go to sleep, but everything feels incomplete.
I know there’s a thousand things i need to do right now, but i can’t remember what they are.
I was also sure i had much better things to write.
maybe i should just go to sleep.