This has probably been one of my longest breaks from writing; that is because the last year or so every piece I tried writing felt inauthentic somehow; it felt as if it wasn’t me. But as I turn 18, I wonder who I am, and every decision that I am faced with at this turning point of life is influenced and weighed by just one question “Who will this decision make me? Who will I emerge as at the end of this tunnel?” And I speak of this dilemma with not just a personal context but also socially, emotionally, and politically.

I recently picked up (and finished reading) Mother Mary Comes to Me by Arundhati Roy, and it was undoubtedly one of the most beautiful and overwhelming books I have ever read. Arundhati Roy, in this autobiography/memoir of hers, talks about how she became who she is. She talks about how her mother influenced her life, how her experiences, decisions, and travels changed the very course of her life and made her who she is. She talks about her radical political views and literature and her life (practically) on the run, and most importantly, she talks of her mother, whom she refers to as her Iron Angel.

Reading that book made me realise that no matter how much I might admire someone like Arundhati Roy for the person and artist she is, neither am I capable nor willing to go down the road she did, to become the person she is. Then the question arose, who am I and who do I want to be?

From a very young age, social issues and wokeism were topics I thought about, and for a good portion of my teenage years, I was sure that I was going to be an activist. Then I entered junior college, my first taste of the real world, and here somehow every campaign I built, every lecture I attended, every activist I looked up to meant nothing.

A few months back, a major issue arose amongst my peers. With the authorities being diplomatic about their resolutions, my colleagues were infuriated and started thinking of organising protests and putting up posters. I was asked if I would join, and my apparent activist spirit couldn’t say yes. I couldn’t fight out loud; I couldn’t hold a protest; I couldn’t put up posters; I couldn’t risk it.

The questions came again, Who am I? Where do my values lie? How much am I willing to do for a cause? Is it wrong if I don’t scream at a protest and just choose to silently support from the bleachers while handing out water? Am I a coward if I don’t want to get my hands dirty?

Adding on to my rediscovery of activism, I had political science as one of my core subjects in junior college, and that being the case, politics became a regular topic of discussion and thought, whether I liked it or not. When political discussions become a part of one’s life, the big question comes “what ideology do you follow” and trust me it is a very stressful question to answer and a rather difficult declaration to make, because it doesn’t just affect a political aspect of your life, to some extent it also dictates your community and your social relationships, that makes it not just controversial but also really crucial, especially if you’re a student of Social Sciences and Humanities.

And so, like every humanities kid, I spent hours mulling over the life dictating political and social ideologies of socialism, liberalism, leftism, rightism, conservatism, communism etcetera etcetera trying to figure out what is wrong and what is right, where do my values and morals lie, which box do I fit in, trying to figure out how radical I’d like to be, do I want to be another Arundhati Roy or another BM Khire or do I just want to have an opinion enough for a dinner table?

Back in school, I was a particularly extroverted person. I could make friends with anyone, get along with everybody, fight for, stand up for, voice every opinion I ever thought of, I was loud and confident and seen, and I believed that is who I would be forever.

Then I entered junior college: a 16-year-old in a new city, a new world, drowning in unfamiliarity, I went into a shell- the quiet girl who sat in a corner, staying out of the lights, never wanting to be seen. And for a while I believed that it was the identity I wanted, and no matter how much I wanted to be content with being so, somewhere deep down it just wasn’t me. So, dear readers, I asked again, Who am I?

Now that boards have ended, results of both the examination and college applications have come out, I was in for some major shockers. The last few weeks have been full of thinking, reconsidering, planning, and making decisions. I’m stuck deciding between two colleges for my undergrad, and making a decision has never been harder, for when I decide upon an institute, it doesn’t just shape my academics; it shapes my worldly perception and thought, and it decides who I become.

The worst part is that I know I will emerge as a completely different individual depending on where I choose to go for the next four years, and I have no idea which one of those versions will be the better pick. Will it be better to stick to being someone familiar or completely reinvent myself? And the question here stands, who do I want to become?

Like I mentioned at the beginning, these questions, over the last year, crept into my literature and my relationship with it. To me, writing has always been the most freeing, the most efficient way of expression; it helped me define and explain myself to myself. But when you are clouded and fogged by the question of who you are, where your values lie, what kind of life you want, and who you want to be, considering that you do not have answers for these questions, it is a rather herculean task to define and explain yourself to yourself.

So, my work lost its heart (in my eyes at least); it started feeling performative and just wrong. The way I viewed my writing changed; for a while, it stopped being freedom and became suffocation of sorts, so I took a break. Although in my heart, I really hope this piece is different, I hope that the second time I read this, it feels a tad bit more genuine than my other futile attempts over the last year.

I feel like this process of explaining and understanding and making sense of yourself is very ironic, in the sense that it needs a lot of thought, but the more you think, the more confusing it gets. I am someone who’s always overthinking a lot and tries to introspect as much as possible, and in my experience, that has just made it so much more difficult for me to be able to pinpoint my identity.

There are times when I say that I’m going to leave it to destiny and let fate shape who I become, but it’s not the easiest to just let go and rely on destiny, because then I have all these decisions to make, and knowing that my choices will majorly dictate who I will become, I become the director of my fate, I become My own God. There is another question here: do I truly have to pinpoint my identity, is it really a requirement, can I just be? Alas, it is a rabbit hole I wouldn’t go down in this piece, at least.

I know that sometimes turning 18 feels like this ultimatum: it feels like you need to have everything figured out, you need to be exactly who you wanted to be, you need to know who you are and what you’re doing. And in this era of Instagram telling me to manifest my “dream life” (as if I know what that is) and drink chia water and try to become a Kendall Jenner in suits and shades, I’ve realised that it’s not that easy and somewhere even a little unreasonable to keep the expectation of being that sorted in mere 18 years of life.

Honestly, it is really hard for me to end this article in a way that gives it justice, but if I were to vomit every dilemma I have on this little laptop screen, it might be less of a blog and more of a book.

But all in all, I’d say although I’m not everything I thought I would be and I don’t know everything I expected myself to know, I’m really excited to turn 18; I’m scared too, but the anticipation keeps me going.

So, Happy 18th Birthday to me. The only thing I will say to console myself would be that ‘I think that little 6-year-old me would think I’m super cool,’ and that means the world to me because I think she’s super cool too…

Anishkaa Muthe

31/05/2026

I am My God, but Who am I? was originally published in Modern Women on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

“There’s something magical about growing up loving books and music and rain.” although I’ve always felt this to be true, I truly realized it today.

A Storm hit my town today: the pink evening sky studded with lightning, echoing with thunder as it rained as if the world would drown; for me, that was the perfect moment to sit in the balcony, a book in hand, music in the background and the raging storm gently moistening the edges of my clothes.

There are so many things I realized in that moment: I couldn’t see the sun setting, yet it was the most beautiful sunset I had seen in a while; Japanese authors have an enchanting way of expressing the beauty of a quiet, slow life, the way the words opened doors to a quiet home hidden in some corner of my heart; My playlist is lowkey amazing, the way some forgotten tunes lit and filled my soul with something unrecognizable yet very comforting.

It’s fascinating, the way I grew up: going from being scared of the sound of the thunder to finding it the most peaceful sound in the world, going from never wanting to be alone, to finding tranquility in my soft solitude.

That’s how growing up has been for me: loving the rain, living through books and drowning in music, Absolutely Magical.

I’ve so many memories attached to these small pleasures of mine: Dancing in the rain with my sister; running barefoot through a grassy field, mid-storm with my mom. Falling asleep as my mom sang to me and forcing my dad into reading or telling me a story every night.

Today, all of those memories came flooding back to me; it was as if the pieces of me, that I was slowly forgetting poured down with the rain, like magic, like home.

Weird, how I instinctively called a Storm ‘Home’; weird, how I described my whole childhood with these few elements. Maybe, that’s why I also call it Magical, because of how weird it is.

But I guess that is an artist’s trademark, too emotional, too romantic, Too Weird…

Anyway, I’m just glad an hour-long storm awoke the artist in me that was so frustratingly dormant for the last few months. I guess, it’s truly just Magic after all…

©Anishkaa. M

18/5/2025

The Child of Stardust… was originally published in Good Writer on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

I used to say “To feel is to be Human”
But sometimes I wonder
What will become of me as I’ll watch every ounce of emotion leave my body?
When I watch my tears dry up and my eyes dim down?
What will I be when my soul hides, shriveled and lost
And my mind becomes unheard noise?
What will I be when all that is left is my hollow body walking?

To feel is to be Human,
But how do I feel when my heart becomes numb to life
And solace becomes cold, quiet nights?
Is that when my HeArt will die?
When the Art I breathe for disappear
And my heartbeat become lifeless thumping?
Is that when being human will become an endeavor for concrete
And Life become an unnoticed passage of time?

To feel is to be Human…
So, when will I be human again?
When this hollow body prepares to lie for eternity
And the only Feeling left to Feel
Is Regret and Relief…

©Anishkaa. M
26/4/2025

Make Me Human… was originally published in Creative Passions 💖 on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

I recently saw a movie, it had this dialogue “teenage girls are psychopaths” and maybe it is right, maybe we are a generation full of messed up kids trying to survive in this deathly jungle we’ve created for ourselves. And this survival gets harder when you’re a 16 yr old that moves into a city way bigger than your own, to ‘step into the world’ with rosy dreams and rosy expectations. I am one of those 16 yr olds, who with very romanticised notions, very naively decided to step into the renowned ‘City of Dreams’: Mumbai.
Mumbai, is probably 10 times the size of my not very humble, but very little town. Moving to Mumbai was my dream since 1st grade, and when that dream manifested, I was on Cloud 9. I thought my life would be perfect, I’d have the perfect group of friends, I’d go to fancy parties, I’d do lots of events in college, I’d be known, I’d be in my ‘Academic Beast’, ‘It Girl’ era and what not; but reality is pretty far from any of that. Back in my town, I was the top of the hierarchy, the Perfect Girl, centre of attention, the Lovely Queen; after moving to Mumbai, my life of the last 13 yrs came crashing down on me. I became this introverted, invisible person; the friends’ group or lots of parties definitely did not happen, neither did the academic beast and It girl era ever arrive.
I came to realise that Mumbai, no matter how pretty, beautiful and picture-worthy, is very harsh and extremely tough. No matter how much anyone says ‘Mumbai embraces all’, the ‘All’ still do feel left out to some extent, when everyone around you is this confident Mumbai Kid and you’re this awkward girl from out of town who knows nothing about the city, its people or its ‘culture’; trying to push through this humongous crowd that’s, without trying very hard, swallowing you down; but standing here, watching this city move past me, I wonder Does Mumbai really not bother about anyone Or Is it just not willing to let you in?
But there’s still something to hang on to, somewhere to belong, isn’t there? When you go back home and you have friends there; Spoiler Alert: you don’t. When I went back home for my first holiday, I realised I didn’t belong there anymore, now I was the Mumbai Girl; 13 yrs lost and forgotten, within 3 months. That’s when it hit ‘I’m all alone now’ neither do I belong in Mumbai, neither do I back at home. Trust me, I have never felt more lost in my life.
I’m the kind of person who thrives on attention and external validation, to have that very thing taken from me was very hard to live with. So, I chose to cope by holding on, holding on how? Well, simple tactic, making an indirect statement saying “you excluded me, but I belong in places better than you” how did I do that? I held onto my past self, my actions were based on how pretty, fun and ‘happening’ my life was to look on Instagram, to the audience of my past. I did have fun, not that I didn’t, but most of it was for the eyes of the world and not my own satisfaction [it still is that way, I haven’t gotten any better yet].
Then came my midterms, and I wasn’t as great as I thought I’d be and my extracurriculars weren’t anything major either. That made me realise that I was like any other kid around me here, unlike when I was back home, always the different one, the one that stood out, and suddenly I didn’t anymore, I was ordinary. The realisation hit me, right in the face, hard and strong, that in this huge ocean, I was no whale or shark, just another little fish in the Shoal. My future suddenly became scary, thinking about college and university became terrifying and I just wanted to avoid it all, simply run away [I still do, sometimes] And now, I’m a mess.
But not all of it was bad honestly, Mumbai taught me a lot of things, it humbled me and it helped me see: within myself and so many things about myself that I never really knew were suddenly crystal clear in front of my eyes, as if a very loud noise had been shut off and I could hear clearly again. Back at home, I had this persona designated to me: ‘The Perfect Girl’ and suddenly I didn’t have to be anyone anymore, it was harder that way honestly, to not have a script to follow anymore. I had to discover myself and who I truly was for the first time Ever; I think that’s what I’m doing now, getting to know myself beyond who I was 6 months ago.
Things aren’t any better right now, I don’t think they will be for very long and sometimes moving here may seem like the biggest mistake I’ve ever made, but I wouldn’t want it any other way. So, this new year I have one resolution: I’m going to find who I am, a new persona, a new person, not defined by her past self, past life and this Social Jungle of teenagers she’s surviving in. This new year will be of rediscovery.
So, here’s to 2025 and to all of us, whose lives changed because they stepped into the big, bad world out there; let us all be proud of ourselves as this year ends, because leaving our homes and lives behind is not easy and we lived that down: The Shift, the way it hit our egos and shattered our sense of belonging, but we didn’t run away, we strived through it and are surviving to see the light of day.
So, A Very Happy New Year People, may you have a bright 2025…

©Anishkaa. M

31/12/24

When the Princess left her Fortress… was originally published in Creative Passions 💖 on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

I moved to Mumbai back in August, and it has been the biggest event in my life so far, that taught me and changed me so much as a person. Coming here also made me realise the fact that, I’ll never go back home now, I’m just going to keep moving further away. It sent me through these waves dilemma and fear and thoughts of how fast I’m growing up. Recently, I learned that this is called “A Canon Event”: an event or experience that changes you and your life completely.

But, this is not a write-up about all of that, this is a compilation of my attempt to put my jumbled mind and feelings into words.

So here goes, the effects of the Canon I set off:

- Into the Air

I’m leaving today,

Maybe to comeback or to fly away forever

There was a cluster of us,

Like a worn out thread

Full of different textures, held together strong

But suddenly by the scissors of fate,

A thread cut into pieces,

Fragments blown into the air

Some fell close to home, some flew miles away…

And now as I fly away,

I see the pieces of me I left behind and the pieces I lost…

I’m looking back at so many stories I still haven’t written,

So many songs I haven’t sung,

So many memories I haven’t made

So many pictures I still haven’t captured

Feels like I left a book unwritten, incomplete

What’s truly fascinating, was the fall

The falling in love when I thought I’d ever only hold hate

The falling in love, when I thought no tears would ever be shed…

But alas, here we are

Victims of fate

Million fragments of a thread

Blown into the Air….

- Am I Really Alright

I feel so much, am I really alright

I feel so much, I’ve run outta words to write

Now I’m leaving my kingdom, i don’t know who to be

This feels like walking in a palace of mirrors staring back at me

Am I in the right place? Is this the right decision?

What is this game of fate, I can’t keep up…

So much that I wanna do

So much of life I wanna see

So many stories to tell

So many people to be…

And I maybe greedy

And it may not be that easy

To see every corner of the world

To read every written word

To meet everyone I’m meant to be with

To test all limits of destiny

But, what if I die?

Before I see the world

Before I go big

Before I live my life

Before I truly feel alive…

There’s so much to think about

And just so little time

So much to do now

And such a little life.

And that’s just how my mind sounds,

Every passing night

As I keep wondering, am I really alright…

- Watching Life Play…

The rest of my life, is by my side

All I do is keep watching,

Watching it play, in front of my eyes

As it pulls me away,

Away from my home,

Links slowly severed

But where is my home

I still wonder

Where does it lie?

With those by my side

Or those that I left behind

And it breaks my heart

As I watch them laugh

Their eyes not looking at me…

Life’s been seeming like a fleeting dream

Where I walk away from everything

That I knew as reality…

I grasp, hold on to wearing threads

Threads of fate, that slip away

As time passes everyday

And all I do is keep watching

All of my life, in front of my eyes

as it plays…

Maybe it’s not for beings like me to stay,

My hunger to roam on a rampage

But this is the mind’s felony

My uprooted self cries in pain

But my hunger to move grows by the day…

With leaving comes leaving behind

And with that comes a lonely rain

As I think of what I called mine

And all that has to stay…

6 Months, A year and two in a blink

That’s how fast it feels it’s moving

But who can say, when all I’m doing

Is watching my life as it plays…

Thank You…

©Anishkaa. Muthe

17/10/2024

I set off a Canon… was originally published in Real on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

I recently read poem, it asked me a question “Can I like something without having to pursue it to the highest degree?” and that one question somehow healed so many parts of me.

There have been so many instances in my life that I constantly beat myself up over for so many years.

I hate sports, but it wasn’t always that way, I used to like playing with my friends, I liked playing badminton and chess and just running around, so why did I suddenly hate it? Well, it was because I was really bad at it, I didn’t play badminton well or chess or any sport for that matter. I felt that I looked stupid when I played and I was scared to get teased if I didn’t do well or lost a game, so I stopped playing altogether.

I have tried to learn a lot of things, like Table tennis, skating, karate and at some point I just didn’t feel like doing it, so I left it and I hated myself for that, for not completing it, for not pursuing it to the highest degree. That hate has always been such a big part of me and I feel so scared now to say that I like something, because I’m scared I wouldn’t be able to do it till the very end.

All my summers end up being so stressful sometimes, just because I can’t read like a 100 books in 3 months. As a reader, I always felt the need to read like a thousand books a year and complete one book in like a day and that became so overwhelming, to a point that it made me stop reading on a daily basis, my reading pattern became ‘One book in 6hrs or no book for 6 months’. I always feel bad because I don’t read a lot of genres of books, I feel like I need to read every genre EVER and I have to like it. That day I was packing up my books and I decided to count them, I didn’t have a 100 or a thousand, I had 56 books that I had collected over a period of 3yrs and that was the most embarrassing realization I have ever had. I felt like I wasn’t worthy of being called a ‘Reader’.

I’ve been learning music for almost 3yrs now and honestly I’m not too good at it. All my performances usually end up being a mess [one reason also being I don’t practice too often, we can talk about that some other time (and this is not a justification for me not practicing)], I always felt like “I’m doing 3rd yr diploma, I need to be awesome at it” and I’m not awesome at it, I’m average at best and I hate myself for it. I remember singing in front of a few family friends a couple months back and seriously messing it up, I was MORTIFIED, and I never wanted to sing EVER AGAIN.

But to be very real, I don’t think any of these experiences had to go the way they went.

I’ve noticed, in this society, the need to excel at everything and this obligation of perfectionism has always been so limitlessly bombarded on us. It defined our character, our worth, our future, even in instances when “how good am I at an activity” didn’t need to be a criteria of judgment. Through hundreds of generations, we could never remain JUST HUMAN and that’s just so messed up.

I mean, I could’ve just played sports because I liked to, I don’t have to be an athlete.

I learn new things because I like to explore, if I end up realizing that I don’t like it anymore, that’s completely ok, not seeing it through doesn’t make me a loser.

I can read just because it makes me happy, I can read as much as I want to, I can read whatever I like to read, I don’t need to fit a standard. I can complete a book in a week and read only 10 books in a yr, if that’s what I want. I just need to be happy and if reading makes me happy, then I am a goddamn Reader, nothing else defines if I deserve to be it.

I can learn music just because I want to, I don’t need to be awesome at it and honestly, although I do need to start practicing, I never had to beat myself up over it so much.

And that’s the thing, we don’t have to chase things to the end every single time. There’s some things that need to be seen through [like your academics and your career] and some just don’t [like your hobbies or things you do for fun]. We don’t need to be perfect all the time, we don’t need to be at the epitome of awesomeness for every activity we do. Honestly, It’s Ok. It’s ok to just do things because they make you happy, to just Be. It’s completely fine to be just human and not beat yourself up over Every. Single. Thing.

But at the end of the day, all I wanna say is, I’m just so glad I came across this poem, like I’ve honestly NEVER, in these 16yrs of my life, felt so relieved and liberated.

Honestly, I think that’s just the thing about literature, it always hits a spot. I also think that’s why I love doing this so much. But, that can be a story for another time…

THE END :)

©Anishkaa. Muthe

25/7/2024

Can I just Be Human? was originally published in The Taoist Online on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

I guess I’ve said this before, we all have a version of ourselves in our heads, perfect or not this image matters to us because it is how we define ourselves.

There are moments in life when this image breaks, due our own observation or maybe due to somebody else’s. Honestly, I agree that there is a dire need for this breakage, regardless, the mess and waves of emotions that follow through make me feel like it should never have happened in the first place [But, Surprise!! It happens anyways]

Many will ask me “Isn’t Mess and Waves of Emotion referring to the same idea?” No, they’re not. Waves of Emotions are emotional (well, obviously), but the Mess covers areas far beyond just emotions. Mess refers to Chaos. Your brain stops functioning, logic just doesn’t exist anymore, you stop understanding your emotions, you start feeling shallow, you just don’t recognize the person in your mirror anymore. Basically in situations like these you shut down.

This mess comes differently for everyone, but from what I’ve seen, you just stop feeling at all, emotions start exhausting you and suddenly life doesn’t make sense (because, well, logic is practically extinct at this point, you see)

In situations like these, you need something constant, something that doesn’t change with the hurricane you’re stuck in. These Constants come as people you know, maybe just strangers, a book, a song, a voice or just about anything, honestly. They ground you, act as your only link to your reality. Talking to them, listening to them, reading them or just their silent presence feels like a wash of cool breeze on a summer, a warm and heavy blanket sitting on you as you fall asleep on a cold winter night, or a cup of tea on a grey monsoon evening.

The most these Constants have to do is just exist for you and suddenly the world makes sense, they somehow bring you back to life.

No matter how much we deny it or act strong, we all need our Constants, maybe just to get by or just to cope with this ever-changing and fickle life.

You know what the best part about this is, we are all somebody’s constants, somebody’s home and we do it just by existing in this world, just by being born. I think that’s the beauty of it, how we unknowingly just bring someone home, how our words give them solace and how our voice calms their heart.

That’s just the Beauty of it…

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Oh! No, I’m not done yet. Don’t leave, stay a minute.

This blog was a complicated one, I suppose. How I went from being a mess to being a solace, but I guess, it expresses best everything that I’ve been trying to say: Life is messy, it is ever-changing and all we can do is keep up.

One day, you will fall behind, everyone does and that day I hope you have a Constant to anchor yourself to.

So to end with, I’ll just say “I love you, dearest Constant. Thank you for being here. I hope I can return the favor sometime.”

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I’m done. You can go now. Have a nice day [and also a nice life] ;)

©Anishkaa. M

29/4/2024

A Mess and a Constant… was originally published in Good Writer on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

What kind of a person am I? This is the question I often ask myself.

I think this is the thing with most of us, we try to define and fit. We make these little demarcation of assessments to define ourselves and our surroundings.

I’ve always lived on the extremes, the edges. Black or White; Good or Bad; Wrong or Right; never the in-betweens. I put everyone in these boxes of my assessment and made myself blind to everything that may contradict my demarcations. I put myself into these boxes, always trying to define myself. Slowly, I started to see that I wasn’t fitting in these definitions anymore and I flung into a state of absolute denial and eventually, despair.

All these 15 years of my life, I lived amongst two realities: one which actually existed and one which I had created in my head. I only ever assessed the world based on the version in my head and if things didn’t work according to this version of mine, I freaked out and did everything in my power to change it, to alter it and to force it to work according to me, just so I could avoid the pain of having to accept.

As I grew up, the truth kept hitting me harder, my realities were forced to shatter, the more I tried to pick up those broken pieces, the more they cut right through me like lethal shards of glass.

Now I see it though, the grey areas and honestly speaking, I am so absolutely scared of them, because I can never really understand where to fit the greys within my world of black and white.

I realise, there are no good people and there are no bad people, everyone works according to their circumstances, according to their conscience and emotions in the moment. A person who may be extremely bad to every person around him, may be the one who is ready to die for a mere street cat; A person who is absolutely selfish and manipulative to the world, may be the one who is ready to give up his whole life for someone he cares for; or someone like me, who has lived in delusion and oh, so dishonestly, can go out of her way to protect those she loves no matter what versions of themselves they might subject her to and can aspire to work towards a better world for people to walk upon, regardless of who the people she wants to help may be.

Maybe, all of us have these versions of the world in our heads, those which stop us from actually seeing the world in its true colours, causing us to judge and stereotype, to label and make assumptions; and maybe it’s time we break these glasses we’ve worn for so long and see the truth.

It’s really fascinating how our world has always functioned on these little grey areas that we purposely ignore, forgetting the fact that we are also a part of those greys.

Accepting these loose ends hurts, healing from that ‘hurt’ pains even more, but maybe, just maybe I’ll be able to find the lost pieces of myself in the journey, I’ll be able to put myself back together on the way; and who knows? Maybe in the process of understanding the greys I might just emerge smeared with every color that has painted this world, I might just reach the end, Free…

©Anishkaa. M

15/10/2023

Mon Amour, The World is Grey… was originally published in Journal Kita on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

People never understood why I loved reading so much, why I fell for those old yellowed pages, found home in the warmth of the freshly printed ones. They thought I was different; I stood out, I was noticed; I loved that and I didn’t want to lose it. Reading for me then became a way to stand out, I wanted to show off how much I read so I forced myself to read a lot, sometimes even when I didn’t feel like it; I wanted to impress my teachers so I tried to read difficult books, and slowly reading became an obligation, a job. And eventually I forgot why I loved it, why I held it so dear, so close to my heart; how I got lost in every page, how the words engulfed me, how every letter wrapped itself tightly around my soul in a warm embrace. I forgot the feeling of loving it, how I found a home in every story I read.

When I was younger, I remember sitting in the balcony singing to myself, I remember getting so lost in it, the whole world faded out, I would forget where I was, I only remembered my voice swirling around me, my thoughts shunned by the sound. I used to sit in the balcony with my mother, lay on her lap as she sang, I remember how serene it used to be; but then, I grew up, music for me became just about performing, it became an obligation rather than something I loved, I started caring about how perfectly I sang and how my singing made others feel rather than how it made me feel. I stopped singing to calm myself down, I started singing to impress. I forgot why I loved it so much, why it made my heart beat so much better, why it made me feel alive; I forgot how music saved me from falling to pieces and it slowly started fading from my life.

The more I grew up, my sole purpose of doing anything became to survive, to get through and over with everything going on in the moment, my focus wasn’t the journey anymore, it was the destination… The Applause.

In the course of life, I have only focused on being perfect and impressing the world. I forgot what it felt like to be in love with Life and with living, to be in love with myself and everything around me. I forgot why I loved everything I held dear. I forgot the small moments that lit up my soul, the small incidents that made me smile… I forgot Myself.

I forgot that what made me different, wasn’t my peculiar interests, it was how much I loved them, it was the humongous amounts of love I held inside me and how much of it I gave to the world, no matter what it put me through, how in awe I was with this huge wide universe. I forgot to be proud of the wild and fiery beauty I held within Me.

I feel like I’m not the only one, all of us forget something in the fast pace of life, we forget what makes us happy, we forget to admire the beauty of the universe, and like I said, we forget to hold on to everything we love and to love Ourselves.

Maybe it’s time we give ourselves that chance, to run wild, to be free, to rediscover our very Essence, to love what makes Us, Ourselves.

It’s about time that We Let the Universe Breathe Life into Us Again…

©Anishkaa. M

30/7/23

Breathe Life into My Corpse… was originally published in Counter Arts on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

It was a usual night; I went to my swimming classes. I was very tired that day, I got in the pool did my usual exercises and started swimming.

As I started to get tired, I heard a muffled sound in the water, it was a beautiful sound, which seemed to be getting louder with every passing second, it sounded as if millions of tiny crystals were being dropped onto the surface of the water. It was the most beautiful sound I had ever heard.

I looked up for a while to take a breath, I was faced with a raging storm, rains so heavy I could barely look past my own hand. Cold droplets struck my face, fast, sharp and freezing, I felt like I could live in that moment forever, it felt so peaceful, as if every pain I felt was soothed, every emotion I felt was silenced.

I looked around, mesmerized by the infinite ripples in the water created by the beautiful shower of raindrops, it was magical how the clear and quite blue water broke into this beautiful dance of a million ripples in merely a few seconds.

I dunked my head back in the water, the water felt colder, I could feel the cold droplets hit my body, I wished only for a moment that I could swim on like this forever, my fatigue, my pain, my shortness of breath all disappeared for those few moments, I was happy.

The water grew darker as I moved into the deeper parts of the pool, I could feel my muscles giving up and slowing down.

“The end’s close just a little more,” I thought to myself as I reached the end of the pool. I was tired, short of breath and my face felt as if it was on fire. I closed my eyes for a second and felt every drop that hit my body, calming myself down and breathing.

I dunked myself into the water to practice my breath. As I looked around through my swim goggles, I was in awe with the view that stood before me — uncountable tiny little bubbles floating around in every direction, a beautiful dance of the light rays penetrating through the water. I looked below me; the reflected light moved with the water, as if it was moving to the music of the rain.

I emerged out of the water — it was almost time to go. A few seconds later, the rain came to a stop. It was as if the world had silenced and come to a stop. The petrichor spread through the air.

I got out of the water, stepped onto the slippery tiles, it was cold and it smelled like heaven, I felt calm and peaceful.

That’s how rains are — everyone knows how it works, the evaporation, condensation and this and that, but even after the knowledge, rains always seem magical.

Rains are so much beyond just showers of water; they’re storms of emotions. Happiness for some, sadness for others, make some angry, excited, bored, or romantic — there’s just so much rain can make you feel.

Rain has the power to soothe every pain, even if it is only for a mere moment, the power to silence every overwhelming emotion, the power to mesmerize every viewer.

Imagine, just sleeping on a cold cement floor, feeling every drop that hits your bare skin, a million thoughts silenced and million emotions dissipated. Just you, the sound of the rain and sting of the cold drops on your skin.

Some of you must love that image, some you must hate it, but like I said rain can make one feel a lot, it is different for every life.

For me, it always reminds me that there are times even the clouds overflow and even the heavens cry, and that thought itself makes me feel safe. It brings my heart back home.

Every time I dance in the rain or even just watch it from afar, I feel beautiful as myself, comfortable in my own skin, I feel at home, because that’s just how Rains are, isn’t it?

Thank You…

©Anishkaa. M

02/07/2023

That’s just how Rains are… was originally published in Real on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.