“Restart”

“Simple physical tasks that require little to no thought aren’t distracting; in fact, as some studies show, doing mindless tasks can actually boost your level of creativity and innovation.“

Yes, I read these lines in an online article. I have a habit of saving random lines I read online and in books. Out of 150 drafts in Gmail, 90 are random lines, proverbs, quotations, that become words of wisdom eventually in the story of my life. Somewhere along this journey of making life worth telling over get-togethers with people I hardly ever meet, I gave up on what had actually brought me back to life. My writing. My words, My stories. My voice. My enthusiastic ability to weave words into poems and stories. This is what had brought me joy when I had fallen so deep into the dark hole where nothing was visible. No voice reached me but my own slow and uneven breaths. One at a time, it reminded me how much more life I still had. And that either I could continue to stand in the filth; in the stench of everything that had gone wrong, or I could try. Try to find a way to be anywhere but here. But this time, on my own. I know that sounds like fake pride.  But I was exhausted from listening to people who knew nothing about my life yet had so much to preach.

My painful, anxiety-driven life was no one else’s to fix but my own. A life where I did not know how to pause and rest. I only understood that my worth was in doing everything for everyone. Sitting down to read a book and serving leftovers for dinner was not an option. Okay, now I am simplifying the struggles. Cooking wasn’t the challenge.Telling myself that I wasn’t worth anything else was the challenge.  

And so I started the exhausting climb, out of the hole. The slippery, wet mud covered in vines that poked and grew stronger with me, reminded me of how long it had been. 

The challenge wasn’t about trying to grow but about accepting the life I was handed over. Knowing in my gut that there was more to me, but ignoring every instinct to follow that voice was the challenge. So today, I decided to write again. For no one else, but for the girl I never hugged tight enough because she did not fit into the mold she was expected to. She was funny and smart, maybe even pretty. I hear her laugh every now and then and wonder if that girl laughed enough. 

Life is in the mundane tasks, the ones that used to hurt my soul, reminding me of my mediocrity and unsuccessful story. I found my voice, my poems, my real stories in the tasks that are no challenge. I learned about the girl who loved bike rides because that was the only time she was truly herself without any duties or expectations holding her back. I started the the journey of self-awareness with one small breath at a time. 

Filthy and weathered

My body long gone

Hoping without trying, 

For rescue to come by.

Unarmed and naked

She remembered how to fight

Till the last breath 

Or Until the knee bent