Sun rahi hoon sudh budh kho ke, koi main kahani,

Puri kahani hai kya, kise hai pata..

I was standing on the balcony. The sunset sky looked beautiful. Thousands of shimmering hues were playing hide and seek there, and amazed with the sublime beauty of the dusk, I was humming this song. While looking back to the road I have travelled so far, this song flashed in my mirror of heart. Something is magical in this golden hour, for sure. It reminds what you have left behind, how you were fooled for your innocence, how you slipped away your heart for someone who never cared and you didn’t welcome the love you truly deserved. “What if, I have followed my heart’s call, for once?” you whisper. And then, you feel a dumb pain inside, your eyes get wet.

 Again, this hour reminds you how far you have come, travelling all alone. How strong you have always been to move on. Despite the circumstances, you stood strong. Defeating all the obstacles, finally, you won.

This is life, embracing new beginnings, starting over and over. A new book, sometimes, a new chapter.

As the thought of beginning came in my mind, I tried to open the new journal of life, to frame some beautiful moments. But then, I looked back, and wanted to cherish some moments from the book of the last decade, as they are inked on the pages of my becoming. For I believe, they are the reason behind who I am today.

 Sometimes, you want to thank the day gone by, to make a promise for the new.

******

It was the beginning of another decade. 2010, a year when so many things happened in my life. After passing my twelfth board examination and clearing WBJEE examination, I got admission in a renowned engineering college of my nearby area, with a hope to secure a good career in life.

New place, new people, new subjects, and yes, the terror called ragging! It was the beginning of a new journey. But soon, from the second semester, my world started to turn upside down.

I started disliking the decision of taking Engineering as my grad course. From that time, I became a girl with no voice, no choice. In my school, I was a kind of captain girl. I have always been a girl with unlimited curiosity to gather knowledge. But, since then, I started to feel choked myself inside. Alone.

Somehow I managed to overcome that situation and my marks were increasing on the higher semesters. But, the fate was planning something else.

On my seventh semester, I met an accident in college. I fell downstairs. I had a severe tendon injury, and wrote the papers on sickbed. With a pain on my right leg, somehow I managed to finish the final year.

After a whole year, I recovered from that pain, finally. I am not cured fully at all, and will never be, as I have to bear a damaged tendon forever in my life. But, during that one year, everything went wrong to me. My dad fell severely sick and went through a surgery, I snapped connection with my friends and stopped calling them, as I was undergoing a deep pain inside my heart. Some of them misunderstood me and broke the so called ‘friendship’. And I am happy for that!

After passing out from college, I decided to prepare myself for the competitive exams of PSU jobs. My dad retired and we shifted to a new city. Here, I found myself trapped in the web of criticism for my ambition, dreams, and higher education. A twenty three year old introvert girl surrounded by books seemed to them an alien, I guess! They were worried for my marriage, and often blamed me for studying too much. I faced humiliation many times. Eventually, I became traumatized. I chose to be isolated, diving deep into my study.

But, I wonder why the universe made me a puppet of destiny. All my attempts were going in vein, every time I was few marks away from the cut off. The more I failed, the more I broke inside. I lost faith on myself. Life seemed nothing but a failure.

Deep inside, the seed of depression was planted, and I was totally unaware of it. Soon I became a girl with frustration, stress and anxiety. I started having frequent panic attacks and developed PCOD.

One thing I would like to mention that happened during this phase. There was another loss, too. Death. I have been so unfortunate to hear the scream of death twice, when I was just a school girl. But, for the first time, I saw death from close. I saw my maternal grandmother with the dying pain. My Dida breathed her last when I was standing beside her with my Maa. I can’t write more. Sorry. Period.

But, one thing was about to come in my life, what I will be always grateful for. I started to believe, there was no sign of life left in me. At this hour, the most beautiful miracle was awaiting to happen. On 2016, I was back to music after eight years of gap due to my study pressure. I started singing again, rarely, but I found music as my escapade from that chaos.

Next year, on 2017, I was back to writing, my new found love. I started blogging in my friend’s website and discovered my true passion. I created my first blog ‘Arts & Tales’ on 2018, posting my writings and my sister’s paintings there.

I thought these two phenomena were just random things, but soon I discovered, they came to awake me, to feel me alive, once again. When writing became my new found love, I realized the divinity through music.

In this phase of my random failure, writing and music were always with me and I found my solace there.

And finally, some months later, I created ‘The Saffron Journal’.

Sometimes, you come across something in the walk of life that will change your life forever. On 2018, I was spiritually initiated to the order of Ramakrishna Mission. I found my Guru, I found the light.

After that, gradually I recovered from the mental health issues and also from the feeling of failure. I started writing against the Menstruation Taboo with my series ‘I Bleed Red’. I created a new writing piece blending the moods of an Indian Raga with a creative way, and named it ‘Bandish : The Raga Tales.’ Alongwith, I started ‘The Queen Project’ to script the tales of women voices with my own tribe of Queens.

Last but not the least, on 1^st January, 2020, I founded ‘VAIDIK’, with an aim to spread love and light all over. I started to pen down my tale of becoming and titled it as ‘Scars & Glory’, 

For I embrace my scars as my glory, I find them as the echo of the light that shines from within.

So, this was my tale of the last decade when I fell, I broke, I screamed. But once again, I dared to rise. To spread messages of hope and healing, I have started writing ‘Letters Of Light’ to send my love and light to everyone around.

Throughout this journey, I had a pure revelation.

There is a blur line between love and longing.

I realized, writing is my love, and music is my longing.

*******

The evening was falling. Looking at the shimmering stars, I started humming,

Jo barse sapne boond boond, naino ko mund mund,

Kaise main kahu dekh na saku anjane raste,

Gunja sa hai koi iktara..

I opened the new journal of life and started to write the first chapter. I wrote,

2020. Embrace New Beginnings.

 _______________

“This post is a part of ‘DECADE Blog Hop’ #DecadeHop organised by #RRxMM Rashi Roy and Manas Mukul. The Event is sponsored by Glo and co-sponsored by Beyond The Box,Wedding Clap, The Colaba Store and Sanity Daily in association with authors Piyusha Vir and Richa S Mukherjee”.