Tag: Self-Reliance

Myself, Writing

Nightmares

Sanjay Sabarwal

failureSo had my first nightmare in a long time. It was surreal as it started in the middle. I am sure I was dreaming of something else, but I see a guy passing by, and for some reason. I call him a pussy. He keeps walking, but I know he is going to come back, and sure enough he does. I am on some stairs, and he begins walking up, and I begin blubbering that I was kidding, and didn’t mean to say what I did but like in dreams, suddenly there are 3 more people, and one grabs my hand, trying to force my wedding ring off while another grabs my watch, and then third has a razor blade. The old school kind that my father used to use when he shaved. And I start mumbling that I really didn’t mean it, but the razor keeps coming towards my right eye. The only one with a contact, and I don’t want to be blind. I don’t want to be squinting out of left eye which sees mostly blurs lately. I knew instinctively that they wanted the good eye, and as I woke up, there was an immediate fading idea that if only I had a gun to equalize the unfairness of the situation (there goes my liberal card).

The weird part is that I didn’t know any of the men well except for the first guy who suspiciously looked like the Reading Rainbow Gentleman Levar Burton (chucking anti-racist card as we speak).  Yes, I did try to figure out the dream, and I am pretty sure the entire dream was an allegory of my recent in ability to read, write or do anything workout related the past few weeks. Each day, I have this vague goal of writing and running, and while some days I am successful in writing for 20 minutes and exercising for 15, I know that’s not going to get it done if I want to be published or be in any sort of shape for the Spartan Beast which is fast approaching in September.

But, and this is a big but, I know I am doing something which is still infinitely better than the nothing I was doing before. So thanks to the Zen Habits, I practice self-compassion. I am giving myself a break even if they give me nightmares.

#30trust, #trust30

Afraid to Do/Personal Message

Sanjay Sabarwal

In the midst of a humid and hot as hell New York, I stayed away from the laptop just taking in the alone time with her and some old family.  So far, it has to led to mixed results as we have become rusty at truly being alone together.  The constant calls and texts from others do not help sometimes only because we have become new at being with each other. Sad truth is, we are struggling more so because there are some old habits we have that are hard to break, and are creating constant friction.  Anyways, that is my long winded way of saying sorry, I didn’t get to the prompts for these reasons/

Trust30-Day 9-Afraid to Do

Afraid to Do by Mary Jaksch

The other terror that scares us from self-trust is our consistency; a reverence for our past act or word, because the eyes of others have no other data for computing our orbit than our past acts, and we are loath to disappoint them. – Ralph Waldo Emerson

Emerson says: “Always do what you are afraid to do.” What is ‘too scary’ to write about? Try doing it now.

Writing for me has always been personal but recent comments by others in my family and others close to me have now made me scared to put down anything “real” or “off the cuff” for fear of offending them as well as coming off as harsh.  I feel as if I can no longer vent bout the issues that are affect my due to friends and family.   Unfortunately, I am in a position that I cannot blog about it but I did manage to find another outlet which is to write a blank document, rant and rave and then deleting so I don’t have the stress that I will offend someone. 

Your Personal Message by Eric Handler
To believe your own thought, to believe that what is true for you in your private heart is true for all men, that is genius. – Ralph Waldo Emerson

What is burning deep inside of you? If you could spread your personal message RIGHT NOW to 1 million people, what would you say?

My message would be a copy and paste of Pema Chodron.  To let things be, let emotion flow around you and don’t waste time on things that do not matter, spend time on the ones that make you matter. 

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Come Alive

Sanjay Sabarwal

Come Alive by Jonathan Mead
Life wastes itself while we are preparing to live. – Ralph Waldo Emerson

If you had one week left to live, would you still be doing what you’re doing now? In what areas of your life are you preparing to live? Take them off your To Do list and add them to a To Stop list. Resolve to only do what makes you come alive.

Bonus: How can your goals improve the present and not keep you in a perpetual “always something better” spiral?

(Author: Jonathan Mead)

I am in the rare position in life where I can say that I would still be doing what I am doing now if I had a week to live with the exception of a few things I wish I was doing more (traveling more, reading more, trying out new activities such as camping), and I realize that I love where I work, I have the partner I love but, (isn’t there always one but?) I am missing some part of my old self, and that’s who I was when I ran Ziba Music with my father and the fact that I was always open to new experiences.  I see now that I want to reconnect with old friends more, old activities even more and limit some of the new people I hang around with only to do things I truly love with my partner.  I would say that I am at 75% in terms of not changing my week but would like at least 2 days to be spent with old friends, doing an event and perhaps traveling. My current goals are getting me to that ideal 100% as just this weekend, I reconnected with some dear friends of mine, spent quality time with her and my family and finally got to do a BBQ at a place (for me, it was the ideal weekend).  Now just gotta make sure I have more weekends like this!

 

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Travel Prompt

Sanjay Sabarwal

Travel by Chris Guillebeau
If we live truly, we shall see truly. – Ralph Waldo Emerson

Not everyone wants to travel the world, but most people can identify at least one place in the world they’d like to visit before they die. Where is that place for you, and what will you do to make sure you get there?

(Author: Chris Guillebeau)
I hadn’t thought of this aspect for my life and I realized that I had very vague notions of traveling, preferring, instead ,to surprise myself by visiting places I have heard of but no know about it.  Now that could be the simplistic  travel the world but that seems like a cop-out and did not really answer the question, but then it hit me that I did try once to travel all over India so perhaps the short answer to visit India, I mean really visit, travel the country, but various methods of transportation, get to know the country in a more intimate way rather than half-remembered places and figure out what makes me tick coming from a country of billion.

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Trust 30 Prompts: Catching up online (A Blog Post)

Sanjay Sabarwal
Title page of Shakespeare's Sonnets (1609)
Image via Wikipedia

So I got a bit lazy in terms of posting my prompts but somehow the defensiveness side of me wanted to make them public so whoever reads my blogs knows that I am not a quitter or one who does not follow through so here are my prompts that I have putting on random documents for the last few days.

Post-it Question by Jenny Blake

That which each can do best, none but his Maker can teach him. Where is the master who could have taught Shakespeare? Where is the master who could have instructed Franklin, or Washington, or Bacon, or Newton? . . . Shakespeare will never be made by the study of Shakespeare. Do that which is assigned you, and you cannot hope too much or dare too much. – Ralph Waldo Emerson

Identify one of your biggest challenges at the moment (ie I don’t feel passionate about my work) and turn it into a question (ie How can I do work I’m passionate about?) Write it on a post-it and put it up on your bathroom mirror or the back of your front door. After 48-hours, journal what answers came up for you and be sure to evaluate them.

Bonus: tweet or blog a photo of your post-it.
My post it note that’s planted on my laptop was:  HOW DO I GET PASSIONATE ABOUT WRITING REGULARLY?  Today is 48 hours later, and I keep remembering the time when I took the class Revisiting the Muse, and it was during those days as well as her Cancer treatment that I was really, truly into the experience of writing because it was my only way of truly expressing myself.  Whenever I veer away from the path of using writing as my ultimate expression tool, I resort to pettiness, day-to-day nostalgia and somehow feeling full of this emotional gunk that makes me not even like myself really.  So what was it about those times? A writing schedule, and a morning one at that.  I don’t know when I turned into a morning person but the last few years, what I have in common with my dad is truly scary.  Nowadays, he is up at 530 and in bed b 9pm.  Ok, so I am not that bad, but I was waking up around 730 and in the quiet of the morning, when I had no distractions, I would pour out my soul.  But some silly comments that I was always in the other room, I took to mean that I shouldn’t be writing when the complaint was not about the other room but about disappearing with no comment and not spending quality time. So I stopped the writing schedule, and although I did not immediately feel it, my writing has suffered and the past few classes, I have merely trudged through the assignments, cutting and pasting from older essays not realizing exactly why my creativity had dried up. Now I see it.  I need that morning outlet, I need to keep reading, I need to stay intellectually stimulated.

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One Strong Belief: A Blog Post

Sanjay Sabarwal
Have I Offended Someone?
Image via Wikipedia

Wow, ended up almost missing the deadline for posting today and the minutes wind down,  I can only pat myself that for once I am through.  The one strong belief that I have that is not shared by my friends or my family is my willingness to write out my thoughts, desires, and commentary about how things affect me.  It has always been easiest for me to express how I truly feel about things, and it has gotten me the most amount of criticism and fascination for those who are offended or moral voyeurs.  I have struggled all my life on how to balance what I need to get out versus on revealing too much about others or worse conflicting with some who have no idea how I feel until they read my words.  The one thing I have actively pursued is my desire to write, and while it sometimes it is far from honest, my recent flirtation with The Artists Way has shown that my belief in my writing is a reflection of my life and even if it offends others, it is my belief that for me to deal with things is to write about them.  No matter the consequences.

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