Only Me ruchi: Fall in Love & Stay Happy!!

Only Me ruchi: Fall in Love & Stay Happy!!: Have you ever been in love? Of course we all have..! That feeling that makes you feel beautiful, that feeling when you smile so much ...

Fall in Love & Stay Happy!!

Have you ever been in love? Of course we all have..! That feeling that makes you feel beautiful, that feeling when you smile so much that it’s easy to believe that you probably slept with a hanger in your mouth… J

When in love the world is suddenly a better place. You believe in the general good of the world, you laugh more, you help more, you live better, you dress better, you feel better and of course you love a lot more!!

Don’t worry it’s not one my phases of going through a mid-life crisis and trying to relive my feelings from when I first fell in love…  See now, read that again, that’s the exact thought that struck me like lightening and I came running to my blog to share it with y’all.

The point is when we are in love we are happy! You feel wanted, loved, missed, adored, admired everything! That’s what is needed to make life so much more beautiful and so much more worth it!

Now, let’s expand the thought a little… Everything in the world that makes it exciting…

The adrenaline, the passion, the romance, the surprise, the dreams of a great life ahead!

Those and many more emotions and experiences that come to us while in love are the ones that make life more and more exciting each day. To be happy every single day and to feel on top of this world every single day – fall in love!

Ok… ok... don’t get excited – I am not suggesting you ditch your partner and go running to the mall to find a new person to fall in love with!!! [Well if you must – then who am I to stop you ;) – go crazy!]

What I mean is find something [or someone] to be in love with – truly. Not like Facebook love it – where you have a perfect life & all! Anything that drives you, anything that makes you feel good about yourself, anything that’s truly worth loving.

If you love your job – then truly love it. I know of people who go through that extra mile to look, behave, perform and do all that it takes to prove it to their own self [& in most obvious ways to all others] that they most dearly love their job.

Take any example… a new marriage – everyone in the family is happy with the concept of the new alliance and there is crazy happiness everywhere. A new baby in the house… everyone is happy with the love for the newborn.

When you see people fighting too much in a relationship, clearly they are not happy and obviously the love is going south. People fighting in family relations, typically with the relatives the love never is really there… it’s all relative you see – mostly an obligation, thus, always an unhappiness. There are happy relations too – your cousins from childhood, that one distant aunt you always miss, ever wondered why? Cause there was love, good old love. Therefore, the happiness!

Wait – don’t confuse the joy of bitching about that most hated relative with happiness you are not in love with her… that’s something else!

People who love cooking, are happy in the kitchen. People who love the outdoors, are happy driving, camping or just being out… it’s simple when in company of what or who you love – you are happy!

When the love starts depleting or when there isn’t enough love for any other reason there is not enough feed to create happiness!

Stay around what you love or love what you are surrounded with – the sure shot way to happiness!

 

 

 

Some days are better than the rest and the rest are worse than some days!

Some days are better than the rest and the rest are worse than some days! We all know that having faith in ourselves is the first thing to do even before we start the journey of developing faith in the almighty. I always thought that this would be an incremental phenomena but as it turns out it doesn’t necessarily work that ways. Some of the days my faith in me is beyond what my surroundings can handle and some [read a lot!!] of days I am like 50 feet of crap… then me…

Well I also thought the on and off switch of the way feel about ourselves would be a teenage phenomenon – as much as I’d like to be that young again, I don’t think this confused self-image ends with teenage, it has a its creepy way of getting on with us just like getting older!

Which brings me back to the basic question – why should we have confidence in ourselves? Why do I need to have a high self-esteem? I have seen people getting driven by other people… their life kind of seems simpler. One need not worry about being on the right path… or being responsible… or having a purpose! Live life and make merry! [or do merry or marry – whatever works for you ;) ]

Well there are 2 kind of people, one; those who have self-confidence and then those who don’t!!

The ones who do, have a convincing amount of belief in their values are self-reliant. They like moving forward and not being pushed. They chose their own path, are focused and have a great sense of innate eternal prospect that makes them become whoever and whatever they chose to become

Interestingly a high self-esteem with substantial self-confidence has nothing to do with being an extreme in anything – you don’t have to be a high performer, or the best student in class or the best of best in every walk of life. I am yet to see a report that says all toppers of all classes are all the CEO’s or the top leaders of the world!

The only connection I have ever been able to build with self-confidence is conviction to learn! It usually works the other way round – if you have the conviction to learn then you are in a comfortable place with yourself! How does this relate to the way you feel..?

Well, I have a theory. I believe as long as you find something exciting to learn, something you strongly feel about… something you are passionate about you would feel great & positive about yourself and keep boosting your self-confidence. Strangely enough it gets into a vicious circle.

The more you are learning new things the more confidence you gain and when you are comfortable with your state of high self-confidence you are not scared to follow your conviction to learn more and explore!

Guess I took the long route to say the simple thing – stay busy with what you are passionate about, follow your heart, explore and learn new things and that would resonate to a more confident you and a happier you!

Now go back to the days you are really struggling with yourself, the days you feel like the worse has just begun and lot more shit is around the corner – go back and analyze what you’ve been up to in these days… I bet you got caught in the routine, or you were doing things out of obligation or go sucked into something you don’t feel so strongly about – maybe at home, maybe with your significant others, maybe at work…?

Find a way to get back to learning a new thing, add a mix of your passion and be on track!

Ever wondered why people enjoy gossips – cause they are learning something “new” about “someone”

We as human being will always show conviction in people and new – and gossips combine these 2…

On that note – keep learning and stay confident!

The Reason...

Let’s start with a story, I am sure it will lay the ground work to the thought that’s been on my mind for a long time now…

I used to have a friend who wasn’t good for me. She never meant harm, she never said anything wrong and probably she meant really well. Though she gossiped with passion. Now hold on, don’t judge me yet! Who doesn’t like a little gossip..! We all do. But if this becomes a compulsive behavior it can start sucking the energy out of you than giving you the cheesy thrills you seek.

Sometimes, when I’d hear things she’d said behind my back or figure that she had been influencing other people’s opinions about me – negatively, I would hurt but not react. I was still sure she and I were great friends. Even worse, I would find that she would tell others about my personal problems—things I’d discussed privately with her assuming full confidence and trust in her.

Obviously, I knew this was one of those toxic relations I spoke about in the other blog. Unfortunately I didn’t have the strength and for some reason the will to try to rationalize her behavior even though I cared about her.

Something tells me probably this kind of behavior is an outcome of self-doubt, so maybe she did this to lift her own spirits. Maybe she was just miserable and a lost soul herself. No matter what the reasons, I tried on many occasions but could never talk to her about this situation. I was so much in shock with my own miss judgment of a person. I had always been so confident of the friends I had, it’s usually a complementing relationship! Once the friendship strikes – there usually is no looking back..! But here for some reason I was suffocating.

This seemed like a compulsive behavior of not being true to anyone and the psychologist in me was screaming – she needs help! Either fix it or get out of there.

We also had a few other common friends. A couple of them I truly cherished and admired. I still miss being with them but it seems like they were a package deal! They would all complain about each other but still be together.

The final nail in the coffin was, when she started lying to me about these other two friends. The personal situations they might have shared with her in confidence came to me from her as gossip! Something she demonstrated too much joy and energy in sharing with me and maybe many others!

This got me disturbed, I grew tired of her negativity, realized she was never going to change and finally shut her out of my life completely, and moved on.

Unfortunately, lost the other two friends too… Interestingly she came about looking as the victim and I as the bitch!

Months, even years later, mutual friends mentioned her name, my heart would jump and I’d relive the pain.

All the old questions such as “Why was she so careless with others personal situations?” and “How did I become friends with someone so shallow?” would re-emerge and I would torture myself.

For a long time I was extremely bitter and angry about what had happened. I used to fantasize about all the things I would say to her face when I next bumped into her. I’d imagine how great it would feel to really speak my mind.

But then, I saw the light. I realized that my former friend was suffering—just like we all are. I realized that she was unhappy. It doesn’t matter how or why she was a bad friend. It matters that she wasn’t happy.

I also realized that if I continued to have negative feelings toward her, I would be poisoning myself and prolonging the suffering. I would be making myself unhappy when there really was no need to do it.

Sadly, this issue of toxic friendships isn’t uncommon. I bet we all have people in our lives who leave us feeling miserable and drained of energy. I also think that when we hang around with these characters, we hold ourselves back and increase our odds of becoming negative.

So what do we do? Do we abandon people if they’re bad for us? Or do we stick around to help them out?

When we choose to associate with positive people, we tend to become happier and brighter and enjoy better lives.

In my case, I chose to move on…! It’s not easy to start over! It can get seriously lonely sometimes, but I guess it’s a choice one needs to make – toxic company or no company, of course for a short period of time –then we all find friends J

When I think of my old friend, I only hope she is happy. Letting her go didn’t mean that I don’t care. It just means I want to be happy myself. That’s why it’s so important to forgive, love, and move on when you have to: We all deserve to be happy. We have the power to make it happen.

If you’re into personal growth, you will at some point outgrow some or all of your friends. The sooner you can accept it, the easier it’ll be. Your friends may object and ask you why you’re abandoning them, but there’s not much you can do. The signs are obvious.

It can get lonely while you’re transitioning from one group of friends to another. You’ll wish that you could go back to the way things were. Friendship is like that. Everything seems so much easier when you selectively pick out memories from the past.

It’s not that you’re suddenly better than your friends. As you keep growing you will literally move into another wavelength, which is why your connection to your friends is fading. There’s always going to be that sense of obligation, of staying true to your friends, but you also have to stay true to yourself. Sometimes you just have to move on. Who knows, maybe you’ll meet up with some of your old friends.

You can’t keep doing what doesn’t feel absolutely right, because it will end up making you miserable. While this may sound harsh, it’s the truth. Listen to your heart.

Let your feelings and heart guide you when it comes to making decisions. If you don’t feel like an activity you used to do with your friends no longer excites you, don’t do it. If something else still seems cool, do it. It’s simple.

Listen to yourself instead of your friends. It’s up to you to play out your own life. Every person in your life is there for a reason. You may feel obligated or bad about cutting your friends loose, but if you’re not 100% happy with where you are and who you are spending your time with, it’s time for change. It’s time to look for a new social circle.

A Healthy Mix!!

When I was studying and practicing psychology I always liked and eventually relied more on the eclectic approach. Without going into the psycho details of it – eclectic would mean a healthy mix or balance of all that’s known. Before I could figure,,, I now have an eclectic approach towards everything – life… people… lifestyle… friends… enemies… the good… the bad… and the ugly!!

The beauty of it is it helps me work with the basic mantra of life that I was always reminded of as a kid “Atii sarvatra varjyatey” – meaning – excess of everything is bad. Looks like if you follow this principle you end up in the lap of an eclectic approach in life – cause you always make room for a little of everything. Since you aren’t in the race for too much of anything you end up adding a handsome variety to make up for it.

The interesting thing about this thought process is that you get to be with and sometimes deal with all kinds of people and situations in life – thanks to the variety you’ve added. To me that’s not a bad thing either. Cause the wider the spread of experiences you have the more your faith in the general good of life, world, people etc. would be built. Having this mix of all kinds of people and all kinds of situations acts like this multi stage refining process and the only outcome is ‘a better you’!

Other individuals affect us more than any other factor in the world. They are the most unpredictable, the most mysterious and the most exciting — at least, some are. There are other types of individuals, however. Then there are those who are more toxic than they are precious. If you want to live the best life possible, you should surround yourself with the best people possible; the best possible situations would follow J

More importantly, you would want to avoid all the toxic ones who will make you worse off for knowing them. The nicer people understand the importance and influence that human beings have on one another and use this knowledge to their advantage.

The good fellas am referring to aren’t flawless and aren’t impervious to all. With enough damage coming from enough sides, even the strongest will fall. The trick is to plan ahead and avoid those that make up the worst of the worst – I’ve been lucky to have this opportunity to let go of these energy suckers multiple times and then good times followed suite.

The big ones to look out for are those who feel the need to be showy are always compensating for something and trying to prove their worth to themselves. Unfortunately for them, this is how you know they have little worth.

Showing and trying to make other people envious is a waste of time, unless you’re trying to make yourself feel better about yourself at the expense of others. People that do such things are not the kind of people you want to keep around.

Then there are those who are too smart. I’m not talking the kind of dumb that can’t be helped; I’m talking about the kind of dumb that is a result of an immense ego, voluntary ignorance and self-righteousness.

Most of us know at least one or two people who are completely unintelligent as a result of continually making bad decisions and not learning from their mistakes for their entire lives.

Yet another category is the kind that would not only drain you mentally and emotionally but financially as well! Growing up, we’ve all had or been that friend who was always a bit broke and always happy to take a handout. When our friends are at a difficult point in their lives, there’s no reason not to help them out or to offer to pay for a few rounds of their drinks so they come out and have fun with the rest of the group. The problem is when the person seems comfortable in the position and is making little to no effort of improving their spending habits.

The list is fairly long… the lazy, the yolo kinds who like to get wasted and waste their lives… and of course the crown wining to those that spend their time running their mouths spend little time doing anything else – the famous big talkers!

I’d keep on fence with the non-dreamers, the comfort zone experts & the non-believers too! Unfortunately some of the believers too remind me of the donkey from the movie “Shrek” singing “I am a believer…” in high pitch……

Yet the biggest disasters around you could be the ones that are perpetually depressed!!

Not those that have an actual chemical imbalance, but those who act like they do. We all know people who are always feeling bad for themselves, always complaining about how difficult their lives are and how unlucky they are.

Bad luck is not a lifelong circumstance. If your life sucks, then guess what? It’s mostly, if not entirely, your fault. Don’t keep these folks around unless you want them to bring you down with them.

Given we cannot completely avoid these kind of experiences to value the good ones in our life and to add to the spice, you would want to keep a healthy mix of life going with a healthy mix of people and experiences :)

stay healthy...!

 

 

Only Me ruchi: Do You Trust Your Kid?

Only Me ruchi: Do You Trust Your Kid?: Do You Trust Your Kid? The answer to my question would you be an instant one from most of you – “of course yes!!” I seriously doub...

Do You Trust Your Kid?

Do You Trust Your Kid?

The answer to my question would you be an instant one from most of you – “of course yes!!”

I seriously doubt that though, for what I am referring to is much larger than just a question that can be answered by just an answer. Think again.

Okay, let’ go back to your childhood. Were you trusted by the grown-ups that mattered? Were your opinions considered valuable? Was a decision ever made trusting your instincts even though you were only a child? How was the reaction of your parents or the significant others when you said you would like to be a scientist who could invent a car that could take you to the moon? What happened when you wore your birthday tiara and said one day I am going to be the miss universe…?

When we talk of trusting our children we are not really talking about just the everyday matters of telling the truth or the little lies that childhood is made of. It’s how much confidence you show in them, their thoughts, their dreams and trust them like you would any grown up if they talked about their dreams or career goals.

The simple thing is confidence breeds confidence and trust breeds trust. This is not only true for our relationships and life in general but is particularly critical when raising kids. They have better senses than maybe 10 fully grown men put together [yeah, yeah, I used “men” intentionally, women of course have much sharper senses anyways  J ] Kids can quickly sense your reaction and that would have a lasting impact on their memory for the rest of their life and would be crucial in shaping their personalities too – so watch out if you are faking it!!

Another simple thing would be to ask yourself, how did you react when the child wears a new dress or gets new shoes or dresses up with effort for a special occasion – do you just say a few good things and move on, do you give a whole lot of speech on how wonderful they look but don’t really mean it entirely…  Do you board the values train and enlighten them that they should really not focus so much on their looks and worry about the real things in life!

I get it, we all say we love our kids and no matter what they wear or do we love them unconditionally. That’s not the point here the point is how you show them that affection and how authentically you do so.

For instance, I know a certain parents who love their kids just as much as any other perfectly loving parents would but at the same time preaching that it absolutely doesn’t matter how you look. You have to focus on your values, your belief system, respect for elders etc. etc… the good stuff in life. As adults you’d be glad that this was the philosophy one grew up with... However, think of this child’s confidence every single morning getting dressed for school, college, work, date, or probably the most important day of his/her life… it’s ruined. He looks in to the mirror and convinces himself I am this average or below average looking person who needs to be good at a zillion other things but should not worry about the way I look…. That’s not true!! The overall package of being confident has to do with everything, the way you look, what you believe, how you present yourself and over all what do you think and believe about your own self!!

It all starts fairly early – Do you listen to the little ones when they are describing their day at the preschool… a crayon fight or boy being too boyish that the little girl couldn’t handle..? This probably is setting ground that when they are teenagers would they like to share their concerns with you or not.

The way you react to their stories is extremely important too. Are you too short with them… or do you let them finish their stories and let them tell you what really happened..?

Think of it this way, when you walk into the office of this awesomely awesome doctor that you’ve got an appointment with a lot of trouble just because you think he/ she is the best of the best. Even though you know this doctor is “THE” one, when you reach the clinic, you would by all means like to tell your story, share your symptoms and some of us the more smart ones like to share with the doctor their own little research and the prognosis & diagnosis as well. What if this doctor after your 10 seconds of talk time tells you exactly what’s wrong with you, writes your prescription and sends you away!!

As much as one would agree that this doc maybe totally right and hitting the bulls eye in treating you – you would be strongly disappointed cause he did not hear you out. He did not let you tell your story your way. This isn’t a surprise; most great doctors I have come across are like this. It’s the experience and knowledge together that somewhere drives them to be a bit arrogant.

Now this is exactly what the awesomely awesome parents do too. We all love our kids way too much to let them through any hard times. We know them too well and can quickly figure out what’s wrong and what they need to make it right!! We want to create short cuts for them, avoid any possible bad experiences for them and in the process what we do is tell them that they are wrong and we are right. In the process we somehow end up giving this doctor like 10 second judgments of their stories and their experiences and impose our thoughts onto them. The result being that the kid would start doubting not only their own thinking and processing capabilities but would also doubt if any of this is worth sharing with the – Oh so learned parent!!

You as a parent will learn to trust, learn to show confidence in your child for them to be able to build these qualities in them to make them their personality. If they trust you on something and share it in total confidence with you, don’t share it with your friend or neighbor just to prove to them how much your kids share with you… If you are in conversation with your kids let them finish it and tell you what they think really happened there rather than jumping the gun and giving them a verdict… if you trust them on smaller things when they are tiny and truly share the joy of the impossible dreams of maybe making a staircase to Mars may be someday they would be able to trust you with more realistic issues in life. That’s when you would get your true chance of being able to tap into your wisdom and experience and share your thoughts with them. That’s when your guidance would truly matter!!

You demonstrate Trust to your kids and they would learn to trust others… You show confidence in them and they would believe in your confidence and live a much stronger, stable, Confident life…!!

 keep reading...

RK