Month: September 2022

If You Have To Pretend, Read This

“Why am I sabotaging my success?”, I thought to myself on the day I was detained during my junior year in school.

I was pretending to be someone else. I had to pretend to be a strong personality, an extrovert and a smart person who could deal with bigger egos easily.

This was a new school in my junior year and I failed in my first year at this school and had to change schools later.

So basically after class 10, I change schools and I was unable to handle the new environment. And my study performance dipped and I failed class 11.

Why did this happen? I don’t know. But I know that I was pretending heavily to fit in, to avoid being bullied, to protect myself, etc.

I don’t know how to say it but I am still pretending even though the intensity is much less.

Also in my first year of college, I was pretending heavily to fit in. And I sabotaged my success again.

I made friends and I started fitting in by pretending. I did not set boundaries and I ended up self-sabotaging and dropping out of that course.

I used to think that I had to pretend because that’s what ensures survival and success.

But in a way, my self-sabotage was a blessing to me. I learnt to go within myself and grow self-awareness by journaling.

But pretending is not necessary for the long run.

Conclusion

Imagine working in an office. Would you pretend and stay under the radar just to save yourself from office politics and avoid unnecessary criticism for your ideas by keeping quiet? Or would you focus your energy on learning from the company, improving your skillset and giving your best work?

The latter does not allow pretence. The former option is a gold mine of pretence opportunities.

So if you have to pretend, let me tell you- it’s a trap.

Thank you for reading this blog post on pretence. A question for you: Do you pretend sometimes? If so, how do you reduce your pretence?

FOMO: This Will Give You Peace of Mind

I was in the mental health hospital in 2017 when I found myself in a room with 3 other families. 

One of them was N(name hidden to respect their privacy) and his mom. 

N was a teenager like me. He was a sensible person. 

I was sitting on my bed one evening and he said to me,”Anirban looks like A. R. Rahman.” And I said with a reflex,”A. R. Rahman. That level of success! “ 

I still remember the moment that came next. His mom said “You don’t have to successful like A. R. Rahman. You will be successful like Anirban(referring to me).”

This taught me that we are unique beings who are meant to be successful like ourselves. We are not here in a race. We are here to express ourselves and be ourselves. We are here to be an origianal being even if it is an original lamb than be a duplicate lion no matter how strong the lion may be. Eventually the lamb will become a lion because of its courage.

Now there’s something I must tell you.

FOMO is real. It’s called Fear of Missing Out. I am getting it. 

Some days I wake up after dreaming that my close friends have got their jobs and marriage handled and I am still in college. It’s a horrible feeling.

“I don’t want to miss out on life. “ I say to myself. 

But I know other people and I are different. We have different challenges, different plans, different destinies. 

So I just tell myself that it’ll all be alright. No one’s looking to judge me.

I am not blaming my mental health problems. I am just setting proper expectations. 

Expectations that won’t be like fake promises, that won’t show me fake timelines of success, etc. 

I’d rather have a realistic dream that has practically set timelines, than to dream big and make my mental health worse in the struggle.

I am working on blogging and I am seeing a career counselor. The problem of indecision is common among human beings. It’s nothing to be ashamed about. There’s nothing wrong about asking for help.

The moral of the story is I am just having FOMO and you may be having it too because we fail to see this simple truth in our lives that we are here to be ourselves. 

Success will come and it will come through hard work, consistency, determination, etc and it’ll take time.

Thanks for reading this blog post. Now a quick question- Do you feel FOMO sometimes? What do you tell yourself when dealing with it?

Thoughts Are More Important Than Actions

To think a negative thought about someone or something because it has fault is worse than having the fault yourself. 

“A prostitute and a saint lived in the same lane.

Each day, the prostitute would look at the saint and tell herself, oh, what a good man he is! He reads the Vedas and the Epics. He spends his time doing the God’s work and in prayer.

Meanwhile, the saint would look at the prostitute and shake his head at her profession and her lifestyle.

When they died, the prostitute went to heaven and the saint went to hell.

God said that sins and virtues were in the thinking, not in the doing.

Each got the afterlife they thought about for the other.

Don’t dwell on the mistakes of others, unrelated to your duty.

Thinking about them spoils your own karma, because it makes you angry, lazy or useless.

This is a story by Sri Ramakrishna Paramahansa.” 

This exerpt is from Illumination at Medium – https://medium.com/illumination/the-prostitute-and-the-saint-743baf82adb0

We must try to think well of everyone and everything. We need to empathize and at the same time fight.

I will tell you about a situation in my life. 

I have heard about a group of people who think they are doing the right thing but deep down they know it’s wrong. And they justify it as if they have no choice but to do the wrong thing. 

It’s not illegal but it’s wrong. 

But there are some people who are so called “perfect”. They don’t have any material character flaws but they will demonize and criticise the people who are doing wrong. 

They criticise the people who are doing wrong so much that they hate and fill their hearts and minds with poison. 

Now let me ask you-

Is a person who does the harmless wrong things worse than a person who does nothing wrong but thinks the vilest thing in existence about other people?

Sooner or later the vile thoughts corrupt the latter so called “perfect” person.

I have also noticed it in myself that I sometimes feel insecure, and I tell myself that the other people doesn’t like me and want to see me. So I don’t make an attempt to see them. 

Well what if I change my thoughts to a more positive one? What if I say to myself that there’s no scientific reason why they don’t like me. In fact I can’t prove that they don’t like me.

Then things change quite fast for the better.

I think that negativity in a person comes from selfishness. It’s the superiority complex and the non-acceptance of other people’s emotions and situations that causes ego to swell in a person. 

“Mind precedes all mental states. Mind is their chief; they are all mind-wrought. If with an impure mind a person speaks or acts suffering follows him like the wheel that follows the foot of the ox.”

The Dhammapada https://www.buddhanet.net/e-learning/buddhism/dp01.htm

Thank you for reading this blog post and please comment “Yes” if you learnt something useful from this post. 

Falling In Love with Twitch Streamers

I have fallen in love with SuperCatKei and itsme_fruity. Both are from Singapore. I am grateful to have found them both. It’s so fun.

On 15th September I was casually browsing through Twitch and I came across a streamer who looked extremely devoted to her music.

I clicked on her. And there SuperCatKei was. It’s as if we were destined to meet.

No not exactly. But I feel in love with her cover of “Castle on the hill” by Ed Sheeran. And I subscribed. I am attending every stream even if it is for only a small period of time.

And then day before yesterday I met itsme_fruity. She is so funny. I love her personality.

Even though sometimes I feel stupid to ask questions about some discussion that’s going on, I am working on it despite my social anxiety.

I watched a horror movie ending after a long time on itsme_fruity’s discord channel. It was fun.

So that’s the thing, I attend their streams every day. And that’s awesome. It gives me hope.

Apart from that I am amazing. I feel like I am getting better.

An important observation I made about myself was that I get social anxiety even on Twitch. I was listening to the sample of an audiobook called “How to Be Yourself” by Ellen Hendriksen on audible.in and I noticed that Ellen Hendriksen said something like what I was thinking.

Ellen says something like how one feels like they don’t belong in society and feel like an outsider so much during social anxiety that they can’t express their feelings and words.

That’s exactly what happens with me. I remember every moment I feel like I was an outsider I felt more isolated even though everything was happening virtually.

And it’s a painful feeling. Everyone with social anxiety knows this.

So I think I should work on overcoming my social anxiety.

So much wisdom and insight from Twitch?!

Thanks for reading this blog post. I have a question for you. Do you have social anxiety and how do you deal with it?