It opened and I started scrolling thinking I'll just scroll for a min and then put away my phone but then I came across this one pin in front of me which was a little oil pastel drawing of a house with some colorful clouds in the background and instantly grabbed my attention. It was a beautiful drawing but it was not perfect with symmetrical lines or perfect strokes. But it was so beautiful and made me stop scrolling. It's imperfection was its real beauty, I thought.

Apparently, for some time I had been liking this messy, imperfect kind of art more than that perfect, realistic art. And I wondered why? But somehow looking at this oil pastel drawing I suddenly got the answer. A thought came into my mind very naturally that maybe I like this messy and imperfect drawing because it tells that life doesn't have to be perfect. That life can be messy and imperfect and still beautiful.

And then another realization hit me that Impressionist art also represent the same thing. When you'll look at any Impressionism art, from afar everything looks so beautiful and perfect but as you'll zoom into the details you can see there is no perfect shape or form in reality. And I think that's why Impressionism is the most realistic form of art.

And that's basically what life is, isn't it? When you look at someone else's life all you can see is how perfect it looks from afar but if you ever care to ask them how they feel or are they happy with their life you'll know that their life is also just like yours imperfect and chaotic life maybe in some different way, they'll have some troubles and worries and you'll have some different ones. No matter how happy, cheery or accomplished a person seem from afar it doesn't mean their life is perfect.

I had the same instance once. Years ago I used to hate my life and wanted to really really get oit of it. And one day someone said to me that how my life is so perfect and that they'll be happy to exchange it with theirs. Tears came in an instant into my eyes hearing that cause in my head I was like “no you'll never only if you knew how hell of a life it was.”

Eventually I do get of that life and I was so grateful but I realized that it was just a step not the whole destination which I imagined. Eventually I learned that I'll keep hating my life if I keep nurturing the hate and focusing on how it is not perfect.

So fast forward to now, I can say that yes I love my life cause I can feel it too but it doesn't mean that it's perfect. It's still messy and chaotic and I still pray to start a new life of own but that doesn't mean I hate my life now. Though it took a lot of patience and years to learn it.

Life sure has some unique ways to answer your question because this one question was bothering me for quite a few days and who knew that the answer was gonna come in the form a beautiful little drawing while scrolling the pinterest.

Thank you for reading Exchanging Letters!

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I will, I will, I will not look at the past;

I will just let it pass,

The pain in my heart that not let me laugh.

I will, I will, I will not look at the dark;

I will just let it pass,

The thoughts that keep me up till the late hour.

How have I become so bitter?

I was a day dreamer in the paradise, 

Now the dreams haunt me in the midnight.

The summer slips through my fingers like the sand, 

And I wait in the sand storm,

In the middle of the desert for the rain.

The autumn arrives with lights and love,

But I'm a dead leaf fallen from above.

The winter freezes me to the death,

And now my blood is blue not red;

My fingers are ice cold and numb,

And I feel my heart is not beating enough.

The spring is like the daydream came true,

Where I listen to the silence in the afternoon.

The possibility of the new!

Then again it's the summer,

I look back to the past,

Same places, same faces.

The thoughts echo in my mind, 

Keeping me awake all night.

But I persisted in vain and kept saying,

I will, I will, I will not look at the past;

I will just let it pass,

The pain in my heart that not let me laugh.

I will, I will, I will, not look at the dark;

I will just let it pass,

The thoughts that keep me up in the night.

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As I pulled out my old journal today and read the first page. Then glanced at some more. Though it gets better in the end, my first impression was “What rubbish I wrote!” It was embarrassing so I buried it again under the same pile of notebooks whence I’d drawn it from. I thought I must burn this notebook. Not that I do not write rubbish now, the pages of this new journal are filled with rubbish too. I’ve been writing some rubbish since many years now and I go on writing more and more (and honestly I would not stop).

As I was writing these lines, strange thoughts clouded my mind and I continued:

And I wonder what is writing, if not rubbish? I know people call it art and I personally find art beautiful and admire it’s every form; thus I find the art of writing sublime too. But to the eyes of a person who does not find beauty in art — what is art, if not rubbish?

And such thoughts started plaguing me more and more, as further I wrote:

You go on reading fiction everyday and what are these stories, if not rubbish? Readers and writers believe themselves superior to those who don’t read or write and say, what are their lives, if not rubbish? And I wonder they believe the same for you! Even what I write right now is all rubbish; you’ll say it’s not true. For it does not have any logic, reasoning or philosophy to prove. People go on reading novels and novels, of dead authors and call them masterpieces; the style, the structure, the strategies, the themes, the metaphors, the analogies, the poems, the sonnets, the plays, the protagonist, the sufferings, the love, the imagery, the great lines repeated thousand times — what it is, if not rubbish? The paintings, the portraits, the sculptures, the beauty — what it is, if not rubbish at all?

Until it is not!

Until it is your passion, until it is your love, until it is your expression. Until it is your disease, until it is your medicine. Until it is your earning, until it is your living, until it is your death. Until it is your devotion, until it is your worship, until it is your religion, until it is your God. Until it is your soul, until it is your everything, until it is your Ghost!

So I thought maybe I write rubbish, so what? Writing is the only form of art, therapy, and self-expression I’ve known. And beside I can always burn my writings if I want.

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I always used to think about how much I have changed over the years. With every year I could feel the difference between I (who I am now) and her (who I was last year or the year before last), not in the dramatic “transformation” kind of way but in a very subtle and quiet almost invisible to naked eyes way.

I often imagine us humans as a huge puzzle of tiniest pieces, forming one piece at a time, over the span of our life (Why I think this way I may discuss it some other time). One must assume the puzzle will complete, when reached a certain number of age or at the least by the death of this mortal body. But I believe the puzzle will remain incomplete and no wonder that it may be forever incomplete.

Coming back to the point, I realised that I am not much changed as I used to think. I knew it of course; and I often ponder over the fact that how amusing it is that a person changes so much over the time but yet he still remains the same, to some extent at least. And I also knew it was same for me too. In fact I was very well aware of it ( or you can say “too much aware of it”). But I seemed to forgot it for a while. A few days before I was standing in front of the mirror and I was almost like a stranger to myself. As I was looking for who I used to be in that reflection but all I saw was who I am now (and they did not looked alike).

I could not feel myself the same person I used to be until one day surprisingly I had a conversation with someone with whom I have not talked since so long (So long that it felt like almost a decade to me but I can count the years exactly; it was closer to a decade though). And this conversation was like that a mirror was lifted up in front of me to see that I am very much the same person I used to be. (And though realisation should feel like a relief because a few days ago I was questioning my identity; rather I felt a little shattered. A part of me was happy but a part of me was sad at the same time.)

The realisation hit me softly and I do not know if I shall take a relief or grief in it. Because at times when I observe that I am not who I used to be in some or many other ways, that realisation sometimes sting me a little and I mourn over the version of me that I have lost; at other times I take pride in it that I am not the same person I was a year or two ago.

But was not it Me who wanted to “change” all along from the start? It was me who believed and relieved in the idea of “always changing, evolving, and growing” and never being the same, the old me; in mindset and in character. It was me who was afraid of being the same person all my life.

Sometimes there is strong feelings of nostalgia which makes me revisit the past. But no matter how powerful that nostalgia is (whether of the past in whole or just of the version of my past self), I know with the utmost certainty that I do not want to re-live the past. And I do not ever want to remain the same person as I was, as I am and as I will be. I want to be ever changing, growing and evolving.

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Often times when I write or quietly observe my thoughts I’ve always felt this way that my mind is like a train with passengers that are my countless thoughts— running so fast that sometimes it’s hard to catch up on a certain thought or to fully observe and reflect upon it because by the time the next 100 thoughts might pass by and I’ll loose them all.

And if I try to chase every thought I tend to get lost. So I try to shift my focus and imagine my endless thoughts as white clouds in the bright blue sky slowly floating away and I’m like a still and deep blue ocean just witnessing them. That way I’m more at peace.

Sometimes the never stopping voice in my head give me headache and makes me wonder if I live in my head a little too much. It’s not always a bad place to be but I just sometimes miss some parts of reality.

And I find reality as a result of state of my mind. Sometimes every little thing is beautiful and magical other time it is irreversibly evil and bitter. But nevertheless I always choose to daydream and create something out of my overthinking be it poems or metaphors I use in my writing.

A little piece from my journal I wrote a few days ago.

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Eyes are heavy with sleep

Yet I can’t sleep

So I open my eyes

But I can’t see anything

It’s hauntingly dark

I close my eyes again

But the efforts are in vain

For my thoughts are too loud

Tired of trying hard

For every mundane task

I’m tired of pretending

To be strong and too hard

Joy has lost its taste

Exuberance is just time waste

Hopes are covered in thick dust

Emptiness is my only lust

Am I miserable or it’s

Just a sleepless night

I hate the way a beam

Of light, struck my eyes

I hate the way

I cannot even lie

I don’t know which

Road I am taking

I don’t know why

I am still even walking

I don’t remember the

Face of the destination

I don’t know how

To fuel the imagination

I swim in the endless

Dark sea, without any sight

I’ll just turn my head

To the other side,

And call it a night!

Thanks for reading!