Saturday 20 June 2020

22 lessons

I’m turning 22 really really soon! Can you believe that? It’s not really one of those milestone birthdays but that doesn’t stop me from being OTT. So, I’ve decided to document a few things that I’ve learnt in almost 22 years of my life. I actually want it to be 22 lessons but I’m not promising. I’ll try really hard to be consistent!!

Also, I just wanted to put it out there that I started my own Instagram account where I post doodles, mandalas and a lot of other fun artwork. Once again, I do it only for fun but a little appreciation never hurt nobody. I started it in 2016 and well, I’ve been more or less active in putting up posts. My handle is @blackinkpot.

Without any further ado, let’s begin the first lesson out of twenty two (hopefully)!


TWENTY TWO to 22 

Lesson 1: Change is the only constant

I probably have used this phrase a billion times on my blog. But this time, I’m not talking about external changes. I’m talking about the changes that happen within. Four years ago, I was fresh out of school, raised by two sets of helicopter parents, completely oblivious to the struggles of every day life and ignorant of the grim realities of our society.

In hindsight, I believe 2014-16 was the period when India (and the world in general) noticed a paradigm shift in ideologies. The world grew just a little bit larger to accommodate new ways of thinking and living. It’s still growing...

So, back in 2016-17, my ideas and my opinions on some of the issues were very different. I called myself a feminist without seeing a need for the existence of such a movement, without knowing what it really meant and without understanding what role are we supposed to play. It sounds weird to say it now but I feel like I was just following a “fad” back then. But the last four years have changed me. Today, I know what it “really” means. In a country, where everyone finds it so easy to find faults in a movement that has only just begun to grow, I try to play my small part by trying to make them understand that this wave of feminism has got nothing to do with eradicating the male gender. I don’t want to make this entire post about feminism so I think I’ll pick up this topic some other time!

I also didn’t really understand what it meant to stand for the rights of the LGBTQ community. But, here’s a thing that I’ve learnt as I’ve “aged” (to perfection, of course) that you can’t have an opinion on someone else’s basic human rights. There, I rest my case.

So, a lot of times, people are very stubborn to change their views. They’ll debate with you without any good argument to support their claims (citing other idiots don’t count). And if you give up, they think that they managed to shut you up. But that’s not true. Sometimes, it gets mentally exhausting to reason with someone who’s stubborn and/or delusional! Which is why I wanted to say that just like we have changes around us all the time, it’s okay to change your opinions and thoughts. There’s no shame in accepting that you had the wrong notion about a particular thing or that you were unaware of a few things and then changing your stand.

I feel like this post has turned way more serious than I intended it to, haha! So there you go, my first lesson in a series of 22 (once again, I really hope to be consistent with this!).





No comments:

Post a Comment

Musings and the #KfcProposal