When I was 16 years old in 11 th grade , my sister gave me a Skincare set as a birthday present . It included a moisturiser , a serum , and a sunscreen . I didn’t really thought of it that much at that given time But it did do wonders . I actually thought this was all rubbish , mostly because people and kids around me who were of the same age , didn’t used any Skincare products so it thought of it as a waste . It was only many years laters I realised how important that thing is , Nowadays where pollution and air quality index is skyrocketing and it’s nearly impossible to stay out in the sun without dirt ,roadside construction air and germs sticking to our faces , this thing called skincare is actually very benifical . I remember my first product was niacinamide serum , moisturiser and Sun…
I have always fell that the would is much bigger than the little corner of it that I know sometimes, I look at pictures of distant places, hear someone speaking a language I cannot understand, or watch a video about a completely different culture. And I find myself woundering what it would actually feel like to be there . It is not just the desire to take beautiful pictures or visit famous tourist attractions.bi want to experience the world with curiosity to see how differently people live, think, eat,celebrate, communicate, and understand life.
One of the things I look forward to the most is food . I want to sit in small local restaurants, try dishes I have never heard of taste unfamiliar spices and understand the stories behind traditional recipes. I want to know what people eat at home…
We often think progress has to look like something big. We imagine reaching a major goal, changing our life completely, or finally becoming the person we have always wanted to be. Because of this, we sometimes overlook the little things we do every day. Getting out of bed on a difficult morning, choosing to try again after failing, speaking kindly to ourselves, or simply making it through a day that felt heavy can all be forms of progress. Not every change is obvious from the outside. Sometimes, growth happens quietly, without anyone noticing. You might realize that something that once broke your heart does not hurt as much anymore, or that you no longer feel the need to explain yourself to everyone. Maybe you have started setting boundaries, trusting yourself, or walking away from things …
I love. Myself. Saying that still feels strongly uncomfortable because we are often taught that loving ourselves too openly sounds arrogant. We are expected to be humble, aware of our flaws,band constantly trying to improve. But somewhere along the way, I realised that acknowledgeing my flaws and loving myself so not have to be opposites. I know myself better than anyone else possibly can . I know the mistakes. I have made the things I regret, the fears I hide, and the thoughts I would never explain completely to another person. I have seen myself at my best and, unfortunately at my worst. Yet after knowing all of that , I still choose myself.
I don't love myself because I think I am perfect. I know I am not. There are days when I overthing compare myself to people who seem to have their l…
we have always been a nuclear family. But a few years back, we had to shift back into our joint family in account of my dad’s going away to work for another country. My mom, my brother and I, relocated to our ancestral home and had to live with my two uncles and aunts who were my dads elder brothers.
Since my dad was the youngest, we too were the youngest of the cousins.
Before this, whenever we visited, these people were the sweetest on the planet but now, now that we were invading their “privacy,” suddenly we became the thorns on a rose that nobody really wanted. Perhaps dad was the rose that was missing and now in his absence, us, the thirns were more clearly visible.
My eldest uncle, who was “incharge” of our food needs, on some occasions on purpose, “forgit to bring us food, while h…
I used to think being alone was something people were supposed to avoid. Sitting by yourself seemed sad, eating alone seemed embarrassing and going somewhere without company felt like something that needed an explanation. We are constantly surrounded by the idea that a good life should be full of people, conversations, plans, notificationa, and someone waiting beside us. But being alone and being lonely are not the same thing.
I can spend an entire afternoon alone and feel completely peaceful. I can read a book. Listen to music go for a walk, sit near a window, or simply do nothing without feeling that something is missing. In those moments, being alone does not feel like emptiness. It feels like having enough space to hear my own thoughts. When I am alone, I don't have to perform. I don'…
There is a mirror in my house that has probably seen more versions of me than most people ever will. It has watched me stand in front of it as a child, barely tall enough to see my full reflection. It has seen me before school, with my hair hurriedly fixed and my bag hanging from one shoulder. It has seen me trying or clothes, making strange faces,practicing imaginary conversations, and occasionally staring at myself as if the person in the reflection were someone I was still trying to understandthe mirror has never said anything. That is perhaps why I trust it.
People have opinions. They tell you when you have changed ,though sometimes they only means you no longer behave in a way that is familiar to them. They notice your appearance, your achievements. Your failures and the versions of y…
Maybe to everyone else it’s just a cup of coffee . Something oridinary , something people drink to wake up, to stay awake, or simply because they like the taste.
But for me coffee has always felt like a little more than that. It has been there on mornings when getting out of bed felt like a task, on afternoons when everything felt too heavy, and on late nights when my thoughts were louder than the world around me.
There is something comforting about holding a warm cup in my hands. For a few minutes I don’t have to figure everything out. I don’t have to know what I’m doing with my life, where I’m going, or why certain things happened the way they did. I can just sit there, take a sip, and breathe. And somehow in that tiny moment life feels a little less complicated.
Coffee has been there d…
I had a list of names in my head. Seven names. They felt like magic words from a story. Giza. Babylon. Olympia. Ephesus. I wanted to see them all. The Seven Wonders of the world.
Most of them are gone now. They are just empty spaces. I went to the places where they used to be. I stood in the dirt and the sun and tried to see them in my mind.
In one place, there were just broken pieces of stone. A great king's tomb was once there. Now, lizards run over the warm rocks. In another place, there was just a harbor. A giant man made of metal used to stand over the water. Now, it's just blue water and little boats.
The old writers wrote about how big the wonders were. How much gold they had. How everyone would look at them and feel small. They didn't write about the quiet that comes after. They…
This is an uncomfortable question because the moment you ask it someone will say that poor people deserve to have families roo. And they do.Bwinh poor does not make someone else human, less capable of love or morally unworthy of becoming a parent. But love and the right to have children are not the same thing as being ablebro provide for them.
A child does notbwxperience poverty as an economic statistic. They experience it in small, humiliating ways. They experience it when they need school supplies and wait untilbthe end of the month because there is no money yet. When they stop asking for things because they already know the answer. Whenba school trip feels like a luxury
When they pretend they are not hungry because there is not enough food at home. When they wear the same thing repea…
The day I realised nobody had taught me how to file taxes
The first time I seriously through about filing an income tax return. I expected it to feel like an adult milestone. Instead, it felt like being handed a complicated form in a language I. Was technically supposed to understand but somehow didn't I know people paid taxes. I knew working adults filed. IYRs .
I had heard words like PAN,, TDS, Form 16 AIS, deductions, refunds, old regime,, and new regime. But if someone had put a laptop. In front of me and said "Go ahead. File it. Yourself, "I probably would have stared at the screen and wondered when exactly I was supposed to have learned this.
That is what bothered me.We spend years in school learning equations, definitions, historical dates,and formulas, but many of us enter adulthood without knowing how to read a salary slip or file a …
I don't remember the exact moment when reading became one of my favourite things. There was no particular day when I opened a book and decided it would become a permanent part of my life. It happened quietly, the way most important things do. One story became another, them another, and somewhere along the way , books stopped being something I simply read. They became somewhere I want . That is probably why I think of books as one of my best friends. A friend doesn't always have to speak back.Sometimea, it is enough that they are there when you need them.
Books have been there during boring afternoons long journeys sleepless nights, and those strange periods when I wanted to disappear from my own thoughts. I could pick one up and suddenly become somewhere else a crowded city, an ancient kin…
Every morning, Ayana checked his phone before leaving home.
Not for messages or social media-he was looking for one thing: a job.
For months , he had applied everywhere.sum companies never replied daughter rejected him after interview. Every rejections slowly made him question himself.
One evening, his mother quietly asked,
"Did you find something today?"
He he smiled and said,"not yet."
But that night, He kept trying.
The next morning,he finally received a message:
"Congratulations. You're selected."
It wasn't his dream job.it wasn't a huge salary.
But to Ayan,it meant something much bigger -
A chance to start again, support his family and believe in himself.
Sometimes ,a job is not a job .
It can be the first step towards changing an entire life.
There are days when I don't need advice. I don't need someone Askin me what is wrong, and I definitely don't need another motivational speech telling me that everything will eventually work out. Sometimes I just need a song loud Eno to drown out my thoughts and enough space to dance badly without anyone watching.
Music has always had this strange ability to change the temperature of a room,but dancing takes it one step further. A song can sit beside you while you are sad.Dancing makes you get up and participate in whatever feeling you arebhaving . Even ig the dancing is terrible. Especially if it is terrible.
I have danced in ways that would probably qualify as evidence against me in court. Completely alone, uncoordinated, with absolutely no concern for rythem. And somehow those moments ha…
The sky gets a funny color before it rains. It’s not gray, not really. It’s like a deep blue blanket is being pulled over the sun. Everything gets quiet. The birds stop singing for a minute. The wind holds its breath. I can smell it coming. It smells like dirt and wet rocks. I like that smell. It means something is about to happen.
Then the first drop hits the window. Plink. Then another one. Plink. Plonk. Soon it’s a whole song on the roof. A fast song, then a slow one. I like to sit inside and watch. The world gets blurry through the glass. The streetlights look like fuzzy stars. It feels safe inside. Warm and dry while everything outside gets a big drink.
The sound makes me sleepy. It’s a good sound. It’s not loud like a yell. It’s loud like a whisper that fills the whole house. It sa…
I have been trying something different lately. Instead of exercising around noon like I usually do , I started doing it around 8:00 in the morning, followed by a shower. And honestly, it has made me feel more productive than I have in days.
My primary work is studying , so I always used to feel like my day had not really started until I sat down with my books, but when I exercise, shower and get ready and finally sit down by around 10, there’s this strange feeling that I have already accomplished something. It feels like I have already won the first part of my day.
Getting myself to actually exercise is probably the hardest part. There are mornings when staying in bed feels infinitely easier. And then there’s the soreness afterwards, when your entire body reminds you that you exercised. Bu…
Hi,
Today I am going to share a story, this was Like a period of time where I was panicking Over smallest details and was in a state of "What am I gonna do". Welcome to story of My life.
This was back when I was starting my high School, a time where an individual would Experience an wonderful time of his/her Life, that's what they said I guess. It was (31 March, 2025) First day of my 12th Grade, the class started immediately after The 11th Grade practicals and it was quite An odd way of starting a new academic Year and I couldn't care much as it was Just a normal for preparation for boards Examinations.
This was the part where I met a dude, who Is actually annoying but he was a new Student and the policy is that we must not Treat them badly. I only talked with him only In Cafeteria and th…
There’s a version of me that people know.
She’s the one who smiles at the right time, says the right things, and never really makes things awkward. She knows how to keep conversations going, how to laugh even when she doesn’t fully feel like it, how to be “normal” in every situation. People like her. She’s easy.
But she’s not all of me.
There are so many moments where I stop myself mid-thought. Where I change what I was about to say because it feels like too much, or too complicated, or just… unnecessary. It’s not that I don’t have opinions or feelings. I do. A lot of them. I just don’t always feel like explaining them.
And honestly, sometimes it’s easier this way.
Because the second you show more of yourself, things can change. People start seeing you differently. They question you, …
Imagine walking into a doctor's clinic for something that has been bothering you for weeks. You are nervous. Maybe you have spent the previous night searching your symptoms online and convincing yourself that you have every possible disease. You sit across from the doctor hoping that they would listen.
But then instead of immediately giving you and answer and diagnosing you the doctor turns to a system. They enter your symptoms into an AI system.
For a mement you might wonder Wait...did I come all the way here just to be diagnosed by a machine?
And honestly,that is understandable. We go to doctors not only because they have studied medicine but for also someone professional to look at us and say I understand what you are going through. Let's figure this out.
There is something deepl…
There is a version of my future that I think about more often than I admit. A version where I wake up one day and realise that all the things I was once worried about no longer have the power to scare me. A version where I have achieved something I once thought was almost impossible and can finally say, “I made it.” I don’t know exactly what that future looks like yet, but I know how badly I want to reach it.
I don’t just want success because of money, fame, or the approval of other people. Of course, having financial freedom and being able to give my family a comfortable life would mean a lot to me. But somewhere beyond all of that, I want the satisfaction of knowing that I didn’t give up on myself. I want to prove to myself that I was capable of more than I thought.
Sometimes I look at …
He was not just a young hunk. He was a season in our Botany Department, in entire Rajendra College.
He was in final year M.Sc. and I had just entered B. Sc. 1st year. 17 years old new in that campus, still asking where Chem - Lab is?
On a winter college picnic, contineous accidents forced me to know his name, because he had smashed my right leg uncountable of times, unknowingly. After the 8th time he said, "Sorry dear, I have smashed your leg many times I think, but unknowingly." He was managing the whole picnic as Departmental Secretary. He told me, Keep my leg inwards, towards the seat.
I tried to secure my leg, but even after 10/12 times I got hurt again. Was his boot lukey to hurt my heeled leg?
I came to know he is the topmost guy in the department. Then to whom would I complain …
There are some days when nothing particularly bad happens, but everything still feels like too much. That was the kind of day I had recently. I woke up normally, followed my usual routine, and there was no big problem waiting for me. Still, as the day continued, I started feeling irritated by the smallest things.
At first, I did not understand why.
Someone talking loudly felt annoying. Notifications on my phone felt louder than usual. Even when people were simply having a normal conversation around me, I felt like there was too much happening at the same time. I just wanted everything to become quiet for a few minutes.
The strange part was that nobody was actually doing anything wrong. People were talking, laughing, calling each other, and going about their normal day. The problem was prob…
I did not realize my phone battery was low until I was already outside. I checked my phone, saw that it was on a very low percentage, and immediately remembered that I had forgotten to charge it the night before. At first, I was not too worried. I thought I would be home soon enough. But as the battery continued to drop, I started checking it much more often.
It is strange how attached we have become to a small battery percentage.
When my phone was on 10%, I started acting as if every minute was important. I closed all the unnecessary apps, stopped watching videos, and reduced the brightness. I kept telling myself that I would only use my phone when I really needed to. Of course, I still checked it every few minutes.
At 5%, I became even more careful. Suddenly, my phone felt extremely impo…
Most days follow almost the same pattern. I wake up, check my phone, get ready, eat something, and continue with whatever I have planned for the day. The details may change, but the basic routine usually remains the same. I never really think about it because routines become automatic after a while.
Recently, I made a small change to mine without planning to.
Normally, I do certain things in a particular order. I like knowing what comes next because it makes the day feel organised. But that morning, my usual routine was interrupted, so I had to do things differently.
At first, I found it slightly annoying.
I had expected the day to go in a certain way, and suddenly I had to adjust. It was not a major problem, but I still felt like something was wrong because I was not following my normal s…
I was looking through my phone for a completely different reason when I found the photo. I was trying to find something recent, so I kept scrolling through my gallery without paying much attention. Then, suddenly, I saw a picture that I had completely forgotten about.
For a moment, I just stared at it.
The photo was not particularly special. It was just an ordinary picture from an ordinary day. But the moment I saw it, I remembered everything around it. I remembered where I was, what had happened that day, and even some of the things that were going on in my life at that time.
It is strange how a single picture can bring back so much.
When the photo was taken, I probably did not think that I would look at it years later and feel emotional. At that time, it was probably just another picture…
Most of the time, I like knowing where I am going and what I am supposed to do. I do not need every minute of my day to be planned, but I usually have some idea. If I am going out, I know where I am going. If I am meeting someone, I know the plan. But recently, I went out without really knowing what I was going to do, and it was actually more enjoyable than I expected.
It started very normally. I was at home and feeling a little bored. I did not want to sit in my room for the whole day, but I also did not have any specific place I wanted to visit. I kept thinking about where I should go, but nothing seemed interesting enough to make an actual plan.
So, after spending more time thinking about it than necessary, I decided to simply leave.
I got ready, took my phone and my bag, and went outsi…
There are some conversations that end, but somehow they do not really leave your mind. You go home, continue with your normal routine, talk to other people, and do completely unrelated things, but certain parts of that conversation keep coming back to you.
That happened to me recently.
It was not a serious conversation. Nothing dramatic happened, and we were not talking about anything extremely important. In fact, if someone had asked me what we talked about, I probably would not have been able to explain why it stayed with me so much.
Maybe it was the way the person said something. Maybe it was a particular sentence. Or maybe I was already thinking about the same thing, and hearing someone else talk about it made me look at it differently.
Whatever the reason was, I kept thinking about it…
Sometimes I do not realise how tired I am until I suddenly do not want to talk to anyone. It is not because I am angry with someone or because something terrible has happened. I simply reach a point where I feel like I have listened to enough conversations, answered enough messages, and spent enough time around people. All I want is to be alone for a while.
That happened to me recently.
The day had not been particularly bad. I had done my normal things, talked to people, checked my phone, and dealt with everything I needed to do. But by the end of the day, I felt like my mind had become too full. Every small thing started feeling slightly irritating. I did not want to explain how I was feeling because I did not even know myself.
I just needed quiet.
At first, I felt a little guilty about i…
I honestly do not understand how choosing an outfit can take more time than getting ready. Sometimes I have a clear idea of what I want to wear, and everything works out easily. But on other days, I can stand in front of my cupboard for what feels like forever and still decide that I have absolutely nothing to wear.
The funny thing is that this is never actually true. My cupboard is full of clothes. I have T-shirts, jeans, dresses, shirts, and so many things that I have probably forgotten about. But somehow, on the days when I really need to decide quickly, none of them look right.
I started with one outfit that looked good in my head. I wore it and immediately decided I did not like it. Then I changed into another one, but suddenly I did not like the way the jeans looked. After that, I …
