Rads

Counting Down to New Year 2021: Tip 3 ⁠
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"Escape competition through authenticity." - ⁠
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Only when I spent time with this thought did I realize this is exactly what I have been doing, ALL MY LIFE. ⁠
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I've never played nice to fit in, I've never competed without good reason and competition always made me uneasy. I've been nothing but honest, authentic through my time. On hindsight, even as a child. ⁠
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I was a loner, a quiet kid, a bookworm, and as much as I wanted friends and to be in a group, a crowd and yearn the love and admiration, I realize(d) that I don't last too long there. Of my own free will mostly, and some coz of the way I think. ⁠
Am the same as an adult, and the pandemic has made me realize and accept it more at a conscious level. ⁠
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Many cannot relate to what I say/think/do, and I am okay with that, I wasn't during my 30s but now I am. ⁠
My mentors have told me, it's partly because am authentic and unafraid of being so, and partly coz you have nothing to lose when you are secure in your own. ⁠
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I believe there can only be one YOU. ⁠
The more YOU you are, the less there is anyone to compete with. ⁠
YOU are your USP (unique selling proposition) ⁠
The internet is full of grand caption/articles on being yourself but no one talks about authenticity wrt how freeing it truly is.⁠
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For 2021, be more you. ⁠
There is only one you. ⁠
Find you, deep dive within you, and you will thrive in your uniqueness. ⁠
My 2 cents. ⁠

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Gray:
Always reminds us of ashes doesn’t it?
Gray skies
Gray dust
Gray hairs
Grayed out.
So on the gray gets such a short end of the color spectrum.
Gloom. Doom.
But..
Gray is also the color of Vibhuti, the holy ashes in Hinduism.
Gray is the ashes even in Christianity
Gray clouds are a promise of rain
Gray hair is almost always a sign of wisdom, of age, and along with age comes experience
Gray is also the space we all live in. Life isn’t binary, and therefore we traverse the depths of hues the gray offers. Sometimes ominous and sometimes just a tint to shift from pure consciousness.
As Count days to hit the milestone, I realize there have been so many gray patches in my life. Not great and not bad, those were the times that made me who I am not the extreme events.
So today, I celebrate
*G R A Y*
The power of accepting all the gray in our lives as women, as swimming the waters not knowing and yet holding onto faith.
May the gray bring you the deliverance that you seek, albeit in hindsight.
I truly must get on the blog. At the very least, I type better on the laptop, even if fewer eyes are reading it.

Did you know there were LOVE LANGUAGES?
There are different ways one can express love, but let's start at the top.

Love yourself first and then others will love you too, they say! I didn't really totally get the meaning of this until much later as an adult.
Growing up, no one asked me if I like/love myself. The focus was never on us. No one thought about themselves, it was always about the others.
Well, to be brutally honest, no one even spoke about love in India. LOL :-) --> love was mainly for the movies and between stars and characters right?

In any case, the more I went inward and the more I read and the more aware I got, the more I realized how important it is to love yourself.
*To like what you do,.
*To like your fat nose,
*To like yourself like you like your friend.
*To like yourself enough to put yourself ahead of others.

There are so many nuances in and within the lines above. This isn't about being selfish, or about not caring or about becoming a narcissist. It is about CONSCIOUSLY and MINDFULLY liking yourself as a third person, even.

Coz you see, once you love and then like yourself, you will start rooting for yourself.
How does one love?
Finding out how you love truly enables you to dig deep into yourself, to recognize the signs and the nuances.

Find out the love language you speak in, then use it on yourself.