Me being grateful for everything so far in life
Now we flip the coin to see both sides of thinking.
This is a mirror post to opening-up. So, keep both posts open or read them before coming here.
- But my mom is ecstatic to get pregnant after seven years of marriage and dozens of temples. My name is borrowed from the temple she went to before I was born. I am grateful for my mom fighting to keep pregnancy against my dad. My maternal grandparents died before my birth, too. We thank the core “maternal” family for helping us in everything during those days and for care.
- Phototherapy saved me. They should be lucky, considering the scenarios and existence of devices in rural areas at the right time.
- I'm grateful that the cut was only a few millimetres deep, and I can still talk.
- The doctor laughed and said, everything is fine anatomically with me, and just asked her to wait
- Mom is also the same one who never went to school, but she learned the English alphabet and basic math to teach us – I was in the first standard in school when I was three.
- Kudos to Mom for letting us go to the public library. Most days are spent in public libraries reading stories and science books. Also, the first time I realised I had artistic skills was when I realised there was a thing called Google in 9th standard.
- Being bullied may be a worse thing, but it made me so different in picking the right friends and being conscious of saying the right things; of course, I am still not perfect, but I am a bit more humble than average in humanity.
- I still don't care about fashion; imagine a family of three children only being financially cared for by mom; so often those clothes are cheapest or from relatives. There have been no complaints from our side for the majority of life.
- Being isolated from male sports and bullies, although with few close friends, gave me so many sisters in school. Girls used to invite me to their games, and my hands were tied with dozens of rakhis from them.
- Fractures at least made me avoid some meaningless summer homework. But I still would not have wanted the pain and hospital visits.
- How lucky I should have been to have access to such malaria medication on time. Malaria is a severe disease with the top 5 leading deaths in the world. A relative afforded the treatment in time.
- The only thing mom taught us is to mind our studies, for that is the quickest way to lift out of caring these silly things and think big.
- High school has been the most beautiful years of my life so far. Hundreds of hours on Discovery TV, the internet, and awesome friends from humble backgrounds since it's a community college.
- Wonderful and understanding batchmates, too. We got 1, 3, 5, 7, 11, 13, 17, 19... in state Engineering en rance exam. Yep, prime numbers. Yes, I was the aberration. lol
- I still love math and can see things on my own. But, good math expertise requires practice to be aware of the patterns I shirked off.
- All that crying still made people see me as a kid, and I made my close friends who even accepted my silliness just because I was a kid to them. Love them.
- Visiting IIT Madras Shaastra Fest made me think bigger about where I want to end up next.
- AI entered my mind during those days, and I was an uber follower of the MIT CSAIL webpage daily. One day, I decided to let go of EE masters for AI and computer science.
- Realised GPA is more important when you want to change stream and with admission decisions—moved from flat 7.5- to 9-pointer.
- Best challenge I took upon myself and loved every day of it. I studied every computer science textbook on my own and understood the fundamentals, even with none of my classmates aware of my attempts to study CS. Although I did pretty well, I haven't joined anywhere since I want to study only AI and only in one of the five universities in India.
- Hilarious days with me walking with the cast in university and grateful to the friends who used to pick me up from home to campus and back by even taking detours for me.
- I tried to reach out to a person I felt was a friend on other platforms, but I made them club me with usual stalkers and lost the friendship I could have made or avoided the pain I caused them. Lesson learnt – Never reach out if they don't want you to, especially not via other channels.
- I found reading various things to be an escape mechanism. Although I feel awful for escaping many times, reading for it is the best thing, not to reduce guilt, but to think broadly and generally.
- She don't want to be friends, mainly because I was immature to not approach her properly. My first feelings were blinding my most cringeworthy moment. Lesson learnt – never use a cold approach without knowing the bare minimum details about them. Not too much to research or stalking, but simply be aware of the person enough to consider whether you should approach. Even now, I use it every time, partly to face my awkward social skills and anxiety. I stay silent until I know a friend of mine enough to decide whether to jump in.
- Looking back to those days, those assignments or problems seem silly to my current self, and I could have performed much better in those grades.
- I tried my best to build up the skillset in my master's, too. I took the time to deal with these irrational fears and escape mechanisms, but I will still be passionate about things if I focus.
- Most cried days, painful weeks and completely clueless future; but mom is always supportive and able to recover almost fully without necessitating surgery.
- The only reasons the days are good are mom, Korean dramas, reading dozens of books, IRL friends, campus staff, and me being back on Discord to talk with new friends.
- One crush got married in a few weeks, but she is still a good friend. One crush lost feelings because I was not showing enough feelings. We were not even in a relationship, and I cared just as much as I could and should.
- All these fears are irrational when analysed using neocortical thinking. Still, the amygdala pathways are so severe by now without proper care that I finally decided to consider psychiatrist medication, of course, with everyone's encouragement and after trying CBT for a few weeks.
- The days have been trying to look positive in the last few weeks as seen in the diary, but the diary doesn't include hardships; I was only showing one side in the diary to myself and others in trying to be grateful and changes that I am trying to make for myself. The net effect moves slowly, even if it's not a strictly upward curve.
- Escaping via reading (not just books, but research and blogs and anything and everything) and escaping via sleep has always helped me in the short term.
- The single most painful thing for me is losing a friend—a friend I value and for reasons messed up. I got distanced from two such friends in life. By being angry, I did the same thing again with the third friend. To understand the gravity, the words I wrote became the sharpest trigger for their trauma.
- I know I should not distance myself from people in these situations; maybe I should have let them understand me better, or perhaps I should have just been available even if they felt it was better that I should never talk to them. Maybe I would have, but with my previous experiences above, I am also aware that I should never disturb anyone when they do not want to, not out of ego, but especially when I don't understand myself and the current situation with my other stressors better.
- Whether you are a friend or not, and have read both posts until now. Thank you. Maybe we will talk again in future, or maybe never. Don't try to stalk my profile; I have almost zero connected digital footprints unless I choose to give you email or other details. Feel free to message or call me as a friend, but if I don't respond, please understand and give me time to travel to your side soon. I am sure I will try my best. I value all relations, people and life. I could not hate anyone, even if you are a flat-earther. I wish you all the best on your life journey and lessons, and I would love to hear your story someday if you ever consider me a worthy friend to know about you.