At My Pace

 Not going to lie, amidst a million things I think about changing about myself, I do take pride in a couple of things. My favourite being sharing a birthday with Christmas. It’s never too late to wish me. I accept all wishes, belated or advanced. Mostly because it gives me time. Time to reflect on how maybe things changed, some fissions appeared, and some mending took place. A week to sit with it, pack some things, unpack others, and in its own spi-ritual (yes, that was intentional) way, embark on a fresh start.

Life is fast paced and overstimulating more often than not, tenfold if you live in Mumbai. Mumbaikars have always had dibs on cribbing about time. They say the Mumbai local is the city’s lifeline, but sometimes I think the people themselves are their own kinds of locals. Bridled with more than they can fit on their plates, running on schedules but still not on their nirdharit time, upgrading in instalments, slow or fast in their own right. City’s lifelines, because the city’s very lives run on these lines.

Every year since I started making sense of life, I’ve sat by my window watching waqt go by, thinking only of how relentlessly fast it runs. I’m left with a blur of the year past, wondering if I missed key moments. Lately, I’ve been quite persuasive about carpe diem-ing. This year, though, the tables changed. Very uneventfully so.

You know how we say that when life doesn’t change for us, we change our hair? Haircuts are universal reset buttons. So there I was, giving myself a pep talk to carpe diem. To enjoy the hair wash and not complain about the haircut. Because nothing screams being present in the moment like a random man sticking his fingers into your scalp. My stylist, a well-meaning young man, added a massage I could’ve slept through. But my mind was running. Here, there, everywhere. “Tanisha,” I told myself, “mindfulness. Enjoy the moment. Rest." But I couldn’t. To be fair, who enjoys relaxation when it becomes another item on the to-do list? I figured I’d have to carpe diem… another diem. And then it happened. A crying toddler.

And oddly enough, that’s when I felt present. Fully conscious of where I was. In the chaos. The child’s wail didn’t ask anything of me. It pulled me out of my inner loop and back into the world. Ironically, that disruption grounded me more effectively than my own effort ever could. Because I wasn’t trying anymore. I was simply there. Being a Mumbaikar.

And that hits the nail. This frantic, futile, feral search for calm often steals the essence of being present, especially if you’ve never known what quiet feels like. For some of us, loud feels like sanctuary, and calm feels eerie. The chase for quiet, the attempt at attunement, and the fear of losing it altogether is exhausting.

The thing is, for reasons unbeknownst to us, we refuse to feel content. We only focus on what went wrong. Last month I heard a wise woman say, “humans are born critics.” And she was right. I thought my year was doomed because I unceremoniously left a job, almost lost a pet I had grown attached to, and found it harder than ever to settle into a new space. Dejection felt almost synonymous with my name.

And I was wrong. I was so wrong.

I told a bunch of teenagers last week that we have the power of retelling our stories, no matter what. I told a friend it’s okay to be misunderstood by people who don’t have context, as long as you do right by yourself enough to fall asleep peacefully at night. I told my brother it’s okay to make mistakes, but not let them paralyse you. But we all need reminders, don't we? 

So here I am, retelling my year.

• I left a job I was deeply attached to, and I won’t pretend it didn’t leave me with regret. Time will take its course there. I got a new one too, one where I am fighting tooth and nail to carve a niche for myself.
• I got a cat and almost lost him. Muffin taught me resilience, and I never complained about a single scratch after that. 
• I watched one of my closest friends get married in a ceremony as magical as her story. 
• I cried. I laughed. 
• I faced music fatigue, but also sang “Krish ka gaana” with people I never thought I’d belong with. 
• I fretted over incomplete friendships and still made room for new ones.
• I turned a new lead and embarked on a new journey in life, too! 

It’s funny how it all comes down to perspective. And perspective demands pausing. I had to sit back. On my toughest days, I had no option but to simply be there, actively looking for something to hold on to. And you will be wiser for it. Because when you pause long enough, you begin to see just how much there is for you to look out for. So... it is just one day at a time.

While I’m still running, trying to meet timelines, board the right platform, and avoid peak-hour rush, the Mumbai local I am is learning something important. Sometimes, the nirdharit time is not the right time.

Reader, I don’t know what your year was like. I won’t promise you the next one will be better. But all I can say is this. You tried. And try you will again. Your train has to keep running, halting at familiar platforms, until a change comes about. But take one day a time, if you can. 

Happy, hopeful, healing new year.