Happiness..

What is it? Getting new and shiny things? Falling in love? No! Happiness is what you feel when you make someone smile. When your friend smiles and says 'You are an idiot'. When your friend can afford only 1 chocolate and still gives you half. Happiness is not in big and expensive things,but in the little things. So live life and spread a smile....

When your heart is happy, there is a smile on your face. When there's a smile on your face but pain in your heart, it's fake. Faking smiles or happiness is meaningless, pointless. Everyone has issues, everyone gets sad, but that doesn't mean you give up hope on humanity and stop smiling, stop being happy, stop living! No! "Good or bad, the time does change.."

You feel happy when you start enjoying the little things. When you smile over a song that randomly starts playing on your phone and you realize how beautiful life is, when a simple text message makes you feel loved, when you manage to give someone a smile who is crying, when you achieve something and make people known to you proud, when you overcome fears... Happiness isn't only about having a smile on your face 24 hours a day, 7 days a week and 365 days a year, happiness is about smiling once a day and meaning it. When you enjoy the little things, the big things make you happy too by default.

You can't try to be happy, trying is just a waste. Happiness can only come from within, otherwise It's just a failed attempt to show something that you aren't to people you don't like. Fake smile all you like but sooner or later, there will be a person who catches your lie because he/she too has been through the same. You aren't alone in anything in this world, you just have to reach out and grab your share of happiness at times. That means, you need to face the people ruining your life, stand up to the bullies and grab what is rightfully yours!

You know you are truly happy only when you see the person in the mirror and manage to look him/her directly in the eye even though you have regrets... When you see pride in seeing yourself and not shame, you are happy. When you look at yourself without pity, you know you have moved on.

Letting go is the first true step to happiness...

The past, no matter how it was, it's gone and you can't do anything about it except let go...
The past makes you unhappy, gives you nightmares because the people in it broke you. By being sad, you let them win. The day you let go of everything, you become happy and start smiling. You stop burning in the fire of your pain, anger, jealousy and hatred..Today, everywhere I go, I find people crying over the past,planning for the future and criticizing today! It amuses me to know that these clueless people don't have any idea how wrong they are! The past is called-so for a reason. You can either learn from it and make a better future or cry over it and ruin the bleak chances of a happy life! The future is not in your control, sure you can try and improve it but you cannot completely neglect the present for it! That's like sitting for lunch while missing what you had for breakfast, thinking about dinner and not eating what is right in front of you, i.e sheer stupidity!

"If people make you sad, you should always remember, it's people who also make you smile. You just have to chose the correct ones..."

Mumbai, my home...

Mumbai-

I am just an ordinary boy in the extraordinary city of Mumbai. Being born and brought up here, I have seen and accustomed myself to the ways of life here. I am used to the dust, the corruption  the fights, the jokes, the love that this city has given me...

 This city is 'EXTREME', swinging between the two points of an endlessly working pendulum which has no stop in the middle.Maybe that's why every Mumbaikar is proud to call themselves a Mumbaikar. Even when they aren't in Mumbai, if  someone speaks about this city, their face lightens up and memories come back... 'The City Of Dreams', that's what outsiders call Mumbai and they have all the right reasons to call it so because this city has fulfilled millions of dreams of people. In Mumbai Life changes in a blink of an eye. 

 This city has EVERYTHING! One moment you are blissfully basking in the Grandeur of your childhood and the next, It's all gone. Leaving you empty but for the memories. One moment you are with the mates of your school shouting loudly over a Football game and the next, cursing over a stock market crash. In the monsoons, the city manages to get even more mesmerizing. Sitting at home with friends and family, having a nice laugh while having hot and fresh Pakodas and enjoying the heavy rain outside is the dream that I live. The rains bring around gloomy days, but are a huge relief after the hot Summer! Here, the rains are a sign of happiness for everyone and are welcomed with open arms and huge smiles. Getting drenched in the first heavy downpour while walking home with friends, having hot Samosa's while getting wet in the rain, etc. are a few scenes that create memories worth cherishing. Screaming way too loudly with your head outside your car in the rains is one thing that no one can hate, if they do, the hate fun. 

In the 16 years of my life, I've lived all of them in Mumbai, but still never managed to explore it entirely. In the fast life of this city, NO ONE has the time to stop, sit in one place and talk to friends or even neighbors, but the beauty of the people here is that no matter how busy they are, if you are in need they will come to help you. No matter in how much of a hurry they are, they will stop and let you cross the road first. Thousands of people migrate every single day to this city in hope of achieving something, being something, meeting someone, meeting the 'Stars', having a future, me? I just come here to breath the air, smile and be able to say " I'm home". 

Fights, anger,  joy, love, hatred, jokes, breakups, patchups, etc. are  all weaved into the lives of every Mumbaikar, even mine. Maybe that's why I love it here, maybe that's why, whenever I go somewhere, I miss Mumbai because even amidst all this havoc and fast life of Mumbai, I managed to find my peace. People call it 'The City Of Dreams', I call it 'Home'... Life never slows down here, so if you want to be a Mumbaikar, you need to learn how to move on... 

Because everyone has a friend like this luckily...

Today, I was asked to write something about my best friend..
So who is a 'best friend'? There are many people with more than 1 best friend and luckily, I'm one of them and fortunately, all my best friends are nuts. A best friend is a person who can make you smile in the darkest of times, can hug you for hours just to make you feel better, scolds you like a parent when you are sick and tortures you like an enemy on a daily basis, yet you manage to love them. A best friend isn't a person to whom you speak regularly, but even when you speak to them after a really long time, it's as if you never stopped. Someone who picks you up when you're down but also gets you back to the ground when you're busy celebrating your little victories. They are happier than you in your joy and sadder than you in your misery. They may be totally opposite of you, but still you love them more than anyone similar to you. I too have best friends who are exactly like that, scold me, torture me, irritate the crap out of me, yet, I love them. We fight a lot, but does that mean we aren't meant to be friends? I believe that "It doesn't matter how many times you fight, or how long you've known each other. What matters, is the fact that even in a short period you've come close and overcame every fight which was a hurdle in your way of happiness..." 

You meet a random person through a mutual friend and instantly connect. You like the same things as them, laugh as they do on the same stupid crazy jokes that your mutual friend considers stupid. Before you even know it, you find a better friend in the stranger than in your mutual friend. It's not wrong to get closer to a stranger than your friend but you should remember to not exclude the mutual friend entirely. Suprisingly enough, all my closet friends are known to be via some mutual friend who excluded herself from us. I don't have regrets because once who were strangers are now my best friends. yes we all have issues, but we accept each other with them, that's what best friends are for, aren't they? Maybe that's why we are close. We are considered crazy but that's how we are. Crazy and happy!

When  you walk your own paths and somehow cross paths with someone who walks with you and makes your rough journey easier by holding your hand in the dark by saying,"I'm scared", even though they know you are scared and they aren't. 

A best friend isn't only a person who you can trust, but also the one person who overlooks all your faults and mistakes and give you another chance even if you don't deserve it because they see the potential in you to change and evolve.

The best part about having a best friend is that you are absolutely sure that never will never break your trust no matter what. Even a million fights can't shake the bond that you share with them. If, however the bond is broken by a tiny nudge, it's for you to understand that the person whom you consider your best friend, was never worth your time. I could talk about how this happens with everyone and even as teens their trust is shattered by people who didn't deserve to be trusted in the first place and how they blame themselves for it even though they are the victims not the evil-doers. An attack on the chest by a sworn enemy is much less painful than a betrayal by your best friend.

In 'The Man Of Steel', a character said,"Sometimes, you need to take the leap of faith first. The trust comes later" and I couldn't agree more. Sometimes you just have to take a risk. A best friend is a person who comes along as a stranger but renews your faith in trust and life, accepts your past and helps you make your present beautiful and future amazing! You too need to do your part by taking that leap of faith and being completely honest with the stranger who calls you their best friend. If the leap is successful, you know you have a person who'll be there forever, if it's not, you just need to wait for the person to come along who will be there forever, no matter what.
You have nothing to lose in the leap. If it's a success, You find a companion, If it fails, the person goes to back to being a stranger.

 The thing about people is that they always need new things to gossip about so if your 'SECRET' is revealed, don't feel ashamed, it will be gone from the minds of everyone even before you know it. At the max, they'll laugh for a week,10 days, a month? Then? They'll get over it and so will you, all you need to do is, just go along... Going along this massacre is much easier when you have a best friend who says ' Chill bro, we'll pick on each of them later.. ' If someone makes you smile even when everyone else is laughing at you, they are your best friend. I read somewhere that," A best friend isn't a person who is only with you when you're sad, but they are also truly happy for you in your victory, even if they failed.."

Smart, stingy, lame, crazy, adorable, irritating, idiotic, amazing! These are the qualities your best friend must have. 

Sometimes, things happen which are beyond your control. When you think you have your life sorted and figured out, destiny plays its card....We were alone before we met but destiny had something else in mind. We met, we spoke, we laughed, we cried, we fought, we parted to never meet again.
Walking on our own paths, we bumped into each other again, caught up on the old days, realized the stupidity and apologized. It's been a long time since that accidental meeting and we fight almost every day ever since but still I love her the most. I know if I let her go again, we will both be alone and as I promised, I won't let her be alone. No matter how much we want to kill each other, even as a stranger or enemy, I will be by her side. Always. Maybe that's why we are best friends. Maybe that's why we can't stay without each other, maybe that's why even out fights are full of love, maybe that's why we met again. Destiny is something I will forever be grateful to because if it weren't for destiny, I would've never been able to sum up the courage to apologize and tell her how much she means to me..

Hope is what matters...

No matter what you do or where you go,life will knock you down! People will feast on your defeat! They will laugh at your fall and be intimidated by your victory, they will be jealous and angry and will drive you to a point in life where you have to doubt yourself. You cannot give in to them, you cannot let them win. Life doesn't only knock you down in form of problems, but also in form of people who are bullies who spit on your self-esteem and treat you as slaves. You can easily get up and fight back or die a slave. It's up to you to get up, fight back and win or die trying, or stay down and die a loser. Getting bad marks or having family/relationship issues is one of the ways in which life knocks you down. You can get back up, study and get good marks or die a failure without trying. You could re-evaluate your part in the issues and take the initiative to sort them out or let them end. It is all up to you, all you have to do is not give up hope.. Feeling low is natural, it's what you do when you feel low that matters. 

Sometimes we lose ourselves due to the external factors like fights and despair and loss. Maybe that's why hope is so rare in the world that when you stay positive, people ask you "What are you made up of? How do you keep hope? How does it feel to have dreams?"  It's not about how many times you fall and loose faith and hope in everything, it's how many of those times you have the courage to get back up and hope again, trust again, live again.. Being broken isn't wrong, not letting people fix you is the problem. 

Jackie Chan once said 'Life knocks you down, you can choose weather or not to get up....'

Life is the cruel reality to fairy tales and good dreams. There are ups and downs,there always will be but if you don't lose hope, even in the darkest times you will see a light. Life is not tough nor is it a game! Life comes without rules or a save button (unfortunately :P), you cannot undo what's done, you can make it better. You can rectify mistakes, not erase them. The Chinese 'Ying-Yang' gives the same message in a different way.."In every good there is evil and in every evil there is good, the balance of life is maintained by having both 'good' as well as 'evil' equally because they both do merge into one another,that's the inner circle of life...." Without ups and downs in life, you just exist, don't live. There is a difference between existing and LIVING!

"If your life goes according to plan, you're living it wrong."

'It will happen, don't give up hope', these seven words are what I have based my life upon. Bad marks, admissions, being unable to learn something, are all problems that can be solved by following these seven words. 

Being alone isn't always bad..

Sometimes it's good to be away from people, sometimes it's good to be alone because being alone saves you from the pains of the outside world where there is no humanity...being alone does not mean you are a loner or a nobody, it just means that the right people for you haven't come along yet and you don't deserve any less. Being alone gives you peace and a chance to shine alone. I prefer staying alone and being called a 'loner' rather than being with people I hate just for the sake of being 'Social'.

I chose my way of life. I fought for myself and parted with my so called 'friends' and no matter what others say, I don't regret one bit of it. All the people I know go out every day for lunch or movies or just to hang out, despite the fact that I am never invited (I wouldn't go even if I was), I manage to stay happy...

I was told that I get involved to much, get too close, give in too much, love too much, care too much and that, to quote the person, 'is terribly annoying!' I give too much because my parents taught me, "The more you give, the more you'll get", that isn't the case here. Maybe that's why people quit on me, leave and never come back. Little do they know, I don't care. If you try to change me, you ain't meant to be in my life, feel free to leave.

People often tease me and call me a 'loner' and label me as a 'sad soul', in exchange, I question them "I am not social and you are, I am happy, are you?" This usually ends the conversation and they walk away in shame. I know I'm right which is why I will keep fighting against every one who labels me in any way! 

Sure, there are times when I wish even I had someone to go out with or a huge friend circle and all that but I know that the few people I have will always be there for me, I can rely on them at even 2 a.m for help.Having lots of friends doesn't matter. How many of them will stand by your side no matter what in time of need? That is what matters. Ideally I'd rather have 10 friends who'll always stand by my side,rather than a 1000 friends who'll leave me in time of need....

Yes, there are times when I feel completely alone and lost,feel alone even in the most crowded areas because I have had ups and downs in life, lost loads of people on the way and gained a few but that doesn't make my life any less livable..
Yes I don't have crores of rupees in my bank,Yes I don't carry around thousands of rupees to waste or a phone worth 50-60,000. Yes I haven't had a hundred affairs and a thousand flings.  Yes I am sort of 'alone', yes I don't go out with friends much, yes I love books much more than people, yes I love the company of my dog more than any human company, but no I am not a 'loner' or 'unhappy' in any way because I am me, I don't try to be someone I'm not. I am not fake! I am the happiest anyone can ever be
I am not like all the 'cool' people. I am not a genius. I do get jealous when people get good marks, hot girlfriends, etc. I do wish that I too had a life like that. I always re-check whatever I post in my blog or on my FaceBook or on Instagram, for what? I am not sure about what I do. I make a million mistakes. It took me guts to even post this post! I may have written it a million times and deleted it without saving. I am not confident. I am insecure! I am half-minded about turning an anonymous blogger again. I don't want to reveal what I am good at because I know people hate me and they will put me down! Wherever I go, in whichever field, there are people way better at it than me and that discourages me. I have been crashed and burned by life! Every time I have a crush, I don't tell her. Why? Because I know she will hate me. I am not like everyone! There are days when I feel like just quitting everything and running away. But I can't because the adrenaline rush is for a few minutes or seconds and impulsive decisions are always a pain. I do make mistakes, I am not an 'idol' for anyone, I am not perfect, I am far from it. I maybe a lot of things, but I am not weak, I am not a person who can pushed around and if someone has a problem, they are welcome to leave.

I have been bullied, I am a mess! I will be. I don't ask for sympathy, I ask for equal status. I don't ask for pride, I ask for respect and I demand it! No one can deny me that. I have molded myself according to this world and gone in a shell. But i am coming out. For how long can they keep me down? Huh? There will be a day when they will be tired of putting me down, there will be a day when the people who despise me will regret it, there will be a day when their insults will be lost in roar of compliments and claps. There will be a day when I will get the respect I deserve. They put me down because I'm weak, I come up because I know they can't get stronger. I have come out of my shell, they do see my growing wrath, they fear it. I still think about what I post, but then again if someone has a problem with me, it's their problem. I will not go anonymous, I will not give up, I will not succumb. I will fight. I may not be the best writer, but I am good at it! Everyone who ever thought of me as a 'loser' will repent. For I, am like a spring, the harder you put down, the higher is my jump!

I'd rather be alone that with a group of people who try to change the person I am and make me go against my principles.

I stopped caring about what others say because I know, if its a compliment or an insult, it's fake. Neither triumph nor failure last forever, they are both traitors. I will not give in, I will not stop fighting. I will stand up to them one day and say,"I win.". I live the life I always wanted, happy, calm, peaceful and unlike most 'social' people, I don't wake up every morning with regrets, look at myself in the mirror, disgusted..

For every end,there is a new beginning, for every death there is life and for every evil there is good...only if you don't loose faith in what is right. Succumbing to the bad doesn't only make you weaker, but also destroys every inch of hope of overcoming the evil, which is otherwise there...

Never start what you can't end because someone else will end it and you will not like the way it ends......

There is no tomorrow, there is no future, there is only today, here and now...