The Writer's Block- Looking Pack From my Old Post

(This was first published on Hubpages)

When Dreams were Young

There used to be a time, when as they say, spring was in the walk and the dreams were young, when words would float in front of my notebook and land softly as today my toddler walks around in the room in the winters of Delhi..on the tip-toes. Dreams were beautiful and not yet impossible. Truth seemed to be an idea which lived and breathed next door and not a distant idea. Those were the times when an equitable limitation of resources cut across the social position and we all stood in front of each other, devoid of the fig leave of social backgrounds. Calls would be made through the public call booth across the road from the Hostel and with new mobile set was not a status defining instrument but only a flight of fantasy. In all our nakedness we shall be all be judged as friends or not by those around us, simply by the grandness of our dreams, our understanding of our ideals, and more importantly, by our ability to love. Love, I had in my heart in abundance, writing poetry on the back of cigarette packets, which friends claim even today to be of readable kind; reading the material which would transport me into an era of self-belief, and belief in all that is good in life. Everything good in life was possible, and all that was needed was to merely stretch the hands out wide, with a heart full of conviction as The Messiah taught the pilot in the books by Richard Bach. I read it, pretty happy in meeting in thoughts with authors good enough to be published and make a best-seller.

The Now

The words come out on the screen, which replaces the notebook of the past, apologetically. A gloomy mist descends over the world with a minor trace of sunlight in the form of my toddler, who is constantly trying all the time to cope up with my cruel mood-swings, I just hope that her efforts to accommodate my mood swings outlives my ability to grow beyond them. I know, it is cruel, but I know it is true and is almost as cruel as truth can be. I keep on thinking if the world in which I live has changed or have I, as a pesky and demanding inhabitant changed. Was the world always like that, ruthless, competitive and all the time measuring me against the scales which were all tilted against me? and I was living in my own euphoric world of imaginary goals and ideals, that I never noticed the crookedness of all straight-lines which I drew around myself as pointers to what I presumed then to be a life of delirium. The words, enter as a soul wretched with poor self-esteem and poor acting ability thrown on the stage to perform an act of consequence, with conviction of not fitting in deeply placed in the heart. Was it that I was happier then because all the expectations of life I had with myself, which I could control and change and shift, thus the goals closer or farther as I wanted to? I do not know, what I know is that then I could be kinder to myself and to the world around me, and I have somehow, now, pushing people to the walls asking them to play the roles as the play which I have scripted requires them to, become to be the living equivalent to the movie recently released called "Despicable Me". Nothing comforts, this unkindness which I had not seen in my life even in the days when Nietzsche and stoic philosophy literature replaced the lofty, happy world of Erich Segal has now descended so deep down, that now I find myself unbearable and writing, which always came to me as an answer to my disturbing dreams, has eluded me, as a disappointed friend who came to meet me after a long time. I hope, somehow, I can run after my long lost friend, beg him, reason with him and ask him to stay back, for I need this ray of sunlight in my life, to pull me out of the depth of darkness. Writing for me is a way to converse with myself, and as with verbal conversation, in the face of emotion, the lump rises in the throat, the clot rises in the pen or the kepboard mocks me, of what I have become. But I have to write, even if it does not make sense to anyone, including myself, as there is no other cure that I know of.

Writer's Block- A Moment of Self-Doubt

I almost gave up writing for good seven to eight years. A period during which I wrote nothing but office mails and minutes of meetings and contracts and such things, dreary and dull, devoid of any beauty or romance. I would write in my mind, sentences getting written and erased in my mind. I quit smoking right at the turn of the century and the glamor of smoke forming poetry in the air to be scribbled with urgency was lost. So I did not write, until couple of years back a sense of loss, a scary thought of dying with all my thoughts faced me. Something told me I had it in me. It used to be fun. It used to be exceptionally fun in good old, pre-computer days when I would write on a paper with my pen. I felt that I was living half my life, with a half a me, the half which carried the truer sense of me, stifled and locked inside me. I would be loud, obvious, and laugh with the crowd which obliterated and belittled the intensity of thought. I laughed with a voice which scar...

The Politics of Language- Rekhta

Languages live and die with human interests. Language does not have with in it to carry itself through public apathy. Language cannot survive vacuum and apathy. One of the biggest loss of the 21 st century is the death of languages. While technology has been one cause of it, religious appropriation and attribution is another important reason. Suddenly we have Latin for Christians, Sanskrit for Hindus and Urdu for Muslims. Absolutist religions have brought clash of civilization to our doorsteps. This reflects in the election of Donald Trump in the US and the books on Islamic supremacy being in best-sellers in France. It is not totally unfounded. Technology connects the mankind in unprecedented manner. Therefore, famines of Bengal in 18 th and 19 th century could not cause mass transfer of humanity from Asia to Europe nor could most bloody of wars in 7 th century push people westwards, as much as it could today. One can easily call names to people who are simplistic and intelle...

Disjointed Thoughts On Writing- Blog Post on Writing

Writing in itself is a difficult task. No one wants anyone to write. Still people write. Some write expertly and leave their work for the posterity, some write shoddily, struggling like yours truly, and await readers. I try to write, as routinely as possible, if nothing else. I have been struggling with getting the manuscript of my collection of stories readied for publishing. Writing is easy. Being a writer is not. I have been struggling to edit the stories. There is a wonderful book- The Writer's Journal - by Virginia Woolf, which I keep going back to, now and then. No one impresses the difference between knowing how to write and writing better than Ms. Woolf. "..I think writing must be formal. The art must be respected." writes Ms. Woolf. I have come to realize how hard it is as I am editing my stories and trying to reach what could be a perfect name for the collection. However, the entire travel for a week could not find me finishing the task at hand. ...

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