Welcome to growing up

Growing up is making sure you get up at a particular time and sleep at a reasonable time before that so you are where you have to be on time. It is being able to estimate correctly and follow your schedule without someone (parents) enforcing the same on you.

Growing up is being able to take care of yourself. You need to know where you can go, at what time you can go, and whether your destination or journey is safe or not. It's setting up Auto Pay so that you don't pay a $200 fine because you forgot to pay the bills. It's stepping into a grocery three times a week because you keep forgetting what you need, or something gets over. And it's about deciding what you want to eat, and actually making it for yourself no matter how tired you are.

Most importantly, growing up is about making decisions without someone telling you what is right or wrong, because it's time you understand that yourself. I had my department orientation today for my Master's Program, and the professor taking it said

"Welcome to growing up and the expectation of maturity and making wise decisions."

And that hit really hard. 

After a huge part of your life being told what to do, making your own decisions could be the biggest change an adult has to face. At home, you have all sorts of rules - don't go here, be home by a certain time, keep some distance from people and evaluate for yourself how they are before you interact with them more closely, and these are just a few. Even at school, courses are selected out for you. There are hard prerequisites. Basically, there are rules for you to follow, and your only job is to stick to them instead of wandering. 

For instance, all through my undergraduate degree, I wished that I could pick my own courses. I wondered why I had to do some that I really did not want to do. But now when I am compelled to pick my own courses, I feel a little confused and am required to do a lot more thinking to understand what I really want. That thinking is great. But it is also overwhelming because I'm worried about going wrong with my decisions. 

But growing up is also fun and exciting. There is so much freedom. There are so many emotions. And so much to figure out. What do I want to do? Why do I want to do it? What do I want to eat tonight, funnily enough, is the harder one. I'm kidding of course. 

I may miss things being handed to me on a silver platter, but this phase of discovery and independence is both challenging and fun. It's an experience, a sudden life change and a chance to start fresh (irrespective of whether you need/want it). New people, new place, new school. I hope to make the most of it.

 

Lots of love,

Kanksha

This is not the end so stop being sad

Most conversations with people these days revolve around goodbyes or leaving the country because that is what I will be doing soon when I leave for my Master's. And after a bunch of those conversations back to back, and me trying to sleep but the same thoughts revolving in my head not letting me sleep, I finally realised what was annoying me. So I switched off my phone's data, switched on the laptop at 1:36am, and began typing. It was time I published another blog post anyway.

When one of my closest friends went abroad for his Master's last year, I remember him asking me to not feel sad but instead feel happy for him. I know what it is like when someone you are close to decides to change addresses. I know that it can be difficult for the person who's in the same routine, and that person feels it's easier for the person who went away because he/she will meet new people and will be in a new place with new things to do. Like when you're the one staying, there's this space that doesn't automatically get filled, and it can be hard to find new things to fill it. I know because this is how I felt when he was going away. Trust me, I know.

On the other hand, I haven't felt really emotional about me going away more than four times in the past few months. And that confused and low-key annoyed me, because I am a highly emotional person. And people who I thought were less emotional were getting much more affected by it. The reason for my lack of emotion that I kept giving myself and to others was that I:
A. do not think about it or
B. block the sad thoughts.
But in my semi-sleepy state, I realised that neither of those two are accurate. I don't feel constantly emotional about it because I don't focus on how I'm leaving people. Because I am not.

I am not leaving my family behind.
I am not leaving my friends.
I am going there to study, and in that process I may not physically be there with my family and friends. But the lack of a physical presence does not mean I am leaving them.

And I think the minute you see going away as something temporary (I don't understand why it is assumed forever), the minute you stop seeing it as leaving people behind and acknowledge that it is your choice and something you want to do, the minute everyone around you also changes their mindset about you going away, is the minute you'll feel a little better about it.

I don't know what I am trying to say in the blog post, so if you are looking for a conclusion, I may end up giving you multiple conflicting ones.

Because on one had, I'd ask you to be happy for people like me. I'd ask you to bring a shift from leaving to coming back soon, cherish the time till departure, and know that history repeats itself hence so will this 'time of your life'. I'd ask you to have faith and security in your relationships with people, and trust the solid groundwork coupled with effort to keep them stable. At the same time, we (people like me going away) also want to be able to express how much we will miss life so far. And how even though a lot of things will change, some things never will and we need that reassurance. We want the bittersweet moments. We're a pinch of scared and a bunch of excited added with an anxious and worried and ready for it and knowing how much you will miss us too makes it both better and worse.

I think instead of asking someone to not feel sad about me going, or asking myself to not feel sad about myself going, I'd tell them and myself to to stop being sad (in the continuous tense). Like be sad in the present, feel how you feel, express it and move on from it. And while we all do this eventually, do it consciously right now too. No one can ignore their feelings forever - you may bottle them up but I'm a firm believer of how they always get back to you eventually. So yeah, let your heart speak. And then let your brain talk to you too.
Because in general, in life, we all have to find a way to listen to both.

And currently? This is not the end so stop being sad.

Love,
Kanksha