6:48.
Woke up after a topsy-turvy night.
Not been sleeping well cos been loading up on carbs like a bodybuilder and Coke (not even Diet anymore) like a man that’s gonna get trapped in the Sahara. And since I am mostly sitting at one place (or riding a scooty to reach these places where I camp at), I am living probably the most sedentary life that I have ever lived. And funnily, it’s in Goa, a place where I was supposed to get active. Run, jog, practise Yoga, see the sunsets, walk for hours. I am doing anything but these.
While it’s easy to pin blame on things like no access to a kitchen, no routine, lot of work, I think the real culprit is me. I am choosing spending time on a screen over spending time on my feet. I am not prioritizing myself. Need to change.
Each day when I wake up I decide that today on I will go lo-carb, if not Keto (which is impossible if you are in Goa). And then I start my day with Kurkure or any of those million snacks available so easy around me. I am a sucker for crisps. And the moment I see something that I know will let me crunch it in my mouth, I want to eat it. And then like going down a spiral, one thing leads to another, and by the time I realize what’s happening, I’ve had butter, oil, bread, potatoes, and whatnot. Oh, and coke. Not just Diet. But coke. And I get bloated.
The other thing I have taken note of is that I get bloated easily. I call it bloating. It may actually be the beer belly or a man who’s too old and eating too much. Whatever it is, it is making me fat. And sad. And slow. And tired all the time.
Need to snap out of it.
It’s clouding my head so much that all I am thinking is food and all that.
The other thing that I am thinking about a lot lately is how would life shape up going forward. Especially with work. I have thought multiple times about quitting everything I am on and taking up a naukri. Even tried hard to get one during the lockdown but could not. I took it up as a sign from the Universe and stopped pursuing it. Now, I am getting itchy all over again about it. Few triggers. The lust for an easy life to start with. Second, the ability to support my people with the money I would make (we are hoping to do PPP awards, there is another short-film opportunity that would help cement Shikha‘s place in the industry, we could do with a larger team at Podium).
Fuck just realized. Even with work, I am more inspired by what I can do for things that I work on. None of those is a chase for things that come back to me? I mean all the people do come back to me. But they can choose to not come back. I may have that voice in my head that tells me that I played a teeny weeny role in their success but that’s just me. The same voice tells me that am the coolest dude around. Am I? Of course not. Similarly, am I responsible for the success of others? No! I am merely a meel ka paththar in their journeys.
So yeah. I think I am not making myself a priority and I need to do that pronto.
Starting with food. And then with work. And then with life. And here’s a postcard to end this post. A view from where I wrote this!
The photo does not do justice to what I am seeing. And how I am feeling as I sit here. The days here are so hot and humid that I am sweating all the time when I am out. Towards the evening, the temperature falls to a point where it becomes bearable. The mornings though are crisp. Fresh. The kinds that I love. There’s a nip in the air, the kinds that would make most people crawl under their rajais. Thanks to my upbringing in Delhi, I am ok with it and don’t need anything of that sort. In fact, I enjoy colder places more.
Brings me to another point. Mountains. Sea.
I always thought I was a mountain person for a large part of my life. But lately, I am realizing that I like these beach towns more. More than nature, I think what is important to me is signs of life. Vibrance. Human ingenuity. The life in mountains is probably tougher than at anyplace else and I have immense respect for the ones that live there. But the thing is, the tough life forces the life in the mountains to be, well, uncomfortable. I mean I can’t just go sit at the edge of a cliff and kill time. On a beach, I can spread a sheet and lie down all day long. At a mountain, I need to literally hunt for places that offer food. Here on a beach, those are aplenty (in fact, way too many for my comfort). In the hills, the roads are literally non-existent and you need to find your way around. You take one wrong turn and you would not know where you ended up. At a beach, you can either go towards the water. Or away from it. There is no third direction!
Of course, at some point in time I want to climb the Mt. Everest. And I enjoy the grind and grit and perseverance and effort and mental strength that it takes to climb a hill. Last time I did it, it was with Shravan (in Feb of last year) and if not for him, I wouldn’t know how much I loved the effort. The effort to reach to the top of the hill. Stay there for like 5 mins. Soak in the view. And then climb down. And once you are safe at the bottom, celebrate that you made it without any incident.
No, that was not the first time I did it. I have done a few. But I think the thoughts from that one are so vivid because I had climbed one after ages. And I probably did not have the words earlier. I did not have the ability to spot the emotions that I was feeling. I did not know that the reward is not the summit. I did not know that it does not stop once you are up there.
Anyhow.
Enough of rants.
Time to get going and get some work done.
Over and out.
7:43 AM