Older self

Dear older self,
I hope you find this letter someday, and I hope that you are happy and content with your life when you find it.

I have pretended my whole life to be fearless, and when the situation actually arrives I freeze to death. I hope you aren't the same, I hope you have stopped pretending.

I hope that you have learnt to stand up for yourself. People have mocked me, and I just can't be mean. They treat me like I don't matter, like I am nothing. I try to ignore, but I am hurt most of the times. And the people who hurt me are generally the ones I love. Sometimes, I really want to say something but then I can't. I hope that I learn to speak for myself.

I hope you are no longer tramautized by your past. I have done awful things, made terrible choices in my life in the past and I am constantly choked by this feeling—this feeling that I have already ruined everything because of what I've done in the past. I hope that in future, I learn to stop people from using my past to invalidate the person that I have become. I have grown, and I have been a great person now. I am just terrified that someday I will be really happy, and that day someone will come with a storm and devastate my entire life, and I would be left with nothing because people will judge me as the person that I was. I hope that in the future, I outgrow this feeling.

You know what, people adore me now and they keep telling me to write a novel or something like that. I have never had that kind of faith in me, you know. I don't know if I can really write something that makes some sense and makes them feel differently. I hope that you are capable of doing that now. I hope that you have learnt to have faith in yourself.

Remember the time when you used to save all those youtube travel videos, and those  instagram pictures of travel bloggers? I hope that by now you have visited 17 countries at the least and that you have find peace in all your trips. And if you haven't, what are you doing?

I love him, I love him so much that for the first time in my life, it doesn't hurt me. It makes me feel how grateful I am. I hope that you are still with him, and I hope when you wake up, you find that love in him everyday and you cuddle and fight, but you don't lose the spark. I hope it's still like that. And if not, if you are single then don't worry. You are going to be just fine. Remember, you always wanted a life with cats and a little adopted daughter? You know that a partner doesn't make you happy, it just makes you feel a little better. I hope that you still remember that.

I hope that you have done all the things that you wished to do, and I hope that you have learnt to say 'no' and you have stopped being awkward around people, and you have started loving yourself. I hope that you aren't killing yourself anymore with that huge pile of feelings that you have been carrying in your heart. I hope that you have learnt to let go, and you have learnt to hold on. I hope that, by now, you own a little restaurant full of books in Manali and that you have learnt to cling to your dreams. I hope you are everything that I need you to be, and I know that it’s an awful lot of pressure on you. And I am writing this letter to you, because there are a thousand things about me that I need to change, I want to grow. And I am just reminding you that if you haven't reached there yet, sooner or later you will need to.

And don't be disheartened if you find this letter and you realise that you aren't the person that you hoped to be, I just want you to know that if you are still alive, you are doing okay. No matter what happens, you will be there to pick yourself up.

Isn't that all that matters?

Yours,
Younger self.

Feeling lost and found

To anyone out there who feels completely lost and confused right now,

Hey there. First of all, I don’t know if anyone has told you this but let me remind you, it’s absolutely okay to feel however you’re feeling right now. It’s okay to feel lost, to feel like you have absolutely no clue where to go from here or what to do. It’s okay to lie on your back, to stare at the white walls around you and wonder what’s wrong every single day. It’s okay to feel so damn tired that your mind cannot process one single rational decision because you’re starting to lose faith. It’s okay to feel whatever you’re feeling. Don’t ever let anyone make you feel a bit  ashamed or bad for how you feel. It’s your right to have feelings and no one has a say in it.

Maybe I don’t know exactly what you’re going through but trust me when I say that I know how it feels. I know how ridiculous it is to be out of your mind and not be able to have one coherent thought. I know how bad it feels when you want to forget everything that’s wrong in your life and start anew but the past just keeps dragging you back. I know how it feels to lose trust in someone who meant so much to you. I know how it feels when you realise that no one is down for you the way you think they are. I know how it feels  to be silently screaming and crying but not being able to say it out loud. I know how it feels to be drowning in your own sorrow. I know how it feels to think that you’re the worst human being alive. I know that you think you don’t deserve happiness and I know you question your decisions every single day.

But hey, don’t even for a split second think that you’re a bad human being. No one is perfect. Hell, we’re human beings and we’re bound to have flaws, to make mistakes. We are fated to make wrong decisions. We are destined to sometimes trust the wrong people and let them in. It’s not your fault. You trusted them and thought that they were good. It wasn’t your fault that they proved you wrong. It’s not your fault that you cared so much and loved so hard, that you made them a part of your small family and gave them your time.

I know it hurts so much when you realise that people are not how you think they are. But darling, that is how some people are. They are selfish and fake. They will stay with you because of how special you make them feel and they know you will always be there for them. It’s not your fault that you were always forgiving and you could never treat them bad and so they said whatever they wanted to you. It’s their bad that they took you for granted and it’s their loss.

You’re not stupid for caring so much, for loving so hard, for being so quick to trust, for listening to your heart and always giving them a smile and being there for them when you were breaking apart yourself. That’s how humans are supposed to be. Not the other way around. So don’t ever think you’re wrong to be yourself. Someday someone will come along who will love you just for who you are and you will be glad that you didn’t change throughout these dark days.

I know you’re your worst critic. You judge yourself harder than anyone ever would. You judge yourself every moment of your life. But please know that it’s okay to get mad, it’s okay to overthink, it’s okay to be sensitive and emotional and feel overwhelmed. It’s okay to be jealous sometimes. It doesn’t make you a bad person it just shows that your love is genuine. It’s okay to be paranoid because you fear of losing the closest people of your life. It’s okay if you unintentionally slip out a lie to get out of a toxic situation. It’s okay to cry when someone says something hurtful. It’s okay to say how you feel without a barrier.

Please know that you are supposed to do what’s good for you. Yes, you have to be there for others and care for them but you cannot go around loving everyone else but you. You can’t burn out everything in you for them. You need to understand that you need to light up first in order to spread the warmth out to others. I know you give pieces of yourself to fix others but sweetheart do not break yourself too bad. Please make sure that they are always willing to do the same for you on the days when you start to fall apart. Because the world is so cruel and people are so selfish that they cannot see anything beyond themselves.

So it’s not an option rather an obligation to love yourself. To care for yourself. It’s okay to be angry at people who hurt you and not be able to forgive them. It doesn’t make you an unforgiving ass. They hurt you even after you gave them chances after chances and honestly, there is only so much you can take. So if you cut out some people in order to leave the toxicity they add in our life, it’s okay. If you want to leave a place because it doesn’t make you feel good, it’s okay.

Just take care of yourself. Be with the people who love you for who you are. You’re still so young and you have such a long way to go. Trust me, your life will end up to be so much more beautiful than you can ever believe.

Just have faith. Just hold on.

Everything will be okay. You will be okay.