Abhey Gupta

Category: Reflections

Prose reflections and journal notes — on love, solitude, work, meaning, and the search for some quiet liberation.

  • Life in If and Else

    One peaceful Monday morning, having ravishing food and enjoying a big brand name, I drifted slightly from my sober sight, and tried to explore the real-life meaning of adaptability and acceptability.

    And I drooled myself to sleep — only to be woken by office colleagues whispering that some senior was coming near. I woke with such a pace that I could have won a medal for it; I found my keyboard and mouse, and started staring blankly at my screen — at some import statements, instances, static members, and condition statements declared.

    If, and else? I was astonished — our life is also like this.

    Multiple ifs and elses: we call them planning, or restrictions. Instance variables are your relatives; static members are your family; and import statements are like education, degrees, friends, and so on. So our life is actually the execution of some code — in terms of if and else, deciding what will happen next — and problems arise with multiple executions, if multithreading is supported, and with all the advice, like annotations, directing our path.

    Multiple ifs and elses: if money, then switch — buy item one; and if money is greater than some amount, then buy this. If money is… and so the code of life keeps running.

  • Adaptability

    It’s weird, but I find it logical to think about how we learned to work five or six days a week, waiting for the one day off that relieves us — and then, the same trained, programmed routine again. It sounds to me like a circle of things: back to where I started, screaming for the day off, living in hell under pressure — and soon, we adapt to it so well.

    We cry about the boredom of routine and want change in life; yet the slightest chance of change tremors our so-called peace, and we want things just as they were.

    So this is how I define adaptability — and acceptability.

  • How It Feels to Love, and Be Loved

    How does it feel to love, and to be loved?

    Today I woke up early — unusual, for someone who sleeps late — and went for a short, brisk walk. People were still half asleep, dreaming dazzlingly of the past and the future; others walked beside me, for various reasons — health, schedule, office, and a few more. I took some steady steps toward a secluded road, to find my solace. I am not very friendly with the crowd around me, but the horses of my mind gallop like nothing else when I am in my comfort zone.

    The day was beautiful, before dawn. It took me a few seconds to realize what I was doing here, and in which direction I was leading myself. I checked my cell — the devil — and there was her last message, with smileys and a few words of love. And I drifted into a sea of thought: how far I have come, from a single word in life — love.

    The earliest love I remember is all about mother. Then, in the mid-90s, television played an important role in the upbringing of all of us 90s-born kids — the love of Aladdin, Popeye, Mickey and Minnie Mouse, a few films I can recall, and a few discussions in school. All these years, I have been trying to decipher love in my own words, in the world of my own thoughts; and crossing every individual’s perception, I developed my own: love is selfless, love is responsible, love is not flawless — and all that other talk.

    I have personally had two encounters with failed relationships, and every ending brought me more complex thoughts, and a fear of falling in love again. The fear of falling, and failing, again — sounds like a loser, doesn’t it? Yes, I sound like a loosely built architecture of the philosophy of failure and the fear of the future.

    But have I done justice by saying only this? I certainly say no. I found myself in the grip of love once again — and far happier than ever before; but this time, practical, and sensible. Still, the mind plays games. I thought, for a second: do we love by thinking of its security? Its future? Its feasibility? A big no.

    I checked my cell — it was nearing 6:30. I couldn’t quite understand what I had been wondering about love for the last hour. I closed my eyes and walked blindly on the road for a minute, only to find myself so insecure in my steps that I reopened my eyes in fear — to find myself alive. But it was thrilling, and fascinating. And then my mind shot out this analogy with life: some days are risky, and you take the risk of doing something you never thought you would; you were afraid of it, unknowing of its future. But things change when there are two people now, both in the same state — eyes closed, walking blindly, but holding each other’s hands this time. And this time, it wasn’t so scary — because we trust the other person.

    Love is all about this. The time will come when you will fear, when you will be scared, when you will regret your decision — but have you ever noticed how far you have come with that love alone? You may call it walking blindly, but together — and trust is the key.

    But how did I come to write this down? A few months ago, I was scared of love — or rather, scared of walking blindly, alone. But one day, I was so close to love that I put my faith and trust in it, and committed my love. And then I realized: it is not about walking alone, but walking together, with trust in each other. We may fight, we may lose hope — but remember how far we have come together, with that trust. That is how love comes into life, and flowers into happiness. It is all about trust — and a morning walk, to write this down.

  • Life is?

    Each day of life is like a tide in the sea. We don’t know how big it is, or how destructive — but we know that at the end of the day, when we have crossed the tide, we are near the shore, where we can relax for a while, realize how far we have come, having achieved one more success, and prepare ourselves for another day.

  • 25th May 2012

    1:10 a.m., 25th May 2012.

    I am still struggling with my mind and its thoughts, wondering what happened last night. Is my wildest fear — that she now knows of my madness for her — finally coming true? Or has it already happened, and in my ignorance I simply couldn’t see it?

    The solution isn’t complicated; it could even be the simplest thing — just letting her know. But the mismatch of mind and heart, of fire and water, of past and present, keeps competing inside me — and, I think, inside her too. What can I do at this particular moment?

    So, as before — but with new evidence, and new feelings — I write, again and again, to map out my thoughts: my cloud of worry, my pursuit of happiness, poured into my poems and my blog. And I hope that one day she’ll read it.

    Near midnight, she says goodnight to me, and I wonder if it is the morning of her dreams. She holds my breath with her voice, and unsettles me with the familiar mischief of her charm — and I wonder if this is just the beginning of her love.

    She blinds me with her eyes, and I am lost in the endless depth of it; I wonder if it is only a part of her world.

    But sooner or later, I wake from the dream. I find the reality exactly the same — except that, this time, she is not by my side.

  • Another Beautiful Day

    I do believe in coincidences. I do believe in love at first sight. I do believe in destiny — though belief tends to step aside the moment it becomes reality.

    Lost in a crowd of strangers, I was struggling through my daily commute — Noida Sector 64, from AIIMS. Most days were just travel and crowd, like any other. But one day, something happened that I could never have imagined: I looked at her, and I couldn’t stop looking, again and again. The day ended at my stop, and I bade her a silent farewell — certain I would never see her again.

    Today is the 17th of March. I boarded my bus at the usual time, and somewhere after South Ex and before Andrews Ganj, she stepped into the same bus. Her eyes met mine, and I went a little mad. That one hour felt like a moment of ultimate solace — I kept shifting, leaning, half-hiding, just to watch her, and often to catch her watching me too.

    Like the rain of a July summer, I was drenched all over in her presence.
    Like the cold of December, I was held by the charm of her endless depth.
    Like a fleeting, buttery life, she comes into mine, and goes — but always with a little hope.

    I hope I’ll see her again.

  • At the Dawn of a New Horizon

    The clock says 1:07 a.m., 1st January — and I am wondering what I can offer in the dusk of the departing year. A farewell? Or should I begin with something — an offering for the new horizon ahead of this dawn? But the point shifts to something that amazes me this time: the timeline itself.

    I posted my status online, wishing everyone a Happy New Year, but with a line of my own: “A single joyous moment of life can overcome many wells of sadness — and we are all just in a quest for that one moment.”

    With this end-that-is-a-beginning, I notice one thing: how small happiness can be, and yet how the fulfilment it offers compares to nothing else. A stranger’s smile, a loved one’s goodbye, the adieu of a good or a bad year — a farewell is always welcomed with something new in life.

    I have ended some of my years in the easy comfort of losing myself, or of losing others; but the strange thing is, I never quite encounter it. It means that whatever I attain in life will, one day, perish. We forget this with time — yet when it comes to action, we meet the greatest fear of life: being alone. It is this fear that makes us weak and vulnerable.

    There is nothing worse than satisfaction — but longing is equally bad.

    The essence is this: life is just a fountain of moments. Whether by the muddy way or by decoration, it has to find itself again.

    Often, the subject most talked about is the one I understand the least.

  • I Wonder

    It’s 2010 — a new year — and what I’m about to publish is simply a reminiscence of the last one, written in the hope that I can learn from it and live this year more fully.

    Last year, I was good to many and bad to most — sad, but true. And the first name I count among them is my own.

    Yes — I said me. We can be good to anyone we meet, but not until we are good to ourselves. We keep trying to pretend to be what we are not; our inner self reflects who we truly are, and I spent the whole year pretending to be what others wanted me to be.

    Still, I’ll remember 2009 as a memorable year. You must be wondering why — because I lived through so much good and bad in it. January, the beginning of the year, fortunately brought some good my way; but instead of simply celebrating it, I began demanding more, and slipped into a circle of suffering.

    But as I always say, “Bad brings better for you” — and I try to follow that.

    Thank you, friends, for being so wonderful to me.

    — Abhay Gupta

    We come nearest to the great when we are great in humility.

    Rabindranath Tagore