Shades...

As I was walking around on the sidewalk..... I saw some children playing.. Yelling and cheering... A little boy crying over a toy.. To his dad..
A mother walking taking the hand of her little girl who is barely at the length of her knees.. And who was looking at the world with such wonder in her eyes...

All I could think of is, how it is like to be a child...

Childhood is the forever kingdom, a kingdom where everything and anything is possible... The one place that nobody dies..
Everything is new... Everyday is Christmas..

Childhood is not being able to sleep the night before we go to the beach because of the overwhelming happiness..

Pure feelings..
Bold dreams...
The world by then is full of colours, sparks and joy...

Turning my sight from this colorful picture and gazing at the adults on the very same sidewalk...

All I could see is lost faces... Emotionless features.. Cold eyes... 

Shades... Walking, hurrying to catch something.. May be late for work, or late for some kind of commitment they have in their lives... May be catching nothing? Running chasing a mirage?

What happens through their lives to make them shift from being so colorful and playful to blacks and whites,,,

Responsibly may be?
Burdens of life? Bills?

I keep thinking hard of what makes people look like empty shells when they grow up..
I thought it might be responsibilities, may be putting food on the table, personal burdens and pains, the long journey of chasing dreams.. Losses...

May be because now they know that not everything is possible,,,
Not every where you look is light..
No more easy sparks,,,

May be because they realized that there is death and loss.. 

And that everything comes to an end... 

Not what they thought as children where everything just goes on and on...

Or may be these people I have seen are just tired and tomorrow they will be fine, 

I just caught them in a bad moment.. Who knows?

I decided to let that matter go, because I will never be able to tell what was the reason of the black and white versions I just witnessed..

Days later, I looked at myself, saw my reflection in the mirror ... 

And I am froze in my place as my picture was just shades... 

Just like the ones on the street..

The two words

Letting go...
These two words,,,

They have been spinning into my head for quite some time..

What does letting go really mean? Or stand for?!
Does it have to be for loved ones who died for example, when a person lets go of his grief?
Or is it related to things we can't do? So we have to let them go?
May be even letting go of our fears?
Or should it directly relate to hopes, dreams and lost love?!

Well, I am not really sure what it entirely stands for, what I am sure of is,,,
Life is an act of letting go... And that in most cases,, Letting go truly hurts..

To me,, It's like, having to cut one of your limps of you...
You don't really want to see yourself doing it... But sometimes it is the only choice you have got left,,,, In order to protect the remaining broken pieces of you from being shattered, in order to continue living..

I thought to myself, maybe it is all for a purpose… May be,, A person has to be in a place to be able to surely define what he wants and what he can and can't do in the future..

Reading what I wrote now, it seems like words weak person would be thinking of ... But I am sure now, it is not..

When you let go, you're stronger than ever... You are a better version of yourself.. A version that is looking for a brighter future...

But don’t get me wrong though,,, I am not really cheering for you guys to let go of what you can’t do or face.
letting go is not always the right thing to do.
You should be fighting for your dreams, your hopes… for what you believe in and what you care for. You should be facing your fears…

So, eventually there is a fine line between weakness and having to let go…

But for now, If you feel pain, Please,, You are not alone... Your bitterness won't last very long… And there will come a day when you feel free... 

It is much more than it looks.

Me and my pet

I hesitated alot before writing this... I mean, I am talking about my pet.. Will that be weird?!
And then, I thought... I don't really care... I love my pet and I am going to write about it... About some of our situations together....

My pet is a turtle, a red eared slider to be exact. I called him "Cake", and everyday, I feel so blessed to have it in my life..

When I see Cake, I see pure cuteness and innocence..

He has a poker face all the time, because it is a turtle and it doesn't really have expressions.. Lol!

When I first got him, he used to fear me.. Whenever I get close to him, he just would either swim away or insert his head inside... He was so cute doing so...
As days went by, he got used to my face, he knows who I am...

In the beginning, It was really hard for me to know how to take care of him, feed him and a whole bunch of other stuff. And as a turtle, it needs alot of care..
But, Cake helped me, YES, HE DID!

I put his food near the aquarium, and whenever he feels hungry, he swims by the side that's near the food!

Whenever he sees me putting his food he waits and eats whatever I put to him.. He doesn't like strawberries much though.. :D

In cold times, he goes by the water heater and settles either under it or over it.. God he is so cute doing so...

Once, he got sick, I was so worried about him, so I took him to the vet... And the vet told me that cake caught a cold..

It was really hard for me to see him sick.. He didn't eat much and he was so quite.. And I was really worried all the time, afraid I would lose him... But things got better and he is fine now..

I love him so much that I decided that when he grows bigger and older, I might try to let him live back in his home.. But I am not really sure if it is good for him or not... But if it is, I will definitely do this for him...

My pet has been there for me, when things got dark and he was the one thing that made me happy...
I love everyday when he is here..  And I enjoy every moment, thankful he is here..

Pursuit of dreams

Dreams..
When we are young, we have so many dreams..
So many dreams that we get confused which one we are going after..

I want to be a doctor, an astronaut, I want to see Mickey Mouse, I want to live forever, I want to own a castle...

Childhood is a kingdom where everything is possible and doable. There is no limits to our abilities. There is no I can do this and I can not.
There is no difference between reality and fantasies... They are all the same.

We have so many ambitions..
As time goes by, we happen to lose them gradually...Until we have may be one or nothing at all when we have the time and the abilities to fulfil one...
When we grow older there come a solid definition to truth, reality and also fantasies..
We categorize every dream we have, the ones that seem okay, we pursuit it.. The ones that are weird, most of us -not everyone-  just let go of it, considering it weird.

What if it is truely weird?
Will it pay the bills?
What if I don't make it?
What about people around me?
Will they think I am weird?
Will they support my decision if I choose to go after my dream?
Will they be judging if I don't make it?

God is here,
Sees all
Knows all... 
You don't have to show anyone your real intentions...
You don't have to explain...
Believe that you are your own judge..
You don't need to think of other people..
Their unstoppable judging..
Their killing looks...
You are your own jugde..
You don't need any of them to tell you, what to do, what not to do..
Will any of them be here when you are in a true moment of despair or need?
Will anyone care if you're the best? Or the worst?

You need to know that something as well... You might think about losing money, you might lose hope at some point... You might even think you are going to lose people... You would be thinking if it is all for a good reason...

By then remember that, you need only to follow your dreams..
Pursuit them... Be into them...
If noone is going to push you to go on... Then you be your own pusher...
Push yourself further everyday.. No, not everyday... Every moment.. With each breath you take..

Know that your dream is worth fighting for.. Know that people who care for you, will be sticking around.. Even if you don't know. When the skies clear,, you will see things clearly.
Know that noone will put you up on your feet except you..
Believe you can do it, with time, working hard, and dedicated mind and heart you will!

HAPPINESS

Happiness... 

The rushing feeling though your body and heart,,,,
Makes you want to jump up smiling for no reason, go crazy dancing or singing loud out of nowhere, in a place full of people...
It is one of the most desired feelings among people.. And many pursue it..
It is one of the hardest things to acquire in your life, if you are not prepared enough for it. 

But really, other than physical or very obvious feelings... What is happiness?
I asked myself that question, I knew what it was for me...  Asked a few people...
But we all Google things eventually...
When I did Google it .. this is what happiness meant:
The state of being happy.
"she struggled to find happiness in her life"

It is what Google said about happiness, and what is more shocking and I didn't even know is that the word "happiness" was mentioned in the 1800s much more than it is mentioned now!!

I thought a lot, why the example Google got was that she struggled to find happiness in her life... Why didn't it say, she saw happiness in the eyes of a boy playing, or she found happiness when she sang... 

Why is the curve going down?!

Definitely the world now is much more civilized and should be much happier now that everything is available.. at least more than before. 

 It was somehow depressing but, I decided I would ask anyone I meet about the definition of happiness to him or her ...
Here are some examples of what the word happy means to some human beings,

Finding an old fashion magazine.
A look in my woman's eyes.
The smiles of my children.
The good relation between me and my wife.
Cooperation between me and my colleagues and work done smoothly.
When my favourite team wins.
Quality time with my best friends.
Honesty, bravery, and sacrifice.
Playing with my dog.
Singing and playing instruments with friends.
A good match.
Lyrics that cut deep into me.
A great movie.
Interstellar.
Hearing my husband saying I'am home.
Dreaming of the late people and knowing they are just fine.
My prayers.
Acing my exams.
Just watching T.V. with my wife and kids at night.
A cry over my girl's shoulders without being judged.
Saving a child.
A talk with my best friend.
Travelling the world.
Ice cream.
Teasing my beloved people and joking around.
Giving people.

Those are some of many answers I received upon asking the question, what is happiness?
I couldn't help but notice, is that some of these answers are really deep but yet very simple.

So why is the curve still going down?

What makes us more miserable than our ancestors is that, we are always craving what we do not have. Focusing our heads on the "what if" and the "could have been". With all the technologies and the progress we are in, we are incapable to do what our ancestors could do.

 I found out that, the key point of finding happiness and feeling it, is by finding yourself. Explore your needs, expose your vulnerabilities, find what truly satisfies you and makes you content and happy.  

Let go, concentrate on the positive things in your life. Be sad sometimes, but do not give so much time to grief. Remember you will only live once, and if you can't make yourself happy now, no one can help with that. Dance when you want to dance, sing when you feel like signing. See the good in every bad. Smile when you are at your darkest moments. Know deep inside you, that, after rain there is a rainbow... And know that deep inside you, you can be happy... YOU can make it happen. :) 

Love is hard

Love is hard,,, a sentence I didn't know how absurd and wrong it is up till now..
Love is not hard... Love is not complicated...

We tend to see the things in our own way... Things are our reflection indeed..

So if I say that love is hard, then I am hard.. If I say love is complicated, then am complicating things up..

Not just love, pretty much every feeling between human beings is treated and looked at the same way..

If two people love and care for each other, doesn't have to be love as people in love, it can be a mother with her son or daughter, two friends, etc...
The first one can verbally express what he/she feels and the other one can not..
This doesn't mean that the second one doesn't have anything to say, it means that this person is different in expressing..
May be he/she express their feelings through painting, may be through writing, may be through caring in a certain way...

Here is what makes it an issue..

The first one who can actually verbally show, gets mad at the second one.. Thinking that he/she is emotionless and careless...
Which is totally wrong but the truth to him/her is unseen..
Afterwards, because it is hard for people to change (or change relatively  fast), people end up in fights, quarrels, debates and they find themselves trapped into a dead ended road.. Leading, eventually,  to losing each other.. 

The key point to this, is doing what u are able to do, expect that people are different. And accept it. So finding someone who does things exactly the way you do might be a tricky one to find. Understand people the way they are.. Love them the way they are.. Don't try to complicate things or overthink it.. 

And may be, you will at least have your peace of mind...