Attitudinal handicaps

I could recall a young woman whom I came across one day. Manoeuvring her wheelchair outside an aquarium, a smile on her face, an infant on her lap and another older child running by her side, she was a picture of resilience. I was moved and inspired by her zest for life. I don't know about whether her disability was from birth or caused by an accident, but I know that she had found a way around it. And nothing could stop her from going after what she wanted. She had decidedly become the master of her body with an attitudinal advantage, raising the bar to a completely different level.

In that case, don't you think many of us are attitudinal handicaps?

When something doesn't work our way, many a time we give up on it without making too much of an effort. In the face of a hurdle, we try to go around it instead of over it, only to be faced with it again a little later.

What one needs more than anything else to live a great life is the right attitude!

When we find ourselves in a dark tunnel, we have to remind ourselves that there is light somewhere. on learning to embrace life with the fullness of our capacities, we will begin to experience a liberation that comes from the knowledge that nothing can hold us back from getting what we want if only we can wrestle the inertia at the beginning. There are countless inspirational stories about people who have risen against all the odds to ride the waves of success and all they possessed at the starting point was the right attitude!

They moved on, one step at a time, allowing nothing to hold them back. The future awaits us. 

With smiles...

Swathi Mohan

(Investing myself in the art of living)

We haven't!

Our life began with the 60-rupee toy car. When it broke we cried. Then we upgraded ourselves to the 2000-rupee remote controlled car.When that got damaged we wept. Then we gifted the 20,000-rupee battery operated car. When that stopped functioning, we were depressed. Then came the 4 lakh car, after that 22-lakh SUV, followed by  36-lakh luxury Sedan. And every time something happened to this machine, whether a scratch or a dent, the mercury of our tensions and worries went up. All in all, it seems our toys have grown, but we haven't.

"Why does she tell this now?"

You wonder, right?

I don't mean literally 'toys' here. But this one, ' but we haven't'...I mean it literally!

Today I write this post because it really pains to see someone who guarded her life so well, & never reacted to any rumour being ridiculed for her death.

They say beauty and talent are a rare combination. She was!

Though she was an introvert, she was considerate, conservative and accommodating with all the people she worked with. She was always busy with heavy call sheets, shuttling between shooting spots and dubbing studios. Yet she was extremely professional, courteous, very respectful towards every technician. She was flexible and calm, & never threw tantrums. She stayed away from the spotlight to bring her children up. Her success & career were commendable that no other actor could have worked across so many languages in so many films.

Yes! I'm talking about actress Sridevi Kapoor.

                                      

People knew her say that she was a very strong-willed woman, who could take her own decisions. However, she depended a lot on her family- father, mother, sister, brother in the early stages of her career and eventually on her husband.

Well, that's not something I wanted to talk about.

She was mercilessly trolled a week before.

I would rather say, conspiracy theorists worked overtime about her death, gossips 'revealed' her private life, other spoke of cosmetic procedure & of slimming pills.

She was trolled for the fact that she boozed and died that she no more deserves to be embalmed and be cremated with state honour. It genuinely leaves me in a daze. How can people be so impractical and unsporting?

What if, she drinks? People have been brewing for thousands of years. Don't we come across women being beaten by drunken husbands in the newspapers daily?

She took a break from acting just to raise her two daughters. She was not seen very often; either on-screen or off it. I read a beautiful experience shared by Priyadharshan, acclaimed filmmaker. He mentioned about Sridevi's birthday party he had taken part, where Sridevi had told her younger daughter Janhvi to pull her dress up in front of him. Surprised Priyadharshan had asked her about it and she had replied, "Priyan, this generation is ignorant. Modern dresses are okay, but one needs to be respectable also"

When people good for nothing contributing null to the nation can still drink and hurt others, what bothers some to troll such a kinda woman who brought unreasonable and inordinate self-esteem to our nation?

Didn't we all take pride in her success antecedently?

Or, does it mean that her attributes and entity were counterfeit and make her an imposter? No. Right? 

The Maharashtra government made arrangements for the elaborate event and the Mumbai police band joined them. She was honoured with a gun salute and draped in the national flag. It was indeed an accolade done for her talents, hard work, passion and determination she had for her career and the awards fetched.

So, don't troll just as you wish. Social media is powerful, not this way!

Now, go back to the first stanza. You will reach out to my idea.

With smiles...

Swathi Mohan

(Investing myself completely in the art of living)

Secret's secret

On a random day, a text message pops up, something similar, which says:

·         “I want to share something very important with you. Promise me, you will             keep it secret.”

·         “A, can I ask you something?” Please don’t mind.

Curiosities from all over the world come to your mind. What are they going to share/ask?

Where your heart starts beating at the speed of light. And lots of questions/probabilities/scenarios/dark secrets start running through your mind.

You say, “Yeah sure go ahead. Shoot.”

And here you get the legendary reply,

·         “Leave it, I can’t share it with you.”

·         “I won’t ask, You will get angry.”

Yeah right???? 

After having all those curiosities, that you have created in my mind, you reply with this!? Well, in these situations I have my own reply;“OK.”

This kinda reply makes me irritated, but still, it happens.

But, this is not the end. In case they share your secret. A secret for which you have sworn that you will take it to your grave. And suddenly, you come to know about that secret from a third person.

And you were like, how did you come to know about this? It has to be secretive. And they reply, “Well! he/she (Mostly she) told me not to share with anyone.” Please let it be a secret.

Now you have sworn another oath about the secret to keeping it secret, where you already know the secret.

Irony! 

SECRET    is something you tell everybody to tell nobody.

And now you don't tell anyone. Okay? 

With smiles...

Swathi Mohan

(Investing myself in the art of living)

She is a fantasy

"If you follow the rules and stay out of trouble you'll never know what the world is offering you"

This is one quote she lives through by. She has many appealing traits which make people wonder at her for versatile reasons. She is daring & her enthusiasm is contagious. Let you know something mysterious about her.

      1.She never bothers, how older she is. She still poses weird before CCTV cameras.

2. She respects people for their intellect, discipline and education. Age is her least criterion.

3. She couldn't keep up lies. So she never takes the risk.

4. She always competes with Koala bear in sleeping. A koala bear sleeps for 16-18 hours and rarely the koala bear wins.

5. She doesn't flatter or get take in by flatterers.

6. She is afraid of none in the world except for those icky cockroaches and her conscience.

7. She has run more in hospitals rather than playgrounds in fear of injections.

8. She loves coffee a lot.

9. She has said a very few no's to her friends

10. She never cared about marks because she believes that single sheet of paper explicitly implies the memory power and not the knowledge.

11. She deserves to be compared with black. Even on mixing different colors to it, black remains black.

12. When she writes her biography, half of its paging would be about her teachers.

13. She never celebrates her birthday.

14. Harry Potter is her greatest pleasure and she has read "Harry Potter and the order of Phoenix" three times.

15.She believes destiny when it is of her design.

Amusing, right? And that's she.

Well. Let me be as sober as a judge. Concisely, one needs to have some steel of
 nerves to get onto her journey of life.Besides, she derives her inspiration from all 
those she had met in the journey of growth. Her craving to excel in everything kept
pushing her continuously up the ladder.  Basically, she is a multifaceted girl. She is
a writer, blogger, artist, orator, bibliophile and a motivator. To excel in a single
chosen field & to hit the top is by itself is commendable, but she has excelled in
more than one field and created a niche for herself.She plays various roles and
performs each one with elan.She is an aspiring writer and a budding author who has
a great passion for blogging that made her win awards from few national blogging
sites. She is an artist who wins the hearts of many and earns from pockets of few.
She is an awesome orator who makes her audience glued to her words in many
forums. She undertakes many sessions for school children and other people under
training. She has great astonishment on reading books and that's her favourite
hobby. She always gifts her friends with her favourite books. And in short, she lives
not to motivate but to inspire.

‘This post is a part of Write Over the Weekend, an initiative for Indian Bloggers by BlogAdda.’

Swathi Mohan

(Investing completely in the art of living)

This post has won the WOW badge from Blogadda. You can see the list of winners here

True sight!

The bench in the park was deserted as I sat down to read beneath the long, straggly branches of an old willow tree. Disillusioned by life with a good reason to frown, for the world was intent on dragging me down.

And if that weren’t enough to ruin my day, a young boy out of breath approached me, all tired from play. He stood right before me with his head tilted down and said with great excitement, “Look what I found!”

 In his hand were a flower and what a pitiful sight with its petals all worn. Wanting him to take his dead flower and go off to play, I faked a small smile and then shifted away.But, instead of retreating, he sat next to my side, smelt the flower and declared with surprise, “It sure smells pretty and it’s beautiful, too. That’s why I picked it; here, it’s for you.”

The weed before me was dying or dead, not vibrant in colours-orange, yellow or red. But I knew I must take it, or he might never leave. So, I reached for the flower, and replied, “Just what I need.”

But, instead of placing the flower in my hand, he held it mid-air without reason or plan. It was only then that I noticed for the very first time that the weed-toting boy could not see; he was blind.

I heard my voice quiver, tears shone like the sun as I thanked him for picking the very best one. “You’re welcome,” he smiled, and the ran off to play unaware of the impact he’d had on my day.I sat there and wondered how he managed to see a self-pitying woman beneath an old willow tree. How did he know of my self-indulged plight?

 Perhaps from his heart, he’d been blessed with true sight.Through the eyes of a blind child, at last, I could see the problem was not with the world; the problem was me. And for all of those times I myself had been blind, I vowed to see the beauty and appreciate every second that’s mine.

And then I held that wilted flower up to my nose and breathed in the fragrance of a beautiful rose and smiled as that young boy, with another weed in his hand was about to change the life of an unsuspecting old man.

With smiles...

Swathi Mohan

(Investing myself completely in the art of living)