It s been nearly four months since I have been on a break from work. I picked up my tablet with an intention of writing about my Scottish isles trip. Yet my mind wandered off and I started pondering about the last four months and its effect on me. I started with a soul searching trip to India, did I find anything ? Did I find a pot of gold at the end of the Rainbow/trip? More importantly have I reached the end of Rainbow? What have the last four months been like for me ? I started to make a list.
1. I have eaten food like never before, relishing and tasting every morsel- smacking my lips after a cool buttermilk, eating a guava on the streets of Mumbai and rolling my eyes in pleasure, eat traditional south Indian meal on banana leaf with hands, taste the sweetness of a Baklava with a friend on the streets of London, drink Elderflower cordial en route to Oban, eat Dosa with friends in London.
2. Laughing out heartily with friends, till tears started rolling out.
3. Sit Still by the kitchen door, watching the birds, bees and butterflies.
4. Joined a Sewing class and made a new acquaintance, who is also on a break from work.
5. Started reading War and Peace and still reading …
6. Preparing for a 90 mile walk later in the year in Yorkshire.
7. Experiencing the little nuances of life with same bewilderment and amazement that of a child.
8. Feeding ducks by the pond not far from home.
9. Started volunteering as a reading helper in a School, through Beanstalk.
10. I have lived the last four months with out fear, with out thinking about future or any negativity.
Can these be termed as achievements? I have not changed anybody s life nor have I done anything magnanimous.
Yet, I am grateful for having this opportunity of self retrospection, I am blessed with beautiful and wonderful friends and family who have stood by me in worst of my times and laughed and smiled for me in happier times, and are with me now reading this blog, shaking their heads and laughing.
I often now get remarks when I meet friends and family, who say ‘you look the same yet not so same at all, you look so different , but in a nice way’. I must agree I have changed, I am positive, I am alive and with a life full of infinite possibilities.
Buddha:” If your Compassion does not include yourself, it is incomplete”
PS: I am still working on my’ to do list on break’.
Le coin des Bobby 
Dear Usha, as always your post in my inbox makes me smile.
Your experiences and accomplishments in the last four months are filled with peace and tranquility. Wishing you good luck on your future endeavors, would be eagerly waiting to read your next to do list:))
Would love to share this quote I read today from an unknown author :
“At the end of life, what really matters is not what we bought but what we built;
Not what we got but what we shared;
Not our competence but our character;
And not our success;but our significance.
Live a life that matters. Live a life of love”
I would really like to apply this in my life and I think you have already started living it my friend.
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