Christmas or Christmas eve? New year's day or the New year's eve?

Ho Ho Ho... Hope you all had a great Christmas!

I just love this season. It brings home a lot of joy and happiness.. pure joy that melts in your mouth, yep, you are right.. ;) endless chocolates, Christmas cake and sweets effectively ruining my diet. While munching on some Ferrero Rocher chocolates and swirling in the balls of chocolate and nuts this afternoon, I was thinking which is the most joyous part of a festival? The day before the actual celebration when there is a lot of preparation, anticipation and excitement or the day of the celebration? Christmas starts days before the 25th of December right. I start the season by watching Thanksgiving and Christmas episodes from my ever favorite sitcom F.R.I.E.N.D.S. This is not just for Christmas, ;) my birthdays start with 'The one where they all turn 30'. I just like to have a good laugh! I enjoy my small Christmas shopping. I walk around the Mission Street here in Pondicherry. Small shops that sell Christmas trees and decorations are set on the pavements during the season. I love going through all the bright jingly stuff.

Then starts the tree decoration process with all those colorful glittering balls, stars, bows, tiny Santas, tinsel, lights et all! Until the day of Christmas, the jitters and glitters continue everyday! And then Bam! Its over! Now what? I have New Year to look forward to! The same happens with New year's eve. It is the 31st of December we are all more thrilled about, busy making up resolutions that will probably last one month. With bundles of hope and new aspirations we look forward to the New year. However, we all know the fact that, how our New year pans out will not just depend on our resolutions and the holiday season's hang over! ;) I mean we got to get into some real action, N'est-ce pas? :) I had spent my Christmas vacation of 2013 in Mumbai. It was a fun trip with family, jolly and eventful. Now, nothing would explain my first week of the New Year better than this meme.

Haha! I seriously had not planned or worked for anything different! That was a lesson learnt! Mmmm.. Will 2015 be different? Will let you know! :)

I personally enjoy the Eve more than the Big day! What about you?

Here's wishing you all a wonderful and lovely New Year!
Bubye fellas! :) :)

The game of survival!

Is life a game of survival? I ask myself as I sit here writing this on a weekday afternoon. I am home on a Tuesday afternoon instead of being at work. I have been suffering from back pains every now and then since the beginning of the year. Doctors, x-rays, exercises have become a routine. Well, to be honest, exercises didn't become a routine and that's why I am here, not working. Doctors say its due to my bad postures, sitting for hours in front of my computer, very less physical activity, blah blah. Hey there.. don't worry this is not a 'Bored software engineer suddenly turned into a self improvement guru' story.

But the most prominent thing in my life in the past two months has been pain. I read books, watched TEDx videos on health and dealing with pain. One book suggested that I think of all the things I am thankful for in my life when I am in pain. Gratitude! This way whenever the pain gets bad you concentrate on all the great things in your life and not on the pain. It did help a little. But in this busy rat race of a life... Okay I hear you saying 'oh.. come on.. I am not in a race. My life is quiet fun!'.

Okay even if you are not in a race, 5 days of work, two days of fun or relaxation, lots of new stuff to learn and explore... Too much in the basket! Well, that's not bad. Yeah it wasn't all bad. I started learning to skate. Didn't finish it though. Learning French. Learnt Yoga which I stopped doing regularly after a year! Learnt about Psychology.. Advertising.. Programming.. But I failed to learn the most important of all things. My body. My mind. And what I was doing to them!

Most living things in the world are just in a game of survival. You see how a cheetah or a tiger has to pee and declare its territory, hunt and bring food and thus become the leader of the gang. I wonder if most people are doing the same, playing a game of survival. Work to make ends meet, to raise their children, to give their children better life, to be a master in their field of subject, to have a decent standard of living as per the 'what your society thinks' scale. Well good job doing all that. But most of us tend to ignore the machine that is going through all of this. We forget to pay attention to our body as long as it listens to us. It is high time we listen to it.

Well what did I learn by listening to my body?

• Human body is not meant for sitting for hours together. It is a must that you take small breaks every now and then during long hours of sitting. Go to the wash room or vending machine or take a stroll in and around the work place.
• Discipline is difficult but a must for healthy life. You can train yourself by repeating the activities of your choice everyday. You will fail and give up in the beginning. But push yourself for a little longer every time you are tempted to quit.
• You really know how much you need to eat. Just listen to your stomach and watch what you eat.
• Body is more like a machine. You need to lubricate it, keep it in active mode and not in couch potato mode for it to function properly. Exercise is a must.
• Study yourself. Your thoughts, posture, the way you carry yourself, how you react to different situations and everything about yourself.

So go study yourself!