Sunday, December 11, 2011

Tattoo CURIOSITY

“My body is my journal, and my tattoos are my story.” - Johnny Depp

Many people get inked on a whim - tattoos aren't bad for everyone, I cant say if they are good either.

Tattoos have always fascinated me but I was never really interested in getting them done to be honest. To me they felt yet another fancy way of showing off how much pain you can endure. I am sure there is more to it than that. Getting inked was something that underwent a task-full of whole lot of reasoning & patience. Not very much to my surprise, It came out to be that hormonal genes seemed quite curiously intense & excited when the word tattoo popped up. 


I always wondered what would my first tattoo be. You know, just the usual confusion. I've met even more interesting people who were keen on getting tattooed on there private parts - Now that certainly was one of its kind "A Private Affair or Pubic Afare" which seems quite a in thing these days. Bygone are those days when It was more of a traditionally social affair, as of now it has become a symbol of masculinity & sexual attributes that govern & flaunt who you were & what you liked - & how you wanted to be looked upon as. A tattoo would do all the talking being inked to your flesh in shades of grey or in a rainbow of hues.

The pain, the agony, the torture. The question that I used to ask, the question that everyone asks - "Kitna dard hota hai"? (How much does it hurt?) 
There was this discussion I was having the other day with a tattoo artist about people having interest of getting inked everywhere they could possibly & specially onto there private parts & then a series of serious & hilarious episodes our talks unfolded into. "Is it going to hurt" - how awful would be the pain & how long would it last"? what amount of time would it take & how much do you charge? What if I want to get it done on a private part? how was it any different at all it was from getting inked anywhere else. The Tattoo Artist replied yes, it can be done anywhere you want, and hour or so would be the time frame and with less amount of pain, depending upon how big or small the size of the tattoo was. 
It will feel as if a cat is scratching you or you’ll probably won’t last a minute. When the needle hits you, you’ll know it - You’ll feel as if your skin is on fire. But I seem to be thinking about other sizes & shapes - if at all the size mattered, it led me to this curiosity of series of questions that I was about to ask him. 


Well after most of the questions, that were answered 'It must have come to him as a surprise, when I asked him "Whether you shall be naked or half dressed, while you are putting that tattoo for me on my private parts? Well lets meet up, and then decide, but yes no harm in being naked replied the tattoo artist. Can you personally come to my place to put a tattoo for me asked the person, yes was a reply of the tattoo artist, with a smiley. 
When asked, was the deal finalized, the tattoo artist said no, not yet - waiting for it to finalize & looking forward to it.


"Thinking, what if by any chance? I decided to get inked on my penis and it had a hard on, while the tattoo artist worked upon". 
Getting a tattoo inked (size does matter) once you have finalized the budget & find comfort of having yourself surrendered to the disposal of the tattoo artist blindly & completely seldom in an attempt to suffice your set of fetish curiosities to deciding as to where you wanted to have him touch you - no matter if the tattoo is for the private parts, or a private affair much largely turning out to be a public affair ...rather a "pubic display of affection" it all seems to be fair in love & war. 

Let's return to the main topic after that brief digression -You can pick anything , but before you choose, think thoroughly because that ink is going to stay. You should pick places that are concealed in a casual posture or the well exposed ones. 
“I am a canvas of my experiences, my story is etched in lines and shading, and you can read it on my arms, my legs, my shoulders, and my stomach.” Kat Von D


If at all, I could have trusted on to thee, I would have sinned of getting inked by now. But as of now I shall stray away & off, not thinking  about the tattoo gun working on my skin. - Anonymous

Friday, December 2, 2011

Those COMMENTS

 


When I hear that:I want to hide,I want to die,I hate myself,I want to cry,I wish someone knew me,I feel completely alone,I wonder what's wrong with me then that I don't have a boyfriend,I get sweaty, I get anxious, sometimes I even get a headache. Sometimes I even want to barf. Seriously tho, when i'm feeling less dramatic, I get a headache, and I get palpitations. I just want one fantastic guy whom I like to love me and he can hide me away and enjoy me all for himself (like the song "Girls just wanna have fun"), and I will spend happy times with other housewives, their daughters, grandmothers, and little girls. I just want a simple life. Not a life full of sh*T that i just don't need.

Why is this? It almost doesn't make sense. Doesn't make sense to me at all...I should like those kind of comments, right? What kind of stupid brain do I have right here? It's madness.....How can I hate those comments. How? Why? How dumbfounding and counter-intuitive. This is madness.- Anonymous

Sunday, November 20, 2011

MARATHON-The Mummy Run





Today I ran for an hour and ten minutes.

My daughter, 7, plays tennis. Generally I drop her off at her courts and run on the track alongside at the club where she plays. Or I hop across to the gym (which is also at the club) and run on the treadmill. When I run on the track, my daughter is half proud of Mummy heffalumping away in plain sight of all her buddies and half e...mbarrassed.

Generally her brother, 3, stays home and plays in the park or rides his bike. Today, because there was no one home to look after him (long story – some other time), he had to be dragged along for tennis. When I settled him down on the chairs near the courts with his toys and his books and asked him if I could run on the half km track, he nodded agreeably.

So I took off.

Exactly one minute later, I heard a wailing keening cry. When I turned around he was coming after me like a bullet. Mummy, mummy mummy, you wicked girl, I’m so scared, don’t leave me, he wept burrowing into my vest. Please don’t go where I cant see you

Sometimes a mum’s got to do what a mum’s got to do.


I ran for 70 minutes straight.

Except, instead of running the half-kilometer loop where I would have been out of his sight for quite a few stretches, I ran only along the length of the courts.

A distance of maybe 20 metres. Back and forth, back and forth.

Passing him playing in the mud every 7 seconds. Admiring the leaves he collected and throwing away the beer bottle shards he found from somewhere. Pulling a band aid off his finger as I ran, “because its getting too dirty to play with mummy”.

I ran for 70 minutes basically circling my son. Before I could get into my stride, I had to turn around and come right back. I ran without knowing how much distance I covered. I ran though I made myself giddy with the blink and you have to turn around loop. I ran despite the fact that my daughter rolled her eyes up at me every time I looked, because she thought I looked “so weird”.

It looked weird because it was weird. It was a really really weird run. The mummy run.

It was also the happiest run I’ve run in a long long while. - Anonymous

Tuesday, November 1, 2011

SEX as PRIORITY

My boyfriend doesn't see sex as a priority in our relationship, am I lucky?

I've been in relationships where my partner has wanted sex every which way, and if he didn't get it a lot he would start looking in other places. For the first time in my life, I'm with someone I totally love and adore, and he views sex as important but a very small part of what makes a great relationship, so if he isn't feeling good or is stressed out he isn't in the mood. He only wants it when conditions are just right. I like to have it a little more often than he does, but I think I am willing to compromise on it and not have it as much because he compromises for me in so many other ways.  - Also, if he isn't in the mood, he got me a vibrator to use.

I'd rather have no sex than bad sex, which means the one night stand thing is pretty pointless in general.


I once suggested to a male friend that some women might have less need for sex because women have better sex toys available to them, but he said I was wrong. (Not about the sex toys, but about the idea that they're that helpful. He said his hand was grand).

If you ask me "Is sex my first priority in a relationship"? No. If we want sex as a priority, we would've gotten a hooker or an easy to get girl. We get in a relationship because we want companionship and someone to be with, someone to accept and love us back. Sex will always be a part of a relationship and might happen sooner or later, but it is not a priority. We want it more if it were to result out of true love rather than just get off the heat at the moment. Sex is not one of the highest priorities in my relationship - Our relationship is incredibly serious.This, however, doesn't mean that we don't have sex/make love. We certainly do, but it is not something that we feel we must accomplish five times a night, every night. We have sex because we want to, and if one partner is too tired or not in the mood then we don't need sex to be close. A good cuddle and just being there is far more important to us. I don't know whether it's significant or not, but I remember the days when we had just met and five times a day was about right. I remember, but I think that we have a much deeper love now, and love-making is slower and more for our pleasure as a couple than the more physical sex we had at first. Sex is only a tiny part of love, and love is a feeling you have to experience to be able to understand.

I myself do not think it is that high on the list of things to do but my partner does. It is always a big deal in our relationship. But i guess if people need sex to feel loved and wanted it is very high on their list. Well I have been with my partner for four years and sex is important...I mean we can go without having it but we choose not to because is a way of showing how much we love each other.. it also depends how you view relationships..

At the beginning my partner had a much stronger sex drive than myself. Sex was still important to me, it just wasn't as high a priority as it was to her. Our relationship has remained very serious. Heck, its been more then seven years now. As we grow old together sex becomes, well, interesting, in ways we never had to deal with before. Fortunately we have a lot of health food store products to help out (lotions). Our sex drives have evened out. And we're still serious.

When the sex is good and plentiful, everything else seems to falls into place much easier.

I know of a friend who's been in a committed relationship for a while now & living together & there sex life is very dull. They feel a huge pressure to have sex. So when they do have sex, its not very passionate..The problem from my vantage point is that women seem to be very willing to do it early in the relationship but once they get what they want, they lose interest. This is the case of my friend. I know a friend who had two girlfriends who were different and loved sex.The difference was obvious. it was just that they weren't as compatible in other ways.

If the sex isn't good, there would have to be a lot of other reason to stay in the relationship. if not, why not just be friends? besides, if people in a relationship stop having sex, that seems like a pretty good indicator that something else in their relationship is wrong. i know of a another friend who's current relationship is not very serious & he is not that far into it. 
   
Sex is important in a relationship. Even though there are spells in which sex is not as important (right now a family member is really ill) but the affection shown in sex is significant, although I & my partner have a serious difference in sex drives. She has told me that sex is not important to her, and that if I wanted more sex I should never have married her. Am I wrong to stay in this relationship? Am I wrong to value sex?

Fact, that we start to like someone, and meet occasionally & want to go on bed with, and after we have tasted the so called sex for a while, say 3-4 times, we kind of get board of the person. Since it's like we are through with the sex as a priority with that person, & love is always there to an extent that you would not like to leave that person, maybe its like a security - stability that you would not want to loose on too, no matter what. Being alone hurts, so you would at times unwanted have sex with the person if the need arises, if its demanded from the other side., but you would not be sexually charged yourself. One would still like to look out for other options to fill in the sex endurance and frustrations, that might overcome somehow by chatting, sex on the phone with newer, fewer, people who would excite you more. The person you are in relationship wont be the person charging you up, afterwards, but the new person, the new taste of the spiced up activity that one would want to try out with is something that no matter what you would want to try out. if not in real, for sure a virtual thing would be satisfying enough. But at the same time you wont ever want to leave the person you are with, spending hours, and time of your life, caring, understanding, talking, sharing, loving (less or no sex, with a little bit of romance, and gifting each-other, going for rides, vacations, celebrations, dancing, party's etc.). It's funny but true when we have someone there to have sex with, we are not that interested, and when we don't have anyone, we get so panicky about it and desperate to have it with any damn person, though we have our preferences of choices tagged to it. I at times wonder what would the person on the other side would be wondering!, Does he/she feel in the same way?. 

At times its not about priorities, but its about the circumstantial phase that make you loose interest in things like this, on the contrary things that would value more! - Anonymous

Monday, October 31, 2011

HOW CLOSE is too close

When often getting close to people - do you find that sometimes, when you get too close being friends with them...both of you end up hating each other eventually? Close was too close to have been so close, to have ended in a closing.

This is what happened between most of my close friends. Initially, we get along very well. But when we get to know each other better and become closer, we end up getting either annoyed or not quite satisfied with each other as a result eventually fail to fall-in, & would rather fall-out of this friendship act. It's really strange how people who are closest to you are the ones who actually seem to have never ever gelled well to have been befriended at the first place. How harsh of a truth it might sound to be, but was the reality.


People with these friendships & relationships are pretty much deceiving
, they have there own set of presumable authentications that one need to prove & its not always that one would qualify completely in an eagerness to quench ones curious approach mending the amendments in ways - coming to ones rescue as the other person figured you all by oneself to be. Things that stay for a while or much long could be symptoms of an ever lasting one, but these momentum kinds of rehearsals that goes by into imitating and balancing in a jiffy are often short lived.

I don't feel like getting close to people anymore, I feel annoyed by most people. Or maybe I just haven't been meeting a right set of them. I totally agree, everyone is different, but then, how indifferent one could be to be friends would have actually made me realize if at all, we could forever just deal with the fact, that you may never find someone just like you. Meeting the right person completely sounded strangely strange to me (There was absolutely no perfect one) & at times there were strangers who would come so close & then fall apart the other second. Does other person even feel the same way or is it just me?

People are like vegetables, or bad-tasting medicine! -you just gotta swallow it. 

Its not just me who gets hurt every time, but I've also even seen people getting hurt by others - which has made me very hesitant to trust others. It might have kept me emotionally safe but I've turned out being a lonesome survivor.

Unfortunately, humans are social animals, and as much as I hate to admit it - we need a certain amount of human interaction, or we'll start to go crazy.  My overactive mind goes into overdrive - getting paranoid & my social anxiety getting worse.  So, I force myself to be as much sociable as I could, & try to ignore the discomfort that bothers me deep inside of intuitively believing that it wont last long. Even if I am not getting that emotional connection with someone,or it was rather a infatuation to console my self with or a fling that was actually good for as little as it lasted. The intimacy was a sour thing and it always looked good in books, & there was absolutely no one as intimate as your own self which just couldn't suffice. 

There's this girl I know. She has a boyfriend who she describes as sweet & caring, But mostly I see her always sitting extremely close to a boy (best friend, as she claims).Extremely close as in leaning onto him,leaning onto his chest and then sleeping basically on him,sitting on his lap and leaning on his face very close to hers, etc.  Worst thing is they seem to have a crush on each other. Personally I think she's going too far as she does have a boyfriend and she does look like one kinda flirty and easy. When I told her she needs to tell her boyfriend - she overreacted and told me that she loves him and that she will not leave him. When I told her not to get too physically close to that boy... she said, there was nothing wrong with that since they were "best friends." Well, she tells me that she's quite committed to her boyfriend so flirting around like that shouldn't be good. She's 18 - an "adult" from a small city called Barangay in Philippines where she's resides ,where everybody knows everybody and who wants to be labeled something bad specially. if you know how fast it would spread? She tells me more then a million times, that she loves her boyfriend but has a huge crush on her friend. It's not really my problem but I do care what others think of her,specially her own family or people around.

Leave her alone? I would if I weren't "in-charge" of her. I'm the one who pays all her bills because I'm like her parent(guardian). I'm not her parent, but I'm a relative of hers. - Anonymous

Wednesday, October 19, 2011

HIRE THE LAWYER, Not the Law Firm

After hearing yet another general counsel tell me, "We hire the lawyer, not the law firm," it seems an appropriate time to step back and dissect this apparently simple statement and see what it really suggests. Clearly, this statement is not as simple as it appears -- as a matter of fact, it is complicated, multifaceted and multipurpose.

This statement has been used for years, and will probably continue to be used, but why? When general counsel say they hire the lawyer, not the law firm, what are they really saying? Is it nothing more than posturing?
We can safely say that no in-house counsel is going to hire a lawyer, no matter how competent and successful he or she is, if the lawyer does not have the capacity, resources and backing of a law firm that can properly represent a multibillion-dollar business.

 There are deeper implications to this statement -- implications for the lawyers facing the client, lawyers working on a client team and ultimately the law firms who employ these lawyers and serve these clients. As my colleague Bruce MacEwen, aka blogger for "Adam Smith, Esq.," observes, "I think it's one of those 'too cute by half' remarks that obfuscates much more than it reveals."

So what are the implications? How can we all better understand what appears to be so precise and clear -- and is used so often? To better understand this issue, I solicited input from general counsel and my consulting colleagues. To dissect the statement, let's break it into its two obvious parts: "We hire the lawyer," and "We don't hire the law firm."
'WE HIRE THE LAWYER'

 This is it. This is what the general counsel want you to believe; and much of it is absolutely true. To a great extent, in a personal service business, it is personal chemistry and relationships that matter. William B. Lytton, who now serves as senior counsel at Dechert and was previously executive vice president and chief legal officer of Tyco International Ltd. and other corporations, told me, "What you want to know when you hire a firm is who will be on the other end of the phone when you call with a question, and whose professional judgment will be guiding the work done and the decisions made."

 In an informal survey I conducted for this article, on a scale of one (lowest importance) to 10 (perfect chemistry) the importance of personal chemistry and relationship is ranked an eight to 10 by most general counsel. We are not talking about chemistry in the sense of friendship, but professional chemistry defined by an ability to effectively communicate, as well as a common sense of judgment and fundamental values. Of course, most people want to work with people they like, trust and feel comfortable with, and general counsel are no different in this respect.

 We have also found that personal relationships are a major factor in determining how sympathetically a request for proposal response will be read by a prospective client, as well as the openness of engagement discussions, and how the ultimate agreements are negotiated. Chemistry also rates a "10," if "the lawyer" actually is the client relationship lawyer and others will be doing the work and funneling the work product upward through the relationship lawyer.

As my Altman Weil colleague, Ken Bunge, former managing attorney of United Technologies Corp., pointed out, "The relationship with the individual partner is the key and is based on a proven track record over time. For example, a successful outcome on an important company matter will not only build confidence within the legal department but also with senior management."

 Bunge went on to point out that success means "the CEO, CFO, etc. will identify that partner by name for future matters." In short, it becomes very personal at that point.

 Many of today's law firms are huge organizations with far-flung offices and many faceless lawyers working on complicated and expensive matters. Making the client relationship personal is critical. A single lawyer must be in a position of ultimate accountability. The general counsel must have someone who he or she holds responsible for the success or failure of a matter, the quality of the services, the way a matter is handled and the cost of the services. This is why they hire the lawyer.

 'WE DON'T HIRE THE LAW FIRM'

 Well, frankly, yes you do hire the law firm. There is more to the client relationship than trust in the legal competence of an individual lawyer.

 Of course the lawyers must have a sterling reputation in the field for which they are selected. Very often, they have already proven themselves to the company or are referred by a trusted colleague. The lawyer's legal talent and skills are essential, but the lawyer must also have a bench strength behind him or her that can get the job done, and be able to bring these resources to bear on client matters in an effective and efficient manner.

 For most corporate clients today, matters are large enough to require a team of lawyers to address the needs.

This point is exemplified by the comments of James Gass, vice president, general counsel and corporate secretary of Osram Sylvania, who said, "For me the perfect world would be that we hire each lawyer who works on our matters. But the reality is that we cannot get away from the impact that the firm has on our relationship. Even though we hire the lawyer, that lawyer depends on the law firm staff. And the billing rate of all the lawyers is dictated to some extent by the law firm's rates. The same is true for other details of the retention, such as staffing, expenses, etc. So even in cases where I like a particular lawyer, I struggle to hire that person if he or she is associated with a firm whose costs are too high or whose back-up talent pool is not good enough."

 Dennis Schoff, the general counsel of the Lincoln Financial Group, framed hiring the law firm issue succinctly and precisely, saying, "We hire specific legal talent, but a firm can cause us to terminate our relationship with even those lawyers we know and trust -- billing practices, for example, could be a cause for termination."

 Both Gass and Schoff clearly identify the lawyer/law firm relationship and the effect the connection can have on selection and retention.

 According to the Altman Weil client survey database, which compiles feedback from hundreds of law firm clients, "hiring the lawyer" is still the most important reason for selection. However, over the years, "hiring the law firm" has gone from No. 3 in importance to No. 2 and is only one point behind No. 1.

There are probably several reasons for this, including the following:
• Clients want to make sure that they are working with a well-informed, experienced team, not a lone wolf.

• The whole team must know the client's business, not just the lead lawyer.

• Firm branding and differentiation efforts may be having an effect on the GC's choice.
This raises interesting issues relative to the concept of branding. Along with the tangible, fact-based question of adequate resources, there are the more fluid, intangible issues of image and reputation. Many people -- and especially lawyers -- feel that they are too smart to be influenced by marketing. However, most people, including general counsel, are more influenced by brands than they think they are. This is especially true when the board of directors of the company recognizes the brand of top-tier firms.
If we conclude that general counsel hire both lawyers and the law firm, each firm must concern itself with multiple brands: the firm's overall brand, as well as that of its practice groups and individual lawyers.

This tiered approach to branding -- and influencing purchasing decisions -- is no different than that exemplified by major global corporations. For example, PepsiCo markets its overall brand Pepsi, but also sells many Pepsi varieties (Diet, Caffeine Free, Caffeine Free Diet, etc.) that have been launched from the parent brand and take strength from it. Whether recognized or acknowledged, branding is an underlying influencer when buying a soft drink … or hiring a lawyer.

However, branding is separate from marketing. Lincoln Financial's Schoff made this point clearly when he told me, "I don't really get a great deal out of dealing with a marketing department of a law firm. If I am going to be 'marketed to,' it is best coming from someone I know: the attorney with whom I have a trust relationship."

Smart marketers will recognize the importance of relationships in the hiring equation and find ways to help individual lawyers build personal rapport as well as confidence in the firm.
In some cases, the company's goal is to affiliate itself with a specific law firm. Here, it is the law firm that is hired, and not the lawyer. The lawyer is secondary, albeit important, in the retention decision.

If influence and power are the company's objectives, a well-positioned mega-firm might be the company's choice. A general counsel may select only one or two of these law firm relationships reserved for this special status. In these cases, the general counsel wants the law firm thinking about the company and identifying ways to help advance the client's business. The loyalty factor in these relationships is high and reciprocal. While holding a special status as a legal service provider, these power-broker law firms may not be selected to handle all of the company's legal work.

CONCLUSION
So, do general counsel hire lawyers and not law firms? And if the answer is no or not entirely, then why might this be such a popular mantra for them?

First, this statement puts pressure on the individual lawyer to perform and to ensure that the rest of the members of the firm perform as well. Second, it keeps the message in front of the law firm that which lawyers work on the company's matters is important. Third, it makes the business of law personal -- it puts a face on an impersonal organization.

By having an identified lawyer responsible and accountable for the delivery of high-quality, cost-effective services, GCs can feel a level of comfort that someone, and someone good, is paying attention to their needs.

"Fire the Lawyer and not the Law Term" - Anonymous

Monday, October 10, 2011

My PEARL EARINGS & the GHOST

When we first moved to Charleston, which was at the very beginning of 2003, we moved into the ground floor of a large grey house downtown, a house with a wrought-iron gate that made up for the fact that the kitchen was essentially just a countertop and an oven in the living room, and that the only electrical sockets in the whole apartment were, bizarrely, halfway up the wall.

A few months after we'd moved in, my mother sent me a package containing some pearl earrings. I'd been saying for a while, I guess, that I'd like some pearl earrings, that they might be good for job interviews---my reasoning being, since I was 22, that what I lacked in experience, I could make up for in tasteful jewelry---and so she sent me a pair as a surprise. They arrived in the mail and I wore them for a few months, and then suddenly one day I couldn't find them.

I looked everywhere. I mean, seriously, I looked everywhere. At first, I looked in drawers and cupboards and jewelry boxes and makeup bags, in the obvious places where I could certainly be forgiven for thinking a pair of pearl earrings might hide. Then I got a little desperate and searched the freezer and the garbage cans, between the pages of novels, the barrel of the washing machine, the laundry hamper, the insides of all my shoes. I couldn't understand it: one day I took my pearl earrings off and laid them on my bedside table, the next day they were gone.

The searching went on for two or three weeks, until I finally gave the earrings up for dead. I'd lost them forever, I figured, one of those things you eventually just accept and stop obsessing over. They were great earrings while they lasted, I told myself folornly. Maybe they'd impressed a job interviewer or two.

One morning, about three weeks to the day after I'd first noticed them missing, I got up, made some coffee, and took a shower. Upon entering the bedroom from the bathroom, cucooned in a towel with hair wet and that slight squint particular only to short-sighted people who haven't yet put their contact lenses in, my gaze was immediately---and I can't express how immediately, how urgently---drawn to my bedside table. There sat my pearl earrings, plain as day.

And here's the really weird part: they looked so carefully placed there, so perfectly positioned, like someone had measured the distance between them with a ruler, making sure that both backs faced in the same direction, that both pearls faced forwards. They were at the front of the table, right in the middle, and they looked like they'd been put there, for lack of a better word, lovingly.

It was one of the most surreal and bizarre moments of my entire life. Ten minutes before, I'd woken up and they hadn't been there---hell, for three whole weeks they hadn't been there---and yet mysteriously, while I was in the shower, they'd reappeared.

Sean had left for work early that morning and I called him immediately. "Did you find my earrings?" I asked him. "Did you find them while I was sleeping and put them on my bedside table?" No, he said, he hadn't.

So how had they got there?

That's up to you, Internet; you can decide whatever you want. My own theory is that some sweet Southern belle who'd died years before had needed to borrow something pretty to wear, perhaps because her husband had just passed away and she was about to be reunited with him. I like to think she saw my earrings, thought "ooh, I'll just borrow these for a little while," and then came and put them back---like a good Southern belle would do; in fact, it's a wonder she didn't leave a thank you note on monogrammed stationery---once she was done with them, making sure to leave them in the exact place I'd be sure to find them.

"To know that we know what we know, and to know that we do not know what we do not know"

So, feeling a little silly, I said a quick but effusive thank you out loud. I like to think that she heard me. "Curiouser & Curiouser" - Anonymous, Female

Sunday, September 18, 2011

EMOTIONS - A deck of Cards


The water that makes up so much of our bodies is like ocean water. The salt crystals in this water vibrate at ever-changing frequencies. Our hearts are the emotional centers of our bodies, and they put out frequencies that are 10 times the power of the frequencies of our brains.

When we are happy, we vibrate at a higher frequency than when we are angry or sad. Our emotions change the chemical composition of the water in our systems. That's why happy tears taste different than tears of sadness.

Experiencing physical, emotional and mental stillness harmonizes the vibrational output of the body, heart and mind and we become stronger.

The life-force within you is trying flush out all of the stuff which is blocking you from being consciously aware of it. Our problem is, that as the stuff is pushed to the surface of our consciousness, we fear it and we try to push it back down and hold onto it.

This causes an enormous amount of fear and we do not know what is happening to us. The secret is to let go of our inner defenses and let the life-force within do its job without resistance. Just like removing the clouds to allow the sunlight in.

It is our addictions which hold our defenses in place. The feeling you get when you crave a cigarette for example is not because you are addicted to tobacco, it is a feeling of fear and you push it down by having another cigarette. We have many addictions, such as tobacco, eating, talking, sex, exercise, cleaning, shopping and working.

You do not get cancer from cigarette smoking, you get it from the enormous amount of life force you lose trying to hold your defenses in place.
Lose the fear and the defense against it, and you will lose the habit or addiction automatically.


Emotions have the tendency to make you a King or Queen/ & as well it turns you to a no one in seconds. With all the faith, knowledge, realization , awakening, efforts put in & circumstances gone through, I have myself gone through a many, & have been working on myself handling & tackling the so called emotions from a long time,since I was a kid. Then later in my youth, & when I was married till present when I have different set of emotions entangling me. It's not a easy job taking in and letting out Emotions and Here is my take on Emotions & things that I have come across & myself worked upon them for better. Every day has been a new day, & every night has been a new night, For there was not the same evening, and not the same noon, that I came across. It's like a weather that brought storm, & subsided in fractions of time. What I have personally learned from them is that It's me, and no one else, who has to handle these set of emotions that come over & see them as I want too, admire them or reject them with a no no). Happier of the Worst of times, It takes not much long that one can surrender & adjust to it's symptoms.


"As we explore the extraordinary interplay of energies between the many aspects of our personality -- our needs, unconscious reactions, repressed emotions, aspirations and fears -- with the functioning of our physical system and its capacity to maintain itself, we soon realise how very wise the body is. With its intricately detailed systems and operations it portrays infinite intelligence and compassion, constantly giving us the means to understand ourselves further, to confront issues we are not looking at, and to go beyond that which is holding us back."


Our personality likes to be in control. It likes to know how things are and what’s going to happen. Underlying this desire for stability and predictability is a deep fear that the world is a dangerous place. The personality fears it will not survive without continually being on guard.

The truth is: we cannot control what happens in life. And under the natural law of attraction, we tend to attract to us what we focus on. Explore substituting trust for fear and the world becomes a gentler, happier place.

You, and you alone, decide what something means to you. Yet this is a decision that most people make based upon past feelings, experiences, understandings, or future fears. None of this has anything to do with what is going on right here, right now.

When you walk the spiritual path, its like traveling up the side of a mountain. You may fall back one step, only to find you have the strength to walk forward three. But don’t fear, you are always moving in the general direction, which is up.

In reality, we are always gravitating towards God whether we realise this or not.

Stay with yourself, bring yourself to the present moment, maybe by just listening to your breath, maybe by looking at something in the room. Then quietly, softly, give yourself permission to make a new choice if you wish. Embrace a new truth.


"Feel your emotions"

"The key is to not resist or rebel against emotions or to try to get around them by devising all sorts of tricks; but to accept them directly, as they are."

"Instead of resisting any emotion, the best way to dispel it is to enter it fully, embrace it and see through your resistance."

"We have to become more conscious of our feeling-world. By learning to identify the ‘emotional baggage’ and manage our feeling-world reactions, we can view life based on current information instead of being held captive by our past."

"Our feelings are our most genuine paths to knowledge."

- Anonymous, 54, Female, Cochin, India

Saturday, September 3, 2011

FOOD between the Legs


"In the twilight hours of this corner of the universe, I feel the hospital ward open up into kaleidoscopic strangeness."


Dating back to months back when, I was visiting to the hospital with my friend to see a family member of mine for almost a week now. One of the relatives had asked me to bring "Dosa" (South Indian Food - delicacy "is a fermented crepe or pancake made from rice batter and black lentils") from the roadside local restaurant (dhaba), on my way to the Hospital.

Despite no outside food was allowed from home or outside the hospital premises, I agreed (could not have said a no, as I was not at all keen struggling into the ironical blabbering, trying to convince & prove a point). I was cursing the guest while proceeding towards the restaurant to order, since I was agitated about the whole idea, about (how will I carry the same inside the hospital premises? The (guest)attendant was diabetic and so I completely understood ones reason to panic in hunger & since had no other option left with, other then to call me and ask me to pick it up & get it across. I wondered why would someone not shell out money if one was in a dire need - could have got it from the hospital canteen itself. Anyways, the not very interesting thing was that I was not carrying any bag to dump the food or else the hospital authorities would have noticed & questioned about what was being carried in the bag & asked me not to.

I must tell you his South Indian Food is really tempting, and what best if it just comes in 30-40 bugs a plate. I asked the guy to prepare either uttapam or dosa, which every would take less time, since 'thy hungry soul was waiting in anguish to feed on thee'. Uttapam (a dosa-like dish made by cooking ingredients (urad dal'Urad bean is sometimes referred to as "black gram". It is the main ingredient of the south Indian dishes: idli and dosai' - 'rice in a batter'. Since I was told to get either of it, but preferably dosa. The guy started making uttapam, but on my request he started working on the dosa,

Not very obvious to my surprise though, it took ten minutes to get the thing ready & pay the person. Since we had no carry bag with us, the the food handed to us was packed in a a brown paper envelope & into a poly-bag. We stood there thinking how were we suppose to hide the food & take it in side the hospital & then...I had an idea, that was quite hot though.

Have u ever wondered how does it feel, to have fresh hot cooked food between your legs, hanging just between your legs, banging & popping to and fro. It looked like if I was carrying a post-surgery bag, or I may aptly address it as a 'poop bag'. I was just like this kangaroo with a hidden bag/pouch 'under my kurta (a loose shirt falling either just above or somewhere below the knees).tied to my pajama's (loose, lightweight trousers fitted with drawstring waistbands) knot tightly as if it was a popper-scooper. I was worried 'what if my pyjama knot opened/loosened?' I was a "pocket penguin series edition" - walking like a penguin, since my balls(testicles) could feel the heat by now & I didn't wanted to hurt other things, that seem to be have already heated up by now, I needed to get it quickly off me, before my willy...burned down".

This hilariously intellectual & priceless expedition out of this petite unpleasant discomfort & hardly unnoticeable traces came to my realization & I fell into fit of laughs & goosebumps of giggles thinking about how thankful & a thoughtful of a disguised gesture, it had been - in an attempt to keep up with my promises in vein though to no avail since there was no scope of being acknowledged wholeheartedly ...despite being worthy of words that could have appreciated or even be thankful enough.

& all this while I kept presuming that everyone was looking at me, watching me walk so strangely through, though no one would have as evidently it might have had been. Walking like that, taking baby steps(as if you were not well, and had trouble walking) in an hospital, finding ones way to the elevator & then reaching to the floor towards the patients room. I took a breath of relief - "I was done away with the whole hot banging".

"Oh bless me Lord, for I had no intentions of causing no harm to the food, keeping it at places so unholy...just trying to make it all worthy". - Anonymous, 34, Male, India

Monday, August 15, 2011

PRACTICE RELIGION

"I wish I could meditate & become a child again.”

I aint a die-hard religious but, I have practiced being religious & spiritual for over many years. Let me share some insightful revelations that have gone into being a practitioner myself. 

I hear people talk about religion, but I fail to understand how they often fail to practice. There may or may not be a hard & fast rule of doing it in a right or wrong way & often difficult to abide by. Well we all try to handle tasks in a way that suits us(self-convenience) in the best possible way. At times we end up overdoing it. Talking about things & doing things are two different things, I've often heard people saying rather being a doer themselves. A doer knows ones strength, ones weakness & how well does he practices before he preaches. 

Many of the qualities that come so effortlessly to dogs - loyalty, devotion, selflessness, unflagging optimism, unqualified love - can be elusive to humans. John Grogan

"I see insane people around me, talking about sanity...I would rather be a silent observer then a big chatter box."

If you are tempted to go to the Himalayas to reach enlightenment, forget it. Many religions tell you to go into the mountains and sit there for years to achieve enlightenment. This is the extremely slow way. I read somewhere..."Being in the world and interacting with other people is the best spiritual practice you can get."You are not interacting with anyone. How can you bring up the negative within you if there are no people around to push your buttons. You will go to higher levels of consciousness by dealing with button pushers all day. Stay where you are. Stay with yourself, bring yourself to the present moment, maybe by just listening to your
breath, maybe by looking at something in the room. Then quietly, softly, give yourself permission to make a new choice if you wish. Embrace a new truth.

There was a time, a phase, when I had devoted myself & a lot of my time & energy with an intent to know, learn & practice. I had a keen interest since my childhood, but as I grew, my curiosity in everything started growing & not everything was about believing, so I had to practice. I was surrounded by people who would guide me thoroughly though. Knowing got better - Things added to my wisdom.

"We all question God, but have we ever answered to what God has always, ever asked us?"

If you want guarantees in life, then you don't want life. You want rehearsals for a script that's already been written. Life by its nature cannot have guarantees, or its whole purpose is thwarted. Whether right or wrong, we often blame him for certain things, at times, and then we say, It must be God's wish. What about us? We do mistakes, do we rectify them? God does rectifies his mistakes, if he does any. God is God, you cant question him, right? We often find ourselves in situations, surrounded by best or worst. Maybe its God's way of saying’ be brave my child, (ascertaining that life is a cycle of birth & death, and all manifestations are merely materialistic approaches)you got to face them.

"Who does not thank for little will not thank for much."- Estonian proverb

My life was like one alarming ritual alerts in clockwise & anti clockwise. At times, I was fed-up of following (practicing & ending up over doing) the same monotonous trails of things, that seem to have been forced upon me by my own self...piled & over burdened. There were times, when I often felt there was something missing, when I failed to even practice. I was getting addicted. But at the end, everything seem to have made sense & I felt there was something that would rescue me. It had brought peace upon me. - Anonymous

"There are only two types of people: one, who escape from their loneliness the majority, the ninety-nine point nine percent, who escape from themselves; and the remaining point one percent is the meditator, who says, "If loneliness is a truth, then it is a truth; then there is no point in running away from it. It is better to go into it, encounter it, see it face to face, what it is. - Osho

Tuesday, July 5, 2011

PARENT-PRESSURE

Well where to start from. It seems regardless ,pointless and yet very peculiar & unsorted. One realizes certain things,as one grows up all together. Parents will be always the same, if they differ, lucky would be the kids. School going, or a College kid, unmarried, married, single, no matter how old - for parents you are all the same all the time. They need to know where to draw a line and to what extent they can, and they should, and should not. Are the lines only for the kids. What about the parents. Why every day or an alternative day has to be a problem for Parents and kids? Why it cant go smooth.

It's not about being a single parent or a single child, it happens with everyone everywhere, all the time. You try to be over protective and at times much curious with one's perceptions and misunderstandings in a misguided way.- May be it's also the generation gap, and the peer pressure, society ,relatives and the surroundings, upbringing, and other pros and cons which add fuel to the whole episode drama.

Why do parents always think there child is a kid , and will always be the same. Until unless you get married and give them a kid, you wont be a man in there eyes. Once you are married you will be facing a whole new set of different dramatized version of issues.

We grow up with certain norms and conditions and we not always abide by them, but yes we often at times try to abide by. & anything that is a burden is unwillingly appreciated and done over with (no choice). No matter how hard you work on yourself and try to be the way your parents want you to be, doing things what they want you to, and the way they want it to be precisely. With several no's to what they tell you, to the most of the yes' and still deprived of appreciation and locked in self with no one coming to ones rescue. trapped in a body and mind, heart all conjured and restless and seeking help from the inner soul and God. With the one life you have, we still have to ought to, share it with the society, relatives, and people around the known and the strangers. Why it just cant be about you and me, us, why it has to be about everyone.

Why is it all the time about, grow up, be like others, why cant one be like the way one is, accept it or reject it, the way one is, why one needs to change one, and bring about change, certainly change is good if it is for good, one understand that, but if it is leading you to an emotional imbalance , with other things in ones mind, and one needs to break free- break - out with all of it, where would one go. If one could not confide with ones parents ,one would only confide in oneself all the time, leading to explore into a emotional outburst. With all the positive feelings and the negative ones in ones mind,one cant curse on to ones parents. One can only curse him/her self. No matter, how much we grow , we will be a kid. & shall always be filtered and balanced and compete, compared with the other kids.

Who are you being friends with, why do your friends come and stay at ur place, Why do you spent a night out with friends? What does your friend do, Handover your friends number and address of your so called friend. Do you drink, smoke, grass? Are you normal? or is there any problem with you? Are you sexually fit? Is your orientation normal? These are some of the major issues that you will always see on your parents face? asking you for more every time, and digging on to you with a annoying face, curious and perturbed attitude. Well Far better are those who stay away from family and live there life independently and are spoilt doing whatever they want too, whenever they want too. Unaware are the parents ,unsure of what company there child is surrounded in. Getting up and sleeping the time they want, eating whatever, doing any damn thing there way. with no obligations and restrictions to be imposed upon or questioned. Why one has to be friends with relatives (the ones you dont like and never want to be friends with) & why cant one be friends with the friends we choose.Why you have to be a sweet face to everyone you are told you have to be with, and you cant be the real you, the way you are or want too be with anyone, everyone you want.

One at times feel better to end ones life in such a misery, if one cant confide and clear out the misunderstandings with ones parents despite being a genuinely decent good child . Is this world full of formalities that one needs to show off, and make it so obviously fake to there parents, instead of being true. Why would parents believe when you tell them a lie, and why would they not believe you when you would be true to them and speak up. I strongly believe parents need a counseling at times more then the kids. But why would one need a third person to tell them about it, and why would it not be parent and child face to face sorting the issues, and clearing the doubts, but what good it would be if one would not even believe and trust all the genuine stories you tell them, and you would be the one always pointed a finger upon, no matter how good you be, and they would take you to be bad always. You are also told change your hairstyle, wear this, wear that.God let the kid grow, if you keep telling him what he/she needs to he/she will never grow. Let the kid be the way one has too, you cant take out a characteristic feature of a human soul .One will be the way one is and you cant help it by any means. We all understand grow up into a good and bad person by constantly being told how to and what to do, but too much of pointing on on almost everything, would let one go away and cause more despair and chaos. Parents grow up please.- Anonymous

Thursday, June 30, 2011

FITTING-IN

For the whole of my life, I've lived with my mum, dad, sister and my grandparents. My mum had a car crash at 18 and so my rich grandparents built a house on the end of theirs for us to live in. My grandmother has always hated my Dad, always at each others throat, it made everyone's life difficult until he died in November. she was always very mothering to me and my sister but recently me and my sister have taken the place of her hatred for my dad. I watch my mum sitting there watching TV everyday, doing nothing with her life and I feel so hopeless. I argue with her constantly because she gives away my dad's things as birthday presents to people when they come round or for Xmas. 

“Omigosh—I'm a squash!” - Dave Horowitz

I've felt detached from my friends for months now, I've lost motivation to go out, I've always smoked but now it makes me feel ill when I don't have one, same as when i do. When the phone rings I feel like I don't even want to pick it up anymore because it just another blah blah blah conversation about petty things in life.

The sun is shining outside but I'm inside, everyone's hanging out in town but it seems pointless to go there. I used to be able to sit in my room for hours and feel ok, but now I feel so bored and depressed the whole time, even when I go out it is not as fun as it used to be. my sister is never home now she has a car and she is the only one i have now really. My sister and one of my friends is the only one who understands. I tried to talk to 3 of my friends about some of the issue going on like the shooter incident, dead birds and fishes but they just skip over that like I never said it. They start talking about really petty things like oh some person said this to me or whatever.

“Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don't matter, and those who matter don't mind.” - Bernard M. Baruch

On the school front things aren't going well either, I used to get good grades but now I am in 11th grade and I'm failing because I missed out year 10 after falling into hospital with a kidney disease. before year 10, everything was normal, I was happy (to a certain extent) but now I live in a broken home, broken family, distant friends, a dull future. I go to an all boys school so I don't have many close girl friends who I can talk to about this and this is not the kinda thing you talk to boy friends about. 

I've seen a counselor before but they just sit there & want you to just repeat everything you've said before which is stupid and I cant go on depression pills because the bad side effects would ruin my upcoming exams! 

“Me, I trust people who show you what freaks they are. It's the ones who blend in that ya gotta watch out for.” - Hope Larson

I feel like I don't fit in. I believe many people do feel this way. I get so disillusioned. Where do you go when you feel like an alien in a very very strange world? I just don't know what to do, is there any escape?

People judge me all the time but I know they are unenlightened. I keep on trying to get my ideas out there regardless. I feel like most people would rather see someone suffer than equal out the imbalances in our society. I am just afraid that my fear of rejection from people leads to my apprehensiveness to be close to people and trust them and I might lose out on some great people.

“There are people who are generic. They make generic responses and they expect generic answers. They live inside a box and they think people who don't fit into their box are weird. But I'll tell you what, generic people are the weird people. They are like genetically-manipulated plants growing inside a laboratory, like indistinguishable faces, like droids. Like ignorance.” - C. JoyBell C.

Where is the cooperative, sustainable society that I was looking for? Am I ahead of my time? I see know that I am not an alien but like I said I feel like one. There is only a little common sense in the world.- Anonymous (Male)

Seeds of HOPE


Two weeks ago my boyfriend moved away and I didn't want to go with him because he said I needed to get a job, and I can't work because I'm too afraid of being around people. I feel like it's getting worse. When I go outside I get sweaty and I become confused about where I am, and I thought my boyfriend understood that.

I loved him the first year I met him, but the other two years I only stayed with him because I was so used to him. I'm a dependent person, and I know it's wrong to be that way but I can't help it. I don't know what to do. I feel so lost inside myself, and I tried to get help but I don't want to take those stupid drugs. I don't want to be transformed into a robot.

I have so much faith in God, but I guess not enough. I talk to him almost every night before I go to bed, and I start to cry because I don't want to be on earth any more. I want to go to heaven and be in peace. This may sound crazy but it's how I feel and no one understands me. I just want to be loved for who I am. - Anonymous (Male)

I felt SO LOST

My friend got married recently. Can't say, how is it going but their espionage-skills are mushrooming. 

Married couples fight more because after the wedding, the dating masks come off. She stops prepping to look fantastic every time she thinks she’s going to see him, he stops trying to do things that she likes to do (that he hates). The fun, exciting sex fades into routine and the household chore division starts to feel like a tug of war. She thinks, “He’s not doing his part” and he thinks, “she nags me all the time”. They battle over money, because they often don’t come from the same place when it comes to how they feel about money, bills and saving - This is pretty normal. Successful couples know how to make this transition work for them. They use compromise and consideration for each other to build a comfortable routine that doesn’t leave them bored and frustrated. They work out a deal on who will manage the money and come to some kind of agreement on how the budget is going to play out - Some couples just fall into misery or annoyance and stay there, but don’t want to go through the drama of divorce and starting over.

I left my husband 3 years ago and when I left him I was 8 months pregnant. I left him b/c he did not want to work and he was doing drugs. Right after I left him he meets a girl. He also moved out his mom house and moved in with friends. His friends are always partying and drinking. 

Since these 3 years have went by so many things have happened. We have always been seeing each other and we still had sex with each other, but he has never ever been there for my daughter. My daughter does not even know her own father. So during these 3 years whenever he needed something I was there for him. I would drop all my plans just to spend time with him. The whole time he kept me a secret. He would see me whenever he needed something or just wanted to see me. He did not look for me for a good 9 months or so. Finally when he started to look for me was when I got my own house back in August 2010. When we finally saw each other again in September 2010. Once again was just for sex b/c right after he got lost again and did not see me till one month and a half later. Then once we saw each other again I told him that I still loved him and I wanted to be with him, he told me the same. He made me believe that I was the only person he was sleeping with. So I finally we said we were going to try to work things out. So he was still staying at his friends house. He would only look for me every like other week. But I always wanted to believe that I was his only one. 

Finally on November 2010 he gets put in jail. I did not know till one month later. Once I see him in jail he tells me that he loves me and that when we got out he wanted to be a family. And also that he wanted to marry me again b/c he wanted to start our life over. So I was like okay and I asked him time and time again if he was talking to any girl, or if anyone had wrote to him and he promised that no one has wrote to him or anything. So I believed him once again. I been their ever since, I visit him, I send him money; I try to help him and whatever I can. 

Recently I looked at his myspace and found comments that said… I miss you, I love you etc. then I look at his best friends myspace and I read a comment from a girl asking if he found my husband address. This girl was the girl he met while I was pregnant and he always promised me he had nothing to do with her. Not only that I find out that she has wrote to him. Then I look at her pictures on myspace and I see of pictures of her on my husband bed? And also found out this girl is pregnant. So when my husband called me I told him everything I found out. He was just left out of words. He did not know what to say or anything. 

He says he loves me. And he still says he had nothing to do with this girl. But why if she is pregnant and he so say she (has a bf) why would she be looking for him? I never knew at that point of time if I should have given him a chance or finally move on with my life?

But yes I did what I felt I should have. - Anonymous

On a LEAVE of Absence


I'm going to try to not make this extremely long. But I just feel so lost lately and i imagine I'm not the only one in this type of situation but I just don't know how to stop feeling so bad.

I'm 26, almost 27. i graduated from a good college with honors in 2010 (BA in history). (majored in education for a little bit though). But I had no idea what I wanted to do - figured out I didn't want to be a teacher. when I graduated, that's when the economy started to worsen and it was hard to find a job. so I took an office job where i worked as a student at my college. the pay is fine for a first job. but it's not a career. I quickly got bored and looked for a way out. I applied and got into a MS program at another college for a degree in school counseling. I tried that out last semester (2011) and realized. no way, counseling not for me. I'm way too emotional and I don't want to work with students who have problems and i don't want to think about my own problems more then I need to and I don't want to go home thinking about depressed students, etc. I also think i really rushed into applying because I just was desperate.

so right now I am on a "leave of absence" from that grad program - I probably won't go back though. I am back to my job of working full time, and i like the job more than I used to, but still it's not a career. i did talk to someone about how i am interested in more responsibility, moving up, etc. but it's not a job with passion.

so, i don't know where to go from here. i feel like i am empty because i don't have something i am working toward or know what i want or anything. i mean at this point i know that i am very passionate about learning about history, i love reading fiction and historical fiction, and non fiction books. i do not like to write.

my boyfriend is following his dream in the film industry and he is finally getting somewhere - going to work on a show with a lot of interesting travel and he writes every day, it drives him. i don't have that and watching him have that makes me feel even more empty.

I have ideas of what to do but i feel frozen and scared to act. Taking non-credit classes to find out my interests or applying for other graduate programs. I could try to apply for jobs (open to all other ideas) I could just sit tight working here and try to move up where I am.

All of these are decent options i think, but even though i have them in my head i don't know how to stop feeling so bad.

I keep telling myself I'm so young i don't have to figure my life out now - but I want to. it's hard to live so vaguely. (side note, i do appreciate that i have had a job since I graduated and have been earning money steadily - i know others have not been so lucky.) - Anonymous

Friday, June 17, 2011

EXPERIMENTING'Sexual Curiosity


Yesterday someone questioned me whether I was straight, gay, bi? and I said straight because I'm out with this girl who I truly loved. So he made me check-out few pictures of naked girls and guys. I liked guys more. But this morning I realized I liked the girls even more & I think the guys are sick. I always thought I was pretty much straight & I hoped that was true. So can someone tell me what the hell is going on?

Well I was obviously confused. I don't think that human sexuality can easily be categorized into neat labels. Basically ‘you like what you like’.Just because you've been aroused by naked men doesn't mean that you're gay or bicurious. I suspect that this is fairly common among heterosexual males. Another thing is that you're young and probably beginning to become more aware of your sexuality. Try not to worry about labeling yourself with anything with regards to your sexual preference, likes or dislikes. You're unique just like anyone else. 

“Gay,bi,ugly,fine,rich,poor,skinny,fat,tall,short,orange,black,white,purple - a friend is a friend - if you don't judge.”

That's his opinion but just be straight & you won't get made fun of. Why does it only have to be straight/gay/bi? If you haven't had sex yet, you're a virgin. What's wrong with that option? Nothing. Heck it's the perfect answer for any age. Is it possible that you just admired those naked men? There's nothing wrong with that. Your eyes are blessed with sight and there's nothing wrong with noticing beauty. It could have been just the nakedness that aroused you & got you all excited, irrespective of the sexual identity. There's nothing wrong with a naked body. What's wrong are the impure thoughts people judge you by.

The person who asked you to look at porn was probably confused himself or was just trying to excite & lure you or judge you & there was a possibility that he himself was looking at you as a piece of flesh with intentions of having sex. Run sweetheart - That's not a friend, its a hormonal quencher in disguise, trying to hunt its prey.

If you want, you could easily hunt down porn & witness how many of lives it was ruining. No matter whatever your age is - I say don't worry about your sexuality. Every other person might just be going through the same process, just don't let it get to you. Nobody is going to care if you are gay or straight & if at all at a point some people might do, those either would be concerned for your welfare or a bunch of idiots who needed to get a grip on there own life. The only thing you should be worrying about is your life. You have a girlfriend, & you truly love her. I had a girlfriend once & I loved her too. When it comes down to it, you’ll probably know. Your true friends and family won't care what was your orientation. You have years before you even have to worry about having a sexual relationship & its true; if you don't know, we don't either. You are probably just curious, so don't worry. Your body is going through some heavy changes - puberty & everything else. It is releasing all sorts of hormones & things. You are free to chose having a girlfriend or a boyfriend.

We all do it, I did it, my friends did it, it is very normal. You will find girls & boys attractive & its normal exploring out with them. We all experiment. We all do it, We seldom look at the guys in the locker room or online to see what the other guy has, it's curiosity. Some guys even get into sex with each other, it's experimenting. Sometimes called a circle jerk, guys will sit around and whip it out to see who was bigger who came first and how much. Even girls do it. Just relax and enjoy life - don't sweat it. maybe you will experiment? maybe not, but at the end you’ll know what you like & what you want. Most of the times as we grow older our hormones steady themselves & realize that we want women, sometimes we will decide we want to be with guys. And sometimes we just wont make up our mind and sleep with either sex. 

Being bi-curious could have it's benefits. It increases your chance of a date on Saturday night. You are young, please don't be bothered about how you felt, it's normal. It's OK you are growing up and discovering your sexuality. You are normal, you maybe confused but I can guarantee 99% of people your age are feeling the same.

People get aroused in many different ways and to be honest I get turned on by girl on girl & I have tried it and liked it & I know that I would only date a bloke ever. maybe the blokes turned you on for the fact that it was all to do with sex. At some point, a lot get turned on by anything so do not worry. Look around you - the boys that you would like to take on a date and when you answer that - you might have already answered your question. good luck.

I have a lot of gay friends. They say they always knew they were straight. If you are worrying about what you are, odds are you are straight. You don't have to be anything to appreciate a man's or a woman's body. You're full of hormones. Either way, you will be fine.

Don't make others define you. Life is a journey and you're in stages of discovering. So don't freak out, just because you are sexually attracted to a guy doesn't mean that it has to do with your orientation, it just means that something in your brain is triggered that makes you sexually excited.

Screw what people say or think, just do what makes you happy. Don't worry being anything that you might be - a label isn't needed to fit into society. You'll find out as time goes by. - Anonymous

Tuesday, June 14, 2011

COMPLEX LOOKS

We're so entrenched, we can't accept bodies that don't fall on either extreme of the gender continuum. Many folks have a body part that isn’t counted among their favorites.

Encountering these attitudes in direct and sometimes life-threatening ways - perhaps because of my struggling to accept my body & imagining what it would be like to grow up as a boy with breasts. 

You shouldn’t think that I am obese. I have a perfectly regular BMI with a 34-inch waist and 16-inch bicep and a 44-inch chest.

I had been a fat kid since the age of nine, but as puberty began to kick in, parts of me started growing differently than expected. I have man boobs and would like to get rid of them. I am of average weight, but I just have this fat that gives me man boobs and I've been depressed about it. "Man boobs" or "moobs" in the jeering parlance of our popular culture - a social stigma. A medically harmless (though socially lethal) condition - with the prevalence of such male boobs estimating in differences probably resulting from variations in what is perceived to be normal.

This was the time, I had realized that it was an aspect of my body that will plague practically every activity I do. It would destroy me; growing up in this current generation would be an absolute nightmare; it's a social minefield of opinions and rumors that can absolutely break a person.

As direct as this bullying was, growing up with these & by other, smaller insults, too. My friends at school would pass me in the corridor and catcall and would laugh. Some might even actually grab one of my breasts and squeeze it in front of the other kids. Not everyone laughed. But many did. Most would just say, "Why don't you wear a bra?" When my bully grabbed my breasts, he was taking what he wanted. He was also reminding me that I was no better than a girl. I was beneath him. Even adults could be cruel. "Are you a boy or a girl?" I was often asked & if not asked would be silently laughed upon. Could a decade of bullying end? 

By my teenage years, I had developed powers of verbal self-defence. I absorbed cruelty and learned how to mete it back out in sharp doses. There's no doubt that this shaped the person I became, for better and for worse. At school, I managed to carve out a social niche for myself. The bullying stopped. But the shirts stayed loose fitting. I rarely went swimming. I continued to wear baggy shirts and the idea of being topless in front of a anyone or acting on that newfound attention seemed remote. 

When wearing shirts, it was crucial that they be loose fitting. If a T-shirt had shrunk in the dryer, I would spend hours stretching it out, so it didn't cling to my body. You can see fat boys do this every day. Pulling at their shirts to hide the shape of their bodies, and particularly their breasts. 

As a fat kid, and one who hated competition, I learned to loathe sports and, especially, physical education. The one form of exercise I enjoyed was swimming. Unfortunately, as my breasts grew, so did my shame about removing my shirt. I knew that taking it off would bring ridicule. So I pretended that I was above swimming – that I was too cool for the pool. A big part of annoyance was our trips that schools took us on as an incentive to do well. Well, everyone except from me because they usually consisted of a water park which means no top which means embarrassment. I too wanted to go to party's and get drunk. I wanted to meet new people & as much as I like everyone else wanted to loose my virginity, if at all I was not insisted upon taking my shirt off. That would be a relief, because under my shirt was a sports bra, and under that layers of gauze. My chest was still hiding wanting to get healed. In many senses of the word, I was still trying to becoming a man. 

Being a testosterone-fueled guy who parties and speaks to girls it's quite obvious that i should at least have the option to get intimate with someone in the future yet that's an absolute no from me, what am i meant to say? 'Oh hi yeah maybe i do have a bigger cup size than you just forget about it'? No i'd rather save myself from the gossip and awkward encounters.

I realized that, as a boy/man, it is my privilege to flaunt my bare chest, but that wont happen in my case. Perhaps my breasts, would invite a kind of censure or I would sink deeper into physical, mental & emotional complexities.

The thing that worries me most is that I have a whole load of psychological and intimacy issues which i feel I can link strongly to my "deformity". My engaging in physical or sexual activities are very less or seem to deteriorate as I find it hard to bond with people physically. I can't wear the clothes I'd like to wear. I'm not sure how much longer I can go on like this.Call me shallow if you will, but that's how I feel. There's no way I could have it surgically fixed, despite the clear psychological distress it's causing me. It was like being ashamed of something that is not in your control. There is no need of treatment if you are not at threat.

I was twenty four & was concerned, about how I looked, when compared to other people I knew,I had an issue. I felt like I was some other planet. I was not handsome and tall like the other guys. I was a short heighten, cute, fair guy with extra flesh on my upper body & almost a little around here & there. But I guess, the time flew from school to college and through my youth & I was caught up with many things at one time or maybe that was just an excuse because I was lazy & on top of that I never had anyone with whom I could things & this made me a laid-back kinds as I would avoid mixing-up with the world around me. I became self confined. Irrespective of the fact that I could have consulted a doctor or could have exercised, hit the gym, taken pills or injections. Well I guess if you have a problem, you need a solution, but with me, it was like, I didn't knew how to go about doing that. I started loosing interest in myself, struggling to look presentable, since I thought I was different from the rest of the lot. Looks matter & they certainly do. Everyone needed & deserved that acceptance & admiration. I still don't know if I would be able to do something about it.

This has affected my life making me uncomfortable with this guilt of complex that I have upon me that I would be happy & proud of getting off of my chest. Nevertheless "I am what I am, Got a problem with that"?  - Anonymous, Male, 24