Beyond Memory
on making and unmaking the bed of memories.
Standing in the hinterland of memories, familiar emotions wash over me. I must curate the bed of memories, discarding a few. This process of selecting what to keep and what to release has to originate from the summit called Anahata—the heart chakra in Sanskrit, associated with love and compassion.
Despite the world's chaos, I've felt the profound force of love. Recently, my perspective on memory has shifted. Once, I yearned to be remembered. Now, I'm growing comfortable with the idea of being forgotten like a breeze. Perhaps my time on the meditation mat has influenced this change.
For years, I documented my highs and lows, striving for significance. Someday, I'd love to pen a comic take on memory's persistence and its aftermath. In this journey of preserving, creating, and destroying memories, I might have forgotten the earlier version of myself comfortable with solitude—the woman who lived with her books and didn't tax herself emotionally for others. She forgave and forgot easily, not out of arrogance, but because her commitment to people was unwavering. She showed up for them, even when they didn't reciprocate with the same fervour. There was this poem that was stuck on my desk at work.
This poem is attributed to Mother Teresa but was written by Kent Keith. The perspective can be changed based on faith. To me, the ultimate answer is to my conscience which I believe is a part of the divinity. Each of us are sanctuaries that we choose to believe or build.
People are often unreasonable, illogical, and self-centered. Forgive them anyway. If you are kind, people may accuse you of selfish ulterior motives. Be kind anyway. If you are successful, you will win some false friends and some true enemies. Succeed anyway. If you are honest and frank, people may cheat you. Be honest and frank anyway. What you spend years building, someone could destroy overnight. Build anyway. If you find serenity and happiness, they may be jealous. Be happy anyway. The good you do today, people will often forget tomorrow. Do good anyway. Give the world the best you have, and it may never be enough. Give the best you've got anyway. You see, in the final analysis it is between you and God ; it was never between you and them anyway.
Lately, I've been summoning this earlier version of myself, rediscovering solitude's deliciousness. It's easy to overlook the good parts that reside in the old quarters in the process of becoming. For years, I tended a garden with everyone I loved, planting bonds that weren't always perfect. Now, I realize it's time to focus on living in the moment as me — flawed, glorious, tender and loving. My garden will grow with those who care enough to tend it alongside me.
Today, I want to remember this month's beautiful moments—my first exhibition, the fellow artists, and the loved ones who celebrated this milestone. I will treasure the words of Asia, who loved my painting on the communion of love. It was a tender moment of being seen by her heart which resonated with my creation and in turn with my heart. I am sharing it here as a keepsake in this post which perhaps will outlive me and my phone, I hope :D
I want to remember these magical days, but I also want to embrace the art of being forgotten. Life is a cycle of acquiring and discarding memories. I am summoning this older and a bit unhinged version of myself to integrate with who I've become. In August, I will be attempting to alchemize some of these patterns of memory. If I can remember, I will write about it. I want to just “be” for now.
I want to remember that London has gifted me with loving and generous people, and I want to celebrate them. Here's to , completing another rotation around the sun. She's one of the few people London gifted me through serendipity. We met at summer school, recognized each other from Twitter, and it's been history ever since—a beautiful history of kind-hearted friendship. This month had many birthdays. A shoutout to another friend with whom I speak once a year but is one of the angels in my past life who shows up in different realities only to show me the mirror or help me. He reads my substack and says that he doesn’t understand. I hope he reads and understands that people like him are rare and special.
While July has been generous, it has also demanded that I confront persistent aches and fears. I've realized these parts will walk with me until I reach the lake where I can send them off as offerings of love and grace. This is where I ponder on the utility of memory especially when thinking of it from the spiritual lens. I may understand the non-utility part of it by the end of my life :). Oliver Sacks has written about memory and the coherence it brings to our lives. I think we don’t realise the beauty of memory until it starts disappearing.
Every moment is a passing memory. We are encouraged to view it as something that has passed and there is nothing to be done about it. The lesson has to be understood. The lesson will drive the change.
However, the heart doesn’t like to bear an overload of unreconciled memories. The truth is that the memory has to flow. It will hit a current for each person at the destined time. The key is not trying to make it synchronise at all times. The ones who want the highest good will find a way to synchronise and let these memories float away with light and love. I see what is going on here, I think am still remembering Inside Out :D
The memory river of zen is perhaps where good and bad memories play their part and merge into the ocean of infinite consciousness—a consciousness where every microcosm of this universe is intertwined. The separateness of the self is but a veil. Everyone is interconnected to each other in this cosmos across time, space and realities.
While I'm still grasping the finer points of consciousness from a spiritual perspective, I understand the language of love. I know in this life, I have loved well with my stupid heart :D I know that the world, my loved ones, and myself all can be saved by love.
As Tennessee Williams beautifully put it:
"The world is violent and mercurial--it will have its way with you. We are saved only by love--love for each other and the love that we pour into the art we feel compelled to share: being a parent; being a writer; being a painter; being a friend. We live in a perpetually burning building, and what we must save from it, all the time, is love."
All we need is love. Love can save us from ourselves and the world.
PS: I want to share some snippets with you all from my exhibition.
I am now looking to exhibit in India too, hopefully when I visit in November. I'm happy that one of the etchings on solitude and rest found a new home. I am still getting comfortable letting my art leave my home. Each piece of art that I have created has a backstory and is special to me.
Going off on a tangent, but I think art, or myself in this world, is a holy sacrament. The chosen few get to partake in my world. I am happy and grateful that you all are a part of my world, even if we haven't met in person. I want to leave you with this poem,
How to Not Be a Perfectionist
People are vivid
and small
and don’t live
very long—
I hope you live long, love well, laugh and surf life to the best of your abilities <3
If you want to travel with me on my art journey, I share my snippets on IG
You are my 🤩