Posts

Inconvenience caused is deeply regretted.

A notification pops up on the screen. Another missed call. A new text. She is deep in a doomscrolling spiral. She sees the name. She loves this friend, she really does. But the mere thought of tapping the screen, typing out a response, or having an actual conversation feels like a massive task. "I’ll reply later," she tells herself. Later becomes hours. Hours become days. She is still on her phone, of course! From the bed to the bathroom, it is always there. She switches between apps, watches reels, laughs at memes, taps through stories, and replies only to messages she thinks are "urgent." In this trap, the friend’s text slowly sinks to the bottom of the pile. When the friend finally calls her out on it, the excuses are ready: the chaotic job, the crazy schedule, the relentless daily routine. Just to prove it is nothing personal! Meanwhile, there is someone else out there who juggles the exact same chaotic job, hits the gym, runs errands, and still manages to hang ...

Not Lost in Translation

I have been visiting a lot of churches lately. It is hard not to when you are traveling around Europe. They are huge, quiet, and usually right in the middle of a busy city. Outside those thick wooden doors, my brain is constantly working. I use my English skills to get by, which works fine most of the time. But I also try to use my German, and that is a completely different story. It is actually quite funny. I can stand in a coffee shop or a train station and understand almost everything people are saying to me. My brain translates their German perfectly well. I know exactly what they are asking. But the moment I open my mouth to reply, I completely fumble. I'm blank. I can barely put together more than a few basic sentences. If a cashier asks me a simple follow-up question, I panic. I just nod, smile awkwardly, say a broken German word, and walk away hoping (overthinking!) I made sense. Sometimes it is exhausting to constantly translate your life and pretend you know what you are ...

You Do Not Have to Be Extraordinary

Years ago, I attended a friend’s birthday lunch. The conversation eventually turned to our post-college plans. I was an arts student. Because of this, everyone assumed I would prepare for the civil services exams. It is a classic stereotype. I mentioned I had not decided yet. But I knew I was definitely not taking that route. A friend laughed at this. He joked that "settling down" was always an option if I lacked real ambition. He equated ambition strictly with competitive exams or climbing a career ladder. I kept quiet. But his comment triggered a lot of overthinking. What exactly bothered me? Was it the assumption that my ambition was small? Was it the casual downplaying of a simple life? Or was it just the realization that I was an oddball? Now we are in our late twenties. The landscape has changed. Most of my friends are married. Some have kids. Others are climbing the corporate ladder. They seem to have achieved the goal of being "settled in life." I am nowhere...