Oh captain! My Captain. - An ode to yourself.

“khud ki talash mei khud ko hi kho rahe hai hum”

#lost myself along the way to discover who I am

“You broke your promise”

My 10 year old self screams at me.

I stand still, looking into her eyes that twinkle with hopes and dreams, a new dream every day, a new hope, a new goal, a new promise to self, a new moment worth remembering, within a second I see all of myself that I left behind a long time ago.

Today when I look back, I realize I left a part of me that I never realized I ever had.

“Into the starry night, I gaze into infinity, wishing upon a falling star, will it fulfill my wishes or pass by like any other dead star”

I have gazed into infinity, talked to an unknown body that doesn’t exist but seems to grant wishes, maybe the hope of finding myself, the old me who dreamt with eyes wide open kept me going, to search a little deeper, to look into the unknown, to wish upon a dying star.

But today I stand here, on the verge of tomorrow and yesterday, my far gone childhood staring at me in the eye screaming at me,

“WHERE DID IT ALL GO WRONG??WHEN DID YOU STOP DREAMING?? WHERE ARE YOU GOING?? WHY ARE YOU RUNNING AWAY FROM YOURSELF?? WHY ARE YOU LOOKING FOR YOURSELF IN THE EYES OF OTHERS?””

I stand there, still, not saying a single word, my heart out on my sleeve, I try to answer back but find myself at a loss of words here.

What happened? When did I lose myself? And what am I doing?

Trying to solve a puzzle with the pieces that don’t belong together, I lost myself trying to find my own way back.

Was I too scared to look inside, to introspect, for once, listen to what I had to say, what I felt, what I wanted to be, where I wanted to be, and where do I feel the most alive. Why is it that, a place too comfortable to be seemed like the one I didn’t belong too?

Why did I took the “road less traveled” as they said and lost my imagination, lost my dreams along the way, never really knowing it was not about finding myself but becoming who I am today.

So I stand back again, gather my words, look into the eyes of my childhood and thank that little kid staring at me, for making me who I am today, for making me question myself today, for letting me know I had dreams that I left along the way, for reminding me to pick them back again and get going, thank him for asking me who I am?

So what to do now? Gather all the luggage left behind to build another bridge, lose a few pieces of myself, gather them again and build another one, doing this infinite times, cause you cannot carry all the luggage at once, its time you pick the pieces you need and drop the ones you can come back for later on, it’s time to question yourself, it’s time that you realize the only place to look for yourself is within yourself.

“kabhi khud se bhi ye sawal kar, kon hai tu?”