MY FUTURE RESOLUTIONS OF YEAR 2025!: THIS YEAR TO HOPE

THIS YEAR TO HOPE! AND ALL YEARS TO HOPE! 

My future resolutions! Yes! In these three phrases might be numerous judgements, numerous smirks and numerous interests and fascinations I might get. 

Whenever we talk about future goals, like this one time, I was with my lab mates and my then supervisor in research, Prof. Ashish Arora. And in some context, I do not remember, I just said, "I want to open a coffee shop after I retire, probably somewhere on the mountains, or may be near a beach, where some poets, some writers or some readers might come to read, to chat, to talk." 

Ashish was surprised at my claim. He said, "Why are you deciding about 60 years down the line?" He was astonished by this dream that one can have for after retirement. 

I mean, I don't know, I might be wrong, but what is wrong in having a dream? The problem with people who achieve their dreams in life is that they get so scared of the trauma of the path towards the dream that they no longer have the ability to dream more. So, in turn, in the further life, they just keep enjoying of their achieved dream and they fear dreaming. Dream, when this word comes, the next thing they think automatically is how to do it? and so on!

They do not enjoy the dream in its idea stage. Nowadays, especially in the neo-liberal economy, the pressure of hustling and finding success is so much that the inherent joy of dreams has been lost. My mentor, Ashish sir, and I really respect him, I think is caught in the same web. 

In my eyes, any person, who is dreaming, who is a dreamer, who has some plans and resolutions, is already a champion. He, first of all, has not lost the taste of life. The taste of life is in desire. Yeah, this is another aspect that you have to lose desire and spirituality and all that, but just if we look life as living drive, I think dreaming is essential feature of that. Dreaming is hoping. 

So, I encourage everyone to make resolutions whether you could not follow it even on 1st January. This shows hopefulness. Have hope, cultivate it. Make a small garden inside your Mindspace and grow some hope for your little life, a little light for your little life. Not more, little. 

Now, let's come to the issue at hand. 

The issue at hand here is My new year resolutions. 

My resolutions are usually based on past year analysis, what things I did right and what things I didn't? and what things I could have done right but I got lazy. And based on this trigonal analysis we will make a list of resolutions. 

Let's start with what things I did good in this year. 

1. I resolved Kalesh in my life. 😅. Almost all pending ones. My friends, I had fought once. I resolved that, I cried. I resolved the long lingering attachment with my ex-girlfriend Smriti, I resolved that. I cried there as well. I fought with my brother for being rude. I resolved that as well. Again, I cried there. 

2. I avoided Kalesh in most of the places, where either someone tried to provoke me, or I felt the anger hidden within me. Like, numerous times in the gym, I was provoked by my gym trainer by saying something obnoxious about either my physique, or my career choices or both. I was provoked by my grandfather (Which is his typical habit, he wants you to argue back so that he can shout at you). 

So, these places and many other places where I kept my cool, even when many times, I was angry. 

Most of the times, I even sense that this has deliberately been said to degrade my morales and so on, But I keep my head. If you are doing this, this is your pathetic life insecurities, your demons, your problems. I will not contribute in it by reacting on it. 

3. I chose another field of career for myself. Public services. Administration, if everything went well.  I think it was wise of me to leave academics. I know, as a doer, I could have handled things better and could have completed my master's at least. But that is the only thing I regret from that place. Leaving PhD is the best decision of my life perhaps. I think my desires and my strengths will be better respected outside academia, if everything went well, in Civil services. 

4. I joined Gym. Yes, mostly people who follow my YouTube streaks and my statuses of WhatsApp, this will not be news. I did join gym and continued till now for 62 days. All the lethargy of 2024 escaped, and a light of activity came in my life. Not only that, I inspired some noble souls to either hit the gym or to start a workout at their homes. 

Like, Sourabh Jain, Himanshu Singh, Abhishek Kumar, Kumar Ashish, Numerous other people who came to me at gym and told me that they saw my shorts on YouTube and thought we should also do it. Also, Anand Mohan bhaiya, who I advised after his setback in his career, to join gym and he did, and I am glad he has completed I think, 7-8 months in the Gym. Nitesh, my friend, is not someone who I inspired. I think, his home workout schedules are somethings that inspired me to do something for my physical wellness.  

I am glad that these people were so generous first of all, to start doing gym, and secondly, generous enough to let me that. Otherwise, people start gyming in jealousy of the other person and they never realize even if in Jealousy, they are doing a kindness to their own bodies. 

5. I was kind to animals. I did not misbehave, took care, as much as my schedule allowed me, of dogs in my locality and the dogs my family had pet. I gave them food whenever I could.

6. I understood that Attention is the best form of generosity. If you give attention to something, it heals. If you give attention to a person, he heals. It is like Jesus's touch. The wounds heal. Emotional wounds, mental wounds. I listened a lot. A lot more than last year where I kept talking more and listened less. 

7. I was consistent mostly in my UPSC CSE 2025 preparation. Yes, there were days of lethargy, days of procrastination, days of frustration. But I kept my head down and kept going. By that grace, I have 1 pager notes made of all micro themes of Mains. I have written model answers of all questions from 2013-2024. I can say I am mains ready. 

And I discovered what a joy and aesthetic beauty is in even note making. How beautifully crafted notes I have. Damn! I feel like Brahma praising the world he created. 

8. I read a lot of books this year. Like, the count that I kept was till September and it included poetry, fiction, non-fiction, books on subjects like economy, administration etc. Till September, I had read some 146 books. Then I lost count. My OCD ass mind did not like this itch but yeah, I am glad also that I read so much that I did not get time for reading. 

9. I wrote a lot. Till now, I have written some 183 blogs that in total has 98,673 words. Can you believe it? Also, my blog got monetized. I used to dream about it when I started it in my first year in college. I used to discuss it with my then Girlfriend Smriti. She used to say, it is extremely difficult to earn through blogs because nobody reads nowadays. And see, When I needed it the most, it came. I had lost hope of whether it will come. But it came. 

10. I meditated. A lot. Like, this year, might be called the meditation year. I think I meditated for more than 1 hour/day. More came the blows, the traumas, More I closed my eyes and went inside. 

Now, let's come to what did I do wrong or what I could have done better? 

1. I hurt a lot of people. May be more than I know. Willingly unwillingly, I hurt a lot of people. Maybe because of my arrogant energy, someone got intimidated. Someone got hurt. Someone felt more down. I regret that I could not take care of that. I could have been more empathetic. I could have been more understanding. 

Some names I remember that I hurt, or I could have hurt, are, Nitesh Kumar Krishna, my friend, Abhishek Kumar another one, Sourabh Jain, Deep Majumdar, Om Vandra for sure (I knew what I said to him was wrong and I regret that, if I would have remained in IISER, I would have apologized to the man), Ojasvi Sharma (She wished to help me when I was sick, but I shouted at her), Shobhit Prabhat (I told him the truth about my past relationship and how it affected me for so long, this might have tainted my relationship with him, since he is not picking up my calls since then😅, Also this might just be me overthinking and he just might be busy, look what meditation does to you, you start recognizing your own fictions created in your head). 

Also, I might have hurt my own father several times, when I cussed my mother in front of him. He would not have liked it since this is the woman he loved at some point in his life. I regret that. I think it is extremely selfish to show my anger in front of someone. Anger is my problem, and I could have handled it. Also, Krupali Meghani, Riddhima, Neha, Surbhi, Disha and some other girl I forgot her name, I found on Bumble. Damn, that's a lot of women. 😅

2. I procrastinated a lot. If not, I could have managed a master's degree from IISER which I could not do. I could have managed clearing prelims that I could not do. I could have revised my mains syllabus and given mocks before today that I missed. 

3. I could have joined Gym earlier. I used to go for walks, sometimes, more than 10 Km. But Gym is something I could have joined earlier. 

4. I paid attention to people's opinion about me. Sometimes on my physique. I hit a guy named Shivam because he taunted me for being fat. I could have handled it better. I got affected by that broker and abused him. I hit many people this year because I could not control my anger. 

5. I could not continue YouTube longer. I am not saying I should not. How many things can I do? I know but still, It is still a job undone. 

6. I missed meditations, I missed some gym days because of laziness or mismanagement of time. 

7. I could not keep my promises. Chaitra ma'am, I promised that I will join her as a PhD student. I failed to deliver that. I promised Ashish, My ex-mentor, that I will be more diligent in lab. Some more promises broken in personal life. I broke up with my girlfriend Surbhi because I lost interest. I am sorry.

8. I was not kind to myself. I still judged myself badly for not performing. I let other people enter my thoughts, I doubted myself. I felt like a loser in like 40 percent of the year. 

Finally, Let us come to Resolutions

1.  More meditation: Now I will keep doing this thing. Whatever time will I get. And maybe I can keep a journal of that. Tracking my meditation times. This will help yes. My ideal in this journey is none other than Yuval Noah Harari, the so called most intelligent man on earth right now, The Israeli Historian, who is meditating for 24 years now. He comes every year to India, to do Vipassana. He meditates 2 hours every day. I am not sure I can do that. But, Yeah, I think 1 hour a day, now I can pull. 

2. More Gym: I will be regular in Gym. I will try to attain hypertrophy in lifting, that is, pushing till your muscles give up. Then only, will muscles grow. They expand, they break, and new tissues create more visibility of muscles. 

3. More Kindness to people around me and myself :) 

4. Do not rush for making relationships if you do not have the time and space for that. 

5. Do not let negative fictional stories come in my head. Not even positive ones. Try to be mindful of the fictions that come up and just be aware of reality as it is. 

6. Keep listening to Bhagwan. He is the light of my life, the reason of my existence, the source of my strength, the only closed one in my life by whom I derive strength. 

7. More focus, and more resilience in the career. Jaan Laga do ya jaane do. Aur as I used to say back in the day, the dialogues of Mountain man, "Jab tak todenge nahi, tab tak chorrenge nahi". 

8. More empathy to my own people. I know people around me complain that I have more empathy for strangers than for my own people, people of marginalized castes, gender, class, Adivasis etc. So, yeah, I would like to be nicer to my younger brother, my Grandparents and my parents. 

9. More reading. Like, organized reading. Like, I always make a list of what to read this year and always start reading something else. This time, I will not make a list but I will surely keep a list of whatever I read. 

10. Some serious writing regarding poetry, Non-fiction, Political theory, Philosophy, and yeah finally, I have started writing stories. So, I will keep continuing them. 

11. Healthy eating. Eating is my vice. I eat a lot of junk. I will try to eat healthier. Also, drink more water. 

12. Spend economically. I spend a lot of money. Mostly on books and on chocolates. probably will keep it to 3 months a book, and probably 1 month a chocolate. 

13. Learn Urdu Script. It is high time I complete it. I heard from my earlier Prof. Chaitra madam that she could not learn Urdu for 12 years because she always got busy. Damn, it scared me. I will learn it anyhow this year. And probably I will write my first Urdu script written Ghazal this year. 

Lastly, People I am thankful to are many. To name a few. 

1. Nitesh my friend

2. Abhishek my friend

3. Deep my friend. 

4. My Father, despite my issues, he has been there for me. 

5. My mother

6. My Grandmother 

7. My aunt

8. My Grandfather

9. My uncle

10. My Physics teacher Shivam sir. he kindled a hope in me that I can clear it. I rigor that I had lost I regained because of him. 

And many other people, like Neha, one of the women I saw this year, she taught me that we can be non-judgmental to people even when they are judging us. The list goes on. I am just a student and even if I settled in some career, hopefully an IAS 😅😅, I would keep learning from people around me. 

So, yeah, this was it. Long list. I will start it from tomorrow. Happy new year to all. Keep dreaming. 

Do not be afraid of dreaming. Even nightmares have a purpose of waking you up. They are alarm clocks. :)