We are all spellbound to appreciation: Key ingredients and my daily 30 minutes of appreciation to all the writers.

One of my friend texted me in the morning, congratulated me on my website and asked me that she was thinking to add categories to her website. I told her that people usually visit the blog post or homepage and the rest of the categories remain untouched by them mostly. She became disappointed and said okay leave it People don’t care. 

I have always been a rational and a straightforward person due to which I lost many friends and faced a flood of criticism. I have always loved people from the core of my heart and also helped them even if I have to go out of my way. I always thought that I am right and people are wrong. And trust me this psychology of mine lead me to nowhere but disappointment and loneliness. I have learned many lessons from my life experiences; both good and bad.

For good experiences, I am really grateful for my abilities to make good decisions whereas, for bad experiences, I am really very grateful to the people who taught me some life lesson.

Our life is made up of people and they are like blood running in our body. If you lose drips of blood one by one, you will die eventually.

How I Started my Journey of Appreciation:

I had this thing in my filthy mind that yes, I know everything and yes, I can write better than many people out there. Yes, it is great to have confidence in your talent but if this so-called confidence transforms into ignorance, trust me, your journey of success will end even before starting. I never thought about how people feel because I was so obsessed with me and because I never had time to think about people. I forgot that it is the community who makes you stand out. Without people, you’re nothing. Who is gonna pay for your expenses? Who’s gonna give you the job? Who’s gonna give you the food? Whose gonna appreciate you? And most important of all, who are you going to hurt then you badass? Don’t take it seriously, I was just kidding 😀 

Well, this made me realize that people do a lot of favours to you during your whole life either they are your parents, your teachers, your friends, colleagues, neighbours, siblings, strangers, or partners. They make up your life, in fact, 99.9% of your life. From your birth till your death, your life is revolving around community just like planets revolve around the sun. The community is a source and you are the sink. Every good and bad will be thrown at upon you. Now it’s up to you which energies do you absorb.

In order to improve, you have to first accept your weaknesses and shortcomings in the first place. I confronted my mistakes, owned them, and corrected them. I started with tiny things and gestures which then became a part of my life. I am here to share those things which can make others feel important leaving you happy and satisfied. 

Step#1: Home participation

While I started off with my home in which I had no interest. I used to be a couch potato laying down in my warm blanket with volumes of dust on my vanity, bed and study shelf. I went to the cheapest store near my house and brought some sparkling rose gold and silver fairy lights. There were many Barbican bottles in my storeroom. I collected them due to their fancy green colour and shape. I went to the attic from where I brought leftover cardboards to make frames and crafts. Finally, after a DIY session for whole 2 days, my room was literally transformed from a dungeon to a super cute humanly bedroom. My mother was happy with me, my sisters loved the decor. My friends, who came to my place for sleepovers, didn’t sleep the whole night taking selfies and exaggerating their feelings of being amongst the stars 😀 Well, apparently everyone was happy and I succeeded in my first step. You might be wondering, where is the appreciation in it? So, my friends, taking interest in something itself is an appreciation. You don’t have to trumpet your feelings every time. In fact, it is much better to do something to show others that yes, we appreciate you. My intention was to take interest in house chores so that, ultimately, it would be a kind gesture that shows my acknowledgement about how much work my mum does alone every day. Remember sugar cakes; “Actions speak louder than words.”

Step#2: To propitiate your enemies and haters:

As I mentioned earlier, I had always been a straightforward and a rational person due to which I never compensated people for their mistakes twice. I have always loved my friends beyond the limit and helped them even if I had to go out of the way for them. Due to an extremely soft heart with a very rigid coating, people always considered me harsh, rude and dominant. Well, everything happens for a reason. I am happy that many people taught exotic lessons and truth about life to me. Now the above debate wasn’t to get sympathies but to tell you that I had a treasure trove of many people who hated me and to be honest, in most of the cases, I was at fault. So, I hit upon an idea and went to a nearby gift shop. I bought a few presents and kept them in my cupboard for the perfect time. This was my kind of compensation for my mistakes (as they weren’t that heinous to kill yourself as a compensation LOL!) We all have our ways of compensating for our mistakes and to propitiate your haters. Back to the story, I waited for the right occasions like birthdays and convocations to deliver them pretty gifts to their deserving haters 😀 I even made a hater list (just as Santa Claus does on Christmas) for giving presents. Luckily, they were not more than three people and I was saved from being broke. My giveaways included sparkling jewellery pieces, organizers, planners and candle boxes.  Results were on the point. Later on, when they texted me back with a thank you message, I appreciated their tolerance and thanked them for the lesson they had taught me in life. My haters were not my haters anymore. Apparently 😀 But, I did my part and I am satisfied with myself.

Step#3: Love Tokens for my Mentors

It took me so long to acknowledge the value and importance of efforts and hard work our teachers put forth for us. I have always been a mischievous student due to which my teachers were a bit disappointed with me. My intention had never been anybody’s disgrace or degradation but maybe I was too lost in my own world, that I never bothered about anyone else. Well, I must appreciate the love and care of our teachers. Teachers are the most generous people of our society. They are the real superheroes! Well, we cant change the past but improve our future. So, in order to make my teachers super happy and to make them feel special and important as they deserve to be, I came up with an idea. At the end of each semester, I used to give all my subject teachers a thank you card with best wishes and appreciation as a tiny love token (being a bit shy and formal, I validated this idea for female teachers only but I am thinking about including male teachers in the list as well). I don’t know if it compensated for the troubles we cause for them or not, but at least I tried. Albert Einstein says: “It is the supreme art of the teacher to awaken joy in creative expression and knowledge.” We should take out some time to admire and appreciate our teachers by heart as they deserve all the love and care in the world.

Step#4: Random texts at Awkward Timings

I started to send random cute messages to different girls at awkward timings as 3 am or 5 in the morning when nobody’s awake. This weird time selection was to ensure that the other person is sleeping and he will read the message in the morning. The only hope was to put up a healthy morning smile to somebody’s face that could possibly make up her day. See, we never know if the other person slept last night wetting her pillow with tears of pain. We never know how lonely the other person is and this message saying “Hey beautiful! You are important, You are rare so just take care of yourself” might prove to be the best morning message he or she can ever get. Love is not about quantity, it is all about timing and quality. Love in the happy moments doesn’t matter that much as a shoulder to cry on in hard times does.

Step#5: My 30 minutes of appreciation to every writer

When I started writing and joined websites and blogs, writers became my community. So, I take out 30 minutes or more daily; once in the morning time and once in the evening. Opening up WordPress feed, I bombard people with likes while scrolling down the page. Plus, I regularly comment on the new posts that pop up meanwhile. Why so? Let me tell you that writers are just like any singer who needs an audience of thousands of people to perform, like any player who needs a stadium flooding with people to play, like any painter who needs visitors to visit his gallery. We writers are just like any other artist who needs appreciation. Who needs love and acknowledgement that yes, people are there for you. They are looking forward to your amazing writings. I know this is an era of busy bees and everybody is busy writing his own content, publishing his own work, carrying out his own research. But tell me what will happen if people stop acknowledging your work anymore just because they are all busy with theirs? What if libraries are producing books but there are no visitors? It’s all useless. We writers are each others strength and if we won’t support and appreciate each other, who else will? Even if you’re busy enough, take out some time, maybe in your tea break and start hitting the like buttons and follow random people while sipping the tea and munching your favourite cookie. Read the overview of posts if you’re already out of time. While scrolling down sometimes, I am also stuck with other works so I don’t read the whole posts and hit the like button to appreciate what that person is doing. Do remember what Albert Camus said:

“The purpose of a writer is to keep civilization from destroying itself.” 
― Albert Camus

 

 

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