A decade ago I wrote:

May your coming year be filled with magic and dreams and good madness. I hope you read some fine books and kiss someone who thinks you’re wonderful, and don’t forget to make some art – write or draw or build or sing or live as only you can. And I hope, somewhere in the next year, you surprise yourself.

And almost half a decade ago, I said:

I hope you will have a wonderful year, that you’ll dream dangerously and outragerously, that you’ll make something that didn’t exist before you made it, that you will be loved and you will be liked, and that you will have people to love and to like in return. And, most importantly (because I think there should be more kindness and more wisdom in the world right now), that you will, when you need to be, be wise, and that you will always be kind.

And for this year, my wish for each of us is small and very simple. And it’s this:

I hope that in this year to come, you make mistakes.

Because if you are making mistakes, then you are making new things, trying new things, learning, living, pushing yourself, changing yourself, changing your world. You’re doing things you’ve never done before, and more importantly, you’re Doing Something.

So that’s my wish for you, and all of us, and my wish for myself. Make New Mistakes. Make glorious, amazing mistakes. Make mistakes nobody’s ever made before. Don’t freeze, don’t stop, don’t worry that it isn’t good enough, or it isn’t perfect, whatever it is: art, or love, or work or family or life.

Whatever it is you’re scared of doing, Do it.

Make your mistakes, next year and forever.

~ Dan Pallotta

Often, you try to be brave and fight with all the ways you know how. However, there are moments when you remember that you are the broken child, never quite figuring out how to put the pieces together and the day falls apart.

There are also those whom you are paid to deal with who have the propensity to cause brain aneurysms. Everyday, you question why you put youself through so much pain for so little.

- Warsan Shire

By 12noon today, there were already two. One was cheeky because we knew we would hang out again soon enough. And I outgrew the previous melodrama. Another was sombre because 365 days later, everything might have changed. And it was difficult to lose one of your best friends.

But I am grateful that at least for today, I get proper farewells.

Scary isn’t it, when you bother to sit down and ponder upon the fact?

Life sometimes throw so much at you that being armed (physically or otherwise) becomes a necessity. And if you have to go down, what better way than with weapons hot?

It’s nice to talk about an ideal world where we’re all judged on our work performance, but we have to live in the world that exists. And in that reality, coworkers don’t appreciate others’ long leaves of absence, bosses don’t reward bare minimum performance, and your appearance affects how others perceive you. It doesn’t really matter if such perceptions are “right” or “fair”.