Neha’s Blog

Disclaimer - No individual; child or adult was hurt or affected during the events which transpired below. Preamble- Never have parents prayed so fervently for their children’s schools to restart. Never has it been less likely to happen in the foreseeable future. We are living in unprecedented times. We are drinking unprecedented amounts of coffee and if we are being very honest, wine too.  As I finally sit in my not so quiet corner to start jotting down my thoughts I realize that I cannot string a single sentence in my head or frame my thoughts and put them on paper without being interrupted at least 5 times within 60 seconds (yes, I decided to keep count lest this discontentment is part of my imagination). The reason behind my disgruntlement is none other than the constant attention that my boys have been craving since this pandemic took over our lives. Homeschooling; seems more like 24/7 school because the questions and demands do not end even post the 1 pm stipulated time that ‘...

A research by Harvard University shows that when you receive a 'like' on social media your brain sends a chemical message called dopamine which gives you a feeling of being rewarded and makes you feel good. In the current times when talking about mental health has become a need of the hour; I feel we cannot ignore the impact social media has on the mental health of individuals. I used to be guilty of finding myself scrolling through social media for hours mindlessly, until I heard a podcast in which the speaker said that this act is much like an addiction. Just like drugs or alcohol in which the addict to get his “fix” numbs his mind of thoughts and refuses to let his heart actually feel emotions; in much the same way, he resorts to these external devices.  Since people haven’t been able to strut their personalities much outside, a lot of them are looking to make their mark online. As we suffer from this pandemic everyone’s favourite visual medium - Instagram has become centre ...

Girl Before A Mirror-Pablo Picasso(1932) Location-MoMA I’ve always had an overwrought relationship with pictures of myself. I don’t like seeing myself in pictures or taking them. Whenever I look at my pics it usually leaves me feeling that my eyes seem somewhat uneven and my nose is always too big for my face. At the risk of sounding vain, I just feel I don’t look pretty enough. And as I get older matters seems to get worse with my eyebrows getting sparser and little greys making their grand entries.  And it’s just so simply that the spiral of negative self-talk begins and, in an instant, the picture gets deleted. Fifty more follow sometimes much to the chagrin of those poor victims who happen to be featured in the pictures with me. One such dismissed picture which had made its way into the recently deleted folder of my phone happened to be seen by a friend who remarked that I looked beautiful and why would I just dump it? That’s when I re-examined it with less critical eyes and th...