Tag: blog

The Pursuit Of Beauty

A Wondering WandererLeave a comment

It is the pursuit of beauty in things and people that is the journey – the real journey. I was happiest when I sought beauty in words and music and images. I was happiest in movies or in the middle of a symphony – whatever allowed the mind to ponder all that was possible and glorious. The world, I suppose, is the result of actions taken by people possessed of an image or an idea, and the world I care most about is constructed from those images that reminded someone of the beauty and the nobility of people. I’m back on the job of looking for this beauty, and nothing is safe from my eyes and my ears. I want to find and host the beauty of the world.

– Tennessee Williams

A very warm hello to the people of the world!

In case you were wondering, this blog is still very much alive! I know it’s been a while (7 months!) since I last posted anything, but I haven’t stopped thinking about this blog, and what it means to me. Life has been busy this year, and I’ve been running a little short on motivation to write anything.

But I recently came across the above quote by Tennessee Williams, given to James Grissom in an interview in 1982, that resonated quite a lot with me, especially with regards to this blog, and which shook me out of my lethargy enough to finally pen something down. 😅

One of my goals with this blog has been to share and reflect on the beauty that I see around me, wherever it may come from – people, pictures, places, or in any other form. 

I do feel that given all that is going on in the world, sometimes, we do need to be reminded of the beauty in things and people. To be inspired by them. To strive to be better than before. To try and make the world, or at least our little corner of it, a better place. I know sometimes things like these sound very naive and cheesy, but I don’t think there’s an alternative. We can either choose to be cynical and become apathetic to the way of the world, or we can try and treasure those little moments of beauty in our everyday life, so that we at least have hope for something better, no matter how naive it may be. And I think you’ll agree with Tennessee when he says, “[t]he world .. is the result of actions taken by people possessed of an image or an idea..” So, it’s very important that that image or idea is a positive one, rather than a negative one. 

So yes, I do think that “the pursuit of beauty in things and people that is the journey – the real journey.” I do want “to ponder all that was possible and glorious.” And even though I’ve lost a little bit of touch with that pursuit in 2024, I want to get “back on the job of looking for this beauty”, and “I want to find and host the beauty of the world.”

As a new year dawns, this almost sounds like a new year’s resolution! But I’m not one for such yearly resolutions, which usually don’t last very long. So I’ll just simply hope that in 2025, I can try and be better at this journey than I was last year. And I hope the same for you too!

May we all seek and find more beauty everywhere around us in 2025, and may that beauty inspire us to take actions, no matter how small, to make our world just that little bit better.

Wish you all a very Happy New Year! 🥳

For more such posts, please follow Echoes In The Ether on Instagram, Facebook, WordPress, or Medium.

Credits | Photo by Johannes Plenio on Unsplash | Edited with Canva

Welcome!

A Wondering WandererLeave a comment

Hi! A very warm welcome to this corner of the internet! Hope you are having a good day! And thank you for visiting! 🙂

You can read what this blog is all about in more detail on the “About” page, but below is a quick summary and index of all that you can find here. Click the links to read posts from that particular category, or just scroll down further to read the latest posts.

Poetry

Some original poems, written by yours truly. Some of my favourites are: ‘O My Moon‘, ‘A Stranger‘, and ‘Chemical Reactions & Business Transactions‘.

Quotes

A collection of some famous and not-so-famous quotes, with my thoughts on what they mean to me personally, and why I like them.

Journal

Lastly (and this is how it all started actually), a whole lot of essays, musings, confessions, rants, etc.. Basically, anything that I felt like writing on a particular day!

Quickies

Bite-sized posts on any random thought or topic, in the style of “instapoetry“. This is something new I’m trying, so please bear with me. 🙂

Curations

Curated content from across the web that caught my fancy, and which I felt deserved to be shared with readers like you.

The idea behind this blog is to share my thoughts, in the hopes that someone, somewhere will relate to them, and realise that they are not alone. And if you do find something here that speaks to you, please forward the same to others too! And if you have any thoughts or feedback, positive or negative, or even if you just want to say ‘Hi!’, please drop a comment! Looking forward to hearing from you… 🙂

Six-Year Anniversary!

A Wondering Wanderer2 Comments

Time flies, doesn’t it?!

Today is the six-year anniversary of this blog! Yayy! Happy Birthday to you, bloggy! 

Wow! I had to check the date multiple times on that first proper blog post I wrote here to actually believe this. It sounds like a cliche, I know, but it really feels like just yesterday that I wrote that piece.

(Well, okay technically, I had created the blog much, much earlier than six years ago – way back in 2011, but I started writing here somewhat regularly from July 25th, 2016 only, and so, that’s what I consider as the starting date of this journey. As they say, things happen when they are supposed to happen!)

And it’s been a good journey. I’ve learnt some things about myself as I tried to put my thoughts and feelings into words. Writing kind of forces you to streamline that jumble of internal monologues into somewhat of a coherent thing, which gives you some clarity. You ask yourself questions, see the inconsistencies, try to resolve them, and when you can’t, you discover, and make peace with, the contradictions that are present in how you look at things – all leading to better self-awareness in one way or another.

Trying to write more regularly also motivated me to introspect more than I may have done otherwise. It introduced me to some good quotes too, as I thought about sharing them as a change from the longer-format essays I usually posted here. Then came the poems. Although I used to write poems even before I started blogging, the incentive of having a wider reach of audience definitely played its part in keeping that flame alive. Let’s see what comes next.. 😉

But, even given all of the above, for the last couple of years, I haven’t been able to write as much as I wanted to. And I’ve been missing it. It’s just that I haven’t been in that zone to be able to actually refine that internal noise into something meaningful. Even though I now have more time than I used to earlier, it still feels like, somehow, things have become ever more complicated. That constant clutter in the background hasn’t allowed me to focus enough to be able to finish my drafts, or to reflect on new ideas.

Plus, it’s difficult to have a creative process work at a fixed, regular frequency. I tried it initially. But I realised that over time, it was becoming mechanical. I was writing for the sake of writing. There was a conflict between two opposing ideas.

One said that I should push myself to write, no matter what. Because you become better only by writing more and more, and if that means setting deadlines and schedules, so be it. And if I’m being honest, there was also a concern that if I don’t put something out regularly, I’ll lose any readers that I may already have (even though I probably have like just 2-3 regular readers, if at all. But for a newbie, wannabe writer, even they matter a lot!).

The alternate view was that writing should be organic, especially given the themes and purpose of this blog. Writing was supposed to be an outlet. What was the point of indulging in it, if I was becoming more concerned about the “materialistic” aspects of it. And like I said before, things happen when they are supposed to happen; we can’t really force them into existence.

So, I’m leaning towards the second argument these days. But I wouldn’t be surprised if, in some time, I start leaning towards the first again. As most things go in life, this might also be cyclical in nature. But yeah, for now, I’ll try to write more regularly (or rather, try to reflect on things more regularly), but I won’t make a thing out of it. If something comes out of those moments of reflection, great! If not, that is okay too.

But I do hope this journey continues for a long time ahead. For six years (!!), I’ve managed to hang on, even if on an on-and-off basis. Writing has made my life just that little bit easier. And I think you’d agree, we can all do with life being a little bit easier.

I’d also like to believe (and really wish) that perhaps, somewhere, someone found some value in this blog. Maybe a thought, or a feeling of being a little less alone, or maybe even some practical advice.. anything. I know I’ve been lucky enough to find words, written by strangers I’ve never met and will probably never meet, that have given me hope on a cloudy day, laughter when I needed it, acted as a guide when I felt lost, and in general, just enriched my life in myriad little ways. In turn, I’d really like to be that person for someone else now – pay it forward along the chain. With interest, if possible.

So, with that hope, I’ll wrap up today’s blabbering.. 😁 Feeling too sentimental I guess. I could go on and on and on… But I’ll stop. For now. 🙂

See you around!

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Photo by Daiga Ellaby @ Unsplash

Two Year Anniversary!!

A Wondering Wanderer2 Comments

Well, well, well…How quickly does time fly! Can’t believe it’s already been two years since I started blogging here regularly!

I still remember that first post. Honestly, at the time, I didn’t know, or even think, that I would be doing this for the next two years of my life. All I wanted to do was to share a pleasant experience with anyone who’d listen. It felt good to share that pleasant experience, and that’s what I’ve been trying to do ever since.

This journey over the last couple of years has been quite interesting. I’ve come across some new thoughts through others’ writings, remembered and re-evaluated some old ones of my own, and reached out to people I never would’ve come across otherwise. There’s something alluring, romantic even, about discovering words written years and years ago, on blogs that are no longer active, by authors who got off this journey at some point, for some reason; about finding that one post with zero “likes”, but that speaks to you as if it was written especially for you, by someone on the other side of the world, at the other end of their life’s journey! The power and connect of words is truly amazing! Reminds me of stones skipping on water. 🙂

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