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I think I asked a different, possibly irrelevant question last time (The real metamorphosis). Could be time relevant. The question now has been re-directed towards something else this time.

In the last post, I got stuck on usefulness and and which kind I meant. Whether it was something I made for myself or just the price of being kept. I left it open ended because I could not close it. Nor I found the answer. But the book does not end nor focus on usefulness. It ends on liberation.

Gregor dies. The next morning the family does not fall apart nor grieve much. They take the day off. They write letters to their employers. They ride out to the countryside and there is warm sunshine. Somewhere on that ride the parents notices their daughter has grown into a young woman. That is the last page of the book.

Kafka does not punish them for not grieving nor rants about their behavior. He just lets it be true. Last time I read this book from Gregor’s room. This time, I am inside the Grete’s mind.

She is the one who feeds him and tried different foods. She cleans and even tried to looking at him, whatever his body had become. Yet, she is also the one who finally calls him “it“, and says they have to get rid of it. But at the end of the book, her young body stretching is the final piece of words. Young, livelier and ready for a life. The one who cared the most is the one who looks the most free. Liberation over grief!

So maybe usefulness was not the question then. Was it death? I don’t mean death as an ending. But death shows you which kind of love you were living inside. The kind that survives the person, or the kind that was only there because something was needed/meant useful.

So, does death mean liberation? Liberation for whom? To Gregor or Grete?

This liberation didn’t sound like betrayal in the book. Not from Grete’s POV. It is what is happens once the caring stops from being required or even forced upon.

Here is the part I keep getting confused or was wrong about earlier. I used to think relief comes first followed by grief once the shock settles. But, it does not come like that in all scenarios. It is more of subjective to the individuals on which comes first or the second. For Grete, grief followed by relief.

Maybe the ending was never closing Gregor’s story. It was opening theirs or even Grete’s. The tram ride is the honest scene in the whole book, because it is the first time nothing has to be performed for him.

This is what death actually does to everyone when it is allowed to. It does not just remove a person. It removes the performance that grew around keeping them. One more thing is that, Gregor’s last thoughts were about his family. He thinks of them with love. He decides that he should disappear.

So the book does have that kind of love in it. The kind that does not need usefulness to keep going. Maybe this is the answer to my previous post.

I am not sure about it either.

Cheers

PS: Every re-read gives a different perspective.

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turtles all the way down!

Sunandhini R

There is always saying that “Prevention is better than cure”. I believe this most of the time.

But, the uncertainty always exists. Uncertainty doesn’t ask us permission anytime. It hit us at its own time, place, intensity. We never know.

All do we do have is a playbook or mental models we have built over time with the experiences. But these doesn’t help during the uncertainty. But they definitely helps us in deciding what happens after.

Take Noah (my fav name) for an example. He works out well. Watches his diet (carbs, proteins, fats). The micronutrients or fiber are not missed out. Does this mean this person won’t fall sick? No. He might or might not.

But if he falls sick, he comes back faster. That’s the difference. The recovery matter more than ever.

The more Noah walks this health path, more the realization. It’s not about how many days he stayed well. It’s about how many days it took him to recover/ come back to the self.

Maybe, prevention was never about avoiding the fall. Maybe it was always about the comeback. How fast is yours?

Cheers!

Check out the previous post: Lifestyle

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turtles all the way down!

Sunandhini R

A few years ago, FIRE (Financial Independence, Retire Early) was everywhere on LinkedIn and IG. Every fin-influencer would talk about it. I don’t know if it still the norm. But the underlying question is very simple. How much of your life do you actually need to fund vs how much have you decided to fund by default?

Money psychology isn’t universal. It’s shaped by how and what we have lived through through our childhood. Mostly through scarcity, excess, a parent’s anxiety, a childhood that taught you either to save or to spend. So when I read a post like the one going around in the X. A man in Gurgaon, ₹26L a year, ₹15,000 left at the end of the month. My first instinct isn’t to judge the number rather than on the behavior. I don’t know. I am heavily influenced by Morgan Housel on this one. Few things to stress on.

Lifestyle has to be a conversation: Every couple has a spendthrift and a saver in some proportion. TBH, gifted if you could get one in your desired way. But, neither is wrong by default. But if that was never discussed and if one partner is optimizing and the other is drifting, then it will be a total chaos. the math would eventually break and the math game would turn into blame game.

Maximizers vs. satisficers: A distinction I keep coming back to link to my old post. One always wants the best available option and the other wants an option that’s good enough and moves on. It is quite important and maybe worth spending time on identify the areas of maximum and minimum.

Morgan’s line: No matter what you earn, maintaining the lifestyle is what costs you. Income solves today’s number/problems and creates tomorrow’s ceiling. The ₹26L earner isn’t broke because he earns too little. Maybe among the top 5% earners in Indian population? He’s stretched because rent, a car EMI, and ₹50,000/month for one child were never weighed against what the household could actually absorb/handle.

Some of those could be reduced. A family of three has room to renegotiate rent, groceries, even school costs and toys. None of it is fixed the way it’s posted across.

And if the answer is my wife should also earn. It is fair enough in this economy and with rate of inflation, but that has to be a conversation. Women re-entering workforce after a maternity gap is not that easy. The hurdles between the kid, job, household has to be managed. Very few get the resources and the additional support.

None of this erases uncertainty or unforecasted events. Health issues, jobs disappear, rent rises. But blaming a partner (irrespective of the gender) for the shortfall rarely fixes the shortfall.

Cutting expenses does. Saving as a habit does. Constant lifestyle does.

Cheers!

PS: Haven’t installed IG yet

Check out the previous post: Delayed Gratification!

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turtles all the way down!

Sunandhini R

Everyone advices the other falls into two. First as stop scrolling. Second one as, to learn to enjoy a quiet evening once you’ve stopped the former. I assume, they are one loop, seen from different perspective. I believe, it is just an advice to be spread and quite difficult to be followed.

The pull isn’t the content!

TBH, most of things in the feed is forgettable the second we scroll up. Yet, the thumb keep moving, right? Does it end? IG doesn’t show the end of the gird. It feels like there is no end. Like Akashyapathiram, there are n number of new creators and consumers.

This feels addictive because we don’t know what the next scroll/reel gives you. It is usually nothing. Then, suddenly, something that resonates. It’s not chasing the good post. But chasing maybe this next one. That “maybe” is the whole game or to be precise, the anticipation is the word.

Why deleting the app isn’t enough?

Lets say the app is deleted or we have set a timer or even uninstalled. And, obviously it works for awhile. In the long run, does it?

The moment it’s reachable again, the urge to use is back. Sometimes even stronger. This never stops. We try to break the loop and the chain continues.

The Connecting dot

Lets say the boundary has been set. What shows up after the boundary isn’t calm. It’s a flatness/baseline that feels wrong. The empty feeling or dip. Now , this feels like something is missing. Like a void maybe? Not because you miss the app. Because the mind is trained on constant small surprises. It starts treating any steady as a problem to fix that we haven’t identified. Hence, the hand reaches for the phone again.

This is why both pieces of advice fail. Delete the app without expecting the flatness/baseline emotion, and reinstallation is done by day four. Trying to be present while the app is one tap away, feels the loses.

Now swap the app for a person

Lets say someone, who runs hot and cold. Replies fast one day, goes silent for three. Love bombing? Occasionally saying the exact thing that needs to be communicated in a consistent manner.

The core issue, is same as the above. Nothing in this changes too. We are not attached to who they are on average. We are attached to the maybe or the anticipation. Blocking them is deleting the app. And the flatness after is the same. A steady, kind, available person suddenly feels boring, because you’ve learned to read predictability as absence. This doesn’t have to be a partner, could be anyone to whom the issue is dealt with.

One question, not two!

So it’s one loop. The boundary has to hold long enough that ordinary time stops feeling empty and starts feeling ordinary again. Delayed Gratification.

But for how long to delay? I am not sure about this. Subjective to the individuals and the context.

Bu, most probably longer than we want. So don’t aim for feeling good but to stay long enough to stop feeling like loss.

Cheers

PS: Haven’t installed IG yet

Check out the previous post: Curse of Terminologies

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turtles all the way down!

Sunandhini R

We’ve named everything now. Almost word for most of the feelings and emotions. Hardening. Avoidance. Emotional regulation. Staying in or out. The vocabulary is rich and glamours. The actual part of doing remains as hard as it ever was. All these terms looks similar like a solution for a particular kind of situation. i.e dealing with grief. Be it any kind. There is a follow up question as how do you come of it.

Most people reach out for one of two ways. Stay and harden or leave the place. Both sounds like a perfect answer. Yet, it hides the layers of flaw.

%Hardening: It is more of bracing. Building a shell so less gets through. Even in agriculture, right after tissue culture, the plants left for hardening. So that it gets adapted to the environment. In real life, we put the Buddha’s clam face on for bracing. But the image is wrong. Buddha didn’t harden. He turned inward and towards the difficult things until it loosened its grip. Hardening doesn’t solve but it can hold a lid over a it by a brutal force.

Leave has the opposite. There are lot of quotes on remove the distraction or stay out of the triggers. It may work well on the situation but it does nothing to the internal world. It always travels within one self and not in geographical senses. If a small trigger still sets off, then feeling was never finished.

So the real question carries two context here

• Do you stay in the situation or leave it? If it is based on the circumstance or geography, then leave or change accordingly.
• If it is concerned with emotions, accepting is the deal. Facing a feeling benefits in the long run rather than avoiding it and letting it grow.

Avoidance is not as same as steadiness or openness. The former says I don’t care while the latter part says I care yet not knocked over. The numb version looks wise but doesn’t help in the long run. Attaining the steadiness across all walks of life isn’t easy or can’t be forced with words. Trying to be clam while the whole larva churning inside is just hardening again. It starts with a gap of stimulus and response and until the muscle can hold the big things. Listening to the body works over the mind. When the waves are bigger, staying open or openness in a flood might be a trap. Sanity is staying at the edge of the wave and not drawing under it.

This Hardening, avoidance and steadiness might look the same but there is thread of level of difference. Hardening is like building an armor/tool to feel less. Steadiness or staying in build the capacity to hold. The avoidance and steadiness might look the same on the external but it is opposite at the core.

• Hardening – Feel less
• Avoidance – Feel less now and more later
• Staying in – Feel fully now and less later.

Staying steady is not about being robotic to emotions. Sometimes, it better to be shaken (more of a human nature). But it just helps not to be thrown around by everything.

Do these words really matter? I don’t know. Maybe in the introspection or in the analysis, it does help. In the end, the everyone has different definitions of these terms including the word insanity.

Cheers!

Check out the previous post: Space for Women

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turtles all the way down!

Sunandhini R

Every time, I end up digging layers around the idea of boredom.

I’ve written about rest, about boredom, about stillness. Three attempts yet never caught at the core. So here’s another layer added I believe.

We take in a lot. A conversation that didn’t sit right. A decision made too quickly. Something you read and moved past. Something someone said that you filed under think about this later and never did. The intake is constant and raising with the social media. The processing isn’t (Not therapy, lol)

That gap is the backlog or unfinished business or tabs. There is no enough time given to the mind to close it.

TBH, we’re terrified of it. So we fill every gap of emptiness with podcast, scroll, task or even music (Found Guilty) that feels productive. Not because we’re avoiding rest, but because the moment we stop, the load/hanging thoughts becomes visible. This visibility feels like falling behind or even failing.

This is what I finally understand. Boredom isn’t the pile/load. Boredom is what clears it. A days ago I was in the ground for my morning walk. I forgot to recharge data plans. I couldn’t play the music nor Starva. Nothing to do, quite annoyed about it. But the walk really help me in finding the data points for the solution I needed. Because nothing else (music) was occupying the space, so the hanging thing finished processing on its own. It was nice.

They call it as Default Mode Network (DMN). When you stop directing your attention or energy outward, your brain doesn’t go quiet. It switches to a different mode. More of internal kind of one. The one it uses for replaying memories, working over unresolved things, or wandering or making sense of yourself to yourself.

This one, can’t run that opened tabs and a podcast at the same time. The input/consumption has to stop first. That’s the part we keep skipping. This is why boredom is the specific tool.

Meditation, Stillness and Boredom might sound the same, but it is not. Meditation is directed for doing something to your mind or bringing to one thought or one sound or light or even trying not to think or chew on anything. Stillness is a place you arrive at once the noise/thoughts has already settled.

Boredom is messier as compared to both. It is slightly uncomfortable and the mind wanders without a destination. And that exact thing, under which the backlog/pending ones clear. Through it despite the discomfort it feels.

So you don’t sit idle to become creative. You sit idle so the pile can finish itself. Hence, already half-formed ones finally has the room/space to surface.

Cheers!

Check out the previous post: Broken Chain of Website Traffic!

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turtles all the way down!

Sunandhini R

For the past two to three weeks, I couldn’t write the blog posts. The major reason was that I created too many outlets for the dissemination. TBH, most of my free time were occupied by Oil pastels and Arrow (game).

Last Sunday, I was checking my stats in WordPress (Basic plan). The numbers were usually average. It doesn’t fluctuations unless there is a movie blog got a referral or cited. But the numbers were even below average. I convinced myself that maybe because I have written only 4 -5 posts for the past two months.

Then yesterday’s Seth Godin post was slight intruding and helpful. Traffic from search is structurally declining. AI answers your question before you click anywhere. The blog as a traffic machine is a dying model. Read more here.

I went down a rabbit hole after that. Then prompting with Claude gave this chart (see below).

Then what about SEO?GEO? does it work actually? Not sure. GEO shows your content to the user without having the need of clicking the website. I am not sure if there is anything like google analytics for the ai referrals. GA4? Unclear yet.

I believe the third one (from the above image) indicates the same. But, it doesn’t show much details on GA4. Or Maybe limited for the plans or no referrals. Whatever. I am planning to adopt the strategies laid by Seth Godin. His prescription are treat traffic as a random gift, not a resource. Serve the smallest viable audience. Build direct subscriber relationships instead.

Writing only for the readers who subscribed or even to the new visitors maybe?.

Cheers!

Check out the previous post: Maa Inti Bangaram (2026)

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turtles all the way down!

Sunandhini R

There are parts of you that have never been touched or remain unexplored. Not because you haven’t looked, but some mirrors exist inside other people.

Relationships are not just company. I mean, not specified to partners alone. They help you to dig deeper. Each one brings a version of you that solitude cannot reach. Certains part of us are dormant without the right connection. Waiting for someone who carries that particular key. Be it a rivalry, or a mentorship or even grief

Isn’t it kind of disturbing? Unreachable or unexplored qualities that are hidden for even oneself?

There is a second thing, somewhat buired inside the first. Every relationship runs on two channels. Ofcourse, how you receive, and how you give. Most people assume these are the same. They almost never are.

For eg, you might give through action like through showing up, through doing the thing without being asked. But what you might like to receive might be just words, and only words.

The language you speak and the language that lands are two different ends. Like the quiet rivalry between a reader and a writer. Most of us are running translations inside every relationship we have, often without knowing it. At somepoint of time, the bridge collapses. Certainly, the translation cost is real.

I don’t have a name for that. I am not sure it needs one.

What I do know right now is this. If the translation never made right, it doesn’t tap the unexplored parts. The version of you that person (not necessarily to be a human) could have called forward, never arrives. You do not fully exist to yourself. You are partly a function of who has shown up and what they unlocked.

But,

Who are you for real? What is still dormant in you, waiting for the right kind of connection to arrive?

Cheers

Check out the previous post: The Devil Wears Prada, would Tamil Cinema?

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turtles all the way down!

Sunandhini R

I was staring at a blank page of this post for quite sometime. Thoughts were there, somewhere. Just needed time to find words. But then, does the mind really stay empty?

J Krishnamurti usally talks about an empty mind like it was the most natural thing. His mind mostly wandered from the curl of a leaf to the colour of dusk. The observer being observed. He spent time with trees and open skies.

What about the rest of us? We mostly stare at walls, screens and almost right angles everywhere.

There is this study that I came across in the media. The Coffer illusion. People from the US and UK almost always see rectangles. Rural Himba people from Namibia almost always see circles.

Half of them can’t see the rectangles even when told to look. Not because one group sees better. But because the environment trained the eye. Grow up around round huts and curved horizons, your brain learns curves. Grow up in a modernized and industrial world, most of us see straight lines, sharp edges, right angles. Our brain learns geometry. None is superior but the way brain is trained to see things.

The observer is not neutral here, I believe.

This is what I have been looping around in the tulips post. The brain builds the things based on the inputs received and sometimes it is beyond. What we call perception is just the brain pattern matching to everything it has already seen.

So when JK says empty the mind and observe the observer, which observer? Observe the trained observer?

I’ve been doing oil pastels lately. Mostly curves, sharp edges are not quite easy in pastels. I could see that I am reaching more of rounded edge pastels instead of a sharp ones.

Btw, does emptiness truly exist? Or does the mind just hallucinate a quieter version of what it already knows?

I don’t have an answer yet.

Cheers!

Check out the previous posts: Things nobody tells you before your first trek!

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turtles all the way down!

Sunandhini R