Humiliation

There will be a lot of back & forth about the 'whys' of what went down.
There will be endless analysis of how you behaved and how the other responded. How the other behaved and how you responded.
You will think a lot about the other's context, history, subtext, station in life, morale and spiritual grounding. You will try to connect the dots with their actions.
You will attempt to do the same for yourself.
You will give all parties involved every conceivable benefit of doubt.
You will plan how to leave. You will cling to the idea of staying.
You will tie yourself up in knots. Then you will stop.

You will utter a word. Perhaps that word will be 'Humiliation'. Perhaps it will be 'Cruelty'. Or 'Disrespect'. Something that rings truer than any rationale you have tried to apply to the situation.
It will become untangled. And you will stop.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intentionally_blank_page

Dear India, sound familiar?

I've finally gotten around to reading The Millenium Trilogy, which is shockingly not fluff (goes to show what an illiterate I am). 
The passage below quotes a character, who visited Germany in 1941 and describes the ethos of that time. 
For anyone who's ever asked in a judgy tone (me): "But why didn't the Germans stop Hitler? Couldn't they tell he was a sociopath?", here, Tinker Bell, is a possible response. 
And colour me paranoid, but it sounds & feels a lot like what's going on in India right now:

"I won't tire you with the details but when I went there, Hitler and Stalin were still good friends and there wasn't yet an Eastern Front. Everyone still believed Hitler was invincible. There was a feeling of...both optimism and desperation. I think those are the words. More than half a century later, it's still difficult to put words to mood. Don't get me wrong - I was not a Nazi, and in my eyes Hitler seemed like an absurd character in an operatta. But it would have been almost impossible not to be infected by the optimism about the future, which was rife in the ordinary people in Hamburg. Despite the fact that the war was getting closer, and several bombing raids were carried out against Hamburg during the time I was there, the people seemed to think it was mostly a temporary annoyance - that soon there would be peace and Hitler would establish his Neuropa. People wanted to believe that Hitler was God. That's what it sounded like in the propaganda."


(I don't wish to compare any one person to Hitler but I do find it fascinating to read about that precarious moment in history right before Hitler became so obviously and famously 'Evil'...coinciding with the moment of brainwashing/ disastrous lapse in individual judgement/ herd mentality that the public suffered.)

 

The Procedure For Letting Go

This is bullet-point guide for getting over devastation like earthquakes, bankruptcies and being caught on the wrong side of genocide.

Or if you’re genuinely unfortunate like me, the end of a meaningful romantosexual^TM relationship.

1.  The T-RAGE-DY Cycle^TM: When something beautiful dies, it’s usually the guy’s fault because he’s a jerk. Still, it’s important to acknowledge that there are jerks and there are jerks.

The Obvious Asshole will have broken your heart in some Oprah-approved act of doucheyness like cheating, stealing from your wallet, hitting on your mom or uploading your naked selfies on to sexydesiaunties.com. It is easy to hate on this guy – all you have to do is steal his phone, pretend to be him and text his boss saying you’re setting fire to his car. Then find his boss’s car and set fire to it.

But then there are the Good Guys With Issues, who have truly made you feel loved for your personality and your boobs and who think you’re a fantastic woman with fantastic boobs but just can’t make a go of it because they have had a difficult childhood on account of that one time when they were 15, when the dentist touched them inappropriately in the mouth-area.

How to get over them?

I find that it is good to completely confuse yourself by indulging in some Emotional Trapezery^TM. This is a game of swinging between compassion for his human failings and fantasizing that a steaming hot pile of monkey feces lands on his face.

It goes something like this: At least he was always honest --> Gutless coward running at the first sign of trouble --> He tried the best he knew how --> I can’t believe I bought him silk chaddies with my hard-earned money!! --> He held my hair back when I puked indelicately into a sewer and never mocked me for it --> Bastard dumped me on the phone!!! 

Etcetera etcetera etcetera

This is a good exercise as it makes you lose sleep thinking of all the smart & bitchy takedowns you could lob his way.

It also makes you cry endlessly at the loss of That One Good Man, which in turn makes you lose weight*.

*This may not be a medically proven fact and is, in fact, empirically unproven as I have gained 2 kilos in the last 1 month.

Which brings me to…

2.  Crying Yoga^TM: In November of last year, I broke my back in a sexciting speedboat incident in Thailand. But enough about my fascinating adventures.

As a result, I have been forced into a life involving slow moving yogic sequences that must be executed every single day or else my vertebrae will fall out or cave in or generally disintegrate in a theatrical poof of angel dust.

Over the 45 odd minutes that I do these exercises, my body transforms its tense and rageful scaffolding into a more vulnerable mass of Zen-Mush^TM.

There is a very specific moment in the routine when this happens. It is right after I have done the standing poses and lie down on my tummy. I breathe in, raise my torso, stay there for 5 counts and gently bring my torso down flat on the ground. Breathe in. Raise torso. Hold. Breathe out. Release torso. Repeat 10 times.

Post heartbreak when I do my daily routine, this is the point at which my spine relaxes completely, in turn releasing Sob Hormones^TM through the body. Such that, now it all goes something like this: Breath in. Raise torso. Weep for 5 counts. Bawl out. Drop torso in a heaving mound of grief. Repeat 10 times.

I find that this is a great way to release toxins from the body without paying for a therapist and I am now in talks with Gold’s Gym to start a pilot program for Crying Yoga^TM.

Do sign up one and all. You will find the mind-body-spirit relief especially useful as you approach the dreaded 4-7 days of every woman’s monthly calender (or not, in which case you may need to visit your gynaecologist)…

3.   The Dreaded Menses: Through most of my 20s I barely used my vagina. My reproductive system was in near-mint condition and more often than not I walked through the world without any awareness that I possessed a uterus.

Except for that monstrous week every month. It seemed ridiculous that I had to go through the agony so regularly (one might even say periodically ha ha), when I was extracting so little value from the damn thing. It felt like I was paying EMIs on an iPhone that would only be released 20 years from now.

So let me tell you this about heartbreak. It is even worse when you re-hire your vagina only to retire it much sooner than you expected. Because now, when the dreaded menses hit, they just don’t grab your Lady-Balls^TM. They get your heart. They make its walls shed their inner lining and exit you in a most painful and bloody manner. Sometimes it involves hideous clotting of regret & longing.

You will want to hurt something. You will want to break stuff. You will want to speak rudely to a telemarketer. But don’t.

Because there is a better way…

4.  Pouring Angst Into Work: They will tell you that work is the best way to get over a relationship’s demise. The ‘they’ will probably be your boss. Do not listen to him. (Or her. Ha ha. Who am I kidding? Girls can’t be bosses.) Take huge amounts of time off work. Don’t make your deadlines. Turn in shoddy reports. Steal office supplies. Release your anger by having bitching sessions about clients. Create long email threads outlining your ideas on how to make the office loo a more ‘conducive place for all’. CC them to everyone in the organization.

5.   Friends Are Bitches, Don’t Trust ‘Em: When in the throes of heartbreak, friends can be those assholes, who are always trying to make you feel better. God, they can be so annoying. Please feel free to ignore their calls or attempts to meet you for a ‘coffee and a chat’. Later when you’re feeling better you can accuse them of not being there when you needed them the most. This will make you feel like a martyr, which totally worked for Gandhi and is a guaranteed ‘pick me up’.

The practice you gain in being a Bitchy Martyr^TM will be invaluable in your journey towards letting go…

6.   Social Media Activism: Did someone say Bitchy Martyr^TM? Sign me up for Twitter and Blogspot!

But be careful to make it an anonymous account that no one can trace back to you. Also be careful to block any and all followers, who may know you from real life.

Then go ahead and rant, sob, indulge in months of self-pity and hateful naming-and-shaming. Drink lots of vodka and babble nonsense on the timeline. Stalk other tweeters and mock their poetic tweets. Write poetic tweets. Write self-indulgent blog posts that you think are profound but really just get on everyone’s nerves.

Go forth and be a gandu. That’s what letting go is all about*.

*Does not apply to Facebook or Instagram. What are you, stupid?

"I'm not pointing the wrong way...I'd planned for you to grab my butt all along..."