the eyes of love

| a dedication to loving the subtle and mundane things in life

why are you so beautiful?

that’s because you look at me with the eyes of love.

It’s easy to call someone beautiful who’s already acclaimed pretty according to the beauty standards of a hollowed out media-world, someone like Megan Fox, Jennie, Aishwarya Rai or Kendall Jenner. Or a carefully constructed architecture, an aesthetic cafe, a garden filled with flower beds, they’re gorgeous I agree, but have you ever had someone call you beautiful for the way you speak? Admired like you were the only centre of his being? Spoken to, in the most gentle & kindest ways?

As a child I used to think loving the ordinary would be much easier, as you don’t have to carry the burden of its rareness, but as I grow up, it slowly crept my mind that its so much more difficult to romanticise the ordinary, to look at the world with eyes of love, to find the peace in the mess, to see yourself reflected in every little imperfection of this art we call “living”.

Be it in the way, the rain drops hit the pavement with leaves scattered all around, the way his texts are filled with typos, the way my hair is a mess when the wind gushes by, the way the ducks swim across the river where a corner is filled with trash, the way an incomprehensible handwritten note still stays in your drawer, the way the birds chirp and interrupt a long voice-call.

It’s all in that subtle hint of raw beauty, that goes unnoticed by many. I wish I could capture all those moments and have them as keepsakes in a museum of my life.

Recently, I went on a trip to Somnath & Dwarka in Gujarat, with my fam, you can say it was a birthday trip as I turned 20, on the 12th of April (is it just me or the date of birth always seems so sacred for some weird reason).

There, we also visited a family friend of ours, they have this pet cat named ‘Mitski’ and take it from a person who was always scared of petting animals, it felt so comforting when she came up to me and put her fore-paws on my knee and well basically “chose” me ehe, it felt so heartwarming in the moment, I pet her, gave her back rubs and adorned her with as much affection as I could before it was time for us to leave, I miss her so much.

Loving Mitski felt effortless, she just moulded into my life even for just a few hours, so easily. Sometimes I wish it were that easy to find friends for life. However, loving someone is never effortless, you have to accept all the parts of them, like pealing an orange or a pomegranate for a loved one, examing all the layers and seeds, not with suspicion, but with affection.

It’s like taking time to gently take off every bit of armor from the soft & bruised body. To take a look at their scars and naming constellations after them, its in those tiny little efforts that your soul’s pure comfort shines through.

And if you’re anything like me, you probably love with all your heart, love all those tiny cracks in the wall, love to take pictures of anything & everything that sparks joy in your heart, but we fail to love ourselves as much as we love the sun at dawn. I have attached the pics from my trip here and I hope you feel even a tiny bit of peace looking at them.

capture everything!!

I think to love the mundane things in life is the goal, not the fascinating that shines like gold. But in the way your throat feels quenched, a gulp of water after a long night’s sleep, the way your heart feels at ease when your friend texts you that they reached home safely, the way you instantly feel better after helping someone in something as insignificant as giving them directions to their destination, the way you look at a book well-read and cherished, despite it making you cry the hardest, the way you feel when a baby smiles back at you, the way a “did you eat?” text makes you feel cared for.

I could go on & on. I genuinely love to see love in things & beings around me. Sometimes when life feels hard, all we need to do is see the world with the eyes of love and also give that love to ourselves.

If you look for it, I’ve got a sneeky feeling you’ll find that Love Actually is all around.

Because you deserve all the love & care in the world, you are truly worthy of all the things that you dream of, so please, don’t you dare call yourself ‘useless’ or ‘insignificant’, because you don’t have to be ‘of use’ or ‘be of convenience’ for someone to love you. You deserve to be loved wholeheartedly, for just the way you are.

Some more pictures hehe.

snippets from dwarka

Tysm for reading my loves, I can’t believe we’re a fam of more than 4.5K ppl, I shall forever stay grateful to you all, tysm for being here <333 I finally got out of my writing slump yayy!!

remember you’re always loved.

xoxo

Shreya