vade mecum

You can borrow my vade mecum as your vade mecum so that you are inspired to keep a vade mecum for yourself 😌

[shalvisharma]

Running fast (& slow)

Are you running too fast? Who is to say how fast is fast enough? As small children, our parents push us to run fast. Our teachers at school tell us to run faster than our classmates or we will be left behind. You assume all the running would end one day. That one day you will grow up and all the doing/eating/watching/reading fast will stop because well you are an adult now. But it doesn't stop. It doesn't even pause. It only gets speedier in different time and space. At workplace, in grocery stores, in parking lots, out of parking lots, in the gym, while traveling, in saving, in investing, in buying homes, in selling homes. The 'fast' never slows down. But, who is to say how fast is fast enough.

[shalvisharma]

Two of my most favourite games! I am so glad I found you

1. Dinosaur Island

2. Caverna

I have figured out growing my crops, selling them, putting farmers to work might be my all time favourite theme 👵🏻🌾👩🏻‍🌾🐄

[shalvisharma]

Recent games which didn’t make the cut sooner:

1. Tabannusi

2. Kanban EV

3. Pax Pamir

4. Altiplano (again) @ work All the above games had mechanisms ranging from negotiation, deck building, worker placement, area movement, hand management, and action points to name a few. Loved all of them! (except Kanban EV is not up my alley thematically)

[shalvisharma]

Resolution 2023

I believe in resolutions now. Intentional goal setting can be so validating for your actions. Such a great thing to practice. I started this ritual last year when I put down 2022 resolutions sometime in January and worked towards it for the entire year. When I looked back at the list in December, I was elated by my achievements which are no less than a big shot of dopamine (and a more lasting one).

This year even though I am late in doing it, I am intentionally putting this out in the web world today. Here is my list: 1. cont. Physical health efforts: Last year was tremendous in reaching the health goals that I had created for myself. This year, I want to build on it and achieve more strength training, higher muscle mass, lose some extra fat weight, and continued health checks.

2. Eating right: I want to give up gluten as much as I can and substitute it with millet, legumes, and quinoa. I am going to lean into seasonal produce only consuming veggies and fruits that are sold in particular periods. Cut down sugar in whatever way possible only resorting to honey/jaggery when necessary. Make your own curd and cheese at home.

3. Fasting: I want to fast weekly. Tuesdays are my chosen days when I have nuts, tea, milk, and fruits in the morning with only one full meal in the day (mostly midday). This also coincides with my faith practices so win-win!

4. Practise Faith: Last year was such a good start with educating myself more on Hinduism and ancient texts. Continue on that journey by reading more and more. Chanting is going to become a daily practice.

5. cont Mental health efforts: Take short breaks. Once the weather gets better go out for post-meal walks. Lean into yoga to relieve stress. Lit up those candles. Make those sauteed tofu with soy sauce. Hot water showers FTW!

6. Miscellaneous: 📲 Cut down on social media. It is pure poison. 🔋 Leave your phone far away before going to bed. 🎲 Keep board gaming. The community needs to be nurtured and expanded if possible. 🎯 Build your board game collection. 🥦 Take care of those plant babies. 🚕 Travel will take a back seat this year. More local exploration. 🗽 At least 2 national parks in the year. 📚 At least 6 books this year. No matter the subject.

I finally put this list down here. Now onto making it happen 😀😌🤩

[shalvisharma]

A board game shelfie

I have turned into a board game hoarder. I was in love with games and enjoyed playing them but now I am a hoarder. I cannot stop myself from buying these very interestingly described games and this might be the first time that I am being reckless with money. My recklessness comes with huge bargaining power but nonetheless, it is a huge expenditure. To think games might cost this much shocks me. But it has a replay value and of course, I always have the option of selling it to another hoarder like me 😁

For now, I am going to enjoy looking at these games which are so beautifully designed. You can check out my collection here which has been filling me with unadulterated joy for the past few weeks.

[shalvisharma]

Midnight already

I was up finishing my work when I suddenly glanced at the clock and saw that it was 12:38 am already. Casual browsing on the internet reminded me how I have been irregular about updating my Tumblr.

So this is a reminder nudge to myself, that tomorrow I shall keep aside some time to write about recent reflections. Without fail! WITHOUT FAIL!

[shalvisharma]

First South American skies

My dad says,….

“Journal your journey to Chile. It will be a memory to cherish when you look back.”

So I did. I made copious notes on my everyday whereabouts. Bought a special notebook from Miniso to do just that. Carried around the grid pages to write my deepest thoughts that were cropping up every time I saw nature’s wonder.

I visited Santiago, San Pedro de Atacama, and Valparaiso, all very distinct in their vibe. Santiago is the capital of the country and felt very politically charged. The walls were painted everywhere in protest against the tyranny and people seemed angry on a daily basis. But the city was still holding up, just like the country. San Pedro de Atacama is a tourist destination. Even though it is a small arid town in the middle of a large desert, it still attracts a lot of tourists who live in hostels and eat whatever is available mostly meaty pizzas. The people here know more English than in Santiago and Valparaiso, and there are daily tours running to show you different parts of the desert. The process is streamlined and everybody collaborates with each other to make your stay memorable. I had never experienced such a clean hostel in my life and if hostels were maintained like that I would always stay in those. El Tatio geysers were the highlight of my trip because it was all the best views combined in one day. I woke up at 4 am to go 1.5 hrs away just to see all the smoke/haze/mist rising from the ground and wondered what kind of a fantasy land we were in. It was surreal and also the best day for pictures. My friendly guide was an enthusiastic photographer and it is he that made me pose in the natural beauty. Almost everyone I met there suggested I go to Bolivia to see salt flats. But time restrictions are real and so is remote working which means you should actually be working. 😁

My last stop was Valparaiso and I had been given so many suggestions of what to do and not to do that I spent my first 2 days in fear. The city has a vibe that takes some time to understand but once you have gotten a hold of it, everyone is there to help you and make it better. I made friends along the way with the local people who took me on strolls and showed me important viewpoints of the city. The food is trying-to-be-fancy but all the Italian, Continental, and Chinese are still South American at heart. The coffee is bitter which I am sure will be loved by coffee addicts unlike me who pours coffee in milk and not vice versa. The city has a lot of cultures for it is the Florence of the southern continent where everybody is an artist at heart or by profession. You will see people painting, creating music, singing in the church choir, and attending group dance classes and all of that would culminate in having a drink or smoking up at one of the ‘Passos’ at night. These Passos are a popular viewpoint to take in the entire city at night. The many lights shining from peoples’ homes together look like dispersed fireflies. It is a sight very different from broad daylight when people are walking around for work and their colorful houses are perched on a sloping hill. 

South America is not everybody's cup of tea but it was definitely mine. I am going back for more and hopefully get to see Argentina and Peru next time.

Hasta la proxima vez ❤️

[shalvisharma]

@incidentalcomics showering love. Happy Feb 14 to you and yours!

[shalvisharma]

Pasoori

I am always on the hunt for new indie music that can make my existing playlists better. I found Pasoori today, on a work Wednesday morning, and have not stopped admiring the entire Coke Studio S14 album. It goes without saying that the music has been upping every season; the Pakistanis have gotten it right since the very beginning giving rise to Coke Studio India which came after. But what trumped me this time was a burqa-wearing-female-rapper, absolutely stealing the show. Shoutout to Kana Yaari which has such an amalgamation of folk and rap. I am going to be looping this till I am saturated and move on with my journey of finding my next musical beauty! 😊❤️💜

For amazing production quality proof watch the video here. I recommend watching each video just because of how beautifully it is shot.

[shalvisharma]

Incidental Comics

Tightrope https://linktr.ee/grantdraws

Today is a new beginning for me, professionally. A new workplace, an unknown community, unfamiliar faces but the only thing I can and hope to hold onto is my belief in my skill.

Am I the best designer out there? Absolutely not.

Am I willing to be the best designer out there? 100%.

I wish we never forget how far we have come, and how far we are yet to go. To the unexplored magic that I am yet to witness. ⭐️🦋

Onward 🍀

[shalvisharma]

Of Jet lags and Home

Why don't we write motivational quotes on overcoming jet lag? It was my first time experiencing one and I thought this was serious. Not enough is discussed about it. One needs care, kindness, and more to overcome this. Gawwd! I am grumpy, hate everything in the world, distrust everything I see and my body is struggling to adapt. To think we put our dear body through so much just to travel. I am hoping this will settle and my body starts to understand that it is living in PDT now and it is okay. Everything is okay.

Leaving home is never easy. Especially when you are visiting after a long time. But life happens and it forces change. So you move. From here to there. To somewhere from somewhere else. So in between all this moving, what is home?

The last few months have provided me a new perspective on home; besides it being a place, it is people, smells, actions, objects, relationships, and sometimes it is you. Home is found within you too. So by this definition, making my morning tea is home. My block print bedsheet with bright florals is home. The jaggery laddoos that my aunt packed for me are home and so are all the plants in my patio that I lovingly grow that remind me of home. My Punjabi Spotify playlist that is my go-to mood uplifter is also home. Everything intangible that got carried from my homeland is home and so the next time I am sad about not being physically around my loved ones, I just need to remind myself that they are with me and around me in many various forms and I am capable of building another home here too.

Location: Somewhere in South Bay, Cali

Date: Beginning of a new year

❤️🧡💙

[shalvisharma]

A New Year

I had a fabulous end to 2021. I mean, too-good-to-be-true kind. Like it ended exactly like I wanted with the people I wanted by my side.

AND BAM! The first week of the new year was opposite to what I was wishing for. Things went downhill and not a smooth downhill, like a downhill with bumps in between that affected many. But today at 8:13 pm IST on a Friday, I have still gathered the courage to write about my new year's resolutions. It is more like a list of "things to never forget this year".

1. PRACTICE GRATITUDE: Say thank you for all that you have and not dwell on all that you do not.

2. CAPTURE MORE: Through photography, art, craft, your memory so that the NOW is more beautiful than anything that was or anything that is yet to come.

3. MINDFUL OF THE PRESENT: Our present is a gift and I promise to constantly get excited about this gift rather than worry about what has passed me or what is yet to come.

4. BE CURIOUS: Try and remember the person you were a few years ago. She wanted to be a part of everything, explore, see, learn everything the world around her had to offer. Go back to being that. In a world encapsulated by this disease, be your own personal cheerleader.

5. VOLUNTEER: I used to work for causes that I truly believed in. Somehow that took a backseat because I moved countries. But I am sure there are people who can use some service here. Find organizations that would love to have you and can help with a higher purpose.

6. MOVE MY BODY: When your body is not moving, it is accumulating unnecessary thoughts. When it is moving, it is recharged, awake, and ready to fight the odds. Nourish your body and mind because they will always prove to be your biggest support system.

7. PRACTICE FAITH: Whatever it looks like to you, chants, rituals, songs, hymns, idols, anything. Practice it consciously because it is much like a habit. If you stop doing it, the habit will rust.

I hope you are yours are truly safe and taking care of your needs!

❤️

[shalvisharma]

Whatadelight☺️

Aranyak is a comeback project for Raveena Tandon and damn she is back with a very loud bang! This 8 part series has some star performances which stand out and also keep the story going. The ones that stood out for me were:

1. Kasturi Dogra played by Raveena Tandon: A hardworking cop and a mother at home, she loves her little town where she is the local SHO. She truly enjoys her work with a very supportive family who understands that she is not good in the kitchen and that is absolutely okay.

2. Parambrata Chattopadhyay as Angad Malik: I have loved Parambrata since Kahaani and the pattern that I have noticed in his acting skills, is that his emotions are mellow yet powerful. Loved him in this one too as a friend and fellow cop to Kasturi.

3. Ashutosh Rana as Mahadev Dogra: Why does this man not visible on-screen more often 😬As usual a fabulous job playing father-in-law to Kasturi and a retired police officer who cannot stop performing his duties.

Special mention to the writing, cinematography, screenplay, color correction work to build the setting of an eerie forest town. It reminded me so much of Himachal. The recent cinematic pieces have been doing an outstanding job to recreate smaller cities in India or just depicting the realities of it, extraordinarily. I visited Lucknow a few days back and was reminded of the many shots from Gulabo Sitabo, an Ayushmann starrer movie that came out earlier in 2020. It is another kind of happiness when you get to see the real-life settings in these movies. Next up, I am excited to watch Aarya Season 2 because the setting is my very own native place, and from the bits that have come out it looks like Ram Madhvani is trying to use every nook and corner of different parts of Rajasthan.

[shalvisharma]

Going back to Reading 🍀

2021 spared no time for me to read. I found myself so caught up with everything that life was offering one after the other that I lost my touch with this habit. In between all this, my reading suffered as I was no longer picking my favorite pieces anymore. I had stopped believing in new year resolutions back in high school but the pandemic has taught me to never say never. Hence, this will be my first resolution for a prosperous 2022. Go back to my reading; embrace this habit that has brought me so much joy over the years. I shall pick up one book each month and finish it no matter what.

And I started early with Siddhartha being a precursor to a wonderful 2022 ⭐️

[shalvisharma]

Daily Musings

Like Brianna Weist says,

"The parts of your journey where you almost felt like you were failing and falling behind, the moments when it seemed like nothing was working out the way it should, the times during which you were all but forced to prioritize rest, to begin a process of self-reflection, to have no choice but to change — these weren’t your setbacks, they were your breakthroughs in disguise. The universe is constantly asking us if we are ready to stop engaging with our old habits and enter into a parallel life, one we begin to build in the gaps between what happens and how we respond to it. The next time we are faced with the exact same challenge, we are being called to ask ourselves: “how can I react differently this time?” When we know better, we do better. So if life has given you a period of quiet, of alone, of reconsideration — say thank you. It was never about constant forward motion, it was never about hitting every external milestone in time. It was always the journey you took with yourself. How you blossomed in the quiet moments, the ones where you left the common path and began to walk one all your own."

I am grateful for the quiet moments that I have experienced and continue to do, this year. There have been lots of those in the past few months and it has most definitely taught me to do better next time.

❤️

[shalvisharma]

Last leg of 2021

A page from the Journal 📓 It is the last month of the calendar year and sadly it is the second year into the pandemic which is seeing no end (thanks to the new variant). Like everybody else's life, my 2021 journey has seen a lot of beginnings and ends too. There have been a mix of exciting news, new places, and not-so-nice people who have crossed paths. So in totality, my year looked exactly like my life, with most blessings, and some lessons. The human mind tries to make the bad bigger than the good but that is never the case in reality. There are lots to be thankful for and so I plan on ending my year with a heart full of gratitude ❤️.

I have been reading weekly horoscopes 👀🥲. Strange times call for strange actions. For Scorpio, most text says that we are beings of transformation, with the Phoenix as our symbol. I chuckled at that because I remember being that bird all my life. It has so happened that all these years of existence, I have always found myself in a mad twist of events. More times than I can count, I have caught myself in a desolate situation that I had to heal from and begin again. So much so that Begin Again has now become my potential tattoo phrase (🧡 the soundtrack).

Irrespective of what the horoscopes say, you got to keep playing the game. That is what survivors do. That is what hopeful souls do because the ways of the world can never fool them into believing otherwise. So all of December, I shall share writings/thoughts of growth and peaceful living, and pray for a better 2022! 🍀

[shalvisharma]

December is a time for reflection! Gathering some of the most important reminders that I plan to keep with me this month and in the upcoming future 🙂

Hoping 2022 is kinder for the world than the last few years have been ❤️🧡💙