Jallianwala Bagh - What Do We Say to the Dead?

There are places that you visit, and there are places that visit you back. Jallianwala Bagh is the second kind. It has been exactly one week since I walked through that narrow passage in Amritsar, and I am still not entirely sure I walked out the same person.

Four days from now, India will drape itself in tri-colour and pride. April 13th marked 107 years since this ground drank the blood of over a thousand of its own children. Independence and massacre, standing days apart on the calendar, forever shaking hands in silence. I have always found that timing strangely unsettling.

Because somewhere between celebrating freedom and remembering the price of freedom lies a question we rarely stop to ask - do we truly understand what independence cost us?

I first met Jallianwala Bagh not in Amritsar, but in a school textbook, a paragraph, a black-and-white photograph, a few hundred words that were never enough.  I remember the flush of emotion. The anger. The helplessness. The tears.

And strangely, growing older never diluted any of it.

Instead, the story built a small, dark room somewhere in my mind - a room filled with screams, despair, helplessness, rage and the unbearable cruelty of people who believed they had the right to decide who should live and who should die.

Even then, something in me refused to close that chapter. It sat in a corner of my mind for years, quietly waiting, the way grief does when it isn't fully yours but you carry it anyway. I promised myself I would go. Last Tuesday, I finally kept that promise.

The temperature outside was nearly 35 degrees. The sun was scorching. The heat was relentless.

But honestly, it was nothing compared to the heat inside my mind which was far greater than the heat outside.

As I walked through that narrow passage into the Bagh, my imagination began filling in the silence.

I could almost see the people who had walked through that very passage on Baisakhi Day.

Families. Children. Men and women.

People who came expecting a gathering, not a graveyard.

And then my mind began asking questions.

How many of them had walked in laughing?
How many mothers had brought their children?
How many people had absolutely no idea that they were walking into a place from which many of them would never walk out?

And then came the darker questions.

How did the soldiers arrive?
How did the orders get prepared?
How did those in power decide that this was the place to make an example?

And how did the man who became known as the “Butcher of Amritsar” walk into that narrow passage and turn a gathering of unarmed people into a killing ground?

There was no meaningful warning. 

No opportunity to disperse. No escape. Just an order. 

FIRE   

Men. Women. Children. No one was spared.

The official British accounts grossly understated the scale of the massacre, while Indian accounts and later estimates placed the death toll substantially higher. Thousands were wounded.

And yet one fact continues to haunt me.

The justification was that those gathered were somehow a threat. That they were armed. That they deserved it.

Then I cannot stop asking:

If they were so dangerous, where were the weapons?
Where were the British officers killed that day?
How many British policemen died in that firing?
How many?

The answer is chilling.

NONE. ZERO

And that raises an even more disturbing question: How many people dared to question the narrative then?

And what happened to those who did?

The horror did not end when the firing stopped. The dead and wounded were left behind. The passage was sealed.  The wounded were denied timely help.   

People were left to die.

The image of bodies lying helplessly in that space, and people desperately trying to escape through whatever opening they could find, is difficult to comprehend even today.

And then there was the ‘well’.

The well into which people jumped, desperately trying to escape bullets.
A well that became a grave for those who believed that drowning might somehow be less terrifying than being shot.

How desperate must a human being become to choose death by jumping into a well rather than face a rain of bullets?

I stood there and could not answer that question.

I still cannot.

---

As I walked further into the Bagh, hundreds of voices seemed to be speaking inside my head at once.

Not the voices of historians. Not the voices of textbooks.

The voices of the people who were there.

I kept looking at the walls.

And I wondered - What did these walls witness?

What did they hear?

The first scream?
The first gunshot?
The cries of mothers?
The footsteps and cries of people running for their lives?
The last words of someone who knew there was nowhere left to run?

Walls usually hold structures together. But these walls hold memory. Brutal and Bloody Memories

And some memories should never be allowed to die. Perhaps, they would never die.

---

Inside the museum, I came across photographs, stories and accounts of the freedom struggle.

And one discovery particularly disturbed me.

Rudyard Kipling was among those who supported General Dyer after the massacre, and a fundraising campaign in Britain portrayed Dyer as a man who had “saved India.”

That sentence stayed with me. What??  Saved India?

No. He did not save India.

He saved an empire's snatched authority.

And that episode reminded me of something much larger than Jallianwala Bagh: Language is powerful.

Narratives can turn perpetrators into protectors.
Cruelty can be dressed up as courage.
Oppression can be packaged as order.
And a massacre can be narrated as an act of salvation.

Perhaps that is why history must never be remembered only through the words of those who wrote it from positions of power.

---

And then the Bagh opened before me.

Today, there is green grass. There is water. There is a memorial standing with quiet dignity. There are lotuses around it, almost like tears frozen into flowers. There is a lamp lit in memory of those who breathed their last there.

Everything looks peaceful.

And perhaps that is the strangest part.

The place is beautiful today because the people who died there never got to see that beauty.

The ashes of Udham Singh rest here too.

Twenty-one years after Jallianwala Bagh, he travelled to England and assassinated Michael O'Dwyer, the former Lieutenant-Governor of Punjab, whom he held responsible for the political climate that enabled the massacre.

I stood before his ashes and wondered: What does twenty-one years of vengeance feel like?

Twenty-one years of remembering.
Twenty-one years of carrying anger.
Twenty-one years of carrying a wound that refuses to close.
How much pain must a person carry to hold on to a memory for two decades- and then cross continents to act upon it?

I wish I could have heard his story from him.

Not from a textbook. Not from a museum.

From him.

---

The well still stands.

Covered now. Protected. Preserved for generations to see.

The bullet marks still remain on the walls.    

28 here.
36 there.
………….And many more.

Numbers carved into stone.  But are they merely numbers!!

They are coordinates of grief.

Every bullet mark represents a moment when somebody's life changed forever.

And perhaps that is why I walked through Jallianwala Bagh differently. 

I was not simply walking through a historical monument. 

I was walking through the aftermath of someone's last day.

---

When I finally stood silently before the memorial, I had no words.

And even today, I don't know what I should have said.

Should I have said Sorry? We failed you?

Should I have said: We remember you?

We feel your pain?
We honour your sacrifice?
We can never repay what you gave us?

Or perhaps: Thank you. Because of what you endured, we live in an independent India today.

But even “thank you” felt painfully inadequate.

Because what do you say to someone who gave you the one thing you were born taking for granted?

FREEDOM

What do you say to those whose final moments became the foundation of someone else's tomorrow?

I stood there.

Silent and with all Silence in my mind.

And perhaps silence was the only honest response I had.

---

But I do have a request to my fellow Indians.

Please remember what these places are.

1. When you visit places that carry history, be silent enough to listen.

Not every place needs your photograph.
Not every place needs your laughter.
Not every place needs your commentary.

Some places deserve your silence.
Because when you stand at a site where people died, silence is not emptiness. It is respect.

2. Please don't turn memorials of death into spaces of entertainment.

Do not laugh.  Do not make jokes.
Do not behave as though you are simply visiting another tourist attraction.

Imagine someone cracking a joke beside a grave.

That is how it feels.

3. Tell these stories to our children.

Tell them that freedom did not arrive as a gift.

It came through imprisonment.
Through hunger.
Through humiliation.
Through sacrifice.
Through blood.
Through people who gave up the ordinary lives they could have lived so that generations after them could live extraordinary ones.

If our children know only that India became independent on 15 August 1947, they know a date.

If they understand what people endured to make that date possible, they understand history.

4. Preserve these places.

Not merely as monuments.
Not merely as tourist destinations.
But as living classrooms of memory.

Because a nation that forgets the places where it suffered eventually forgets the value of what it gained.

5. And finally, perhaps the most important one - They gave their lives for India to become independent.

We don't need to give our lives today.

We need to give something else.

RESPONSIBILITY.

Responsibility to our country. 
Responsibility to our Constitution.
Responsibility to one another.
Responsibility to question injustice. 
Responsibility to reject hatred. 
Responsibility to protect public spaces, institutions and the dignity of fellow citizens.

Responsibility to stop asking only: “What has my country given me?”

And occasionally ask: “What am I giving my country?”

Because independence was not the end of the struggle. It simply changed the nature of our responsibility.

---

As I walked out of Jallianwala Bagh that afternoon, the sun was still burning.

But I carried a different heat with me.

Not just anger. Not just grief. Something more heavier.

A responsibility.

And perhaps this is what Jallianwala Bagh whispered to me that day:

They did not die so that we could merely inherit a free country.
They died so that we could learn how precious freedom is.

So, when August 15^th arrives and we raise our flags, sing our anthem and celebrate our independence, perhaps we should pause for a moment.

Remember the walls.
Remember the well.
Remember the bullets.
Remember the nameless.
Remember the families that never returned home.

Remember the people whose tomorrow was taken away so that we could have ours.

And then ask ourselves one uncomfortable question:

If they paid for our freedom with their lives, what are we willing to pay for it with?

Not blood. Not martyrdom. Not death.

Our integrity.
Our responsibility.
Our citizenship.
Our courage to stand against injustice.
And our commitment to never take freedom for granted.

Because perhaps the greatest way to honor the dead… is not to keep mourning how they died. It is to live responsibly because they did. 

 

Lessons of Adversities

 

There are days when life grows quiet enough for our thoughts to become louder than the world around us.

Today is one of those days.

As I sit in silence, I find myself thinking about challenges, not the kind that simply test our strength, but the kind that quietly reshape who we become. Looking back, I realize that every storm I have walked through left behind something far more valuable than scars. It revealed people.

Adversity has a strange way of becoming the most honest mirror of human relationships. Success often gathers crowds, but hardship gently removes the masks. It tells us who truly belongs in our story and who was merely passing through.

Life has taught me that there are three kinds of people you should never forget.

The one who left you when you were struggling.

At first, their absence hurts. It feels like betrayal. You question your worth, replay conversations, and wonder what changed.

But with time, you understand something profound.

They didn't leave because the storm arrived. The storm simply revealed that they were never meant to be your shelter.

Just as autumn sheds leaves that cannot survive the season, life sometimes removes people who were only meant for your sunshine, not your winters. Their departure is painful, but it also creates space for stronger roots to grow.

The one who held your hand when everything seemed to fall apart.

These are rare souls.

They don't always have solutions. They may not possess wealth, influence, or extraordinary power. Yet they offer something infinitely more valuable....their unwavering presence.

Sometimes healing doesn't begin with advice. It begins with someone quietly sitting beside you, saying, "We'll find a way. I'll do my best." Those simple words remind you that you don't have to carry the weight alone.

Like a lighthouse that never stops shining through the fiercest storm, these people become your direction when your own vision is blurred. They become living reminders that humanity is still beautiful.

Never measure such people by what they gave you materially. Measure them by the hope they restored when you had almost lost your own.

And then, the one who put you into the problem.

Perhaps the hardest person to understand.

For a long time, we carry anger. We replay the injustice and wish things had happened differently.

Yet life has an unusual way of rewriting our understanding.

Many times, the person who wounded us unknowingly became the reason we discovered our strength. Had they not pushed us into discomfort, we might never have found the courage to rebuild ourselves.

A seed must first be disappear beneath the soil before it becomes a tree.

Gold must endure fire before it shines.

Diamonds are created under unimaginable pressure.

Not every painful chapter arrives to destroy us. Some arrive to reveal us.

This doesn't mean we celebrate the hurt or excuse those who caused it. It simply means we refuse to let bitterness write the final chapter of our lives.

As I reflect today, I realize that challenges are never merely about surviving difficult days.

They are life's way of introducing us to people, exposing truths, and shaping character.

Some people become lessons. Some become blessings. Some become both.

So if life feels difficult today, don't ask only,

"Why is this happening to me?"

Also ask,

"What is this moment trying to show me?" "Who is this season revealing?" "Who am I becoming because of it?" "What is life trying to teach me?"

Because long after the storm has passed, we rarely remember how hard the rain fell.

We remember who walked away....and what their absence taught us.

We remember who stood beside us.

And we remember the pain that, unexpectedly, became the turning point of our lives.

Perhaps that is the quiet wisdom hidden inside every adversity.

It doesn't just test our character.

It introduces us to it.

So today, I don't just wish you strength.

I wish for the birth of a new you...one who has learned without becoming bitter, who has loved without becoming fearful, who has fallen without forgetting how to rise, and who carries every scar not as a mark of suffering, but as a signature of growth.

May every challenge leave you wiser. May every wound leave you kinder. And may every ending quietly give birth to a stronger, gentler, and truer version of yourself.

The Favorite Place I Couldn't Choose!

 

Some questions don't just seek an answer. They quietly reveal something about us that we would have stopped noticing.

It happened during one of our usual late-night conversations, just another conversation between PIC besties (Prati, Indu and Chaitra). It was somewhere between the night of July 22nd and the early hours of the 23rd.

Out of nowhere, Chaitra asked me,

"Which is your favorite place you want to visit?"

To be sure, I asked, "Do you mean among the places I've already been to?"

She smiled and said, "Yes."

It sounded like one of the easiest questions anyone could ask.

Instead, it became one of the hardest.

Within seconds, twenty-five years of journeys began unfolding inside my mind. It wasn't a recollection it was a replay.

My thoughts wandered beyond countries and continents. They revisited long drives that never felt long enough. Solo journeys where silence became the best companion.
From Pondicherry's cyclone to Leh–Ladakh's breathtaking landscapes; from the mountains of Sikkim to the deserts of Rajasthan; from the Titanic Museum in the US to the majestic Alps viewed from Milan; and from midnight shopping in Singapore to countless other unforgettable moments - every memory came rushing back.
Treks that tested my endurance. Ancient temples that humbled me. Museums that whispered forgotten stories. Magnificent architecture. Timeless monuments. Caves carved out of mountains. Skyscrapers touching the clouds. Adventure sports that made my heart race.

Every destination came alive. Every journey carried a story. Every place seemed to compete for the same space in my heart.

Choosing one suddenly felt impossible.

As Chaitra patiently waited, I finally answered,

"Ellora."

More specifically, the Kailasanatha Temple.

Even today, I find myself wondering how human beings imagined something so magnificent, let alone carved an entire temple out of a single rock. It continues to leave me speechless.

She simply smiled and said,

"Interesting."

Then she moved on to the next question.

The conversation continued.

But my mind didn't.

Long after the conversation ended, that one question stayed with me.

Why did I take so long to answer something so simple?

Why did every place feel equally meaningful?

Why couldn't I instantly name a favorite?

The more I reflected, the more I realized that perhaps I wasn't choosing between places at all.

Psychology tells us that memories are rarely stored as isolated events. They are encoded with emotions, relationships, struggles, achievements, sounds, smells, and the version of ourselves that existed in that moment. We don't merely remember a destination; we remember who we became while we were there.

Maybe that is why every place came rushing back.

Pondicherry wasn't just a coastal town. It reminded me of how powerful nature is!

Solo drives weren't about roads. They reminded me that solitude can be peaceful instead of lonely.

Treks weren't merely mountains. They reminded me that every difficult climb eventually rewards you with a different view.

Museums weren't collections of artefacts. They reminded me that every generation leaves behind a story waiting to be understood.

Singapore and Sri Lanka weren't just another country to visit. It carried conversations, laughter, discoveries, unexpected moments, and memories that photographs can never fully capture.

And Ellora?

It represented 'Wonder'.

It reminded me that human imagination is capable of creating what logic initially believes to be impossible.

That's when another thought quietly emerged.

Perhaps our favorite place is never determined by its beauty.

It is determined by the emotion it awakened within us.

The place becomes memorable because something inside us changed while we were there.

That late-night question also made me realize something else.

Maybe the most beautiful journeys are not measured in kilometers travelled, countries visited, or photographs collected.

They are measured by the number of times life quietly reshapes who we are.

So, if someone asks me again, "Which is your favourite place?"

I may still say "Ellora."

But now I know why it took me so long.

I wasn't searching for a destination.
I was searching through decades of becoming.
Perhaps we never truly fall in love with places.

We fall in love with the version of ourselves that those places quietly helped us discover.

 

Have We Really Evolved?

 

Sometimes a thought arrives so quietly that it refuses to leave.

Today, it came disguised as a question.

Have we really evolved... or have we merely become technologically advanced?

And then another question followed, one that my friend Chaitra asked me:

"Who are we to judge?"

That question stayed with me as I am writing this!

I am writing this from Sakleshpur.

Ironically, I travelled here for one reason alone to meet silence.

Not luxury.  Not sightseeing. Not adventure.

Just silence.

I deliberately chose a weekday, imagining empty pathways, birdsong, rustling coffee plantations, and the kind of quiet that slowly untangles your thoughts.

When we arrived in the afternoon, it was almost that.

The coffee estates stretched endlessly in shades of green. The breeze carried the scent of wet earth. Somewhere a bird called out. Nature wasn't trying to impress anyone. It was simply being itself.

There was one group already dancing, laughing loudly, playing music.

I smiled to myself. "It's temporary," I thought. A harmless interruption.

Then another group checked in.

By evening, everyone had dressed up not for dinner, but for cameras.

Tripods appeared. Phones were mounted with hard hitting speakers. Music blasted.

One reel after another. One dance after another.

As darkness settled over the plantations, something strange happened.

One group increased the volume. The other group increased theirs.

It became less about music and more about winning.

The night no longer belonged to the crickets or the wind.

It belonged to speakers.

I had carried two books with me.

Books that had patiently waited weeks to be opened in a place exactly like this.

What a beautiful assumption that turned out to be.

Oddly enough, there was more noise here than back home in Bengaluru.

And that is when another question quietly entered my mind.

Why do we travel hundreds of kilometres to escape the city... only to recreate it?

If all we wanted was loud music, dancing, and celebration, our cities already have countless pubs, clubs and banquet halls.

Why bring all of that into the one place that asks for none of it?

Perhaps because we rarely ask ourselves a simple question: Is freedom the ability to do whatever I want... or the wisdom to know when not to?

I looked around.

Coffee plants.

Towering trees.

Birds returning to their nests.

Insects beginning their nightly orchestra.

For a moment I wondered...

What would this evening feel like if I weren't human?

Suppose I were a bird living on one of these branches.

Or an owl preparing to hunt.

Or even a tiny insect whose world existed entirely within this forest.

How would this sudden invasion feel?

Imagine someone walking into your home uninvited.

Rearranging your furniture.

Playing loud music.

Ignoring your discomfort simply because you couldn't protest.

Wouldn't that feel like an intrusion?

Perhaps that is exactly what we unknowingly become in nature.

Visitors who behave like owners.

And then Chaitra's question returned.

"Who are we to judge?"

She was right. To them, this was joy.

To me, joy was listening to leaves and wind moving.

Neither emotion is wrong.

But somewhere between my freedom and your freedom lies a forgotten word.

Consideration.

Civilizations are not built because people become freer.

They are built because people learn where their freedom ends.

Lately I've noticed something else.

We seem to be documenting life more than living it.

Roads become dance floors. Pilgrimage centres become filming locations. Public transport becomes content studios. Every beautiful place becomes another backdrop.

There is nothing wrong with creating content. Nothing wrong with dancing. Nothing wrong with celebration.

But somewhere we've confused attention with expression, and visibility with meaning.

Not everything beautiful needs to become content.

Some moments deserve witnesses, not cameras.

Some places deserve silence, not speakers.

The more I thought about it, the less this felt like a story about noise. It felt like a story about awareness.

Education teaches us how to make a living. Evolution should teach us how to live together.

Those are not the same thing.

Perhaps the real measure of an evolved human being is not intelligence.

Not degrees. Not technology. Not followers.

It is the ability to enter a shared space without disturbing its balance. To recognize that every place already has a rhythm before we arrive.

And maturity is knowing we don't always have to become the loudest sound in it.

Maybe evolution begins the day we stop asking,

"Am I free to do this?" and start asking,

"Who else will bear the cost of my freedom?"

Because every choice leaves a footprint.

Some leave memories. Some leave scars.

And the most evolved among us are not those who occupy the most space...

They are the ones who know how to leave space for everyone else.

Perhaps that is what civilization has always been.

Not controlling people. But cultivating enough awareness that control is no longer necessary.

 

The Invisible Currency We Often Forget to Count

Have you ever paused long enough to notice that life has an extraordinary memory?

Not the memory of grand achievements or milestones. Those often fade with time.

I'm talking about the quiet moments.

The bowl of snacks you casually shared.
The unexpected phone call.
The cup of tea someone made without being asked.
The stranger who chose to help instead of simply walking away.

Life has an uncanny way of preserving these seemingly insignificant moments. And then, often when you least expect it, it brings them back to you—wearing a different face.

Lately, I've found myself witnessing this more often than ever.

At one of the organizations where I serve as an HR Advisor, there is a tiny snack counter. Nothing extravagant. Just the familiar comfort of crunchy Indian snacks that somehow make long meetings and busy afternoons a little more bearable.

Almost unconsciously, whenever I pick up a bowl for myself, I pick up another for my WorkBro—a little term I coined for a colleague who has become more like family than a coworker.

There has never been a reason behind it.
No expectation.  No obligation.  No calculation.

Just a simple habit of sharing.

Perhaps that's how I've always been.

If I bring fruits from home, most of them gets a share.
If I prepare a healthy drink, someone else tastes it first.
If I discover something good, my instinct is rarely to keep it to myself.

Giving has never felt like an act.

It has simply felt natural.

And then something beautifully ordinary happened today.

As I sat immersed in work, the very same bowl quietly appeared on my table.

"This is for you," my WorkBro smiled.

Nothing dramatic had happened.

The bowl had merely changed hands.

Yet in that small exchange, life whispered one of its oldest lessons.

Kindness has a remarkable memory.

People notice far more than we imagine. Not everyone expresses it.

But many carry it within them until one day, it quietly finds its way back.

Almost like an echo. 

Yesterday offered another reminder.

I had driven nearly forty kilometres across the city for work. By afternoon, both my energy and enthusiasm had nearly run dry.

Coincidentally, the route took me past my dear friend Indu's home.

Now Indu is one of those rare people whose kitchen feels like an extension of her heart.

I called her with complete honesty.

"I'm hungry."

Nothing more.

By the time I reached, a steaming hot, spicy snack was waiting.

Not ordered. Not planned. Simply prepared.

I ate with the kind of gratitude that only genuine exhaustion can produce.

As I was leaving, she smiled apologetically.

"I wanted to make something sweet too... there just wasn't enough time."

That sentence stayed with me.

I had asked for nothing more than a portion of snack

Yet her mind was already wondering what else she could have done.

That is abundance.

Not abundance of food. Abundance of heart.

A few days earlier, after returning from a tiring walk, I stopped by my parents' home.

I casually mentioned that I was craving something sweet.

Within moments my mother arrived—not with one dessert, but two.

When I protested, she laughed.

"When you ask for one, you get two. You hardly ask for anything."

Only a mother can make generosity sound so ordinary.

And perhaps that is what love always does.

It gives more than was requested.

Even complete strangers have taught me this.

Whenever I drive through unfamiliar towns, I instinctively trust people more than Google Maps.

Maps know roads. People know journeys.

One memory remains unforgettable.

After travelling through Belum Caves and Gandikota, I was heading towards Penukonda when Google Maps confidently directed me onto a road that seemed determined to disappear into darkness.

Road construction.

No street lights. No people. No certainty. Just silence.

A small truck happened to stop behind me.

I asked for directions.

The driver didn't explain.

He simply smiled.

"Follow us."

For the next several kilometres, they led me through winding village roads until I safely reached the highway.

Then they waved and disappeared into the night.

We have probably never met before. We may never meet again.

Yet for a brief moment, they became custodians of my journey.

When I look back, I realise something.

Truth be told, these are merely a handful of stories from an ever-growing collection. There have been umpteen instances of generosity, affection, unexpected kindness, and quiet grace that life has generously placed along my path. Some lasted only a few minutes. Others became lifelong memories. Yet each one left behind a gentle reminder that the world is far kinder than we often believe provided we choose to notice it.

Perhaps that is what makes life so beautiful. Not that extraordinary things happen every day, but that ordinary moments become extraordinary when viewed through the lens of gratitude.

Perhaps life has always been generous to all of us. Some of us have simply learnt to notice. 

Not because extraordinary things happened. But because ordinary people repeatedly chose kindness.

Friends. Parents. Colleagues. Complete strangers.

Each adding a small brushstroke to the larger canvas of my life.

Which makes me wonder...

How many such moments pass unnoticed in our own lives? 
How often do we pause to acknowledge the invisible hands that quietly make our lives easier?

And perhaps an even more uncomfortable question...

Do we return what we receive?

Because gratitude is incomplete if it ends with just appreciation. Indeed its true expression is reciprocity.

There are people who keep receiving kindness, opportunities, encouragement, affection, support...

Yet somewhere along the way, they stop becoming contributors.

Relationships begin to feel one-sided. Conversations become transactional. The flow quietly dries up.
Not because life became less generous. 
But because generosity was no longer allowed to circulate.

I've come to believe that kindness behaves much like water.

When it flows, it nourishes everything around it. When it is contained only for ourselves, it eventually stagnates.

Perhaps gratitude isn't merely saying thank you. Perhaps gratitude is becoming the reason someone else has a story worth telling.

Because life rarely returns to us the exact favour we once offered. It returns something far more beautiful.

The spirit in which we chose to give.

And maybe that's how life comes full circle. 

Not through coincidence. But through countless hearts quietly choosing to keep goodness in motion.

A Morning Thought: The Power of Travel

 

This morning, as I woke up and checked my messages, a habit I’ve developed, where the ones from the closest people always grab my attention first, I saw a photo from Chaitra. She had been in Haridwar before dawn, standing by the Ganga. The temple lights shimmered on the water, and the steps leading to Brahma Kund looked so peaceful and serene.  She simply mentioned, “I’m experiencing something different,” and that hit me.      

We all love to travel, don’t we? I know I do. I’ve often thought about how I categorize my travels into three different buckets - professional, personal, and transactional. Each of these helps break the routine in different ways, exposing me to new cultures, different people, and sometimes even a new language. It’s like hitting refresh button on my mind.

But then I wondered… why do we feel so different when we travel? 

Why does stepping away from our daily life give us that fresh energy, new ideas, and a sense of excitement?

Here’s what I think: When we travel, our brains are flooded with new experiences. This sense of novelty stimulates our brain, giving us a hit of dopamine the chemical responsible for pleasure and motivation. It’s like a spark that makes us feel alive and engaged, pushing us to be curious and open. We get this mental break, and suddenly, we’re more flexible, more willing to embrace new things - emotionally and mentally.

It’s also about perspective. When we’re away from home, removed from the daily grind, we
start seeing things differently. Life becomes clearer. You know that feeling when you take a step back from everything and think, “Wow, I can see things so much more objectively now”? It’s called self-distancing - giving ourselves space to think things through, to find clarity. And when we’re traveling, we often give ourselves that space.

Travel makes us more mindful. Have you noticed how, when we’re somewhere new, we’re more present? We notice the smallest details, savour experiences we might ignore at home. There’s something about being in an unfamiliar place that encourages us to slow down, to appreciate the little things. It’s almost like a reset button for our mental well-being.

But there’s more. Travel is also a chance to explore who we really are. I think we spend so much of our lives trying to figure out our identity, but travel gives us the opportunity to test it. New places, challenging people, unfamiliar situations - it all forces us to step out of our comfort zone and, in turn, expand our sense of self. It’s like we discover new versions of ourselves, constantly evolving.

And of course, meeting new people. There's something special about the connections we make when we’re traveling, isn’t there? Whether it’s a brief chat with a stranger or a deeper connection, those interactions release oxytocin - the “bonding hormone”- and suddenly, we feel more connected, more alive. There's this quiet joy in feeling like you belong, even in a place where you don't know anyone.

I also think there’s this sense of freedom that travel brings. We all crave it - freedom to be ourselves, to act without the weight of expectations. When we travel, we shed the roles we play back home and step into a space where no one knows us, where we can just be. There’s this liberation that boosts our confidence and well-being, and it feels so good.

Travel opens our minds in so many ways, especially when it comes to culture. I think exposure to new cultures is one of the most important things we can experience. It challenges our beliefs, broadens our worldview, and teaches us to adapt. The more we experience, the more we realize how much more there is to see, and how much we still have to learn.

So, it’s not just about the places we visit - it’s about the changes that happen inside us. Travel isn’t just a change of scenery; it’s a shift in our minds and hearts. It’s about feeling different, feeling enriched, and feeling like we’ve grown a little bit more.

Next time you’re feeling stuck or caught in routine, maybe it’s time for a change of scenery. Take a trip - big or small and let it shift your perspective. You never know how much it could change you.