As a privileged, Mumbai kid, a part of me, though I\u2019d never admit it out loud, longed to be amongst the popular kids. You will soon learn that I am not bragging when I say this, but I was. At least when it came to school – I was surrounded by a large group of people who I thought were my friends, I had a ~boyfriend~, I was a back-bencher (who did better than some mid-benchers when it came to grades) and I was that confident, bold (read: mannerless), girl who pretended to not care about anyone.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n
When I joined junior college, I realised that I wasn\u2019t cool at all. Being \u2018cool\u2019 meant hooking up, not having a boyfriend. Being \u2018cool\u2019 meant meeting up at joints for a smoke, which I didn\u2019t. Being \u2018cool\u2019 meant going clubbing every Saturday, but I\u2019d much rather spend my Saturday nights watching Jab We Met for the hundredth time. I spent two years feeling conflicted and out of place.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n
By the time I reached my degree college, I stopped caring. I stopped caring about trying to \u2018fit in\u2019 or being ‘cool\u2019 and preferred staying unknown. I attended my lectures (twice in a week or so) and left immediately while others stayed back, chilled and had the time of their life. I stopped making friends actively. How I got out of my shell is a story for some other time, but I\u2019ll get to the point I\u2019m trying to make before I have you clicking out of this monologue.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n
From being someone who cared too much to someone who didn\u2019t care at all to becoming someone who finds the right balance, I\u2019ve come a long way. Of course, at this point, you must be wondering, \u201cTasneem, everyone finds their own balance, what\u2019s the big deal?\u201d<\/em> <\/p>\n\n\n\n It\u2019s this. My balance involves cutting off from almost every person in my life – barring, probably, 15. If you asked me how many people would I invite to my close, intimate wedding, I would name only 15. But let me be very frank when I say this – those 15 people? They are the ones I expect to actually show up at my open-for-all funeral. <\/p>\n\n\n\n I am done trying to have a huge friend circle whose birthday\u2019s I can\u2019t keep a track of. I am done trying to impress people with whom I\u2019ve not discussed my passion. I am done being connected to people I have not had more than 5 proper conversations with on social media. <\/p>\n\n\n\n When I say I am done, I mean I won\u2019t courtesy wish you on your birthday just because I saw it on your story. I won\u2019t say, \u201cOh let\u2019s meet, it has been so long.\u201d without having any intentions to follow through with the plan. I won\u2019t repost your art because \u2018that\u2019s what friends are supposed to do\u2019, balls I\u2019d rather repost a stranger\u2019s work, that I actually appreciate. <\/p>\n\n\n\n I am getting good at it because not more than 2% of these people realise that I have cut them off. That\u2019s the truth of it all. That\u2019s the definition of what those relationships were in my life. The Surface Troopers, I\u2019d like to call them. One\u2019s who never cared about my existence beyond becoming a topic of gossip. Now they are somebody that I used to know.\u00a0(Yes, I am quoting Gotye song lyrics, deal with it.) To tell you the truth, I have never felt more at peace. So If you’re looking for a sign to cut off your surface troopers, this is it. Just be unapologetic and unabashed and you will see how easy it was all along. <\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Okay, it’s time for real talk. Pull up your chair and gather around because I am about to tell you a story. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":75,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false},"categories":[2],"tags":[27,25,28,22,23,26,24],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/inappropriatenotions.orderstack.xyz\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/inappropriatenotions.orderstack.xyz\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/inappropriatenotions.orderstack.xyz\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inappropriatenotions.orderstack.xyz\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inappropriatenotions.orderstack.xyz\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=74"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/inappropriatenotions.orderstack.xyz\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":76,"href":"https:\/\/inappropriatenotions.orderstack.xyz\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74\/revisions\/76"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inappropriatenotions.orderstack.xyz\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/75"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/inappropriatenotions.orderstack.xyz\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=74"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inappropriatenotions.orderstack.xyz\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=74"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inappropriatenotions.orderstack.xyz\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=74"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}