10 DAYS

Today is the first day I’m fully on my own in a year. That’s a long time for someone like me.

I have the next 10 days entirely to myself. No family, no friends, no partner within a thousand-mile radius. No interruptions — except the ones I create. I’m wondering: what’s the most I can make of this time?

I say “on my own” and not “alone,” because it doesn’t feel that way — at least not right now.

This morning, before sunrise, my partner got up to catch an early flight. One of my first thoughts was of a memory from childhood — I was just shy of ten. My dad had already moved from Bombay to Kuwait, and now my mom, brother, and I were heading there too. I had said goodbye to my friends, my school, the life I had known. I knew the drill, I had done it many times before. But at the airport, something unexpected happened: my passport had expired.

I don’t remember feeling angry or upset. Forgotten, maybe — that was a theme in my childhood. But somehow, this incident didn’t carry that weight. Everything went smoothly: my mom and brother boarded the flight, and I returned to our apartment to stay with our caretaker and my mom’s assistant while waiting for my new passport.

That week turned out to be one of the most fun and memorable of my childhood. Sang and Shruti took care of me like cool aunts. There were no rules — it was total freedom. We ordered Pizza Hut, drank Coke, devoured bags of Lays chips and Cadbury chocolate. We blasted music and danced around the living room. We watched womens WWE on TV and wrestled each other. I wore my mom’s heels and lipstick. We even went to the cinema — was it Geity or Globus? I can’t remember.

One day, I hung out with Shruti’s college friends. She was in fashion school and interning for my mom. Sitting in a café with her and her friends, I felt like one of the cool kids. Probably not something my parents would have approved of.

This morning, the memory resurfaced — and with it, the realization that I’ve always had a complicated relationship with community and autonomy. I’m finally addressing these things, 30 years into life. People have pointed out that I didn’t have a “normal” childhood — we moved cities or countries every few years. Did detachment become a coping mechanism? Have I really processed the loss — of friends, of homes, of places I once belonged? Or is this simply the kind of person I am? Maybe I’ll never know. 

I’m circling around these questions now. My partner, D, is the opposite. He grew up in the same house his whole life. He feels separation more deeply than I do. The other day, my dad visited for three days. I hadn’t seen him in seven months, and we had no idea when we’d see each other again. This bothered D. He asked if it made me sad — but it didn’t. I just trusted that we would see each other again eventually.

D has known profound loss in his life, the kind I haven’t yet experienced. Maybe that makes a big difference. I’m casual — nonchalant — about hellos and goodbyes. But I wonder: is that a defense mechanism I built long ago?

When I was leaving Kuwait to move to Berkeley at 16, my best friend at the time, Alia, said to me: “there are no goodbyes, just ‘see-you-laters’”. 

In Hindu philosophy, there’s the concept of samskara — deep impressions or imprints that shape our behavior, character, and preferences. A samskara might explain why you have an aversion to something — say, driving — without a clear reason. The idea is that a past experience, even from another lifetime, could be affecting you now.

To work through a samskara, you find its source. Through a set of techniques, you look at it over and over, uncovering its roots and eventually “de-charging” its emotional hold. Of course, not every behavior can be traced to a samskara, and the point isn’t to “fix” yourself — but to understand, and act from free will rather than conditioning.

One of my recurring patterns lies in the tension between community and solitude. Being with others gives me immense joy and meaning — and yet, it’s often emotionally charged. Similarly, solitude nourishes me deeply — but I sometimes use it to hide or escape. The inner work I’ve done around this has offered insight, but I’m still in the thick of it.

So I’m writing this, maybe more for myself than anyone else. What do I want these next 10 days to look like? Where can solitude bring me closer to the parts of myself that don’t get to speak in community? What am I really longing for when I crave space?

A couple months ago, I ran an experiment. I anonymously shared parts of my birth chart with various large language models and asked for reflections. Here’s some of what came back:

“The Moon-Venus opposition indicates tension between emotional needs (Moon in Aries) and desires for harmony and connection (Venus in Libra). Adding Jupiter intensifies this polarity, suggesting a struggle to balance independence with relationships. Emotional expression may be bold and impulsive, while relationships require diplomacy and compromise. The Moon in Aries conjunct the South Node indicates a karmic pull toward individuality and self-assertion, yet growth (North Node in Libra) lies in collaboration and partnerships.” and “The Libra-Aries axis emphasizes learning to balance personal independence with cooperative relationships.”

Read me to filth, Chat GPT. It was wild how spot-on it was. I’m still thinking about it, months later.

I am stepping into these next ten days feeling optimistic. It’s the first time in a while I don’t have to consider anyone else’s needs or desires but my own. I hope it’s fruitful, filled with creative experiments, and maybe even some insights.

Wish me luck.
xoxo
Reaa