What Are You Running From?
My mother asked me what I am running from. The honest answer is nothing - and everything. This is about living alone in the mountains, being okay with yourself, and why tomorrow will always be a good
“How long will you be in Yuksom? Don’t you think three months is enough for a break?”
My mother asked this over a phone call. I knew this conversation would come sooner or later.
I wasn’t angry. Not even slightly. She has given her life to her family and nothing I say or do will come close to matching that. So when she asks hard questions I answer them honestly.
“I haven’t thought of coming back to Bangalore. I don’t have a reason to come back - I am living the same life here that I was living there.”
She was patient with that. Then she added - “Why live in someone else’s house? Why live such a tough life when you have a beautiful, comfortable home in Bangalore?”
And then: “What are you running away from? You had friends there. Living alone for so long isn’t good.”
That sentence has two parts I want to sit with. What I am running from. And living by yourself.
What am I running from?
Honestly - nothing. Or to some extent, yes.
City life doesn’t interest me anymore. The traffic, the noise, the mad rush. When I lived in Bangalore I was already mostly by myself - but even going for a coffee meant getting on a vehicle, sitting in traffic for thirty minutes for a five kilometre ride, having the coffee, and coming back. In Yuksom if I want to go anywhere I just walk. Unless I’m going to Geyzing, I don’t need a vehicle. Less crowd, more forest, mountains that never end.
I didn’t plan to stay three months. I came here and found everything I need - mountains, trails, a gym, less noise, and a kind of love that’s hard to name. I live the same life, follow the same routine, do the same things almost every day. And I’m not bored. I love routine. The days I don’t follow it I go slightly mad.
I am completely okay with where I am and what I’m doing. I don’t know when I’ll go back and if I have to I will - but not because someone has decided I must be running from something.
My mother can ask me this question again and again. I’ll answer the same way every time, with the same decency.
Living by yourself
There was a time I couldn’t be with myself for ten minutes. I found escape in drinking, partying, looking for love, someone to talk to - only to eventually understand that the peace or love I was looking for was already inside. You can only access it once you stop needing other people to complete you.
I still love people. I still believe in love. But I no longer need company to feel okay. That shift started with running, continued with Vipassana, and settled somewhere in the mountains of Yuksom.
Though I’ll be honest. There are days when all of this means nothing. I’ll sit in my room, try to meditate, fail completely, grab some chips and a Coke, watch reels, listen to music, and go to sleep.
Because I know tomorrow will be a good day. And I’ll be back to my routine.
Shivam.
🙌👍🏃