Sadboi Hours

As I fall back into unhelpful thinking patterns and these hightened * $ ~ EmOTioNS $ ~ * I just wanted to talk about one of my fav memories.

Before leaving Delhi, I was going all cray cray about classes because it felt like a YOLO thing, you know? People might have ragers and stuff before leaving towns but I was taking classes. In hindsight, I could have traveled around a bit and maybe gone to a couple of places I hadn't been able to go before. I can think about a couple of reasons why that didn't happen but this is not about that.

It's about the improv session I did manage to go to. Absolute nuts of me. Just yesterday, there was a business session thing and I didn't ask a question because you needed to go to a podium and I hated the thought of that much attention. I do not enjoy it unless I am a part of a group choreographed dance. Here I was walking into something which was hypothetically going to happen on a stage and I had nobody going with me to hide behind.

Turned out, improv was actually cool! Maybe all improv groups aren't that way. This improv group was specially focused on mental health too, if I remember correctly it was about being able to say no? There was performing but there was no stage. It came after the ice-breaker rounds. They genuinely did take away a lot of the weirdness from the whole thing. The first thing we go around the room and look at people in the eye. Then compliment one thing about them. Sounds a little like cult-like, no? Things I would never do in a million years. Yet after you get past the discomfort, it's a nice feeling. 

I wouldn't participate easily when these guys started performing. Basically what was happening is, a couple of people were in the center and you tag in somebody else (who actively wants to) to come in your place. The moderator person was super nice about it, asked a couple of times but didn't push people in - honestly a big relief! I finally did walk in. Once. It was okay, I guess. The mod guy later paused the whole activity to talk about a nice thing I did in my two minutes. Something about how the whole point of improv is to adapt and I did that really well because I rolled with the co-star instead of making it my scene.

But my fav memory comes at the end (especially after the breaks where I was lurking around super uncomfortably not knowing what to do when everyone spoke to each other). The group does an exercise where you gather in a circle and it was called something like a cooking pot thing. You throw in an imaginary fistful of something into the center and talk about someone you appreciated and why (among other things that I can't recall). I thanked the instructor because this is a difficult 2 hours that could have gone horribly wrong (for me). It could have put me off from any group activity. It didn't though. At best, people are good. At worst, indifferent. 

This girl though randomly spoke about me. I do not remember her name. I was so surprised. She said she saw me come in alone and try to do my thing. Basically she'd noticed me making my way through the whole thing I guess. I've been told that I'm transparent with my emotions so I'm sure my face reflected whatever I'd felt during the experience. So, this random girl who I'm sure still doesn't know that she left me with this thought, found the whole thing amazing and inspiring. :)

I think about that unexpected appreciation and validation sometimes.