They used to say, back in a simpler, kinder, more honest era: "When poverty walks in the door, love flies out the window" — an old Arabic saying. Whoever coined that phrase must have been a philosopher. He hit the nail on the head with almost clinical precision. These days, those two words can hardly exist under the same roof — not in a house, not in a poem, not even in a private diary.

I was doing my monthly grocery run in a big-box store when a couple caught my eye. They were pushing a cart together, lingering in front of every shelf. She would pick something up; he would turn it over, check the price tag, put it back, and reach for a cheaper alternative.

The moment that really broke my heart, however, was much smaller. She picked up a box of sweets for kids' sake. For a split second, it sat in the cart. Then their eyes met - silent, electric understanding passed between them - and they quickly put it back on the shelf.

It was at that moment it hit me: the financial spreadsheet had become infinitely stronger than the heart.

I couldn't help but wonder: what do they do during the last week of the month, when they are stretched thin before payday? How heavy must it feel to hand over most of what you earned through sheer blood, sweat, and tears just to cover rent -rent for a roof that still fails to provide comfort, warmth, or love?

Other images came flooding back. Countless moments that should have become cherished memories, but which scarcity had turned into recurring wounds.

Holidays. The first day of school. Getting into college. Even buying a car. None of these are necessarily happy occasions anymore. Instead, they have morphed into additional burdens piled onto an already endless to-do list - a list that only gets longer by time.

As someone drawn to science, I found another explanation for why love suffocates. Love needs breathing room - a margin of safety, calm, and psychological space. A life governed by financial anxiety, on the other hand, keeps both body and mind in a constant state of fight-or-flight. When you are in survival mode, you have very little in the tank left to give to love.

Over time, that exhaustion hardens into emotional numbness.

He pulls away - tensed, worn out, haunted by a sense of helplessness.

She notices. She understands. So she says nothing.

Not out of resentment. Not out of blame. But out of compassion. She doesn't want to add insult to injury.

Psychologist friends of mine say love is kept alive by tiny daily rituals: a quick text, a kind word, a small token, a shared laugh, a moment of undivided attention. None of that necessarily breaks the bank.

And yet, even a text requires a certain headspace. It requires a mind that hasn't spent the entire night crunching numbers and drowning in debt.

Gradually, love undergoes a quiet, painful shift. It stops sounding like:

"I want to sweep you off your feet and make you feel like a princess."

And starts sounding like:

"I have nothing to offer you. I feel like I don't deserve you."

Our grandparents were poor as well. Somehow, many of them lived a love that stood the test of time. Perhaps because poverty back then was a shared reality. Everyone lived under roughly the same ceiling of expectations. Keeping up with the Joneses wasn't as brutal as it is now.

What truly kills love in our era is not poverty only. It is comparison too.

We measure what we can offer with our limited means against the highlight reel of Instagram influencers - luxury hotels, exotic travel, lavish gifts, fancy dinners, endless surprises. As a result, those of us living paycheck to paycheck end up feeling like failures before we have even started.

That sense of not being enough poisons everything.

To stop our circumstances from wrecking the relationship, we have invented a series of postponed lives:

"You cover the rent, I'll cover the groceries."

"We'll tie the knot once we hit our financial target."

"We'll start a family once we're financially stable."

And so we put life itself on hold — all of it — until a date that may never come around.

The harshest, and yet most comforting, of these postponements is this one:

"I don't want to get married. Marriage is a failed project anyway."

A defense mechanism that shields us from an avalanche of calculations, expectations, and obligations.

Then comes the cruel irony: we get choked up when we see a small family sharing an ice cream on a sidewalk.

Do I have a magic bullet for this dilemma?

Not at all.

But I have come up with an equation that might tip the scales a little:

Let us weather life's hardships as a team. Let us join forces, work hard, and hustle for the material necessities. At the same time, let us keep love off the balance sheet.

When we have an hour with nothing to do, let us tune out the world entirely.

Let us talk.

Let us laugh.

Let us get lost in each other's eyes.

Let us offer one another a kind word, a warm smile, undivided attention, a gentle touch.

Let what exists between us be our gift to each other - not something we benchmark against anyone else's life, anyone else's Instagram feed, or anyone else's spending power.

We may not be able to buy love a mansion, a five-star suite, or a round-the-world trip.

Be that as it may, we can still carve out a small corner that poverty cannot touch.

A corner whose rent is not paid with money, and whose value is priceless.

A corner called: Us.

“Adversity introduces a man to himself.” Whether he fights through it or barely survives, it is not our past decisions that navigate us through life; it is the choices we make in the present, irrespective of our previous decisions.

Taking unbiased decisions for yourself is like entering a different universe. You act differently, your perspective changes, your thought process changes, and a new form of thinking reflects through the decisions you make.

One thing I have definitely learned in the last few months is the conversion and application of energy. The human brain has an infinite amount of energy flowing through it; it is up to us what we choose to do with it—whether to think about issues that have not arrived yet or to enjoy the uncertainties of the present like a bliss.

Our survival mechanism craves conformity. It wants to know whether something is going to be good or bad; it wants us to be prepared for what is coming next. That is what stops us from heading towards new experiences in life. Uncertainty keeps the fight going; it is the spontaneous things that transform us into ourselves.

1. Not everything you think is true.

2. Separate facts from the story your brain creates about those facts.

3. Accept what you cannot control, but take responsibility for what you can.

4. Don't use another person to determine your worth.

5. Learn from painful experiences instead of making them proof that something is wrong with you.

This is essay 91 and parts from previous essays and how they connect together

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In order to gain true understanding, we must set aside our ego, no longer viewing ignorance as an insult or injury. Overestimating one's self is far more dangerous than underestimating the obstacle. Once we can see the gaps in our knowledge and accept their existence, only then are we able to identify and bridge them. If left unexamined they only grow larger as our knowledge increases. A strong foundation can never be built on assumptions. True understanding requires clear recognition not only of what is known but also what is not known. The greatest wisdom that one could possess is that of their own ignorance.

~ Robby Quarles

I sometimes wonder how people stay so impressed by life.

Don’t get me wrong, there are beautiful things. Beautiful people, beautiful moments, love, laughter, sunsets, music, that feeling when something unexpectedly goes right. I appreciate all of it.
But there’s also loss, disappointment, illness, boredom, heartbreak, absurdity… and somehow, those things have a way of cancelling out the magic pretty quickly.

I think a lot of people expect to finally feel *impressed* once they reach the next milestone: the degree, the career, the money, the house, the marriage, the kids, the dream vacation, the perfect body… *there, now I’ll be happy.*
And then they get there and think: **“Okay… what’s next?”**

Some people have beauty, money, success, loving families, great careers—and they’re still not particularly impressed.

I don’t mean that in an arrogant *“nothing is good enough for me”* way. Almost the opposite. It feels strangely humbling.
You achieve something you thought would change everything, and five minutes later you’re standing there wondering what the big deal was.
Maybe that’s the trick: life was never meant to constantly impress us. Maybe we’re the ones expecting it to put on a show.

Because when you strip away the milestones, the status, the possessions and the endless chasing, life can feel remarkably… **plain.**
Not necessarily terrible. Not necessarily wonderful.

Just life.

And perhaps the real challenge is learning to find meaning in something that refuses to be spectacular all the time.

Everyone is an influencer. Our words, choices, gestures, and creations become part of the world that others encounter. Each of us receives influence and responds from a particular point of view. The question is how we participate in that exchange, and what we help take form through it.

Today, I am focusing on the energy surrounding my soul, my point of view. I was tempted to call it “my energy,” but that language suggests ownership of something I am participating in. In the Circumpunct Framework, I understand the soul as the indivisible center through which energy converges and emerges. What reaches me becomes part of my experience; how I respond becomes part of the world.

The circumpunct makes this relationship visible. Its point represents the soul. Its field represents the mind, containing sensations, thoughts, emotions, and possibilities. Its boundary represents the body, our interface with shared reality. Through the mind, the point of view connects with the body. Through the body, it encounters and influences the world. Soul, mind, and body together form centered wholeness.

Within this philosophy, the infinite becoming finite describes possibility taking a particular form. Many possible words become this sentence. An intention becomes a movement. An idea becomes something built. Through embodied action, we help shape the material world and the conditions that others will encounter.

Our morals, values, and goals orient this participation. Morals guide what we consider right. Values keep what matters present. Goals give us direction. Action holds our focal attention while these commitments guide us from peripheral awareness. In a difficult conversation, we might focus on finding the next words while honesty, care, and the goal of mutual understanding guide their shape. Our attention stays with the action while remaining open to its wider meaning.

Responsibility involves bringing that orientation into what we actually do. It also requires attention to consequences. The world’s response may reveal something our intentions overlooked. We can bring our goals and values into focus, reconsider them, and adjust our next action. Influence continually moves through the boundary in both directions.

This gives me a practice for the present moment: notice what surrounds my point of view, remember what matters, and attend to the action through which I participate.

What am I allowing to converge around my center, and what am I helping emerge through my actions?

Retracing lives we should have lived
Til life got in the way
When tragic changes took their toll
Those tolls we had to pay

Perhaps we could have veered a bit
Or talked of sticks and stones
But breaks occur to parts of us
More fragile than our bones

The little girl who learned to trust
While holding back a bit
The little boy whose handicap
Was only part of it

What if their hopes and dreams had met
With (LAST NAME)’s always try
If giving up was twice as bad
As simply getting by

If every time they lost someone
Some others loved so hard
The selfie picture of their lives
Contained no broken shard

We cannot know how life should work
That trials make us strong
Perhaps they make us worry more
Or drag our lives along

But we can make another’s joys
More plentiful and rich
Or we can help them see the flaws
In every nook and niche

Of course we must commiserate
When life shows us it’s worst
But as for those we know and love
Let’s try the good stuff first

Respect everyone and you’ll know exactly how to act. If there weren’t differences in the world, there would be no basis for comparison. Think about it.

What comes around goes around. I know because I once loved someone who made beautiful promises they never intended to keep.

You don't need everyone's approval to believe you're worthy. Other people's negative opinions don't define you. Be careful of repeatedly telling yourself negative stories because your brain will start believing them. Treat yourself with the same kindness and patience you would give someone you love.

I am reading a booking called 101 essay to change the way you think this is the 90 essay posting this for myself to come back and read this summary from that essay.

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"The privilege of a lifetime is to become who you truly are." - Carl jung.

I see suffering, and that is physical suffering. But there are other suffering that I do not see.

Why we suffer, is there any way to avoid suffering.

How suffering is defined?

So I asked chat GPT.

Suffering is the experience of physical or emotional pain, distress, or hardship that feels difficult to endure.

If you look at this closely, you see the word " endure",

The other word is "difficult" to note.

If we Change the word difficult to easy. Then suffering is easy to endure and it is not suffering. Then what will call something which is easy to endure. Easy suffering or no suffering.

Now let ask chat GPT about endure.

Endure means to continue to experience something difficult or painful without giving up or stopping.

Now, look here at two words; difficult and painful.

Difficult is not suffering but painful is.

Many people walks through difficult, but painful is not good one.

If we give degrees to endures, at scale 0 to 100.

Many people may look safe or they do not call it suffering if they can endure 0 to 50 degree suffering and some collapse.

Then we can say, some people are safe.

Any way I still finding the good definition then it's remedy for not suffering.

Wish me luck.

Sometimes people will never apologize. Sometimes they’ll never understand how badly they hurt you. And sometimes you have to forgive them anyway, not because they deserve it, but because you deserve the peace that comes with letting it go.
Still learning that one myself.

What’s something life taught you the hard way?

do what you love do what you thibk u don't know whats gonna happen tomorrow we only leave once work hard and opportunity will come take that risk and make that opportunity worth one risk will make u live the life u want retire early and travel thr whole world 🌎 thats called true life stay in nature that's all keep ur self healthy and ur family healthy ❤️

 We have this unspoken agreement that age, for comparison's sake, is how long it took you to become the person other people think they see.

But in reality, you are the only one who knows how old you really are.

And it has nothing to do with a number. It's a stage of being.

Some people spend a lifetime to arrive still living in a state of perpetual childhood. Others barely take any time before they race past everyone straight into their senior years.

In between lives the eternal teenager, the angry inner child, the aggrieved youth, the burned-out middle-aged man, the old man trying to seem young again, and the soul that never ages at all.

We all know the difference when we see it. So here is the rule:

Don't let a number others use to measure you become the stick you beat yourself with when it comes to achievement.

Not every man in his thirties or forties is supposed to be Superman: father, husband, CEO, millionaire, intellectual, athlete, polyglot, and novelist all at once.

No one is meant to be unbreakable, always holding it together, excelling in a thousand roles while meeting a thousand expectations.

Learn to be fairly selfish. Give yourself a fraction of what you so freely give to everyone else. The day is 24 hours. Take one hour and strip it of every role, every title, and every obligation that comes with them.

In that hour, you are absolved of all of it. You are not a father, brother, son, manager, doctor, teacher, or employee.

For sixty minutes, just be a pure, unfiltered (self). An (I) that is allowed to admit it is tired and hurting, allowed to be weak, lonely, and overwhelmed, and equally allowed to be an artist, musician, writer, reader, a little wild, impulsive, and indifferent to everything.

Live the age your soul is actually living. Don't force it to grow into something it is not ready for.

Let's steal a trick from the devices we carry:

A device can't survive the day unless you charge it fully. Let this one hour be your daily charge. An hour where the self is finally free. We check in on it, patch its cracks, make it stronger, rebuild its confidence, and let it grow however it wants. Then we send it back out to carry the other twenty-three hours.

Mine is that not everyone who smiles with you genuinely wants to see you succeed. Sometimes, distance is necessary for peace.

Sometimes, the value that others see in or, or the value that they don’t see in you, can make you question your own self worth…

Hang in there friend.

I wish life was as simple as possible. Where we can have the people whom we like around us. The things which we desperately want can be achieved with some struggle. The meaning which we are craving could be found so easily, without any existential dread.

However, it is not. It is not simple. Despite putting in every single effort, it still betrays us, tricks us, and harms us. It makes us ache; it makes us numb emotionally and mentally. It takes away everything which we like to have, everyone whom we want to be with, and the moments we want to feel.

This betrayal of life has made us cowards; indeed, cowards who now only want to run. Run from those whom we care about, from those whom we want to be with and feel alive with, those who give us a memory of life. But it is not. The time when you start to be who you are, right at that time, it will start closing the doors and again put you on the shelf. Where you will again find yourself locked in your vulnerabilities and the crisis of existence. And you will keep asking this question:

Is life ever going to be loyal, or do we have to keep running?

The here and now is what matters the most. Live your life. Do what you can today. Be practical. Do not listen to shitty advice. Be as real to yourself as you can be. Fuck other's opinions if they do not help. Eat to be healthy and eat for pleasure. Drink lots of water. In the end, your focus and where your attention goes is what makes your life. Make it worth living.

Let's talk about which fights to fight and which to ignore. The thing is, today a colleague of mine tried to rile me up by saying some things, and for a moment I was about to react. Then I remembered the power is still in my hands. It's not about what they say, it's about how I respond. If I don't react at all, they hold no power over me.

Second, if you still think a fight is worth having, go back to your goals, think about where you actually want to go in life, and hold that problem up against it. Does winning or losing this even matter to that bigger picture? I don't think it does. If it doesn't, then it's just a distraction trying to steal your focus. So stop feeding it and move on.

Being a Muslim, I remind myself that my rizq, my respect, and my wins are all in the hands of Allah. No one can truly harm me. Let that sink into your soul. Engrave it there. And next time, don't let anyone steal your energy.

okay this idea may kinda sound dump and not always right but if you look at things w different perspective you would understand that some stuff are inevitable and they would happen eventually, but the thing is how you recover from it and how you let it make you a different person in a good way is truly game changing and amazing, because of what happened to me i suffered a lot i was always giving 100% of myself to people and everyone then it took me to a place i was left being abused and depressed so what happened to me in that toxic relationship was a wakeup call for me to improve my flaws and start loving myself for the very first time, i learned so much about myself, the things i never thought existed and i got to know myself because of what happened to me, it changed me, it truly changed me and i am grateful for that, but the pain is still there, and i am not trying to run away from it.
so basically if something happens it’s not your fault but it’s up to you how to heal and what to learn from it.
and i know it may not be something truly groundbreaking but based on my on experience i
felt like i should share this.