This reflective essay explores how love evolves, from youthful fantasies of grand gestures to the quiet strength of companionship and presence. It contrasts enduring partnerships with lonely, transactional modern relationships shaped by technology. Ultimately, it affirms that true love thrives on equality, emotional labour, and self-respect,culminating in the most powerful love story: choosing yourself.
An elderly couple fondly revisits the day love first trembled between them. Amid nervous smiles and unspoken confessions, she recalls how his courage faltered, but her heart did not. Taking a leap of faith, she voiced what he couldn’t, sealing a bond that quietly endured a lifetime.
Reflecting on love beyond clichés, the narrator redefines Valentine’s Day as an act of radical self-love. Tracing her journey through desire, motherhood, body changes, and societal pressures, she embraces her evolving body with pride and sensual confidence,urging women to reclaim beauty on their own terms and “strike a pose” for themselves.
Mishti revisits her childhood home, where shifting spaces awaken layered memories — of innocence, laughter, and something unspoken that changed everything. As past and present collide, she confronts the weight she once carried alone. With her sister beside her, she finds steadiness, reclaiming power, healing, and a quieter, stronger self.
In the quiet after Valentine’s Day, I turn inward—to books that shaped me, words that healed me, classrooms that defined me, long walks that strengthened me, tea with mother that grounds me, Olive’s unconditional love, simple food joys, and solitary pilgrimages. These are my sundry, steadfast forms of love.
This reflective essay explores how women are conditioned to equate love with waiting, suffering, and emotional neglect. Drawing from romantic culture and ancient Indian narratives, it argues for boundaries, dignity, and self-preservation. True love, it suggests, begins when a woman learns to choose herself over self-abandonment.
This essay explores modern love anxiety shaped by WhatsApp blue ticks. Unlike the patient waits of love letters, today’s silence triggers insecurity, self-doubt, and overthinking—especially for women seeking reassurance. It urges readers to stop chasing replies, value consistency, and choose self-respect and peace over digital uncertainty.
Turning twenty-five meant standing at the edge of change – marriage, leaving home, and learning to grow. Amid love, fear, hope, and loss, she discovered that home doesn’t disappear; it travels with us. With courage and trembling faith, she stepped forward, carrying her parents, her past, and herself into a new life.
Working mothers juggle two full-time roles — paid work and invisible caregiving — while battling guilt, burnout, and unrealistic expectations. With limited workplace support and unequal gender roles, their load intensifies. Support systems, flexibility, and changing attitudes help, but true balance comes from shared responsibility, empathy, and valuing every mother’s labour.
Men are expected to be strong, responsible, and unshaken, but beneath these expectations lie silent emotional struggles. Conditioned to hide vulnerability, they carry pressure, conflict, and self-doubt without complaint. On Men’s Day, we honour their unseen battles and remind them that vulnerability, rest, and emotional honesty are human — and deeply valid.
