Life's Too Big for Me to Make Sense🤔
Soul Letter #26
Hello👋 folks, Shubham here.
I have been thinking a lot about life lately.
The more I try to make sense of it, the more peculiar it gets.
Today’s newsletter highlights this mystic nature of life.
A Random Connection Request on LinkedIn
Of late I have assigned a personal mission for myself, to mend several old friendships especially the school friendships that couldn’t survive the wrath of time.
I had a friend in school, let’s name him X. X and I were friends since the first standard.
We stayed friends for four years then a reshuffling parted us which kind of hindered the bond.
We became classmates once again in 11th standard, and our friendship resumed from where we left.
Like many other relationships, ours turned sour over some trivial issues (I can’t recall why!) Call it teenage ego or raging hormones, no one was ready to yield. Eventually, we fell off by the end of the school term.
Fast forward six years, I sent a connection request to X on LinkedIn on a whim. The possibility was bleak considering he had only a handful of connections, yet I wanted to give it a try. Surprisingly he accepted the request and shared his phone number.
We talked for like an hour giving our latest updates, catching up, and reminiscing the nostalgic school memories.
It was astonishing that we remembered each other’s minor details from when we first met fifteen-sixteen years back.
To sum it up the experience was gratifying.
The story gets more interesting from here.
Turns out X had a maternal uncle who was college friends with one of my cousins. Like every other college friendship (that’s as vulnerable as a school friendship) there’s too couldn’t survive the wrath of time.
X told me that his uncle often inquires about my cousin.
When I relayed this to my cousin he immediately asked if I can ask for X’s Uncle’s phone number.
I shared the number with my cousin however, I am not sure whether he called or not.
The point is life’s too big to understand guys! It works mysteriously.
Rekindle those old friendships which once meant the world to you. Your buddy misses you, believe me.
It’s time to revive some old ties (This is the sign you have been looking for😇).
Call, message, and if required poke them.
Wanna go one step further? Show up unannounced to their home.
The Unknown Stranger
Slowly is an app that provides a letter-writing experience. Basically, you can send and receive letters from strangers. The time taken by a message to be delivered depends on the distance between the sender and the recipient (I plan to do a separate article on my Slowly pals someday).
Moving on there’s a stranger with whom I shared one of my articles through Slowly. It ended up encouraging her to apply for a new job post.
Below are the screenshots of our correspondence.
I never knew an idea stitched together with words can have such a profound effect.
Along with her I have five other pious pen pals.
What’s fascinates me the most is the fact that we won’t ever meet in person, yet a monthly/weekly letter ritual continues to alter the trajectories of our lives.
You guys have read about the Butterfly effect?
It states a minute localized change in a complex system can have large effects elsewhere.
Our innocuous efforts may lead to outcomes which we can never comprehend.
Keep Writing BRO!
Nowadays whenever I talk to a friend, there is a mandatory mention of Soul Letter🗞
The conversation usually ends with a suggestion, Keep Writing Bro!
I still ponder how I landed on writing.
In-School I dreaded English, especially grammar.
Even now I flounder with the syntax but thanks to Grammarly and our proofreaders I am able to serve quality content.
Back then if someone would have told me I will have a newsletter, I would have taken it as an offense considering he was mocking my skills.
However today people advise me to continue writing.
Another intriguing thing to observe here is those who ask me to focus on my craft won’t benefit from it. If I write good articles, I will receive praise and compliments. They wouldn’t make a dime still, they wish I do well.
I assume watching me do something I enjoy, infuses them with a sense of joy.
It’s funny, but then again life is too big for me to understand.
Hope you enjoyed today’s edition.
Signing off for today :) Until next time, Houdoe! 🙋♂️