Keep things light and you’ll stay bright!

As much as we think that Valentine’s day is all about – chocolates, red roses, and love quotes – we forget that every relationship is unique. It’s a great time to express your feelings — and possibly impress them with your talent.

I will admit, it took some time for me to realize this, but growing older has been one of the greatest gifts I’ve ever received. As time pass, I have realized how indigenous pleasures made my relationship beautiful than I could have ever imagined; the pleasure of short neighborhood walks, the pleasure of sharing one chocolate, the pleasure of playing a game of chess and the pleasure of being completely opposite to each other.

“If you can make a woman laugh, you can make her do anything.”

― Marilyn Monroe

Couples who laugh together stay together. So forgo red roses and box of chocolates and instead get something exciting that you both can enjoy together. All of these ideas are affordable ways to spread love and make them feel special…even if it’s last-minute quick and easy Valentine’s Day gift.

For new relationships

If you are in a new relationship and not sure what to give, it’s always a good idea to give a cute card or watch a movie together. Or a gamer power bank that can keep him/her entertained whilst the phone is on a charge.

For Best friends

Celebrate female friendships the day before the world becomes obsessed with lovey-dovey Valentine’s Day – Happy Galentine’s Day! You can exchange gifts like a hand-made card, inspiring feminist read or consider going for a spa.

“Ovaries before brovaries, you know?”

For Married with young kids

It’s always a good idea to present something to your better half to show how much you care – and you really don’t need to break a bank to do so. Forget flower deliveries; give them a fully grown air-purifying plant that will help you remove toxins and improve air quality like peace lily. A back massager to relax and rewind or a gift card as a customizable option.

For long-distance relationships

If you think about it, as advanced as technology is these days, there’s no reason you can’t be together on Valentine’s Day. Have a dinner date on skype or send your love a care package or a playlist.

For a couple who doesn’t plan Valentine’s Day

Rather than stressing out about choosing the perfect gift and planning a special dinner date. You can go shopping together or include your kids in the celebration.

Your Valentine loves you for what you are. So do not pretend to be someone else and treat them with things they truly love. Surprise and delight your loved ones with your creativity.

You can also read these 20 Rules of Love together and spend a memorable evening.

I hope you like this list and please share your unique style to enjoy Valentine’s Day.

xoxo

This is a month of love and I thought to collect timeless quotes and poetry on “LOVE”. Love is indeed the most mysterious emotion we have. Some consider “Love” as the most divine feeling. Some consider it to be a pain inflicting emotion. Whatever is your encounter with Love, whether it is requited or unrequited, it has the power to change you completely. Love is not restricted to romance, it is omnipresent and palpable. Even though “Love” is a very personal emotion, it is the only anchor of humanity. But “Love” somewhere lost its importance in our life, when we started to focus more on biases based on race, religion and region. This Valentine’s Day exercise of collecting timeless quotes took me to a very personal journey. Here are 21 timeless quotes and verses of poetry that conquers our heart.

“You’ve gotta dance like there’s nobody watching,

Love like you’ll never be hurt,

Sing like there’s nobody listening,
And live like it’s heaven on earth.”
― William W. Purkey

“You know you’re in love when you can’t fall asleep because reality is finally better than your dreams.”
― Seuss

The opposite of love is not hate, it’s indifference. The opposite of art is not ugliness, it’s indifference. The opposite of faith is not heresy, it’s indifference. And the opposite of life is not death, it’s indifference.”
―Elie Wiesel

I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where. I love you simply, without problems or pride: I love you in this way because I do not know any other way of loving but this, in which there is no I or you, so intimate that your hand upon my chest is my hand, so intimate that when I fall asleep your eyes close.”
―Pablo Neruda

“Being deeply loved by someone gives you strength, while loving someone deeply gives you courage.”
― Lao Tzu

“I am nothing special, of this I am sure. I am a common man with common thoughts and I’ve led a common life. There are no monuments dedicated to me and my name will soon be forgotten, but I’ve loved another with all my heart and soul, and to me, this has always been enough..”
― Nicholas Sparks

“I’ve been making a list of the things they don’t teach you at school. They don’t teach you how to love somebody. They don’t teach you how to be famous. They don’t teach you how to be rich or how to be poor. They don’t teach you how to walk away from someone you don’t love any longer. They don’t teach you how to know what’s going on in someone else’s mind. They don’t teach you what to say to someone who’s dying. They don’t teach you anything worth knowing.”
―Neil Gaiman

“When I despair, I remember that all through history the way of truth and love have always won. There have been tyrants and murderers, and for a time, they can seem invincible, but in the end, they always fall. Think of it–always.”
― Mahatma Gandhi

“One is loved because one is loved. No reason is needed for loving.”
― Paulo Coelho

“When we love, we always strive to become better than we are. When we strive to become better than we are, everything around us becomes better too.”
―Paulo Coelho

“Where there is love there is life.”
― Mahatma Gandhi

“The best love is the kind that awakens the soul and makes us reach for more, that plants a fire in our hearts and brings peace to our minds. And that’s what you’ve given me. That’s what I’d hoped to give you forever”
― Nicholas Sparks

“There are two basic motivating forces: fear and love. When we are afraid, we pull back from life. When we are in love, we open to all that life has to offer with passion, excitement, and acceptance. We need to learn to love ourselves first, in all our glory and our imperfections. If we cannot love ourselves, we cannot fully open to our ability to love others or our potential to create. Evolution and all hopes for a better world rest in the fearlessness and open-hearted vision of people who embrace life.”
―John Lennon

“This is a good sign, having a broken heart. It means we have tried for something.”
―Elizabeth Gilbert

“Every heart sings a song, incomplete, until another heart whispers back. Those who wish to sing always find a song. At the touch of a lover, everyone becomes a poet.”
― Plato

“I have decided to stick to love…Hate is too great a burden to bear.”
―Martin Luther King Jr.

“Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing
and rightdoing there is a field.
I’ll meet you there.
When the soul lies down in that grass
the world is too full to talk about.” – Rumi

“I am not sure exactly what heaven will be like, but I know that when we die and it comes time for God to judge us, he will not ask, ‘How many good things have you done in your life?’ rather he will ask, ‘How much love did you put into what you did?”

― Mother Teresa

“I don’t trust people who don’t love themselves and tell me, ‘I love you.’ … There is an African saying which is: Be careful when a naked person offers you a shirt.”
― Maya Angelou

“I think… if it is true that
there are as many minds as there
are heads, then there are as many
kinds of love as there are hearts.”
― Leo Tolstoy

One love, one heart, one destiny.”
― Bob Marley

Celebrate this Valentine’s Day with the most romantic songs of 2016. Find it here.

Cheers!

xoxo

Boy! Oh Boy! I hate mathematics. But I love the new inventor of math: Ed Sheeran; the World’s favorite redhead singer is back with a new album. There was excitement everywhere, when he announced on 1^st January 2017 that he will be releasing a new album this week. There can be no other New Year’s gift than a new album from Ed Sheeran . After his debut album Plus (+) in 2011 and Multiply (x) in 2014, this album was speculated to be Minus (-) or divide (÷). And here it is-(÷) Divide. This guy seriously loves math and trust me he will find enough math symbol for his albums. What I like about Ed Sheeran is that his songs are lyrical and stays fresh in your mind for long. You literally have no idea how much hubby dear and I was waiting for his new album. When I heard his voice, it felt like taking shots of vodka. (Eh! I think I am getting carried away. But I love him so much)

Castle on the Hill

“When I was six years old I broke my leg
I was running from my brother and his friends
And tasted the sweet perfume of the mountain grass I rolled down…”

Our reaction: I got so nostalgic hearing this song. My face was filled with emotions and hubby dear couldn’t stop listening it again and again. It is magical! This can be a new anthem and trust me you will not be able to forget the lyrics. The best thing is that he mentioned his mentor, Sir Elton John, when he tells about singing “Tiny Dancer” in a friend’s car.

Shape of you

“The club isn’t the best place to find a lover
So the bar is where I go
Me and my friends at the table doing shots
Drinking faster and then we talk slow…”

Our reaction: Send this song to your love. Right now! This song is so so so so beautiful, fresh and sexy. It is a pure pop! He said that one of the songs was for Rihanna. I guess he was talking about this song. (Cute wink!)

If you missed old Ed Sheeran then remember change is the only constant thing in life. I personally feel this album will have the perfect blend of lyrical and “catchy” songs. Overall, I loved the feel of these two songs and this guy really love maths!

Let me know what do you feel about these two songs. Did you miss Ed Sheeran?

What makes a perfect marriage? Is it only love in marriage that makes it successful? Is it true marriages are made in heaven? I am neither a love guru or a marriage counsellor. But I know one thing for sure that love is not a base for a healthy married life. Love is not a constant emotion. You can quickly fall in love and in no time fall out of love. Then what? Boom! Your base for a relationship is gone. So what makes a perfect marriage? A perfect marriage is when two individuals seek companionship, good co-parent for the children and a defined purpose. Love is just like a cup of coffe, you enjoy it everyday, even if it is bitter. As I was looking for the perfect recipe for marriage, I found 20 quotes that speak volume on love, marriage and relationship.

“I’m selfish, impatient and a little insecure. I make mistakes, I am out of control and at times hard to handle. But if you can’t handle me at my worst, then you sure as hell don’t deserve me at my best.”
– Marilyn Monroe
“Love doesn’t just sit there, like a stone, it has to be made, like bread; remade all the time, made new.”
– Ursula K. Le Guin, The Lathe of Heaven
“Let there be spaces in your togetherness, And let the winds of the heavens dance between you. Love one another but make not a bond of love: Let it be rather a moving sea between the shores of your souls.”
– Kahlil Gibran,The Prophet
“A great marriage is not when the ‘perfect couple’ comes together. It is when an imperfect couple learns to enjoy their differences.”– Dave Meurer
“There is no more lovely, friendly, and charming relationship, communion or company than a good marriage.”– Martin Luther
“Love has nothing to do with what you are expecting to get–only with what you are expecting to give–which is everything.”– Katharine Hepburn, Me: Stories of My Life
“Come, let’s be a comfortable couple and take care of each other! How glad we shall be, that we have somebody we are fond of always, to talk to and sit with.”– Charles Dickens
“We need a witness to our lives. There’s a billion people on the planet… I mean, what does any one life really mean? But in a marriage, you’re promising to care about everything. The good things, the bad things, the terrible things, the mundane things… all of it, all of the time, every day. You’re saying, ‘Your life will not go unnoticed because I will notice it. Your life will not go unwitnessed because I will be your witness.’”– Shall We Dance?
“Love is like a friendship caught on fire. In the beginning a flame, very pretty, often hot and fierce, but still only light and flickering. As love grows older, our hearts mature and our love becomes as coals, deep-burning and unquenchable.”– Bruce Lee
“Love is a temporary madness. It erupts like volcanoes and then subsides. And when it subsides, you have a to make a decision. You have to work out whether your roots have so entwined together that it is inconceivable that you should ever part.”– Louis de Bernieres, Captain Corelli’s Mandolin
“You know you are in love when the two of you can go grocery shopping together.”– Woody Harrelson
“Love is of all passions the strongest, for it attacks simultaneously the head, the heart and the senses.”– Lao Tzu
“Chains do not hold a marriage together. It is threads, hundreds of tiny threads which sew people together through the years.”— Simone Signoret
“It is not a lack of love, but a lack of friendship that makes unhappy marriages.”— Friedrich Nietzsche
“Coming together is a beginning; keeping together is progress; working together is success.”
“One advantage of marriage is that, when you fall out of love with him or he falls out of love with you, it keeps you together until you fall back in love again.”— Judith Viorst
“What counts in making a happy marriage is not so much how compatible you are, but how you deal with incompatibility.”— Leo Tolstoy
“The great secret of successful marriage is to treat all disasters as incidents and none of the incidents as disasters.”— Sir Harold George Nicolson
“The best love is the kind that awakens the soul and makes us reach for more, that plants a fire in our hearts and brings peace to our minds.” —Nicholas Sparks, The Notebook
“I first learned the concept of non-violence in my marriage.”— Gandhi

Finally, I have found the perfect recipe for marriage.

Marriage = Companionship (1 spoon) + Relationship goal (1 spoon) + Friendship (2 spoon) + sprinkle lots of love

What is your idea of love and marriage? Do you agree love is not an ultimate goal in marriage?

See you later!

xoxo

Last week, when we went out for grocery shopping at the mall, I sneaked into Sephora for a quick update on the lip color I was tempted to buy. My husband, like most of the men, frowned and gave me only 10 mins to inquire. Imagine going on a pilgrimage and you get only 10mins inside the sacred place. Nevertheless, I took only 10mins and I was disappointed to know that lip color was still “Out of stock”.

“Are you crazy?”,he shouted at me. ” I am not accepting any challenge.” I knew this will be his reaction after I spelled out the rules of the challenge. Honestly, I gave this challenge after I read an article on Allure.com and wanted to see his shopping talent. I also wanted him to witness how difficult it is to select beauty products in just 10mins.

CHALLENGE: Shop at Sephora without any help.

RULES OF THIS CHALLENGE:
a) He is not allowed to take any help from any sales person.
b) He has only 15mins to shop at Sephora.
c) He is not allowed to buy men grooming products and perfumes.
d) He has to buy at least 5 products.

It is not that he has never shopped at Sephora alone. But every gift he bought from Sephora was selected by sales lady. I am not complaining though. Clearly, he wasn’t interested in the challenge but the reward to complete the challenge made the difference.

REWARD: I will quit Nutella for 3 months with immediate effect.

When he entered Sephora, he was really confused with the layout of the store. Crowded with brands, products, sales people and customers. It was a busy day. It took him few seconds to deduce that he has limited time and he has to pick up 5 products for me. In a perfect world, it’s the easiest challenge to win. But, since, I am married to a banker who takes every task seriously, this challenge turned out to be a surprise.

He came out of the stores with a smile after 15 mins with a Sephora bag.MISSION ACCOMPLISHED.

I asked him why did he buy so many face masks and only one lip color. His answer was the perfect thing I got along with some super hero face masks.

“There is no need to mask your skin imperfections with the layer of products. You have got beautiful skin and I thought it would be better that you treat yourself with great face masks.” He finally told me that it is difficult to shop within 15 minutes in Sephora and next time I can take my own time.

Here are 7 products he bought for me:

1- Glam Glow Youthmud ( hydrating treatment)

2-Glam Glow Super Mud clearing treatment

3- Glam Glow Powermud Dual cleanse treatment

4- Oleva + Oxygen Activating Renewal Black Mask

5- Kat Von D Duo Lip Vixen

6- Sephora Face Mask pearl

7- Sephora Rose Lip mask

And I quit Nutella for 3 months and turn on my healthy eating habits.

We’ve hit summer season, so I have to spend most of my time indoors with my little girl. It gives me enough time to clean my book shelf. It is one of the most enriching things to do. I love books. Except books that have a heavy dose of SCIENCE (Physics, Chemistry & Mathematics ). For some strange reason, flipping pages of the books I have already read takes me to a different world. It is one of the most pleasant experience.

I picked up a book to re-read this week. It is “Forty Rules of Love” by Elif Shafak. She narrates two parallel stories – one contemporary and the other set in the thirteenth century. Ella Rubenstein is a forty years old lady who is not happy with her marriage and mundane life. She takes a job as a reader for a literary agent. Her first assignment is to report on Sweet Blasphemy, written by a man name Aziz Zahara. Sweet blasphemy unfolds the forty rules of love that Rumi learned from his spiritual mentor, Shams of Tabriz. Ella is mesmerized with Shams of Tabriz search for Rumi which transforms him to a passionate poet and advocate of love.

20 quotes from “Forty Rules Of Love” that are powerful enough to make you look at life from a different prism. Here are 20 Rules of Love, I learned from the book.

1. “Whatever happens in your life, no matter how troubling things might seem, do not enter the neighborhood of despair.”

2. “Every true love and friendship is a story of unexpected transformation. If we are the same person before and after we loved, that means we haven’t loved enough.”

3. “Where there is love, there is bound to be heartache.”

4. “The words that come out of our mouths do not vanish but are perpetually stored in infinite space, and they will come back to us in due time.”

5. “Do not go with the flow. Be the flow.”

6. “Try not to resist the changes that come your way. Instead let life live through you. And do not worry that your life is turning upside down. How do you know that the side you are used to is better than the one to come”

7. “Fret not where the road will take you. Instead concentrate on the first step. That’s the hardest part and that’s what you are responsible for.”

8. “No matter what your destination, just be sure to make every journey a journey within.”

9. “His honesty offended others, but he liked to provoke people to see what came out of them in moments of anger.”

10. “Let us choose one another as companions!
Let us sit at each other’s feet!
Inwardly we have many harmonies – think not
That we are only what we see.”

11. “Be thankful for every thorn that others might throw at you. It is a sign that you will soon be showered in roses”

12. “Loneliness and solitude are two different things. When you are lonely, it is easy to delude yourself into believing that you are on the right path. Solitude is better for us, as it means being alone without feeling lonely.”

13. “The quest for Love changes us. There is no seeker among those who search for Love who has not matured on the way. The moment you start looking for Love, you start to change within and without.”

14. “Quit worrying about hell or dreaming about heaven, as they are both present inside this very moment. Every time we fall in love, we ascend to heaven. Every time we hate, envy, or fight someone, we tumble straight into the fires of hell.”

15. “The quest for Love changes us. There is no seeker among those who search for Love who has not matured on the way. The moment you start looking for Love, you start to change within and without.”

16. “Just as clay needs to go through intense heat to become strong, Love can only be perfected in pain.”

17. “Your destiny is the level where you will play your tune. You might not change your instrument but how well you play is entirely in your hands.”

18. “The way to a man’s heart can sometimes take a woman far away from herself, my dear.”

19. “Neither a drop of kindness nor a speck of evil will remain unreciprocated.”

20. “If you want to strengthen your faith, you will need to soften inside. For your faith to be rock solid, your heart needs to be as soft as a feather.”

Hope you enjoyed these quotes as much as I loved the book. I would highly recommend this book for summer. You can connect to your soul and might get the answers to your question.

THE CRAZY LIST

Tag Archives: love

15 Last-Minute Valentine’s Day gift ideas for every kind of relationship

Keep things light and you’ll stay bright!

As much as we think that Valentine’s day is all about – chocolates, red roses, and love quotes – we forget that every relationship is unique. It’s a great time to express your feelings — and possibly impress them with your talent.

21 Timeless Quotes to spread the magic of Love

2 New tracks: Ed Sheeran is back in 2017 with “Divide”

20 Thought provoking quotes on Love, Marriage and Relationship

Keep things light and you’ll stay bright!

As much as we think that Valentine’s day is all about – chocolates, red roses, and love quotes – we forget that every relationship is unique. It’s a great time to express your feelings — and possibly impress them with your talent.

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