If youâve ever been haunted by the possibility of dementia, youâre probably not alone. In a world that glorifies productivity but rarely practices brain health, Keep Sharp by Dr. Sanjay Gupta is a much-needed reality check. Dr. Sanjay Gupta is not just a trusted neurosurgeon and medical correspondent; heâs also a clear voice cutting through the noise around aging and cognitive decline. In Keep Sharp: Build a Better Brain at Any Age, he uses his medical expertise to busting myths and offer practical lifestyle changes, to remind us that itâs never too early â or too late â to care for our brains. But hereâs something special: Sanjay Gupta doesnât just offer you…
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What White Nights by Fyodor Dostoevsky Reminded Me OfâââBollywood Edition.
You know how sometimes youâre reading a classic Russian novel about existential crisis, loneliness, ek tarfa pyaar and you suddenly think, wait a minute⌠I know this from somewhere. Thatâs exactly what happened when I read White Nights by Fyodor Dostoevsky. Itâs a sad, four-night-long torment of unrequited love, hopeful delusions, and one very lonely man who just wants to be seen. Argh! The number of Nice-Guy-Syndrome and Friend-Zone memes I witnessed when reading reviews of the book had me roll up laughing. As I finished reading, I couldnât stop but think that the book reminds me of some Bollywood movie that I know of. It took me right about 5 minutes to pin-point, and…
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Finding Comfort and Connection with Days at the Morisaki BookshopâââReading After-Thoughts :)
When I picked up Days at the Morisaki Bookshop, I was craving something lightâââa fiction that didnât need me to intensely analysis the passages or use my intellectual muscles too much. After being deeply immersed in Sanjay Guptaâs Keep Sharp, which is a science-driven guide to protecting your brain from cognitive decline, I needed a gentler read. And this book turned out to be exactly that: a soothing, binge-worthy read that pulls you into short bursts of life and literature. Blurb Hidden in Jimbocho, Tokyo, is a bookloverâs paradise. On a quiet corner in an old wooden building lies a shop filled with hundreds of second-hand books. Twenty-five-year-old Takako has never liked…
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What the City Forgot: Lessons in Living from Indiaâs Indigenous Cultures.
Why we lose ourselves in WiFi, and find ourselves in the mountains. We, the millennials and Gen Zs of the metro cities, scrolling through reels on mental health while gulping cold coffee and juggling multiple internet tabs. Somewhere between grocery home deliveries and soft boards that look straight out of a murder mystery, weâve turned life into a never-ending to-do list. Meanwhile, Indiaâs indigenous communities, often dismissed as âbackward,â are out there living lives of balance, groundedness and joy that most of us only dream about during spa sessions that we schedule on Urban Company. This isnât about romanticising rural poverty or denying progress. This is about acknowledging the gaps…
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Why You Should Stop Asking AI to Disagree With You.
How our obsession with AI tools have unplugged a deeper issue: mental laziness. Lately, Iâve seen a lot of people say that ChatGPT should disagree with you more â that it should challenge your opinions. Thereâs been a noticeable shift in how people want to use AI tools today. The hype used to be all about how helpful these tools could be. But now? People are asking for something more: AI that disagrees with them. AI that doesnât affirm their beliefs. AI that calls out their logic, and doesnât automatically praise or validate their inputs. And I get where thatâs coming from. But hereâs the thing: did we pause to consider whether we…
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Did Kokoro Just Give Me the Existential Reality Check I Needed?
Reading Kokoro by Beth Kempton felt like being softly bonked on the head by somebody. So, here’s my tiny ramble about the things I learnt, felt, and awkwardly nodded at while reading this book. My belief of a neatly wrapped up life died somewhere between a pandemic and a quarter-life crisis. I knew it, but maybe didn’t accept it. Kokoro helped me grieve that belief and move on. Life isnât a checklist. Sometimes, things fall apart even when you’re doing all the right things. And the sooner we let go of that illusion of control, the lighter we become. At some point during my reading journey, I also realised that…
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Don’t Scroll, Please Stay [Poetry – Note]
In this world wired to keep us connected, We’ve never felt more forgotten. Explore pages, reels, and feeds, Swiping right across stories, Leaving heart reactions in red, But so much still left unsaid. Once, eye contact used to mean something, Now, we look, we scroll, But we rarely see. We exist in grids, In captions, Ending conversations with laughing emojis, Even when nothing’s really funny. We’re in each other’s network, But not in each other’s lives. Our touch now replaced by a tap, Our eyes awaiting a ping, Some part of us still hoping, That someone will stop, will stay, will look. Will see more than an aesthetic feed. Walking…
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My Search for Soft-Hug Reads: TBR for my soul.
We can also call this blog post my personal plan to emotionally cuddle myself into books because the reality has started to become a little too real these days. **grunts** Hi. Itâs me, again. Local introvert, socially awkward book human, reporting from my work-desk. As someone who hasn’t read a lot of âcomfortâ reads yet, I wanted to build a TBR list for the soulâa little collection of books I hope will hold me gently when I need it most. If you’re looking for the same kind of warmth, maybe these will find a place on your shelf too. Lately, Iâve been craving books that donât make me feel heavy…
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Why I Researched on Beth Kempton After Reading 09 Chapters of Kokoro
Okay so⌠here’s a confession: I picked up Kokoro by Beth Kempton in February 2025 thinking it would be a calm, aesthetic, soul-soothing, finding my inner journey kinda read. Something like âlet me sip my coffee and romanticize my lifeâ vibe. And it is that book for sure â but also, somewhere between Chapter 1, Chapter 9 and my untimely afternoon existential crisis, I decided I had to know everything about the woman who wrote this book. And yes, I mean everything. I went full reader-stalker mode (and ended up calling it research). So, hereâs something we should know about Beth Kempton. Beth is a Japanologist (which is a super…
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Must-Read Book Quotes: On Earth, We’re Briefly Gorgeous by Ocean Vuong
You ever read something so beautiful it lowkey ruins your day because now youâre just sitting there⌠feeling things? Yeah. That was me after I read On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous by Ocean Vuong. On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous didnât just give me beautiful lines, it gave me permission to pause. To reflect. To crumble a little. And maybe⌠rebuild softer. This wasnât just a book. It was a long, quiet letter that turned into a mirror. It was one of those books where the stories are the life â messy, aching, and unspeakably gorgeous in their pain. Ocean Vuongâs words had a way of crawling under my skin and…