Darkness before Light

I am Perfect and Whole

Growing up in a dysfunctional family, I always had the feeling of being defective, of being less than others. Shame and self-hatred enveloped my world.

I sought help in a myriad of ways. I joined spiritual programs, experimented with various religions and schools of spirituality, saw therapists, gobbled up self-improvement literature, had long conversations with people and friends on similar journey, went to meditation retreats, tried creative therapy, tried narrative therapy, and so forth. I looked in every direction for tools that could give me some respite from my darkness, and make me feel good about my world and my place within in. Well, each of these tool did provide me with some respite. But the darkness continued to exist within me – the inexplicable heaviness in my chest that would attack me at any given time during the day.

It was only during an interaction with a friend, when the friend pointed out that I was still living out the victim script in my life. I wanted to live a secure and stable life. I was afraid of making mistakes. I was frightened of experimenting and taking risks. And all that pointed towards the fact that I did not accept and forgive myself for the choices that I had made in my past.

That night, I went back home and took out the pictures from the various stages of my childhood and growing up. Each one of the pictures seemed to scream at me, ‘What have you done? How did we get here? In that moment I realized the amount of self hatred that I carried within me. I realized that I did not accept myself. I picked up the pictures, one by one, and started talking to them. I asked each of them to forgive me, to understand that I had done my best.  I slept very well that night.

And then the next day, the friend pointed out, “You have been trying to seek so many ways of fixing yourself. You seem to consider yourself as someone defective who needs to be fixed.”

This was another enlightenment for me. Memories came flooding back. How I had grown up with the feeling that I was defective that I there was something wrong with me. Relationships, money, career, achievements had not taken away that feeling. I still lived with that feeling everyday. It was evident in my choices and thoughts.

You committed the same mistake again. You lost the keys again. You cannot go out for lunch with a man, you don’t know how to handle them. Stay on the safe path lest you will make a mess of your life again. These were the thoughts that ruled my life. The past had a firm grip on my present, and the child within me was trapped.

As I became aware of these feelings and thoughts, I made a decision. The decision to love and accept myself completely as I was. The decision to accept my limitations and imperfections. The decision to accept my human-ness.

In that moment, I set myself free. In that moment, I became perfect and whole, as God had intended me to be.

I am Enough

It was the severe dread instilled in my heart while waiting outside the ICU for an update on my grandmother’s health that made me realize “I am enough.”

Several thoughts raced through my mind as mom and I waited outside the ICU.  “Ventilators mean long term medical care. It is going to cost a lot of money. Granny is not insured. “

“How will I arrange the money? What all assets can I sell immediately?”

“All these grand thoughts of being on sabbatical and learning art and music are fantasy at the end of the day. I should have continued with my job. I would have had the necessary funds and access to any loans that I may need at this time.”

My beloved grandmother had fallen sick all of a sudden. We had rushed her to the hospital and doctors had straightaway put her on the ventilator as she was suffering from an acute respiratory disorder.

The next wave of dark thoughts began!

“Oh God, I feel so alone”. I wish there was someone I could call to be here with me at this hour. I wish I could seek advice from someone I trusted.”

I continued to burn in the fury of these thoughts for the next hour before respite came in the form of nurturing and loving thoughts.

“I am not in charge. God is in charge.”

“I could have access to all the money in the world and yet not be able to save my Granny. If Granny is destined to get better, God will show me the way.”

And then:

“I have taken care of myself all my life. I took care of myself when I was a little child growing up in a dysfunctional family. I have survived much bitterness and disappointments.”

“I have many achievements to my merit. I have won some really tough battles in life. All this while, I took care of myself. I can take care of this too. I can take care of my Grandmother. I have always been enough. I am enough now. I do not need anyone else.”

Grace had happened. The weight of victimhood was replaced by the lighter, breezier feelings of empowerment and belief in me.

Nine days later, when the doctors recommended an elaborate procedure known as tracheostomy, my heart skipped a beat. The procedure requires the ventilator tube to be inserted through a slit in the neck. Patients can take months to wean off the tube. It would involve a lot of funds and intensive care. Once again my faith shook as I wondered about what all it entailed.

But the feeling of empowerment was restored. I told my mother in a firm voice, “Let us pull up our socks now. We will give it our best.”

“As for the funds, we can sell off all that we have. We earned this money. We created these assets. We did it, and we can do it all over again. I am enough. You are enough.”

Empowerment is a matter of perspective. It is about how I choose to look at my life. Do I want to continue the victim script of “Poor Me” or do I want to feel empowered and say, ‘I can deal with this. This is simply life happening.” It is a choice I make.

Self Acceptance

It was a bright and sunny winter afternoon. I finished my work early and headed straight towards home, looking forward to spending some quality time with my grandmother. 

As I entered the house, I thought to myself, "She will be lazying in the Sun on the terrace. I will go and massage her legs. She has been complaining of leg pain for a while. And then I will comb her long, golden locks just like the good old times. It will be nice and intimate."

After changing my clothes and parking my handbag in my room, I walked up to the terrace.

To my utter shock, I discovered that my favourite quilt was hanging on the clothes line to be dried.It had been washed.

It was the same quilt that carried the smell of my cat who had recently died. I was attached to the quilt and the smell. I had strictly forbidden my mother and maid from washing that quilt. I realized my grandmother with her obsession for cleanliness, and washing clothes must have washed it. 

I had been struggling with my grandmother over the issue of space and privacy for a while. I had asked her repeatedly not to intrude into my room and not to wash my stuff without my prior permission. She would keep ignoring my pleas. And now this had happened.

I felt this was an unacceptable intrusion of my space especially since I had requested that no one should touch this particular quilt.

In that moment of anger, I took a conscious decision - the decision to express my anger. My usual way to express my anger is through healthy communication. But I decided that this situation warranted some action to send out a stronger message to her.

I did not say a word to her .I quietly picked up the quilt from the clothes line and shredded it into pieces infront of my grandmother. She just kept watching me. I then went back to my room, thoroughly disappointed.

Ten days later when she died, this incident replayed in my mind several times. But I was able to accept it as part of my human-ness; and as part of our every day human life. Would I change it if I could? No, I would not. Emotions make life enriching, especially when we are simply expressing ourselves and not acting out of pure malice. I was able to accept that part of myself without any guilt. Aah , what a relief !!! If the same incident had happened a year back, I would have spent days flogging myself over it, and maybe even blamed it for my grandmother's death.

Self Love

My grandmother recently passed away and my mother and I have been grieving her loss. We were very close to her.

Few days back, I decided to cheer us up by making a plan for a movie. My mother refused.

"How can I go for a movie. My mother has just died. We have not even completed the ritualistic grieving period of 40 days.

But you go. Cheer yourself up."

Amazing - a mother's love for her child. A mother wants her child to be happy and cheerful. Why can we not love ourselves like that? Why do we need to be harsh on ourselves when we are so loving and compassionate with our loved ones? Where is the love for self? Are we not worthy? Don't we deserve the compassion that we reserve for our children?

Am I Worthy?

I am a human "being" and not a human "doing". Hearing this phrase made me ponder about my life.

 I have always prided myself on being an efficient and productive human being. I have always had long “To do lists” and I have managed to check most of the items on those lists on a regular basis. I am always thinking about the next thing to "do". To just "be" is an alien concept for me.

Recently, a friend gave me a book on the dubious topic of “Shame.” I buried myself into understanding the contents of that book. The book was written by a famous American psychologist, lending it credibility and making it worth my hours.

As per the book, Human Shame is Universal in character. The Shame stems from our recognition of our limited capabilities and capacities. As children, most of us do not receive unconditional love from our parents.  When that happens we feel “Unworthy”. We feel something is wrong with us since there cannot be anything wrong with our parents. Our parents are like Gods to us. We then start feeling ashamed of our selves due to this deep sense of unworthiness.

The only ways to feel worthy, to reduce this shame and to feel loved then are:  through achievement and through good behavior.

 Our life’s journey then becomes about the struggle to climb higher and higher on the ladder of achievement. Each step higher makes us feel more worthy of being loved and respected.  Each certificate, each promotion, each medal makes our parents more and more proud of us. They love us more. We grow and expand from the appreciation we receive from our boss, colleagues, friends, etc. They will not reject us now. I have proven my worthiness to them.

The other way to gain that love is by becoming good boys and good girls. We learn about acceptable behavior, attitudes and mannerisms and adhere to them to the best of our ability so that we are loved. My parents’ ideals and desires may not be mine but I follow some of them just to keep them happy. My life begins to revolve around keeping other people around me happy. That way they continue to love me and not reject me. My own happiness does not figure in the equation. I am happy in keeping my family members happy.

Love is the food for the human soul. And we will go to any lengths to feel loved and accepted.

Our constant discomfort stems from this inherent sense of our unworthiness. I am unworthy of being loved. So let me go and achieve some more. Let me try to look better. Let me try to be a better father/daughter/wife.

In this struggle to appear worthy, somewhere I lose a sense of my own self. I become distant from my own inner being. I forget who am I. I forget my own values, desires and aspirations. I become dishonest with my ownself. And if I am dishonest with my own self, how can I ever be honest with anyone else?

I forget about accepting, respecting and loving my own self.  If I cannot really love myself, can I really love anyone else? My relationships and life's purpose are all then based on my neediness - my need to appear worthy to others. I want to be loved because I am incapable of loving myself. I need to be told that I am worthy because I have lost my own inherent sense of worthiness.

Every morning when I wake up, I tell myself “I am worthy.”

Different Kinds of Families

My friend is a single mother of a fast growing 8 year old boy. He has been complaining often that all his friends have fathers who come to pick them up and take them out for various games and activities. So he keeps asking his mother, "Where is my father? Why is he is not here? I am so unfortunate. I do not have a father."

My friend did not want her son to grow up with a feeling of deprivation. Luckily, she came across a book that spoke of different kind of families. The book intended for children illustrated the idea with graphics.

There are different kind of families. Sometimes, it is children, mother and grandmother. Sometimes,it is just the father and children. Sometimes, it is mother, aunts and children. Sometimes it is a bigger family with uncles, and cousins. Sometimes, it is Uncle, father and children. There is no stereotypical family. Families come in all sizes and shapes. And they are all beautiful in their own ways. Yes, the most common kind of family is mother, father and children.

What a wonderful way to learn self acceptance!!!!

The Paradigm Shift

The doctor had just informed me that they would be putting my grandmother back on the ventilator after 36 hours of struggle and signs of improvement. I felt bitterly disappointed. I stepped out of the hospital along with my mother to digest this news over a cup of chai from the street vendor.

As we were ordering the chai, the parking guy approached us and started complaining that we had paid him Rs 10/- less the last time we had parked the car.

“This is not the time for discussion.  Come later.”

“But I want my Rs 10, “he persisted.

I lost my temper. I yelled at him. He went away. I was seething with anger. My grandmother was battling with death and all he was worried about was his Rs 10/-.

Later at night, when I had calmed down, I felt guilty for having spoken to him so rudely.

So when I saw him again, I told him, “I am sorry that I spoke to you so rudely. We had just received some really bad news about my grandmother admitted in the hospital. It was just not the time to discuss money.”

“Aah! I can understand. I am sorry. It is bad for all of us though. I work hard 20 hours a day to put together the money for the treatment of my 3 year old daughter who is suffering from cancer. She has already gone through three rounds of chemotherapy at AIIMS. Each ten rupee is important for me.”

I was dumbstruck. It was a paradigm shift for me.

I keep getting amazed with the resilience of the human spirit. The challenges and the pain that we deal with willingly and happily!