The grass is always green on the other side. Empty nesters crave company, full nesters crave solitude. Parents seek silence, couples seek space and singles seek intimacy.
If only we could start stirring a dollop of joy in what we do and chime in a jingle apt for what we are facing. If only we could start fully embracing the cards we are dealt on a daily basis. ‘I am happy, I am blessed’ is a human rarity.
What comes first? Your role chooses your routine or your routine defines your role?
For most working parents, roles define their routines. Once in a while they would love to be away from the parenting mode and focus on other aspects of life. Helping the individual nurture their holistic personality and other shades of a being.
Sometimes, the role remains but in a different setting, one where the routine can be more relaxed. This arrangement helps develop the existing bond. Devoid of the pressure of routine, one can be spontaneous in their quality of time spent together.
But these were rare settings. More often than not, in daily life neither can be escaped from. Take the middle path – where the role remains but the routines can be flexed to the maximum!
By guru I don’t mean the dhoti clad, self proclaimed god-men. I mean what if you were living, thriving and growing by the principles of one and only one person – could be your parent, your spouse or a friend you are enamored with. Wouldn’t that blindside you, giving you no perspective that’s different than theirs.
It would be terrific to subscribe to the views and behaviours of various experts. Follow a health coach for your fitness goals, look upto a successful professional on your field for career guidance and speak to a parent-role model for your parenting woes. Limiting ourselves to a uni-dimensional life and thoughts of one is certainly not a growth path. Seek your tribe in all your spheres and cherish the real connections you make along the way.
Mountains or beach?
Tea or coffee?
Big city or Small town?
Past or Future?
Global or local?
Personal or Professional?
Traditional or Contemporary?
This or that?
Have you ever felt that you don’t belong to either. That you have a bit of both but don’t completely identify with just one of the two. Welcome to the world of ambivalents – those who are neither extremes but lie somewhere in the middle. The good part – you get best of both worlds. The bad part – neither has your heart.
Step 1 : We read, we process.
Step 2 : We assume, we analyze.
Step 3 : We prepare, we review.
& then life throws one of its curveballs. The unexpected. Go to step 1 and repeat.
Between the ‘process, prepare, repeat’ cycle, life happens. We can choose to beat ourselves down everytime the unexpected happens or can continue to adjust all the while humming our favourite tune.
Often considered an alternate economy, household productivity does support the mainstream economy and boosts domestic output albeit indirectly. Household productivity or the time spent in chores done to keep the home in order aren’t considered a part of nation’s economy as it alters the conventional parameters and can be misleading in policy making decisions.
A proxy indicator can be utilization of automation and outsourcing. Automation indicators like sales of refrigerators, washing-drying machines, dishwashers, robotic vaccum cleaners, etc are already part of Gross Domestic Product. It’s time now that outsourcing chores also gets measurable indicators and thereby included in the formal economy. For example childcare, gardening, home maintenance and likes are already listed services available in developed nations. Adding cooking cleaning, laundry, pet care, etc to the catalogue would make it comprehensive and give more dignity to these workers.
Here’s wishing for more power to the unorganised sector in the future decades! ๐ช
Yes that’s not a typo but a spin on the Indian version of “where there’s a will, there’s a way” in the context of tea-lovers. Wonder if you faced the same social backlash as me when you were caught at a bar saying your poison is tea/coffee or any other non alcoholic beverage!
For all the teetotallers out here, are we a shrinking minority? Would we soon be what dinosaurs and mammoth are today – extinct? Would bars, pubs and clubs soon start charging premium entry cover since we don’t guzzle our way to the bill? Or would society start ostracising us by banning us from social setups since we are too bore a sober to join the scene?
Hopefully none of the above! They are all ramblings from an idle mind which is down one cup tea and a ‘grande’ latte by mid-noon already.
Unhinged, unbridled and without any strings attached. It is good to spend sometime like this. A ‘once a week’ refuge, for a few hours, should help the weary soul to rejuvenate.
Call it detox, self care or priortising oneself – it is about shedding the load of the ‘roles’ we play in life and being with oneself, minus the luxuries and privileges of modern life. A เคตเคจเคตเคพเคธ (sanskrit for exile into the forest) from connections and devices – the modern day trap.
Corporate mode : OFF. Parent mode : OFF. Vanvaas(Back to basic life) mode : ON
Humand mind can travel faster than speed of light. It keeps taking memory trains; jetting out of one decade and zooming into nostalgia all at the drop of a hat. This flight can take one back to what one misses the most.
But it’s an adulterous relationship. Where one exists here but lives there. And truly never allows oneself to give their one hundred percent to the here & now. That which is tangible deserves your best. That which is present is who you are. Choose loyalty to the present, choose loyalty to thy self.
Ever found yourself swinging to the tunes and swifting out of a bad day, all without intention and concious effort? That’s the power of music and rhythm.
In a jiffy, one can travel back in time. Some music gets ingrained in the cerebral cortex and brings back the memories associated with the lyrics. & In the era of zillions of OTT, this doens’t happen with moving imagery on the screen.
Sometimes one can go into the future too with music. Some lyrics uplift us, inspire us to dream and look forward to a brighter future. Giving one the hope to hope and stay on. โฅ๏ธ
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