The Truth about Parenting

Giving birth to a child is one of the most memorable moments for all parents and why not, they actually give 'life' to a soul. I am sure it is by far one of the most magical experience for any parent. No matter how difficult the journey and cumbersome the wait is to the parents, it surely is something they cherish and hold close to their hearts for life. The cute and innocent bundle of joy with those tiny little pink fingers- delicate like the leaves of the pine tree, the crinkly closed eyes - tiny yet pure, waiting to open up and explore the world, the first burst of laughter with a twinkle in the eyes, the first lazy yawn to announce the commencement of the holy "sleep" hour, the I-am-going-to-scream-face, when not given milk on time, and the beautiful toothless smile with an innocent dimple on the cheeks as angelic as can be.

Years pass and memories fade and as your child grows up things don't remain the same. However, no matter how old the kids get, they still need support and love from their parents and that remains an eternal fact.

As I see it, good parenting skills are by far the toughest skills to develop. Though, the 'happily married skill' is also a tough contender but nowhere close to the former. The secret to good parenting lies in developing an everlasting bond of unconditional (usually unidirectional : parent to the child) and everlasting love. Love that protects, cares and nurtures. This love that knows no boundaries and entails a lot of sacrifice with no expectations of a return favor. It certainly isn't easy to be a good parent.

The roles of both the parents are very different. It is almost like they are playing good cop bad cop with you during your childhood. While one pampers you, the other one ensures that you don't get spoilt. While one ensures that you see a friend in them who is going to side with you no matter how wrong you are, the other ensures that they are a strict teacher to you, who never lets you get your way. Their role play is almost seamless and complimentary. As years fly by and you enter your adolescence, both parents shift their roles from the teachers to the mentors. There is a subtle difference between the two. Teachers hold you by the hand and teach you things. Mentors just offer advice, when you seek it from them. It is during this time that parents want you to start being independent decision makers. It is a difficult phase for both the parents and the kids. Kids are trying to discover their own selves and their potential while parents are struggling to give up control. It is almost similar to the kite flying experience. When you want your kite to soar high in the sky, you need to let the string loose. You hold the string just loosely enough so that you don't let it go out of sight.

While with time the kids are on the flight of their dreams and ambitions through the lifts and drags of life, parents seldom make them realize how much they miss spending time with them. This is the truth about parenting. Parents unconditionally give the best moments of their lives for a lifetime of memories with their kids. It is a thankless job but it is one which they truly love. They don't want to be acknowledged by their kids for what they did for them, but if they are, nothing would make them happier. In the end, I guess it is all worth the effort.

Let me end by a simple qualifier to my conversation on this blog - I am not a parent but I was brought up by two lovely souls and I wrote this blog from solely that experience.

How Being Busy is NOT such a Bad Idea

When you are busy, the world has a different meaning. Being busy keeps us engaged and focused on work or else we would wander in our complex chain of thoughts. So the question then is, how easy is it to stay busy. Well, it depends, it could be really easy at times, and could be really difficult otherwise. It is easy when you love what you do, or when you keep yourself occupied with a range of things to do. And it is difficult when you don't know how to pass your time or when you don't know what you like to do.

Let us talk a little about what to do when you don't like what you are doing. This is a challenging situation indeed and needs to be tackled with creativity but before we do that, it is important to know that we continually train our hearts and minds with the different set of experiences we face in life. For example, when we see someone whom we didn't like before, doing things for us with love, we do see a change in our feelings towards them.Therefore, we all have the power within us to change the way we think and feel about things, people and circumstances. They say time heals but it is essentially our own thought process that changes and heals us.There are times when we instantly find a liking to what we are doing and concentrate all our energies towards achieving the goals we set for ourselves. However, there are also times when we don't like something at first, then after doing it a couple of times we get used to it and later start deriving pleasure out of it. I have experienced this for myself. The message is simple yet powerful. In essence, the human mind and heart can be trained either consciously or sub-consciously by you.

So how do we start liking what we are doing ? It is simple, make your mind and heart your best friends. Train your mind, speak with it, provide it with rationale and repeat this persuasion over a long period of time. It is simple to preach but not in the least easy to implement. However, it is possible. Another idea around it could be to explore what you enjoy doing effortlessly, so that it is virtually impossible to get bored.

So why to stay busy ? As goes the saying, an idle mind is a devil's workshop. It indeed is. So it is important to preoccupy your mind with work that is good for self-development and for the society at large or else it is easy to get carried away in emotional turmoil / anxiety / depression. Needless to say, the achievement of doing something good generates emotional value that is both satisfying and fulfilling. Somewhere, I always feel, the harder I work during the day, the more peacefully I rest and the more happier I feel. However, there is a fine line between staying busy and exhausting yourself. I guess this distinction is important to make. You must know when to stop and call it a day. In my opinion, this is by far the most important skill to have in today's age. While the pleasures of working hard has no fine substitutes, one must strive to achieve work-life balance. I strongly believe that taking time out for people you love is what makes you complete. No amount of material success or wealth can replace the ecstasy of having strong and loving relationships in your life and if given an option to choose between work and relationships, you must choose relationships, because they are irreplaceable.

In summary, adding value is the essence of human existence, so find ways of adding value to your own self, the world around you and relationships that you cherish. Love what you do or find what you love, to make the most out of your lifetime and stay busy in adding value always :)