Sometimes, circumstances in our life make us feel that despite all the hard work we’re doing, we’ve got nothing to show for it. There are days when all we ever encounter are roadblocks, preventing us from moving forward. The moments when our dreams seem so out of reach make us wonder if it’s truly worth pursuing or fighting for. However, the challenges we face along the way are not meant to make us quite and just spend the rest of our days on the sidelines, being better about life. The challenges strewn on our paths are meant to test our mettle, to see if we’re made of stronger stuff. It is very normal to feel anxious when we’re dealing with life or when we are pursuing our goals. That moment of the anxiety is the time when most people quit and later they regret doing so. Many of us might have experienced similar situations in our lives at some point of time. It is very important for each one of us to develop the positive thinking towards such situations. I am sure, many of you, like me, can corelate the above quote with our lives. In many such testing circumstances, we give up thinking why such difficult things are happening in our lives but how many of us really think on the positive perception of this that what we get to learn out of such challenges? I wouldn’t say that it is easy to stay positive all the time during any challenging phases in life but definitely we can tune our mind slowly towards the positive side of it. When we start changing our thoughts, am sure we will change our world in return. Our mind is a powerful tool. When we fill it with all the positive thoughts, our life will start to change.
Our key to transforming anything lies in our ability to reframe it. Hence it is important for each one of us to take responsibility for our own happiness, never put it in other people’s hands. There are problems, difficulties and challenges in each one of our lives but remember, when life knocks you down, roll over and look at the stars. I have always followed one principal in my life and trust me, it has worked wonders for me. It says, ” Whenever life puts you in tough situations, don’t say, “Why Me?” Instead say, “Try Me”. It means life is full of blessings and troubles, but it is up to us which influences our life more. It all depends on our perception towards life. We can be happy that life has given us many blessings for which we can be thankful and happy or we can feel upset, sad and get demotivated for the troubles we face in the journey of life. What is that you focus more on? The more you focus on anything, the more it will influence your life.
My Reframing Mantra
The key to happiness is letting each situation be what it is instead of what you think it should be. Have gratitude towards whatever you have in your life. Gratitude can transform any situation. It alters your vibration moving you from negative energy to positive. I have always believed in this mantra and I feel this positive energy has helped me face all the difficult and impossible situations in my life. Not only facing those situations, but it also helped me overcoming each of those hurdles in my life and standing back stronger than ever. Since my childhood, I have been very active in sports and cultural activities. Dance and Badminton always topped the list. Whenever I used to be on stage dancing to my favorite tunes or holding the badminton racquet during a match, I used to be my best with loads of positivity and confidence. These two became the most important part of my life until my life took an unexpected turn with some medical issues during my college days. I had to give a pause to my passions but had a hope that I would soon get back to that positivity of my life. But the life had some other fate planned for me. The medical complications never stopped and I had to continue living with those challenges for a very long time. No doubt, this had disturbed me a lot as I did not have a break with these medical challenges and had to continuously depend on the medication all the time. One after the other, without any link to the previous one, every few months, I was facing some new challenge with my health. I was prepared for a short pause to my regular activities but never expected that my body will stop supporting me to get back to my original state of being so active and confident. Not only that, I had to be on some or the other medication for multiple health concerns but had to undergo multiple surgeries because of those complications. I myself can’t believe that I was away from my passions for more than 10 years of my life. If I turn back to that period of my life, I cannot see my original self. This went on and on until around 2015. That was the time when I got a job in Novartis Healthcare based at Hyderabad and my life gave me another opportunity to reframe myself and get back to life by getting back to my first love “Dance”. There was never a moment of dark in life after that. All the negativity which had been filled in my body and mind due to the health concerns for those many years had started vanishing slowly and I started gaining back my confidence again. This was the best opportunity life has given me to reframe myself and try to find my original self once again. When life gives us a second chance, we should give our best shot. I did the same and gradually I worked upon myself and tried to gain back the lost confidence and started believing in myself once again. This was no less than a miracle. I have always believed in fortitude and resilience as these two are the only things that have helped me to come back stronger every time life had turned me down.
The aura of the medical challenges never stopped, but this time, I did not let my confidence go down with those challenges. By now, I had become quite an expert in handling medical emergencies with all the practical experience has had given me. Few years later, I also brought back my another love into my life. Don’t go too far thinking about it or make any assumptions, I am just talking about “Badminton”. I started playing badminton with my brother every day in our community. Slowly but finally life was on track again. I was enjoying every bit of my life to the fullest without worrying about any concerns in my life or thinking about what would happen tomorrow in my life. The road to success is always under construction. This is so true, at least in my case. When everything seemed perfect with life, another big storm passed my life and everything was blurred in front of me. This time, the challenge was with my knee and the situation got worse and hence had to go for back to back 2 surgeries, the first one being a minor one but the second one was a major one. Doctor had warned me that I might not be able to dance or play the game again as the condition of the knee was worse. This had not only shaken my confidence but I was devastated. But as there was no alternative, I planned and got both the surgeries done in the gap of 3 months. The second one was actually quite a major one which required me to be on bed completely for 3 months. I was not allowed to keep my leg on floor for these 3 months. I had to take the helper of a walker and a person to walk around on one leg. I could not even lift my leg few inches above the bed for these 3 months. The fear of what if I would feel the same way for the rest of my life broke me inside completely. For the very first time to my knowledge, I cried to my mother about how helpless I was feeling and that slowly I was loosing my confidence and hope to get back to normal life again. But do you people know what is the best part of life? It is when your family understands you as a friend and your friends support you as your family. This was yet again proved in my life. My family and friends never stopped believing in me and kept on motivating me to fight with the situation. They gave me the courage to face the challenges with much positivity and made me believe that I am a strong woman and I definitely can win over this.
Self-Confidence is a super power. Once you start to believe in yourself, the magic starts happening. With all the confidence my close ones had given me, I started working towards myself and started recovering gradually. It took me around 6 months for me to start walking without any support of a person or a walker. But in these 6 months, my weight went up 2 times. Though my doctor gave me permission to walk normally, drive my car and to do other normal activities without much stress, the first thing he told me about my weight management. Now this was another big task for me as I could not do heavy exercises to reduce my weight as my leg was not yet ready to bear too much of weight. Having a strong will and desire is half the battle and probably the bigger half. I was determined towards my goal and starting working upon myself every single day. The journey is definitely not easy but when you start seeing the positive outcomes for all your hard work, the hardest journey also feels positive. It has been 4 months since I started putting my double efforts towards my transformation journey and am proud that I could come down 9 Kgs by following all the advices my diet and fitness coaches give me. I am not stopping my journey here, as there is a lot to be worked upon and I would surely reach my goal. The best part in this fitness journey is that I have again started dancing and playing badminton daily. What else can I expect from this life.
When you are determined towards achieving a goal, there is no scope for excuses. There is no possibility of a “try” in such situations, either you do or you don’t. The amount of efforts you put will decide your closeness towards your goal. Remember, there will be obstacles, there will be doubters, there will be mistakes. But with all the hard work, there will be no limits. The only thing that matters in this journey is the effort. It does not matter how slowly you go as long as you do not stop. To double the gains, you must triple your effort. There is no short cut in this journey. You either walk the path till the end in the correct way or just stop in the middle of the journey without any other opportunity to change your life. The external factors like age, gender, societal norms, responsibilities, limitations, nothing matters when your will is strong and determined to achieve what is good for you. If, at the age of 40, I am able to do it, why not you? You just need to believe in yourself and be determined towards “Reframing Self”.
“Here’s to strong women. May we know them. May we be them. May we raise them.”– Unknown
I am grateful and proud to be a woman irrespective of all the criticism and misogyny I have had faced in my life. I am sure all of us would have some people who inspire us, motivate us and play a major role in shaping our life perfectly. But, today being our day, I will talk about only women. I feel women should be celebrated daily and not just a single day. Woman is clothed in strength and dignity. Since years, I have seen people talking about how a woman should be or what are the boundaries for a woman. But am glad that the thinking of the society is changing and women are being given the equal opportunities as men in all fields across the globe. I have never understood the thought of the gender bias in our society. Why do people feel men are superior and in what way? Is there anything that men do and women cannot do? I doubt about it. I personally have got the privilege to have many wonder women in my life who have been the greatest inspiration in helping me become what I am today. Today, 8th March being the special date for all women across the world as we celebrate this day as the International Women’s Day, I would like to talk about few of the most influential and inspiring women I have met in my life. There is no second thought about accepting the fact that these women are the best examples of beauty, strength, courage, love, successful, hard work, independent, resilient and the list of qualities would never end.
The Guiding Force – My Mother (K S Lakshmi)
“She stood in the storm & when the wind did not blow her way, she adjusted her sails”. This quote best describes this wonder woman. All that I am or ever hope to be, I owe to my mother. She has been the best and highest support in my life. I sometimes wonder if I would have been able to do anything without her in my life. Right from my childhood, I have seen her changing herself and her beliefs for us according to the time. During my childhood days, I have seen her putting her responsibilities above her interests, I have seen her giving more importance to relationships than her self-respect, I have seen her putting family before her personal life. Irrespective of all the hurdles, problems and all kind of negative vibes in her life, she always has been the strongest amongst all in the family. I have seen her struggling with her own health but has never given up on her duties. But I always used to wonder how she manages to be so active all the time with a beautiful smile on the face. For me, she always has been a perfect woman who has successfully dealt with all her responsibilities in her life. There has been time when people around her had criticised her, blamed her for no fault of hers, had let her down in many ways but she never left them. The best thing in her is she has a golden heart and has forgiven everyone for all the disappointments they have given her and moved on in life. She is the woman who is my best friend, my teacher, my guide, my philosopher and my whole world. Just thanking her for being my anchor in the stormy sea of my life will not be sufficient. I am blessed to be known as her daughter and she will remain to be my most favourite ever.
The Vivacious Soulmate – My Bestie (Harivardhini)
“Sometimes you get lucky and find a soul that grooves with yours”. A true soul mate is the person who shows you everything that is holding you back, the person who brings you to your own attention so you can change your life. She is that soul mate for me. She is loving, crazy, beautiful, bold, caring, energetic, genius, naughty, hardworking, independent and the list just goes on. By profession, she is the HOD in a reputed Engineering College in Hyderabad. Dr. Harivardhini, as people respectfully call her in her professional network. But for me, she is the most fun-going and the naughtiest girl in our group. She is a person who has been a strong pillar since last many years and has never stopped encouraging me or motivating me in my life. There has been times when I lost confidence in myself but this girl never gave up on me. Though all my friends has always motivated me and supported me, but this girl always has a special place in my heart and life. The reason I respect her so much is her positive attitude towards life. I have never seen her cribbing over anything in her professional or personal life. The way she handles her career, the way she takes care of her duties at home, the way she balances both her professional and personal lives and the equal importance she gives to all her friends is amazing. She starts her day with such a positivity and energy. But the surprising factor is that she will be seen with the same amount of energy and positivity at the end of the day. I cannot surely become like her in wildest of my dreams but I surely try to learn many things from her. She stands as a great inspiration for me and I feel so very proud to say that a strong and successful woman like her is my bestie for life and I am enjoying the privilege of being with her each day of my life. Her love is a strong pillar of my life. I love her so much and I am blessed to have her in my life.
The Facsimile – My Partner in Crime (Swapna)
“Meeting someone very similar is like you both were cut from the same cloth”. The two of us are like non-identical twins, though we look different, we are like single soul in two bodies. Sometimes I really wonder how two people’s thinking is so similar. Swap (That’s how I call her) is a corporate employee and a Fitness Coach by profession. Passion is a great thing which helps you to find the best version of yourselves and also the most similar versions which can be combined together and create magic. The bond between me and Swap is the same. It’s just been few years we have met but it feels like I have known her since ages. The first most common thing in us is our passion and love for dance. There wouldn’t have been anything better than dance to get associated with this girl. Since the moment we met, we have gathered some millions of memories together, be it our dance shoots and events or be it sharing even the small and silly secrets, we both are just the carbon copies of each other. She is a few years younger to me but that has never been a bothering for either of us. I have never enjoyed my journey of dance as much as I have started enjoying it with her since last few years. She is a straight forward, fun-going and a trustworthy friend in my life. She has always been a great motivator for me in many ways. She has not only enjoyed my company at my best but also have handled me in the best possible way during my worst. She is one person who keeps inspiring me with her never die attitude. Irrespective of many hurdles and disturbances, she manages to give her time to all that which makes her happy. The best thing I love about her is she never backs me when am wrong. She will be the first person to tell me on my face that I am doing the wrong thing and she would stop me then and there. It is a blessing to have her as partner in all my crimes and vice-versa. The love and affection I have for her is infinite and there will never be anything that would change this for us.
The Conqueror – My Rockstar Bestie (Annapurna)
“She is a warrior woman. With strength, power and patience, she was all set and dressed. The way she fought on the life’s battleground, even the devils were impressed”. There is nothing stronger than a woman who has rebuilt herself. I have known this woman few years back during my temporary job as a dance instructor in an international school. When I say school, you might think she might be a teacher for some subject, right? If you thought that way, then you are correct partially. She was not a subject teacher but the Swimming instructor for the kids. If I have to describe her with her looks, she is tall and she is healthy. The first impression when people get to know that she is the swimming instructor in the school, many of them have a second thought. I have heard people expressing their doubt if she will be able to teach their kids to swim properly because she doesn’t seem fit herself. Do you really think talent has anything to do with the physical appearance at all? If so, many great sportspersons might not be successful. She is an amazing person loaded with bunch of talents within her, yet ground to earth. She had started learning swimming in her 30s and since then made it her passion and profession both. Not only she teaches swimming in school, but also has won many national and international championships in swimming and made our country proud overseas. She has been awarded with so many awards and titles for her achievements. I have known her story, her failures, her learnings, her hurdles, her hard work and her success. Believe me, it was never less than a roller coaster. But what thrills me is how this woman has always ignored all such negative vibes around her and just went ahead in her life with all the commitment and dedication. Her never give up attitude is a huge inspiration. I have seen her struggling to prove her talent with all men around in the so called male dominated sports domain. I have seen her bearing all that with a lovely smile on her face all the time. For me, she is no less than a warrior and I would not think twice in giving her that heartful salute for inspiring me and many other women like me to fight back in life. “Work hard in silence and let your success make the noise”. She has proved this to be true in her life. Recently, she has won 3 medals in the India – Sri Lanka International Meet held in Sri Lanka and made our country proud yet again. She is the true example of woman power and what better occasion can we have to let the world know what a woman can achieve in life. I am blessed and super proud to have known such a talented woman and call her as my bestie for life.
The Impeccable Artist – My Mentor (Lalitha Mam)
“A woman that is patient has the ability to endure provocation, pain, annoyance, etc, with much calm and strength”. I started believing this when I met Lalitha Mam and started to know her better. I had got the privilege to work under her guidance as a Dance instructor. But she is much beyond my guide. She is a soft, kind hearted, patient and an amazing woman. She is a trained and professional classical dancer, choreographer and guru. She is one person I have come across with so much of patience. I have never seen her loosing her temper for anything. She has faced many hurdles in her life but with all her calmness and stable mind, she has been handling her professional and personal life in a wonderful way. There is so much to learn from her but I am not sure if I can be even 50% of what she is. Though I worked with her for a very short time, she definitely will be my mentor for life. She has always pushed me to fight with my weaknesses and helped me improve myself all the time. She has always shown the concern towards me and helped me to realize my self-worth. I do not have the fate to learn dance under her and be her student but at least I have got the privilege to feel that honour couple of times. A thank you would not be sufficient to express how much I respect her and what she means to me. But definitely I would like to take the opportunity through this dedication on a very special occasion of Women’s Day to convey my heartful gratitude for all the support and guidance she has been giving me and inspiring me to be a better person every time. Thank you so much Lalitha Mam for everything. It is a great blessing to have known and be with someone so talented and kind hearted like you.
The Warrior – My Brave Friend (Bhargavi)
“She is a true warrior and you can see it in her eyes. She was not born strong; she was made strong. She was sculped to be her own hero when the world lets her down and she keeps picking herself back up”. This is the inspired story of one of my very close college friends Bhargavi. The girl I knew back in college was a bubbly, funny, caring and a lovely girl with loads of knowledge and talent. I was sure that this girl will definitely do wonders in her life as she was multitalented and an amazing person to be with. Her journey has never been easy and may not be even as expected. She has faced many hurdles and heart-breaks in her life but she has single-handedly faced them and stood strong as a warrior. I have seen her struggling physically and emotionally. But the way she has handled her life and her kids is unbelievable. At every stage, she has stood for herself and her kids like a fighter and never allowed her weakness or the low situations come in her way. With every phase of her life, she has been inspiring me with her courage and fighting spirit. For me, she is a true woman and a true warrior. She is the best example of how a woman is and should be. Her never give up attitude has earned huge respect from me. I always admired her for the kind of lovely girl she was but now I respect her whole heartedly for the brave woman she has become. I cannot be with her physically to support her and stand by her during her difficult times but emotionally I will always be there for her and she knows that. Women like her are the real sheroes of the world. Kudos to your brave soul and kind heart Bhargavi.
It is said that Life is all about making choices. At every stage of our life, we might see different options and we tend to choose the best one for ourselves. But, do we really choose the best one? Not sure about it. At that very moment, whatever our mind or heart directs us, we pick the one thinking we are very sure about the choice we had made. Whether that choice seems to be the perfect one for the rest of your life is always a puzzle. For few of our choices, we might feel proud and really happy that we did it. But there would always be circumstances or instances in life when we are forced to re-think about few choices we had made in our past, which surely has an impact now or might have some influence in the coming future. But when we come across such situations in life, do we have an option to change the selection we had made earlier? Obviously no. Then why do we even have to think or talk about it? Definitely, we cannot change what was already picked up or done by us, but there is always a possibility to learn from that wrong choice made and give our best, if at all life gives us a second chance. Sometimes I wonder if all of us are really lucky to get another chance in life. The answer might be a yes or a no; may be it would depend upon our perspective towards life. Life always continues to give us chances, it is up to us to have an open mind to identify them and pick them up to change our life or just stick to the imperfect ones which we already have with us and keep complaining for the rest of the life. The choices or decisions can be either good or bad depending upon what circumstances do we face going further with those.
How do we know if the decision is good or bad, right or wrong? One might say if I know the decision which I would take or the choice I would make is wrong, why would I do it? This is so very true. The above quote answers to this in such a great way. The experience is the best teacher. And how does one gain this experience, it comes from those bad or wrong choices we had made earlier in our life. But now, I would rather say when it comes to choices, there are no right ones or wrong ones. This might be contrary to what we have been taught or what we might have been following throughout our lives. But, after experiencing these things in life personally, I feel and believe that each choice comes with its own potential merit and consequences further. We make the best decision we can at the time based on what we think and what we feel. If life would have been an erasable slate, how easy it would be to start afresh, right? But unfortunately, we don’t have that facility with life. So when we understand that the choice we made yesterday was not the perfect one and we are facing the consequences of it today, you always have a possibility to grab the best learnings from it and start again with a new choice. Remember, we cannot change the choice we already made, but we always can change the choice we make today. But to do this, the first step would be to take accountability of our own choices or decisions. Blame game is the safest escape route we all follow most of the times to hide the actual story. When I say we, I mean it. I myself had done it quite a few times in my life. It might always not be intentional to do it but the thought of surviving at the nick of that moment, we all do it. It’s a human tendency and we know that it’s not right to do that but still we end up doing the same thing intentionally or unintentionally. Better late than never at all. Though I have personally realized and understood about it quite late, I am glad that I am able to do it at least now and am keen on changing my thought process hereon.
Is it so easy to realize our own mistakes and accept the blame for our own life? Definitely not, but it is neither impossible to do it. It actually looks so difficult because we all have huge expectations in life. We get so influenced by the race of life in focusing what we want that we tend to miss the minute important things to understand what is good for our own life in real. We get carried away by the temporary satisfactions or happiness and end up loosing the permanent ones in our life. I have done it many a times in my life experience that I ignored truths for temporary happiness. Be it the professional life or the personal life, I had many a times ended picking up wrong choices for myself. Sometimes due to the influence I had from others and sometimes I failed to understand what was more real. I was in a phase when that temporary happiness or attention felt more needed than the actual ones. I have lost few best relations because of this attitude of mine for the ones who always saw me as an option and not as a choice. Today, I don’t have a second thought in accepting that I was wrong at that time and I could not understand what was actually best for myself. I know it takes guts to admit the mistakes and I feel doing so is courage and not weakness. Today, when I think about all the wrong choices and wrong decisions I had made in my life, I can connect the dots to get a clear picture, which were like a blurred vision till now. I might have hurt few people by not choosing them over the temporary ones earlier. This has definitely had a very huge impact in my life and I have realized this now when life has given me another chance to rectify my choices and move forward in life with a new positivity. In this process of gaining that attention and so-called temporary happiness, I had lost few amazing friends who were the most important part of my life once. There was so much of silence between us for years and trust me it has always been bothering me inside. I don’t know if it was a guilt that I could not live up to their expectations or if it was my wrong choice of giving other people the priority over the right choice of friendship. But, I am glad that I have got another chance to rectify the mistake I had done earlier. Sometimes, second chances work out even better than the first because we learn from our mistakes.
I totally believe that if the bond and affection between friends is true, nothing between them changes irrespective of a rough patch between them. There might be a small pause in the friendship, but there is never an end for sure. This is absolutely true not only in friendship but any relationships in our lives. Restored relationships give us perspective on our experiences, and deepen our lives. I am sure many of you might also have experienced some similar phases in your lives too. If yes, then trust me and give a try repairing the rough patch in your relations, if you feel they are worth the efforts. Tell the other person how you feel now, because opportunities are lost in the blink of an eye but regret of not sharing your thoughts might last for lifetime. Explaining your emotions or feelings might help you rather than expressing them. This will help you to open the door to a solution instead of arguments. Trust me, the journey of accepting and correcting your mistakes or wrong choices will never look easy. But the final output you get from the amount of hard work you put into repairing those patches would be really worth it and this time it would be much more stronger and would last for life. My life experiences have taught me that we should never leave a true relationship for a few faults. Nobody in the world is perfect, nobody is correct. In the end, affection is always greater than perfection. No matter what you have been through in the past. Remember, there is always a light at the end of every tunnel of the dark. It may seem hard to get to it, but definitely you can do it. Just keep working towards it and you will surely find the positive side of the things. If I can win over the chaos in my mind , I am sure each one of you will be able to do it in your own way with some amount of willingness and hard work. It is time for us to realize, understand and admit that life is 10% of what happens to us and 90% of how we react to it. Regardless of how it goes down, life goes on. Whether you take a chance to move on and take a chance in the unknown. Or Stay behind, locked in the past, thinking of what could’ve been. We cannot change what had already happened in our lives. So let’s not waste out time thinking and regretting about it for very long. Let’s move on, let go and get over it.
Yesterday I was clever, so wanted to change the world. Today, I am wise, so I am changing myself. Not everything that is faced can be changed, but nothing can be changed until it is faced. I have put up myself at a point where I realize, understand and accept the choices I made. I am not afraid to start over. It’s a chance to rebuild things. Better this time and the way I want it!
There is nothing stronger than a woman who has rebuilt herself. Surya – The Light
Once upon a time, there was this calm, soft and a shy girl I had met during her college days. The memory of my first sight of hers is still fresh in my heart and mind. I joined as a Training Officer in the college where she was one of my students. The innocence in her face, the shine in her eyes and the radiance in her smile made me fall in love with her the very first moment. You all might think what is so special about these characteristics as most of the girls have these characteristics. That is absolutely true. It is said that the curious mind never stops questioning and curious eyes never stop exploring. I am sure you would surely agree if I say, though our eyes keep exploring many things around us, they do stop at someone or something which cannot be ignored. For me, she was that spark. I knew nothing about her till then but the thought in my mind that there is something about her and I want to explore her deep never left my mind. Gradually, I started interacting with her and started my trials in understanding her as a person.
As and when I started observing the deep nature of this girl, I always realized her to be quiet, introspective and deep in thought. I could not categorize her as an introvert though, but may be she was shy or I always felt there was something inside her which is probably stopping her to bring out the best version of herself. The curiosity inside me got more and more strong and I started observing every minute thing about her in the process. She had drew a circle around her and there were very few people inside that circle with whom she used to spend most of her time. But one question never left my mind was whether she was being completely honest and sincere in being herself with those few people at least? Her actions and her eyes always gave me a puzzled answers to that. Sometimes, the sixth sense of a person works so strong that your mind denies to accept what your eyes see. The same was my experience with her. Officially, I was their trainer and mentor during their engineering and used to help the students with their trainings & placements. But, I decided to mentor her specially and personally. I felt she was like an iceberg, showing just a part of her abilities and keeping the rest hidden from the world.
Gradually, she became quite close to me and used to share her feelings and emotions with me. This was quite an improvement in my project. I remember one day the students were practicing for their annual celebrations in the college. I was there with her seeing her actively participating in a group dance practice. There was a glow on her face and the happiness I could see and feel inside her that day was amazing. As and when I got to know her better than before, I started loving this girl more and more. It was then I started realizing that she had a great influence of the thoughts of few people around her. She always used to try to be as they expected her to be and not be herself anytime. She had literally buried all her likes, feelings and emotions inside her and had covered all of those with the likes and emotions of those influenced people. She was literally living their life rather than living her own life. Finally, I understood this but when I tried to discuss the same with her, she always used to convince me saying that she likes being that way. But her answer never could convince me completely and the confusion inside me kept on disturbing me for very long. I never stopped my trials of counselling her and making her realize that being oneself is the utmost happiness in the world and she needs to change her perspective towards life. I was never sure of her thinking towards it but whenever I tried to talk to her about these things, she just used to divert the topic by giving a lovely smile and trust me her smile is a killer one, and I used to get carried away with that. But the thought that she was hiding too many secrets behind that lovely smile never left my mind.
With these continuous efforts in understanding her and helping her come out of that circle, time just passed too quickly. I had moved out from that job and later she finished her graduation and was ready to take up a decent job. But, we continued to talk regularly and meet whenever possible. She, along with a group of few more friends used to visit my place and many a times, I used to go and meet them. So there was never a gap felt between us in our bonding. She joined a job in an organization and I was working with Novartis at that time. While talking to her about the job, I realized that may be she is not that comfortable with it and I thought it would be great if she could be with me all the time so that I can protect her from all the negative vibes around her. I am not sure if it was my attachment with her or my over-protective nature which made me think that she should always be with me so that I can make sure she is fine and safe from all the negativity around in the world. That was the time when I approached my colleagues for her job in Novartis and she got through the same. Believe me, that was one of the best moments of joy for me. By then, knowing this girl for so many years, there was a very special bond with her. I have no idea of what to name that relation with her, but the kind of affection and attachment I have with her is undoubtedly one of the best. It is said that we should always trust our intuition, because it never lies. I don’t know if it was my possessiveness towards her or a hint from my gut feeling that I got her into Novartis with me, but I still believe and feel it was one of the best decisions I had taken in my life.
That was the time when we used to enjoy each others company every single day. We used to spend so much of time together talking about every damn thing in this world. We gathered so many memories together that we can cherish them for lifetime. All the gossips, the parties, dance performances, outings, secrets and many more such crazy memories with her doubles my happiness in life. She is one such person in my life who knows every bit of my life, be it my past, my present or my future plans. She understands every bit of me as a person and believe me, she has been a victim of my mood swings and crankiness many times but she never complained it anytime. Sometimes, I wonder that how we both get along each other so well and understand each other immensely irrespective of the age difference we have. But our relation has yet again proved that “Age is an issue of mind over matter. If you don’t mind, it doesn’t matter”. For us, age never mattered and we were just the best versions of ourselves when next to each other. Many people used to ask me what is my relation with her. Shall I say she is a student, a friend, a sister or a daughter? The name just never mattered for us. When the bond is so strong, when we understand each other’s feelings without even talking to each other, when we compliment each other in the best possible way, why should anything else matter? In the midst of those happy and joyful days, there was a storm which just blew away all the happiness in our lives. Something unexpected happened in her life and she was devastated. Few incidents and few people for whom she has given the half of life completely had put her down and she was in the worst phase of her life. It was like people could not see her happiness and tried to knock her down by hurting her very badly. Though I was with her as a rock standing next to her but to take all that and accept the bitter facts of life was the biggest challenge. I was worried that how would she take all that as she was a very sensitive girl, she not only showed up the courage to face that situation but also knock it down with such a great confidence. She had proved that no matter what, the comeback is far greater than a setback. Finally, I could see my girl breaking out all the barriers of her circle and walking out of it with her head high. That was the best ever feeling for me as a mentor and well wisher for her.
When a ‘setback’ brings a ‘comeback’, that’s grace in action!
The way she handled herself in that situation and turned the biggest nightmare of her life into a learning lesson and moved on made me so proud of her. I always had loads of love for her but the way she fought with her weaknesses and brought out the best version of herself made me respect her to a great extent. Not only did she handled herself in such difficult times but since then she has been a greatest support for me in all difficult times. There have been instances in my life when I felt low and could not handle myself. She was the one who handled me and made me realize my self worth once again. It was a biggest surprise for me to see her motivating me and making me fight with circumstances. A feeling that when did that shy little girl had turned into a positive and confident woman surprised me. What else can a teacher expect from her student? She has surpassed me in many ways and that makes me so proud and the most happiest person in the world. I left Novartis few years ago but she continued her journey with the company for almost 7 years and now she is ready to take the next challenge of her career. I am sure she will do wonders wherever she would go. Not only career, but she also has proved that if you have a strong will, anything is possible in life. Life is all about accepting every situation, face it, fight with it and win over it to achieve the utmost happiness.
This has been my long pending wish to pen down my emotions and feelings for her. I wanted to dedicate this to one of the most and dearest persons in my life as she is in the phase of starting a new chapter of her career. I always wish she gets everything she wishes for in her life. May she reach to greater heights in her career and achieve utmost success and happiness both in her professional and personal life. There is only one thing I can tell her that I love her to the moon and back and no matter what, she will always find me next to her in every step of her life.
“A smile can open a heart faster than a key can open a door… So brighten the world with your smile.”
“Memories are timeless treasures of the heart that tell our story”
“There are certain people who make the world a better place just by being in it. You are definitely one of those people My Angel. Loads of love and blessings always.”
Fortitude is the mental or emotional strength that enables you to find courage in the face of adversity, whereas resilience is the mental ability to recover quickly from depression, illness or misfortune. Have you ever known a person who seems to be able to keep going and stay motivated when everything seems to be falling apart? This is called mental fortitude. Many people wonder how a person can be with such high mental strength and think if did he/she was born with this quality? But the fact is that we are not born with fortitude, it is something we develop in ourselves gradually as part of our life. I feel every person experiences this stage in their life at least once at some point of time. I, personally, have gone through this stage and have understood how developing a strong fortitude has helped me to cope up with so many tough situations in my life. It does not happen overnight and it does not happen easily, but it is always possible to do so. It needs lot of patience and efforts to tune your mind towards learning to get mentally strong. How you do it? Everyone has their own way of doing it. I am sharing my ideas and thoughts which I have been following and which have actually helped me to build a strong fortitude for myself.
Have Courage – The first thing to have to build mental toughness is courage. It is important to have the courage to face your fears and endure those challenging and at times uncomfortable situations. This is where your attitude towards such situations comes into picture. You need to believe that you can overcome the challenge and when you do, you need to reflect on how you felt at that time and how great you feel now. To have courage, you need to be prepared to fail and to learn from that failure. This will help you to improve your mental fortitude.
Be Determined – You need to be determined and focused on your goals and vision. It will help you to keep an eye on what is most important to you and to prioritize where you focus your energy and determination.
Be emotionally self-aware & calm – It is actually important for you to be aware of your emotions and how you feel in certain circumstances. What actions or behaviors of others make you feel uncomfortable, strong, confident or upset? By identifying these situations and how they make you feel will help you improve the self-awareness of your feelings and body language. The next and important step is being aware and controlling your emotions in these situations. Being calm under fire is an important trait of great leaders. It is very important for us to be calm and composed during difficult situations and help our mind to think in the right possible way.
Work hard at building fortitude – Building fortitude takes time so be patient and look at it as a learning process. We should not be too hard on ourselves but find someone to hold you accountable.
A great outcome of having fortitude and mental toughness is that you will develop resilience. In challenging times, you will be able to bounce back and remain productive and be focused on your goals. Acknowledging that we are not perfect but yet we can still be confident and have a positive attitude towards life is a great feeling. You might make mistakes in your life but you can have the toughness and fortitude to not let these mistakes stop you or derail your plan to move forward in life with confidence. Resilience is the outcome of having strong fortitude.
It’s your reaction to adversity, and not adversity itself that determines how your life’s story will develop.”
Dieter F. Uchtdorf
What is that one thing which can help us to keep going when you just want to quit? It’s nothing else but Resilience. It is to bounce back from negative experiences and disturbances in life. To some like me, resilience is a sort of “miracle drug” personality trait, something that can heal all wounds and right all wrongs. To be more precise, developing resilience basically requires emotional distress. If we never ran into disappointment in the first place, we would never learn how to deal with it. When you think about it in those terms, it’s easy to see that we all display some pretty impressive resilience. Some of us are more resilient than others, but we have all been knocked down, defeated, or disheartened at some of time in our lives; however, we kept going – and here we are today, stronger and more experienced with such difficult situations in life.
My Personal Memoir
We all have some kind of motivational factors in our life which help us to face the challenges life throws at us and successfully overcome those situations with confidence. I am no exception in this matter. I have been a very active child right from my childhood. I used to love to keep myself busy with all different learnings and passions I had which used to always help in having a positive atmosphere around me. I used to be a passionate dancer and an enthusiastic sportsperson right from the beginning. I was always a below average student when it came to studies but my passion always was in other activities. Things were quite smooth for many years until I was in my Graduation. That was the period when I had some medical complications and had to undergo a surgery and had quite a few side effects post that surgery. Gradually my health started deteriorating and got too complicated post marriage and even worse after having kids. As and when the time passed with these medical complications, I was forced to go away from my passions as they needed much physical strength. There were few years in life where I could not even think of anything else apart from my regular job and my routine activities. It was quite difficult managing the same but am blessed to have a wonderful family around who had been my biggest support in all these difficult times. Still, to fight with these challenges wasn’t easy at all for me and had gone through a bad emotional phase many times during these years. But the only thing which kept me going is my mental strength which I had developed for myself. The resilience I had developed was the only key factor in facing these challenges and fighting it back every time life knocked me down with some emotional challenge. Even after trying my best, I could not win over these medical challenges which had made my life very difficult. In every bad situation, life gives us a second chance to make it right. Some take it, others leave it and most don’t see it. Life had given me as well the same chance and I was fortunate to grab it by bringing back my passion of dancing again into my life. Dancing and sports have always been my biggest motivational factors which give me the utmost strength to fight with anything that comes in the way and successfully come over it over a period of time.
I am 40 years old today and would you guys believe me if I say that I had undergone 10 surgeries in past 20 years of my life? Many people don’t. In fact, I myself feel surprised when I think of these 20 years of my life. It has never been less than a roller coaster. But I am glad and proud of myself that I have been strong enough to face all these challenges and overcome them with self motivation and confidence. Recently, had to undergo a major knee surgery and may be I will never be able to dance or play sports in my life in the same way again. This had shaken my confidence in a worst way. But again, my resilience had helped me to motivate myself and bring a hope back again that I might not be able to lead my life in the same way as I used to do earlier but this would not stop me. I always believe in a quote which says, “When life gives you hundred reasons to cry, show life that you have thousand reasons to smile.” What if I will not be able to lead my life in the same way, I am sure I will still manage to make the best out of it. I always haven taken these challenges in a very positive way and I feel these tough situations help me to bring out the best version of myself every time. I feel life is too short and is very unpredictable. We never know what is in store for us the very next moment? We should live every moment of our life with positivity, try to be happy with whatever life gives you and make people around us happy in the best possible way.
Did you ever stop and think about how often we have seen people talking about one’s appearance? I have heard many times in my personal experience. Sometimes, it’s in a positive sense but sometimes it seems like a criticism. Many people in the society, especially women, have been through these so-called societal norms across the world. The widespread phenomenon of receiving the feedback from society when our bodies don’t meet the unrealistic beauty standards. I personally feel that we spend most of our time in self-critical thoughts, despising our body and comparing ourselves unfavorably to others. I, personally have faced lot of criticism from many people around towards body appearance and weight aspects. Probably, this is one of the reasons which has pushed me in writing this blog. But whatever I pen down here in my blog is just my perspective and my personal experiences towards it.
Body shaming has been the most used term for this. But I rephrase it as Body Shining or Body Positivity for myself. For me, personally, shaming seems a bit negative and I feel why should one feel negative about themselves in any way. As a child and a youngster, I was very slim and fit person in the normal societal language and am no more the same. But why should this bother someone, when I am fine with however I am. In my perspective, am still fit and active, might not be physically but definitely mentally and emotionally. I always have been confused about why people only think about being fit and active physically and don’t focus on mental fitness and activeness. Don’t you agree with me if I say this is equally important, or to be more precise, being strong, fit and active mentally is much more important than being strong physically?
There have been many personal experiences in life for me, just like many other women in the society. I have been through many situations when people around me had criticized me for my body appearance. The terms like “Oh! You are too thin, you need to put a bit of weight and become more stronger”, “OMG! You have put on so much of weight, how would you even manage to do anything in your daily life”, “It would have been so good if you were a bit taller”, “Oh! You are so tall; you look equal to those boys” are the common ones we can hear people talking about others. Some people think that it is just for fun. But pause there for a second and place yourself in that position and think if you would ever be able to take it as a fun if someone criticized you that way. It would be difficult for any of us to see ourselves in that position. But if we really empathize with the situation of the other person, we will understand the pain and emotional stress one goes through in such situations. I, personally feel, this is intended more towards women but still don’t understand why? One who has the mindset of criticizing others in this way will anyways do it. We cannot control the actions and comments of others, but we can stop ourselves from entering the vivacious cycle of body shaming.
“The next time you start criticizing yourself, take a split-second pause, step back and ask yourself where it’s coming from”, said Jenny Weinar, a Philadelphia – based social worker and therapist. She asks people to focus on whose voice we hear and says that voice could be of someone specific in our lives. Regan Chastain, a Los-Angeles-based fat activist who holds the Guinness World Record for heaviest woman to complete a marathon, spent a long time feeling angry at her body. Then, she realized she hadn’t spent a minute being grateful for its powers. At that point, she listed off everything she could think of that her body did for her. Going forward, every time she experienced a negative thought about her body, she replaced it with something from her gratitude list. This story of hers had inspired me personally to a great extent. I feel our mind would act as we tune it. If we focus more on positive, it will lead us towards positivity and vice versa. Since I had learned of this story, I had started following the same and I realized that there are so many positive things about myself for which I can really be proud of. I strongly believe the proverb, “Count your blessings, not your troubles”.
Embrace Yourself
Many times, I have heard people getting worried if there is any solution to this and how do they fight against body shaming? I feel there is no problem without a solution, it is just that we need to change our focus and mindset. I personally follow my own principles to allow myself to stay away from such negativity in life and love myself as I am. I am over weighted and fat – so what? Does this make me do anything less in my life than I wish for – Never. Then, why should this even bother me. I keep telling myself frequently that I am beautiful in my own way and I can do wonders in my life. “Self-Confidence is the best outfit, rock it and own it”.
Embrace our own – Body positivity as opposed to body shaming is learning to embrace your own imperfections and feeling content with how we are and how we look. Once we start doing this, no amount of judgement that may be directed towards us can put us down.
Maintain healthy relationships – Surround yourself with people who are body positive and accept you for who you are – without forcing you into society’s impossible standards. It is very important to spend quality time with people who will help you view yourself positively and prohibit any semblance of body shaming.
Educate those who body shame – The effects of body shaming are more emotional than physical. In most of the cases, the people around might not even notice the emotional trauma the victim is experiencing. This emotional stress accumulates and bursts out at some point of time. If you catch anyone body shaming another, confront and educate them. Talk out nicely and discuss the harmful effects of body shaming a person.
At the end, each one of us want to be accepted for who we are and how we look. Beauty is not about having a perfect body or amazing looks. It’s all about the person’s heart and soul. Every person is beautiful in his/her own way. When a person is meant to be in a particular way, why should we expect him/her to change for some baseless norms of the society. Size of your body doesn’t define your beauty. Be confident, be happy, love your body and embrace yourself!
