Happy New You…

So another year gone by…possibly one of the darkest years of our times. When I sit back to reflect on how friends and family lost their loved ones, their regrets and their pains….my heart sinks. But life as it is, moves on.

 I am completing 36 this year and have had my share of new year resolutions over the years ….from clearing the MBA entrance exams to moving to a better role at work to getting married to having a baby to losing weight after the baby and so on and so forth….(Yes… getting married was a project whose deadline was ever shifting. The losing weight part, often,does not move out of the list). This year, however, I have a different kind of a resolve. This year God revealed to me one of life’s deepest secrets….And I am so thankful to have realized it, I thought I might as well share it with you. 

Let’s admit it…all of us either have a difficult relationship or a health issue or some negative people around us. How much of our energy is sucked out because of this? We can’t perform at work/eat/sleep in peace because of the nagging voice in our head. This further affects our health, relationships and it all spirals into a bigger mess for everyone around us. We know it but can’t do anything about it because we are trying to change the other person or putting the blame on something external.

The brutal truth of life is you can’t change anyone not even a two year old…. The only thing you can work on is yourself. So this year, I promise myself to approach every difficult person/ situation with “what is this person trying to teach me”. By God ‘s grace, I truly believe that every person/ situation crosses your life with a specific purpose. It’s up to you to decode what they are here for in your life.

And as I go down the memory lane, I realise how Bou and Bapa have unassumingly done this in so many ways. Generally moms teach daughters a whole host of girly things …. art of dressing up, buying jewellery, cooking skills, putting jhoti (alpana). Bou, as a mother of three daughters, taught us none of these things. For sometime in my teenage years, I was very cross with her for not knowing or teaching any makeup or helping with “what goes well with what” advice.

Of late, I realized that she has gifted us something invaluable and so precious that I would not exchange it with anything in the world. Bou as a person, had this habit of never complaining, no matter how bad the situation was. Through the difficult times, she gracefully thanked God for what we had, thought of how things could have gotten worse and left the rest to God…While growing up I found this approach a “very weak approach” and I wondered why she did not take the bull by its horns. After experiencing a fair bit of life, I realized how wrong I was. (The funny thing about growing old is that we become exact replicas of our parents as we age and things that we hated about parents while growing up are what work best for us too.)

Now I agree, that every situation is not worth getting entangled in…the wise and successful people in life know which problems are worth their attention. Both Bapa and Bou’s attitude of seeing every tough situation unconsciously got ingrained in us. They never focused on what could not be done or what was outside their control. They did what they could and left the rest to work out on its own. No cribbing, no regrets just whole hearted gratitude for what you had and lot of enthusiasm for future. As for others, they often thought the other person had a tougher life and could not understand this … so possibly how could he/ she solve it. This perception empowers you. You are no longer the victim in your mind. Just a shift in perception and a dollop of faith can do wonders.

The magic of life unfurls when you start focusing on yourself and not on others. So this year, my wishes for a Happy New You…