To accept or not

A Monday afternoon conversation in the office kitchen in a reputed uni back in 2012 that started casually:

Lady: “How was your weekend?”

Me:” No Good”

Lady: “Why?”

Me: “Daughter had an asthma attack.”

Lady:” So who is looking after her today?”

Naïve Me again:” My husband is looking after her today”.

Lady:” So you are not even capable of managing your own child” and simply walks away.

I was flabbergasted and stuck to the ground. Emotions began to flood in a while. The rest of the day became hazy and I was totally unaware of what was going around. I went home to cry shamelessly in front of my husband and poured everything to him. He comforted the hysterical me but reminded me gently “She has ruined your day for sure, let her not ruin your capabilities.”

Life back then was throw balling challenges at a fast rate then in the form of uni, work, exams, unexpected illnesses and trips to India. At one stage it started to get frightening and overwhelming.

 We then decided to invest in something for our long term happiness. We took the first step by going for Reiki healing sessions. The initial few hours were about why we were both sitting in that room. The wise teacher finally spoke “No two days of our life are mirror images. Each day of our life throws us challenges; sometimes big, sometimes small. They can be in the form of people and incidents. Happiness and sadness are just emotions that come along with them. Take it, accept it and finally FORGET it. Treat the outcome of each challenge as a lesson, learn from it and move on. They are only here to make you stronger.” Remember it is easier to blow out a candle in the wind than to set it alight.

Speaking of people, have you ever noticed the difference between happy people and sensitive people? Life gives its fair share of challenges to both people. It is really the attitude which is different.

 Happy people simply see through nasty people, accept that this is the best that you can get off them and move on. They are like ducks. Why ducks of all animals? Why not a tiger or a lion or an eagle?

Pour water on the duck’s back. Not a drop of water is absorbed. All is washed away.

Sensitive people like me on the other hand have an elephant’s memory. All the events are stored in a chronological order, scrutinised and don’t enjoy life’s best moments to the fullest.

I always try to remember the golden words “Life is indeed a gold mine”. In the mine, precious gold is found embedded in dirt. Pick up the gold and leave the dirt behind. In our school days, we have all learnt the concept of gravity. Gravity is a force whose hobby is to pull everything down. Similarly in life, there are more people to pull you down or to scrape away at least a little peace in you. You can never make the world perfect, but definitely you can rewire your attitude.

I end this post with the beautiful serenity prayer that stuck some chord somewhere within me.

                                                            
God grant me the                                         serenity to accept the things I cannot change,
courage to change the things I can

  and wisdom to know the difference.

PS:
Dearest  people,
A lot of you were kind  enough  to write  comments. Some  of you  were unsuccessful  but were perseverant to try till the comment got published.
We looked into it and found that the easiest  way  around  this  is to sign up to blogger.com using your Gmail  account.  After which add bubandgrub.blogspot.com.au to your reading  list and it is easy to  comment. Please note the whole process takes just less than a minute.

Thanks much again

Lines of Communication- Positive Affirmation

Rewind to that chilly August 2006 winter night in Melbourne

 Anu and I were newly married and officially unemployed. Anu was busy preparing for his upcoming medical exams while I was doing a casual evening job in the city, besides completing my Masters. After work, I was rushing to catch the 9:30pm tram to our house. In that frantic rush, I lost my balance and went crashing on to the ground. Dazed and still there, I could feel people watching me, but no one came around. Finally someone picked me up and placed me in the tram. When I got home, my jeans was drenched in blood and Anu cleaned me up. I thought Anu would be angry for my clumsiness, but he surprised me the following night. The following  night , at the end of my shift, Anu and his books were patiently waiting outside my workplace  and that became a ritual.  Although the financial side was dim, we were content with each other. When he got his first job as a doctor, I was ecstatic and rang up mum. I informed her that we were moving from our humble studio to better premises with better facilities. This is when she gave me a piece of worldly wisdom “As the house get larger, so does the distance between the hearts”.

Life went predictably well until bub arrived in 2009 along with the big recession. Anu went into a stringent specialist training program while I was again officially out of work  with a bub this time.Stresses were high, expectations from each other soared, fights were intense and regular and tongues got sharper. Our relation saw new lows. I was truly overwhelmed with my new duties and my dreams took a backseat.

With Anu’s encouragement, I went on to do a research degree. But the scene in the home front hadn’t improved much. Chasing the research life made me realize, it was high time for damage control. Everything was everywhere.

Having a sharp memory of an elephant, I began to recollect our good old honeymoon days in Singapore. We met a Mexican couple married for 40 years. They fondly told us “Marriage is an institution where you have to put in a 100% every day , a couple of percentages down, it immediately goes in a different direction” Quite often with the arrival of bubs and changes in work priorities, marriage starts to become challenging. To fall in love is the easiest, to continue to be in love is the hardest.

Our in-house Juliet with longest and contented marriage aka my 85+ aged grandmother once told me “With love and respect that is so strong, nothing becomes impossible. Follow the 3As Accept, Appreciate and Apologize, there is a greater reason to smile in life”.

A simple and sincere thank you goes a long way when the other half does something for you. Becoming parents, we often deem ourselves to be the world's best advice machines on every matter under the roof. Actions speak louder than words. The way we conduct with each other often becomes a source of inspiration and imitation for our children rather than being a preaching box.

Loving Science as a student, I tend to compare life with chemistry. Iron and Carbon on their own are easily breakable. But combined together the right way, the resultant is an unbreakable metal called steel. Which reminds me of a standing joke between Anu and I. Sometimes I go and ask Anu for a favour, he retorts back jokingly “Do you need my help for everything?” To which I reply “If I could do everything myself, I would still be a single :) “

As someone once romantic said, “Walk alone, you can walk quickly; walk together, you can walk further.