Go with the flow and enjoy the swim

[The following article by me appeared in the Deccan Herald Living Supplement of September 29, 2012]

Don’t create resistance in a relationship you value, says Maullika Sharma.


I recently got an email from a friend’s daughter saying that she was going away by herself on a six-week trip to Europe.

Surprisingly this found me grappling with a mix of emotions and questions, and I wondered why I was confused. Was it because she had an 18-month old baby and I was being judgmental about how incorrect it was (in my opinion) to just take off on a whim, leaving the baby with dad and grandparents? Was it because I was jealous and I wanted to do the same? Was it because I was never able to even dream of doing such a thing when I had an 18-month old baby (not only because of circumstances, but also because I would never even have considered it a possibility)? Or, was I just in awe of her boldness and her clarity about the importance of defining her own space? I think it was probably a little bit of all of these things.

Once she was home after her sojourn, the young lady in question was thrilled to get an apology from her husband for under-valuing her contribution over the past 18 months. He’d had to spend two whole days by himself (i.e. without his parents) with the baby, before she returned, and that experience gave him a renewed appreciation for her role and her contribution. My friend’s daughter, no doubt, was thrilled to receive the apology. However, she wondered if two days was really enough to give him a complete picture and get a complete appreciation? She was cribbing to me about this, and I found myself telling her to be happy she got some apology!

I am not sure what point she was trying to prove, and to whom. But I told her that she shouldn’t be doing these things just to prove a point. She should do it only if she wants to, for herself – not to give a message to someone else.

I believe that relationships should not be about proving points. After all, how many points are you going to try and prove? And, to how many people? And, then, what if, you still don’t prove anything (because accepting the point being made is really dependent on the other person)?

Life is about going with the flow and enjoying the swim. Unfortunately, though, all too often, we make it about proving a point to the world, to our partners, to our children, to our parents, to our friends, to our colleagues, and even to ourselves.  This forces us to resist the flow, and never really allows us to enjoy the swim. And, isn’t that what life is really meant to be about — enjoying the swim.

So when and how do we resist the flow?We resist the flow with our children when we get so caught up in our anxieties, about their future, or ours, that we forget to enjoy the millions of priceless moments they give us. We get so wound up in trying to control them, and our life, on every front, that we forget to prioritise and let go of the unimportant. Everything becomes equally important, and everything becomes a stress-full battleground.

We resist the flow with our partners when we make the relationship about establishing superiority and authority. We also resist it, surprisingly, when we make it about establishing equality and trying to reinforce equality in everything, from who does how much, to who earns how much. Essentially, we resist the flow every time we try to control what the other person says, does, or is. Unconditional acceptance allows us to enjoy the swim; being constantly judgmental creates the resistance.

We resist the flow at work when we make work about being the winner in our competition with peers; when we make it about always being right, and being ahead. We enjoy the swim when we allow ourselves to have fun, learn, enjoy the bonding with colleagues and be human enough to make mistakes and still move on relentlessly.

We resist the flow with our friends when we make our friendship about material acquisitions and professional success. We enjoy the swim when we cherish the bonding and the presence and support of our friends in our life. When the care freeness, that is the central theme of the very popular Airtel jingles, changes to who has more, does more, or is more, we generate resistance.

Whatever the relationship, when we make it about our ego, power and control, we create resistance. When we allow ourselves to be human, and make the relationship about the love, connection and bonding, we are able to enjoy a leisurely, yet energy-giving, swim in the pool of life. And, if the relationship is not important, then go ahead and make it about proving a point.

Meanwhile, to the young lady, I said, “I really do hope you had a good time, whether you won the point or not is immaterial! You deserve it! You did it! Be thankful for it!

Focus on your strengths - Ask our counsellor Q & A column

The following column, written by me, appeared in the Deccan Herald Education supplement on September 27, 2012]

Dear Madam,

I have completed my M.Sc (CS) with an aggregate of 73 per cent and I’ve been looking for a job for the past six months. As I have a very low score in my 10th and 12th I have less opportunity.
I feel very depressed to hear that all my other classmates got placed — even those with lower marks than me. I really don’t understand what’s lacking in me. The few companies in which I have cleared rounds, didn’t call me back for further rounds. I have lost faith in myself. My sister wants me to study abroad. But I am not sure if I should go abroad, as I’ve not even been able to do well here. The sad part is that I am very bad at programming, but I feel that if I have to study, I must take up computers. The problem with me is I don’t know what I’m good at. I want to work like everybody else, and my family feels that I’m not dull and have good grasping powers. But I don’t have confidence at all. I feel like trying out everything, but due to some failures I find it difficult to pursue anything further. Please help.
 
Sushma

Dear Sushma

I am glad you took the time to write to me. There are several things about your letter which make me hopeful, even though you say you have lost hope. Firstly, you seem to have a family that believes in you and is willing to stand by you, even though you don’t believe in yourself. You should not underestimate the value of a supportive family, and neither should you take it for granted.

It is not something everyone has, and you should feel thankful for it. To me this also means that you have strengths and capabilities that others can see in you but that you are not allowing yourself to see.

I would like you to take a few minutes and write down what you believe your strengths are. You may find this hard to do at first, given your current belief that there is nothing good about you. If you are unable to make progress with this on your own, try taking the help of someone you can trust in your family or extended support system. Being mindful of our strengths gives us the courage to draw on them when we are in challenging situations.

There are a couple of fallacies in your belief system that I seem to pick on. Firstly, that marks equal success. Marks may just open a few doors for you into the work place but will not guarantee success. Success in the workplace depends more on your self esteem than your marks — it depends on your confidence, your belief in yourself, your communication skills, your ability to work in a team, your leadership skills, your ability to think creatively and out-of-the-box, your ability to problem-solve, etc.

The reason you may not be getting to the next stage in your interviews may not be because of your marks, but because of your low self esteem which you may be communicating in other non-verbal ways. Read more about this on my blog at http://personalorbitchange.blogspot.in/2010/09/see-lion-in-mirror.html

The second fallacy I see is your giving up in the face of failure. Failure is a part of the road to success, and is merely a stumbling block on the way. You cannot allow it to become an obstacle that blocks the whole path.

What you make of your failure is your choice. Do you choose to learn from it, or do you allow it to define you as a success or failure. Read more about this at http://personalorbitchange.blogspot.in/2010/09/its-not-end-of-road.html .
The only thing that may be really lacking in you is your belief in yourself and your capabilities. And that’s easy to fix because it is entirely within your control. And, if you need help with it, take the help of a counselor or trusted family member, to do it. All the best

Tide over a crisis and look at life positively - Ask our counsellor Q&A column

[The following column, written by me, appeared in the Deccan Herald education supplement of August 29, 2012]

Dear Madam,

I am an engineering (Information Science) graduate looking for a job right now. I have a speech disorder where I repeat the words or sentences. I am more prone to doing it when I come to the last sentence of a page or when I reach the end of a chapter. No matter how much I try, I cannot control myself from repeatedly reading the last word or sentence over and over again. So I end up wasting a lot of time. This happens even while saying my prayers.

I have been battling with this form of speech disorder since Class VIII. I was extremely good at studies till Class VII and I always finished among the top three in class.  But from Class VIII onwards, my grades have been falling. I have never shared or discussed this with anyone. But recently, I came across an article on the Internet on Obsessive Compulsive Disorders, OCD. And mine is of  a repeating type of compulsion, a category of OCD. And the article has thrown light on many aspects of my life and my struggle with this speech disorder. I realised that it has had a great influence on my academics and my grades. I am slow at performing tasks and I always plan them out meticulously to avoid ruining my work.

I am lazy too. As a result, I have finished my engineering course with only 52 percentage. My main issue now is this difficulty and delay in learning. Please help me overcome this problem and become a quick learner like others. I want to study further as I have a slim chance of landing a job with low scores. But before that, I want to completely overcome my OCD of repeating words and hone my learning skills, so that I get good grades at the PG level. Please help.

Anonymous

Dear Anonymous,

When I started reading your letter, I thought it sounded like you were suffering from OCD. I am glad you have been able to identify the problem and are now willing to address it. I am not sure which city you are in and what kind of access you have to mental health professionals. You can address the OCD to a point where it becomes manageable and allows you to lead a normal life. For this, you would need to see a psychiatrist and a counsellor who will help you.

The psychiatrist will prescribe you medication, which may help you bring the symptoms under control so that you can then start therapy. Alternately, if your symptoms are not very disruptive and severe, you may choose to do therapy alone. The kind of therapy you need, which has been proven to be most effective for OCD is Cognitive Behavioural Therapy or CBT. You can find plenty of information on this online. If you are not able to access a therapist who works in the space of CBT for OCD, you could consider using some online sites that provide this.

This therapy helps you tackle the symptoms in a gradual and systematic manner that will bring you relief. You could search for some books on the topic too which could help you understand the process. I recommend Freedom from Obsessive Compulsive Disorder by Dr Jonathan Grayson. Good luck.

Dear Madam,

I’m currently studying Information Science engineering. My PUC grades are not so good. I was interested in sports but didn’t seem to see any scope in that field. So I moved on and joined an engineering college even though I was not interested in the subject. Now I have lost a year due to poor scores.Will this affect my employment status in the future? I am in a lot of trouble. Please help. Sometimes, it is so frustrating that I want to commit suicide. I am very worried about my future.

XYZ

Dear XYZ,

I can understand your pain and confusion. Sometimes we end up pursuing paths that we are not interested in because of societal or parental pressure, or our own lack of awareness and understanding of interests, and then we can’t find the motivation to perform. Just finding a job should not be your goal. Your goal should be to find a job that you will enjoy and that will let you learn and grow.

And success in the workplace is not dependent on your marks. Your marks may get you an entry point, but ultimately how you perform will depend on what you make of the opportunity. And that is a function of your creativity, your communication skills, your ability to function in a team and lead a team, your ability to solve problems by finding solutions, your ability to think out-of-the-box, your confidence, your self-esteem and a host of other things.

These have nothing to do with marks. While marks are important to open doors, that is all they do. Meanwhile if you are feeling helpless and suicidal because of these, or other concerns, I sincerely urge you to see a counsellor, or contact a free support helpline to help you tide over the crisis and look at life positively.