CAREFREE DAYS OF BLISSFUL CHILDHOOD

This topic is so vast that it’s so hard to sum it up in a few words and restrict it to one memory. The moment I think about it, so many memories flash back at me.

That was the time when day cares were not very common and the nuclear family set up was just evolving. Both my parents were working and my uncle and aunt were working. I was the eldest, then my sister Roomina (she is my first cousin but I hate to refer her like that cause she is just my sister and not cousin), and then my brother Mayank. We used to get together during the vacations and I being the elder one had to take care of these two monkeys. I took my job very seriously even thrashing these two at times or scolding them and giving their report to parents in evening – remember those were the days without cell phones and we didn’t have landline either.

These two are my first kids, now being mother to a six year old son, I actually re-live those memories through my son in his mannerisms. I have always been a strict sister, and may be that’s the reason these two were always scared of sharing their things with me, they used to gang up against me at times, but as time passed that gap narrowed down and we started sharing talks, friends, crushes, experiences and so much more. We had our own games- some that we are ashamed of and never mention anymore, we had our own slangs, our own songs and our own movies.

I remember this one incident when we sneaked out of the house at the canal nearby and my sandals floated away in the water. We came back home and lied that we had gone to temple and that someone stole the sandals from there. We thought we were super smart but our neighbors told the whole story to our parents (neighbors were next to parents then and had all the authority to scold the kids around).

Summer vacations were the best when we used to wait for our other cousins. Dehradun being the place of beautiful weather and nature, we had many picnic spots. But lacchiwala and robbers cave were always our favorite. It was customary visit every year to these two places, these were our designated camp sites. We used to enjoy endlessly for hours in the water streams without any worries of food, or someone watching, or hearing us. We would be in our home stitched simplest of the swimsuits and play with the fruits that would fall down from the trees into the stream.

I have so many memories of schooldays with Prabhjot as well, but the one I remember distinctly is when we had lied at home that we got late in coming back because the tire got punctured. The next day, Prabhjot got a pin from home and while driving to our coaching class we tried endlessly to puncture the tire but in vain. After a few minutes of ride, one guy signaled us that the tire is punctured, what joy we had on our faces. I still smile every time I think about it.

We have come a long way since then, everyone has got busy with their own lives and daily routines. But thankfully to the social media we are all connected in one way or the other and at least know what’s going on each other’s lives. So many people come and go but even today when one distant friend of childhood sends a friend request on facebook a flood of memories come by.

Childhood is supposed to be blissful and carefree, but in today’s world it is being interrupted by gadgets. I always keep thinking if my kid will be able to make the memories that I did, whether he will have the same connection with his cousins the way I have it?

FACE YOUR FEAR

“I can’t sleep alone in my room mumma” said Saksham my 6.5 year old whom we are trying to sleep train alone in his room, “monsters trouble me, so I can’t sleep alone”. “Face your fear son and you will feel strong, that’s the only way to accomplish things in life”. He did understand whatever 30-40 minutes chat we had and he did sleep in his room. He had a broad smile on his face the next day morning – “I did it mumma, I faced my fear”. Next we went to Adventure Park, Saksham was not allowed on one of the roller coaster because of his height, and I was too scared to even give it a try, “I can’t do it Saksham, mumma is really scared of rides”, Saksham took my hand in his and looked me into my eyes and said “Face your fear mumma, you can do it!”, and I did it and me and Saksham celebrated the overcoming of fear with a smoothie. It was such a great feeling of accomplishment.

That’s when I realized how important it is to face your fears. Sometimes life throws situations at us that we are just not ready to face, but we have to overcome the fear and face the situations in order to walk ahead in life. There are many fears that we have – as a toddler we have fear to fall but we learn to walk only when we overcome that fear. We get hurt in the process, bruised at times but then we accomplish it and walk ahead with head held high.

There would have been someone who would have had fear to fall from the sky, yet they invented airplane, someone would have had the fear to sink, yet they would have achieved depths inside the ocean, someone would have been afraid to climb the mountains, yet they faced the storms and reached the peak.

To sum it all up, sky is limit for any of us- just face your fear and March ahead in life with head held high and leaving footprints behind and creating wonderful memories through the journey!!!

IMPORTANCE OF PREPARATION

What does preparation mean, if we go just by the definition it simply means: “the action or process of making ready or being made ready for use or consideration”, but is it as simple as this definition – it’s much more than that.

Imagine how chaotic life would be without preparation for the day, be it home (cooking, cleaning, laundry), work (meetings, presentations, targets to be achieved for the day) or kids (getting their stuff done, packing their lunch box, preparing their meals, driving them for classes etc.).

Preparation however is not a skill that can be taught or given knowledge on. It comes with practice and experience. My dad is the most organized person I have seen, he would plan days in advance and do his preparations accordingly. An effective way of doing this is to note down all your plans and make a note of the preparations you need to do to achieve the same.

Preparation is not just a task, it can be helpful in more ways than one for the person:

1. Self-discipline: when a person is prepared for things in his/her life, they drive their life towards achieving the goal, hence it becomes imperative that the person follows certain routine and hence in the process becomes more disciplined in life.
2. Confidence: when a person is prepared well enough to achieve the goal they have set, it becomes easier to achieve the goal, and hence the more they achieve the results or their goals, the more confidence they gain in life and hence more self-respect as well.
3. Maturity: The more a person is prepared, the more logistically their brain functions. They see life through different aspects and situations and hence prepare accordingly, hence they can handle the real life situations in a better way than the normal.

However, having said all of the above, it is also obvious that no person can always be prepared for all the situations in life. Human mind and emotions direct us internally to be prepared for the so called ‘happy path’, but destiny might have different plans for each of us. Hence, no matter how well prepared we are, we should always be ready to change directions and planning towards the instant challenges that life throws at us. So as they say-

“Plan for the best but be prepared for the worst”.