kabhi haan kabhi naa...

was watching the shahrukh movie, kabhi haan kabhi na, today..one of my favourites...can resonate with the character...don't all children/youth go through handling judgements, condemnatioins, guilt...and crave to be loved and accepted? just as they are....more often than not, they are not able to accept themselves....love themselves..and herein lies a story of bruised self-esteem...leading to so many links - becoming manipulative to get their ways; telling lies, sulking and being bitter and irritable, angry with everyone and everything...the list goes on...Consequently, we also become insensitive friends, insensitive lovers, insensitive spouses,insensitive parents and so on... We can only share what we have within...if we are full of hurts and resentments and hate, it manifests in our relationship spaces outside...

We also become beggars for affection, craving for it in myriad ways.We want to make ourselves indispensable, often humiliatingly in the lives of people whose affections we seek; we crave for recognition in all we do...Thus , our lives are an incessant struggle to appear more beautiful, more sexy, to cook better, to earn more..the list goes on..we are constantly insecure about losing the people we care about, and strive to make ourselves more attractive/useful to them, so that they continue to need us.

it also manifests in a seeking for constant social attestation of our actions.We want to be ourselves but not at the cost of various social privileges a "conformist" attitude brings with it.Thus, we wear elaborate and burdensome masks, pretending to be what society expects us to be.

It has happened to me....as an older guy, I have learnt through those.....worked on my resentments, my hatreds, my insecurities,my tendency to judge incessantly......so many of them....i am still in process, learning even as I share.

Can i remind my younger friends, that everything is ok..it is ok the way we are, nothing wrong with it....we can always improvise, but we are not condemned species in creation....we are equally special as anyone else..does not matter if we are thin, fat, dark, short or whatever...we have our own space....life is not hurting and humiliating because of what we are or not, it is hurting and humiliating because people(including us) are still learning to love, learning to care....we are also a part of that great learning process...and very critical links of the chain called life....let us discover that sacred space within each of and enrich ourselves as well as others we meet on the way...

a fundamental human need...to be accepted as one is....and then, in that acceptance,one flowers....