BackCome on, Mom, don’t take it personally
When I face up to my own little fears and acknowledge them, I won't get triggered by the small stuff
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Our school library was in the basement of one of the many buildings that were a part of the large school complex. I remember it as very airy and well-lit. I don’t remember the name of the chief librarian, but I can see her face in my mind, and the way she wore her sari and her cotton sleeveless blouse. She had a Punjabi name.
In that library, I discovered the world. I would read Time and India Today and I found books on palmistry and black American poets. In one of the Time magazine issues, I read an interview with a woman who was a surgeon in the US. She had become successful in what had been a male bastion and she had been asked how she dealt with sexism at the workplace.
“I don’t take it personally," she said.
I didn’t understand what that meant. These words made no sense to me at the age of 15, but I stored this information in my head for future use.
Ten years later, I hadn’t yet completed two years at my first workplace when I was interviewed about my experience of being one of the few women in India who worked as videographers.
The trouble began when the interview was published in a Hindustan Times supplement. One of the journalists in office took a printout and highlighted the paragraph where I was answering a question on the attitude of my male colleagues towards me. He put up the article on a pillar in the office and mocked at the words that were attributed to me. The lines, highlighted without context, sounded like I was being patronizing to my seniors and passing judgement on them. It could have been a moment of glory for me but I felt shamed and humiliated.
I remembered to not take it personally.
I had work to do. Equipment to check, planes to board and frames to compose. Staying away from the negative space enabled my other colleagues to reach out to me in support and friendliness. It was easy and necessary to move on.
By now there was another dialogue embedded in my consciousness. In Ketan Mehta’s film Mirch Masala, Sonbai, played by Smita Patil, is repeatedly taunted by other women that her wayward behaviour has put all of them in danger too. She walks up to Abbu Miyan (played by Om Puri) in a huff and insists that he let her surrender herself to the man who is waiting to assault her.
Abbu Miyan holds her back. “Thode bohot taane sun le, Sonbai," he says to her. “Apne hi logon ke hain (Just put up with these taunts, Sonbai. They are from our own people)."
Many years later, when our first child was born, I took a lot of small stuff very personally. An aunt would visit and tell me that my baby’s voice was hoarse because I had let her cry for too long. I hated my aunt. The cleaning lady would mock the awkwardness with which I was nursing my baby. I would yell at her for something unrelated. I remember getting very angry with an elderly woman who pointed out to me on an AC train that I should have carried socks for my restless infant. She made me feel so incompetent.
The equanimity that had come naturally to me at the workplace, seemed to escape me at home as soon as I became a mother. In retrospect I can see what was happening. I was scared and overwhelmed in my new role and my veneer of confidence was paper-thin. I was supposed to be in charge but I didn’t have the tools to cope as yet. Everything feels like an onslaught when we are vulnerable from inside.
As our children grow up, I often catch myself taking their casual, childlike behaviour awfully personally.
“You are not waking up because you want to make me late!"
“You deliberately leave your things around the house because you don’t care for me!"
“You went and got hurt because you want to add to my troubles!"
Sometimes my words will go totally out of control. “You hate me! You wish I wasn’t here so you could do exactly as you please…"
The children look miserable as they try to cope with a miserable me. Sometimes I can read the expression on their faces.
“It’s not about you, Mamma. Don’t take it personally."
It reminds me of my mother through all my growing-up years. Papa would scold us severely and later she would try to help me deal with my feelings by saying: “You are not supposed to take his words personally, Natasha. You know he doesn’t mean them."
“He is my father! This is personal, Mom," I would rage back.
Now Papa and I are both grown up and sometimes we burst out laughing as we catch ourselves replaying old scenes by habit. He intervenes when he sees me scolding my children. We shake our heads at the silliness of the situation that had seemed so serious a minute ago.
I write this down here to help myself back off from the negative space in my own head. My children deserve the same wise-owl Mamma that my colleagues get to work and laugh with. When I face up to my own little fears and acknowledge them, I won’t get triggered by the small stuff.
Natasha Badhwar is a media trainer, entrepreneur and mother of three. She writes a fortnightly column on family and relationships.
Also Read Natasha’s previous Lounge columns
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