I give up

“To heal a wound you must stop scratching it.”

-Paulo Coelho

My father has badly hurt my feelings, time and again. I hold terrible grudges against him since childhood. He has let me down throughout childhood and has never admitted to his mistakes. He is extremely selfish even when he is supposed to be a “caregiver” according to the universal rule of our society. Needless to say, I end up having expectations from him (really basic ones, I swear!) which always remain unfulfilled. He only cares about himself and his convenience at all times.

Yesterday, I felt extremely helpless. Even though he hasn’t fulfilled his moral obligations towards me, I am expected and obligated to do so. Whenever I am asked to do this, all the memories of being terribly hurt in the past, disappointments, unfulfilled wishes, unmet expectations come rushing back to me and I feel helpless. He has absolutely “NO RIGHT” to expect anything from me, yet he does so, with pride. I end up screaming, yelling, trying to bring some sense into him without respite. Nothing works, nothing has ever worked when it comes to this man.

I have no choice left but to give up.

I give up having expectations from him, of any kind or nature whatsoever

I absolutely do not give him power to make me feel helpless and hopeless in life

I take back his ability to act as a hindrance in my journey of personal growth

I do not wish to enter into conflicts of any kind or nature with him

I take total responsibility of building my life from scratch and do not expect any help or support, whether emotional or financial from him

I will fulfill all my obligations towards him without fighting it (whenever I have tried to fight my way out of this, they end up mounting and become multi fold. The Universe is never in sync with my escape attempts and wants me to go through this pain. All I can do is change my attitude towards it so that it stops hurting me or have any impact on me.)

This is not a one time process and will require daily dedicated practice till the time I am immune to this pain and don’t allow such situations to have an adverse impact on my mental health. I wish to never feel hopeless and helpless in my life anymore due to such situations.

I’ll try to use the following techniques to deal with such situations whenever I need to encounter them :-

• Take deep breaths when the mind starts churning out negative thoughts at the speed of light
• Calm yourself down, go for a walk or a stroll, listen to music, write in your journal, do anything that works to divert your mind from the current situation
• Be quiet, try to avoid conversation with the person who is the source of your pain (in my case I end up using harsh words to prove my point which ends up making me feel guilty without having any impact on the person)
• Know that you are NOT at fault here, you are NOT being punished, nothing is being taken away from you, you are NOT destined to be unhappy or in pain, this is NOT your reality. The Universe always has a way of balancing things out, GIVE with an open heart and positive mindset
• You are HELPING someone out of their misery, you ARE doing a good deed, try to avoid taking such situations to heart, have NO expectations in return

I somehow feel that this the thing that has been holding me back all this while. If I make a tiny change in my mindset, I can look forward to a fulfilled and abundant life.

Show me the money

Too many people spend money they earned..to buy things they don’t want..to impress people that they don’t like.

Will Rogers

#6/100

I’m closely connected to a person who has a money spending problem. This person’s entire life revolves around money. He wants to earn money without working too hard for it. He isn’t able to part with the money earned by him, no matter how insignificant the sum is. He piles on loans after loans and doesn’t wish to repay them, a very uncanny thought which leads him to believe that money received through any source is his to keep. Ironically, this person also has a family to fend for. How does he manage his responsibilities you ask? Sadly, by ignoring them. When the breadwinner has difficulty in managing finances of his family, other members have to rise to the occasion. The family thrived and shone in adversities without the help of the supposed patriarch.

Now that he is old, his source of money is on a constant decline. The concept of saving money for future needs never crossed his mind. This person has a weird understanding of money. As far as he is concerned, he can never have enough money, is always short of it and keeps asking for more. When it comes to his family members who are working hard to be independent, he believes that they have an unnatural source of money and demands his share frequently. He only asks about the sources of income of his family members or any person for that matter and conveniently excludes the expenditure. When it comes to money, this person’s idea of ‘living in the present’ has been detrimental to his survival. I have no clue how and when he developed this problem.

So how much money is really enough? Why are humans so crazy about money? Everything that surrounds us is profoundly affected by money. People work on jobs they absolutely hate to keep their family afloat, some indulge in criminal activities to survive, others just to add to their huge pile of money, some compromise their soul, happiness, passion, hobbies to earn more, some save through the entire life to spend on their retirement, money really governs all our minor and major decisions in life.

How much attachment to money is really enough? When we start dissociating ourselves from our core personalities just for the sake of earning money, we gradually lose interest in our life and have difficulty staying happy. Is earning more money worth losing our sleep and happiness over? When should we stop? People are on a constant chase of earning money, spending it on materialistic things that give momentary happiness and seek constant validation from the world at large. Why do humans care so deeply about other people’s thoughts?

There are a lot of unanswered questions about money in my mind. Money enormously affects every human to walk on the face of this earth. My only wish for the world at large is to focus on making happiness a necessity rather than considering money a source of happiness. Figure out ways to keep yourself sane and happy without involving an unrealistic amount of money. Is that really possible? If we stop and pause, list down things we really need for survival and compare it with everything we end up buying on our impulse shopping trips, we surely would find things that give us no happiness or usage. Happiness, sanity, peace and calm is what keeps you afloat during hardships and let’s you hold your hope high for the future. Let’s try and work on improving our quality of life than blindly earning money.