There’s never an empty glass...

Dear Swastika,
I’m caught in the middle of my dreams and my parents. My parents want me to take a steady job so I can support myself, but I think that my potentials lie in something else. I’m in a really difficult phase right now, and I’m not being able to move forward with my career. My parents are using this fact against me. I’m tired of being in the middle like this. How can I maintain my cool?
Anonymous

Nothing in nature can be in the state of vacuum. There’s never an empty glass; there will be water, or juice or wine or if neither of these, there will be air. Empty spaces always get filled up. A glass has a lot of potential—it could hold the sweetest wine, nectar of the rarest flower, or the elixir for eternal life. But regardless of what potential the glass has, the moment where there is nothing on it, the air floods in and fills it up. Regardless of what potential you hold; if your life is not full and doesn’t appear to be filled with something, your parents will attempt to fill it up with something that they value and consider important. The point that I’m trying to make at this time is that it’s very natural for your parents or for anyone in your life to try and fill up space that they feel is empty or emptying. With your career at the juncture of uncertainty, your parents are pushing you towards finding security. But I also understand your anxiety about losing control of your own life and then being filled up with a smelly liquid that we didn’t need or ask for and thus having to spend rest of your life holding on to that musty smell without being able to get rid of it.

The best thing about being human is that we are not a glass that has no choice. We have the ability to say what may or may not fill up our lives. We have the choice to refuse, to hold still, to maintain the vacuum that we sometimes need to think, plan and make sense of things. To maintain your “cool”, understand nature and nature of things. Understand what is and what is not within your control. Accept the fact that what your parents are doing is very natural. Understand that you, however, have the ability to hold things off for as long as you need. Life will always pull you in different directions, or try to fill you up. But if you believe that you can find your elixir that will make your life worth living, then you need to have to find the courage and strength to struggle to get the space you need. I’m sure you’ve heard the Nepali saying that you don’t get to heaven without dying. Heaven will only come to those who have the ability to pay the price—your possibility of reaching your truest potential is only as much as your ability to manage the different pulls and pushes of life. Family is not an obstacle to your heaven; it’s the ultimate test of your ability to hold the elixir of life.


Dear Swastika,
I’m in my mid thirties and recently married. We’re from different castes but that isn’t the problem. He’s a good man. However, things have changed after marriage as I hear it often does. He has become a little controlling and as I’m soft spoken and want to avoid conflict, I always do as he says. While nothing serious has happened yet, I’m afraid this new side of him will just grow bigger and secretly, I’m terrified it will. He still speaks to me nicely and doesn’t raise his voice. Am I being paranoid? This has been haunting me for some months now.
Anisha

My academic advisor at Cornell University was a lady professor who came to Nepal in the early 70s and since then based a lot of her work and research on Tamang community of Nepal. Just yesterday, amongst some youth who are leaving Kathmandu to serve in different remote parts of the country, she was sharing her early experiences of emerging in a new culture as a foreigner. Some women from host family where she was living and learning had given their ethnic dress—cholo, patuka, ghalek, lungi, pote, dhago, etc for her to wear. One day she was going around the village and some villagers looked at her and were at awe as to how this foreign girl could speak in Tamang language, comfortably walk around in the Tamang dress and look almost like any other Tamang girl. But then they noticed that she was wearing a hat made from jeans and they started laughing – “Why would you wear a jeans hat with the Tamang dress?” An elderly woman, who was hosting her and had persuaded her to wear the Tamang dress, said to them, “She’s wearing the dress because she wanted to respect us and wear what we had given to her. She’s wearing her hat from her country so she may never forget who she really is.”

Dear Anisha, as you slip into the role of a wife and a daughter-in-law, never forget who you really are and what you absolutely need. The question is not whether your husband is controlling or not, the question is whether or not you’re able to voice your need, find your personal space in the house, and freely express who you really are. The greatest marriages are not made from silences, sacrifices or compromises. The greatest marriage is where two people become one, but at the same time, continue to be the individual that they are. Voice your concern. It might turn out to be an argument, both of you might be sad for a while and he might feel offended, but take that risk. These trivial arguments actually make your relationships stronger. What weakens a marriage is silence—when one makes a decision to overlook small contentions and shove it into the carpet and pretend that all is well. Marriage is like a pressure cooker. Allow the steam to come off every now and then, otherwise it’s going to explode and do irreplaceable damage. Remember, it takes two happy people to make one happy marriage.

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Swastika Shrestha is the founder of Anuvuti – a social enterprise that engages young people in service-learning. She has been coaching and mentoring young people in different capacities for over a decade.