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Moving on is generally a term used post breakup. Though it has a huge role in healing post separation, the term is not just related to it. It is a very powerful tool nature has given us to maintain equilibrium.

So what is moving on? It simply means letting go of what happened be it good or bad. Moving on from bad things is pretty self explanatory, but the key lies in moving on from good things. It might sound controversial afterall we all want good times to keep going but its a very toxic notion. Unable to move on from good things creates huge expectations which in some way or the other disappoint us, thus disturbing our equilibrium. Once we let success get in our heads, we doomed. Be it a good result, a salary hike or any good events, we have to let the feeling of ‘I am top of the world’ let go as soon as possible. Practically speaking its not possible to stay calm after we get a good news but we shouldnt stay in that aura for too long. Just like bad experiences have to let go, good experiences too should be dealt in the same way.

So how to move on? Well its easier said than done, but we have to keep our head still as much as possible. What I did( and still do) is tell myself its not the end of the world, few years down the line it would hardly matter, what matter is the effort I have and the persistance I showed, it defines me. We as humans are generally focussed on what we lost and what we dont have rather than appreciating the good things we have no matter how small they are. Thinking like this regularly creates a lot of mental health issues. Many of my friends( and to some extent even me), we suffered from the same. Our huge expectations based on past success made us so fragile that we werent even able to cope up with faliures and real life once we got into college. What I learned is acceptance is the key be it good or bad. First we have to accept what we got or what we did and then we have to introspect on how to better it or improve ourselves. But most us were in denial and depressed for a long time cause we didnt accept the bad part, we just thought we were too good to face these. This created self doubt, fragile self esteem, anxiety, depression, PTSD and in extreme cases bipolar or borderline personality disorder. To move on first we have to accept what has happened, take sometime to introspect and get over it and then prepare for the next.

My personal story-

As a teenager, I had a very high ‘pseudo’ self esteem. Pseudo cause I didnt realise one blow from reality and it will crush my self esteem into pieces. I thought of myself as the smartest, passionate, confident guy because of good results back in school. I didnt realise the expectations created a huge emotional burden on me. I always lived in that bubble. But the day life hit me hard, I crumbled badly. Almost 6 yrs in depression, self doubt, anger, hatred, jealousy I carried all those negative emotions in me cause I wasnt ready to accept the reality and move on. Even being in one of the best medical college in the country, financial stability,loving parents, good friends, I wasnt happy. But one fine day, a very close friend of me made me realise where I was wrong. She showed me the mirror. She made me realise the resentment I carried in me, wont do any good neither it will heal with time if I dont accept and let it go. And the way to let it go was to ask myself, even if I would have achieved those things would I be truly be happy? The answer from within me was -just temporarily. That day I realised happiness is not based on results, money but its based on how I perceive life. Another day I saw a poor guy with a broken cycle. He wore shabby clothes, couldnt afford any luxury, any ongoer who would have seen both of us would have thought that I was the happier amongst the two, because I have everything but he didnt. But the actual thing was he was 100 times more happy than I was. The vibe he emitted was super positive, so and so that it made me ask that unknown person how are you so happy? He simply smiled and told me he keeps enjoying the small things be it riding the broken cycle or dress up even in shabby clothes. That made me realise happiness can be found with being a topper and without being a topper, with friends and without friends, with money or without money. We just have to know how to live with what we have. Afterall our time in this world is limited. No where its written that if we are sad today, we will be happy tomorrow. Sadness will continue throughout our live, if we dont take responsibility. If we are happy from within we will enjoy a mediocre meal, if we are not, even world’s tastiest cuisine wont please us. We will miss a lot of world’s charm if we are not accepting the reality. For the past 6 months I have worked on myself to rewire my brain, and it has worked tremendously. My suggestions to everyone will be

– Accept both success and defeat with equal grace and start fresh

– Let go of the praises, the more we are dependent on other’s praises the more their criticism will affect us

– Actively participate in every event no matter how mundane it looks. We all have something to gain from each event.

– Every event in our lives wont be same. Some will give us more happiness than others. So its futile to compare different events, so enjoy every event in its own way.

– Dont fret on what we didnt achieve. There is no guarantee that even if we had achieved it we would be happy forever. So rather than thinking of reaching the destination, enjoy the journey in its own way. Even if we fail to achieve, we all would be satisfied because we enjoyed the process.

– Once we achieve something, be thankful to the universe and let that ‘excited’ aura go as soon as possible.

– If we dont achieve it, still be thankful to the universe for giving us the oppurtunity, accept the sadness, and then move towards the new goal.

– Always remember life is dynamic, ups and downs will come, and it happens to all. Enjoy the journey

We all have been through such a phase in our lives where we are no longer with the person who was once largely responsible for our happiness. Its true some bonds dont last forever, but what lasts are the memories. The person may go, but in many cases it opens door for new better oppurtunities and a lot of traumatic issues.

Why breakups happen? Well the general notion is the person no longer loves us( which is true in many cases) but in modern world there are a lot more of them.

1. Growing apart- We all grow and continue to grow at different rates. More often than not, our partners fail to keep up with our pace, or they outgrow us. Thus we are no longer in the same page and feel that connection, and we decide to move on with our lives.

2. Toxicity- Every relationship experiences some form of toxicity be it overdependence or gaslighting. If both partners realise their toxicity and work on it, it might and in most cases will save the relation. But the problem is most of the time we are not ready to accept our mistakes and work on it. Thus the toxicity kills the relationship.

3. Past issues- Most people go back to dating without properly healing their past traumas. Those wounds still remain fresh and more often than not flare up, affecting the current relationship. Its a thought prevalent specially amongst young people is the best way to moveon is date someone else. But doing this they enter a vicious cycle of dating breakup again dating without actually healing but also adding new issues on themselves.

4. Not accepting self responsibility- People most often than not depend on their partner for their happiness, emotional support and are the first one to blame the other half for their sadness. Well our partners are one of the reason for our happiness but arent the only one. If we are not happy with the other aspects of life( career, family etc) we wont be happy internally which will always make us feel unsatisfied in a relation leading to breakup.

5. Family problems- Many of our families dont accept our partners for many reasons. Also people like to avoid people coming from toxic families and thus they break the bond.

6. Cheating, extra relationship affairs are again a big reason for breakups

Emotional affects of breakups-

1. Depression, addiction, anxiety, ptsd

2. Trust issues- After a major heartbreak more often than not people are afraid to love again because of the pain. They develop loads of insecurities which prevent them from trusting other person. The fear overrides the joy thus affecting our quality of life.

3. Commitment issues- Broken people most often are uncomfortable in the presence of another person in their lives. They still dont get over the feelings from the previous relation and thus dont indulge in companionship and want to be left alone.

How to heal and move on properly-

After a breakup its very imperative to take a break from day to day life. It very important to give ourselves time. Practising a new hobby, travelling to a new place, calling friends( but not ex) and crying out loud, sharing stuffs helps a lot. After a few days once we are healed a but its very important to look back at the relation and analyse. Analyse what was our mistake and what was not. We can change someone else’s flaw but we can surely workout on our flaws. Its very important to know ourselves deeply that what we really want. Its also important to be happy with ourselves. If we are happy inside, external shortcomings dont hurt a lot. Its pretty much like punching a fit person and punching a person who has a fracture. In the first case it will hurt a little but in the second case it will pain tremendously because of existing internal damage. The same concept applies to relationships. If we are happy with ourselves, we wouldnt fear losing a person cause it will hardly hurt a little. How to be happy with oneself is a different procedure for different people. I personally accepted my flaws and fears and faced them, I deepened by bond with friends and family and found a new hobby. Well it is different for different people. Its just we have to know ourselves what truly makes us happy inside and do it.

We all need people we can connect to, to feel comfortable around, to share our highs and supporting us in our lows. We as humans are social animals and its very imperative to form bonds to have a healthy living. But at times( and it has happened with almost everyone) the bond itself destroys us mentally and affects our quality of life and happiness. But still we hold on to it, and thus marks the beginning of toxic attachment.

So what is a toxic attachment? It was a form of codependency where one person stays with another despite the relationship is eating up his/ her happiness on a daily basis.

So why people stay despite them knowing it is becoming toxic? My simple answer is LOW SELF ESTEEM and Self esteem in simple words is how you perceive yourself. If you have a negative outlook about yourself you will never be happy with yourself. If you a positive outlook about yourself, you will be happy no matter what. Having a healthy self esteem is not about thinking I am the best everyone loves me, but its about thinking I know I have my flaws like all humans, even if others dont like me, I will be happy with myself. People with low self esteem often end up in toxic relationships because they feel validated by their partner( who again has low self esteem and is toxic, cause toxic people attracts toxic people).

In a toxic relationship one person plays the role of a victim, the other as a saviour. Both have low self esteem. The victim always complains, overthinks about problems in life( we all have problems in life no matter what), cant handle themselves, isnt happy and is always and always dependent on the other person to feel good and validated. The other person, always solves the personal life problems of the victim and always makes him/her feel good and validated even if he/she doesnt mean it. They do it basically with the thought process that if I solve his/ her problems, I make them feel good about themselves, than they will stay with me and make me feel good about myself( Told ya, low self esteem and validation seeker both of them). This kind of relation where one person is dependent on the other person to feel good, high, confident, calm is nothing but like taking drugs or getting drunk to temporarily get high and escape life problems. Rather than facing the problems the person takes an temporary escape. Also I read somewhere love and cocaine stimulates the same part of the brain and the person feels similar joy in both cases.

Toxic relationship ends very easily because-

1. Its nothing but a superficial bond with no deeper connection.

2. Sooner or later, one of them realises its wrong and detrimental to mental health and leaves,leaving the other person in a some severe form of toxic mental state.

3. One of them finds someone more attractive( another toxic person, because toxicity attracts toxicity) and leaves the relation to be with a more ‘attractive’ validator.

In a toxic relationship there is no deeper bond or trust as trust requires complete honesty and conflict( yea you read that right). No two person can have 100% similarity, there is bound to be conflicts in a relation. If one person always agrees with other person, deep inside even the other person know that he/she is lying and thus dishonesty affects the relation.

Let me take an example of X and Y.

In first scenario both of them have healthy self esteem. X doesnt like that Y smokes and X tells honestly that to Y. Y quietly listens( because healthy relations need open communications), and tells X that he/she cant quit smoking( for whatsoever reasons) but wont smoke infront of X because X is uncomfortable with it. Both of them accepts what they cant change also finds a healthy way to accomodate their flaws together. Another thing which can happen is X tells Y about the side affects of smoking, and why one shouldnt do it. Y listens quitely and gives it a thought that yeah it will affect me and people near me, so for the betterment of everyone Y quits. In here X showed whats right and wrong to Y and left the decision on Y and also not forcing his/her opinion on Y, nor emotionally blackmailing or threatening Y that if Y doesnt quite smoking X will leave Y. Neither Y left smoking because X doesnt like it, because with healthy self esteem one doesnt change his/ her way to accomodate other person in my life. Healthy self esteem People change because they believe it is better for them and for everyone else not to impress and accomodate a certain person.

Scenario 2, both X and Y have low self esteem and are in a toxic relationship- X because of low self esteem is afraid to tell Y to quit smoking( afraid to express your opinion because of how the other person will react- Toxicity 101), Y keeps smoking infront of X because he/she feels entitled to other person’s affection no matter what. Or somehow X manages to tell Y about quitting smoking, Y overthinks,gets anxious, starts to yell that you dont like anything about me, you are not giving the love I want( toxicity A+). Or Y quits smoking against his/ her will to impress X so that X stays in Y’s life make Y feel validated because Y cant make ownself feel good because of low self esteem. Worst possible case X starts smoking too, so Y feels good( welcome to my ted talk of how to be toxic and stupid xD)

People with low self esteem keep ending up in toxic circles because-

1. Toxicity attracts toxicity

2. Need to feel validated by someone else, will only happen if you date a toxic person.

No healthy person will ever validate you. A toxic person will lie, manipulate, solve your personal life problems to keep you in his/her life to feel good, a healthy person will show you whats the right thing to do and support you but wont cross your personal space and solve your problem for you.

Post breakup we all gain some sort of toxicity, which is normal. Rather than giving ourselves time to heal( if we have low self esteem) we keep jumping from one date to another, and the vicious cycle continues of validating and being validated( because as I said earlier its like a drug, a temporary escape to life’s problem, a deadly addiction). Trust me most young people find toxic people exciting interesting, sexually turn on because of the make you feel good factor and healthy people boring, mundane and strict( heard of the term, people like bad,nasty people). This momentary excitement can ruin your mental peace forever.A healthy person will take time post breakup, detox him/herself and then after being completely healthy again will get back to the dating field. Even suicide threats or commiting it post breakup comes from a toxic person because he/she doesnt know how to handle his/her life.

See honestly we have been in such relations atleast once. To detox ourselves and to be in a healthy relationship in future, We have to learn to spend time alone,learn to be happy with ourselves. Pursuing a hobby, spending time with family, solo trips are a great way to know ourselves, what we actually want, what gives us real joy( and not just the sexual thrill). Heal yourself first cause just as toxicity attracts toxicity, healthy people attracts healthy people.

My personal experience, I once dated a girl who forced me to dress in a certain way, shave in a certain way or else she wont go out with me. I felt caged for months. After we ended things I felt relieved, I felt free, thats when I realised the amount of toxicity in me, which resulted in attracting toxic partners. I never took out time for myself and thus my toxicity kept increasing day by day. Once I realised and started to detox myself, I felt more positive, calmer more confident and happy. My personal tip will be read a few books which helped me( mentioned below), write a journal daily letting out your whole day’s anger and frustation and spend more time with family.

Books I recommend-

Bhagwat Geeta

The subtle art of not giving a f*ck by Mark Manson

Atomic habits by James Clear

Eat that frog by Brian tracy

Suicide is the one of the leading cause of death right now around the world specially amongst teenagers and young adults. So on World suicide prevention day, lets get into an indepth analysis on why one decides to take one’s life and how we as a society can take steps to prevent it.

Taking your life isnt a short term decision. It takes a lot of trauma, despair, toxic environment, insecurities to lead oneself to take such a drastic step.In our society boys, girls, non-binary folks everyone has to go through a lot of negative experiences. But when the pain outweighs the fight, there is no option left for them other than killing oneself. People commonly call them cowards to people who commit suicide, but the truth is the amount of pain faced by the victims is tremendous. They dont want to quit because life is tough, they want to quit because the emotional pain is unbearable.

Suicide has a lot of common causes across all genders, religion, sexualities. Some of them are-

Academic pressure- A common burden on all of us, to excel in our lives. But for some it is a reason to end their lives. Being labelled as a looser by family and peers for not be able to get that marks or rank, inculcates a permanent scar on many of us. Being compared to people who are better than us in studies just triggers our inferiority complex and makes us feel worthless and have nothing left to contribute to the society. Parents, peers, relatives, neighbours each and everyone plays a role in some form into pushing us to commit suicide. Trust me all have being compared, criticised, made of fun of because of our results. Trust me we all do well in life in some form or the other. Marks and rank dont matter in long run.

Body shaming- Social media and our family plays a big role in making us feel inferior and extra consciouss about our body. Models and actors have set fake beauty standard. We as common people hardly have the time and resource, to get as toned and muscular as the models we see on magazines or on the internet. We should realise that, its their livelihood to be upto certain body size and dimensions or less they wont get paid. Their main focus remains on maintaing a perfect body. We common people dont have that much time and resource to workout professionally, diet in their standards plus get a plastic surgery. Dont get me wrong I am all for healthy eatimg and fitness, but our aim should be to be increase our productivity not be aesthetically beautiful. Many a times I have seen people call a healthy guy or a girl fatty. They think its because of their unhealthy eating habits and can be rectified by diet and exercise. They fail to realise that weight gain or loss depends on a lot of factors and not just eating habits. Our inborn metabolism, our hormones our ethnicity plays a very vital role in our weight gain or loss. Conditions like PCOS( in woman), certain hormonal disorders affects our body shape badly on which we have no control. Body positivity doesnt mean have a 6pack or toned body but it means to eat healthy, exercise and love the body shape you have. Trust me beauty comes in all shapes and sizes.

Racism, sexism, castesism or any form of discrimination- Making fun and boycotting someone because of their colour, heritage, caste, sexuality etc has a tremendous potential for driving someone to end their lives. Behaving differently with someone just because they belong to different group or community, just makes the other person feel inferior, outcast, burden. We all have been responsible for using homophobic, racist, casteist slurs deliberately or casually. It might be a joke to us but for someone it can be a huge triggering factor which can lead to heinious consequences.

In our imperfect society, we all are expected to be perfect or else we are not accepted. Girls are expected to be fair, well mannered, virgin until married, soft spoken. They are even not allowed to dress according to their will. If we continue to pass stupid remarks on their dress, character, casually harrase and pass sexist remark, the situation wont improve. Even today in top schools and colleges girls are demeaned cause even today, even many well educated people think they belong only to kitchen.

For boys, growing up we always have been told to hide our emotions. The stupid phrase ‘Men dont cry’ is still taught to us. Bottling up our emotions day after day just keeps on adding salts to our wounds. If we are still afraid to share our emotions cause it wont look good as a boy, we are just harming ourselves day in and out. Boys and Men out their, let me tell you its ok to cry, its ok to vent out emotions, it doesnt make us less manly.

For non- binary people, they always have been taunted about their gender. Not everyone figures out their sexuality and gender very early and its ok to take our time to come out. But homophobic slurs and jokes on same sex couples and gender unspecified people, makes them believe they are abnormal and they are not meant for this world. Suicide rates are generally higher in queer folks than straight people because of this reason. If we are a little more considerate and oen minded to their plight, a lot of deaths can be prevented.

How to prevent suicides-

Well if we know any friend and family member going through any issues no matter how small it seems,we shouldnt ignore it. If we care about that person, we should take responsibility and have an non- judgemental open hearted conversations with them. We should hear them out and do out bit. We all cant do everything but we all can do something and it helps a lot. In this case being a non-judgemental hearer to their problems. We should not label someone, cause we dont know their past traumas, their emotional state. We all act in a certain way because of our experiences. My way of doing things and decisions might be different from someone else cause their experiences taught them differently. Judging someone’s reaction and decision based on our personal experiences is stupid. If we had being in their shoes, if we had faced what they faced since childhood, if we felt what they felt, we might well had made the same decision or reacted in that way. Jokes and friendly banters are always welcome but their is always a thin line between them and insulting someone. A joke for someone can very well be a triggering insult for someone else. If the other person isnt comfortable with the topic or the joke we better stop it right there without asking for any explaination. We all have to a safe space for someone. Practically we cant help everyone but we very well can help people close to us whom we care about. And for others even if we cant help, lets not make it worse for them.

Well what if I told you that, you dont have the right to express your desire? Or you have to feel guilty and depressed for your way of life. Or you have to live in anxiety, constantly blame yourself that, why am I not ‘normal’ like others? Why god made me different. Sounds pathetic amd frightening right? Thats the daily life struggle of a queer person.

In this world where everyone has to struggle to make a living, queer folks have to struggle to even show their real selves. They have to hide in closet for years, ashamed,guilty, anxious, scared for life. Most queer people in history lived their whole life adjusting and not been able to fulfill their desires.

So who a is queer?

Well queer is an umbrella term for sexual and gender minorities those who are not heterosexual. It encompasses gay, lesbian, transgender, bisexual and many more. Any person belonging to this groups is classified as queer.

So why does the society thinks its wrong to be queer?

Simply because of lack of education and awareness. Homosexuality, transgender is not something which originated a few years back. Its references can be found in ancient hindu texts like mahabharata, vedas, puranas. Even ancient Indian temples have scriptures of queer folks thus solidfying the fact about its presence even hundreds of years back. But the utter ignorance and narrow mindedness of society has constantly discriminated against them, made them feel outcasted and both emotionally and physically tortured them. I personally have seen people calling queer folks mentally and emotionally abnormal and prefers to stay away from them.

Problems faced by queer folks-

Well apart from day to day problems, they face a wide spectrum of problems such as

– Not being accepted the way they are and made to be feel guilty about them constantly, even by their own family members

– Made fun of and inculcated with a feel of insecurity and disgust about themselves.

– Denied jobs, expelled from schools, denied apartment for rent, even thrown out of their own houses and discarded them for life by their own loved ones, simply because they were different.

– Several hormonal therapy, sexual conversion therapy, painful electrical shock therapy and even being harrassed and raped just to convert them into straight people.

– Anyform of mental health issues, suicide rates are around 5 times higher than the rest of population.

Stereotypes regarding queer folks-

They are reason for spread of AIDS- well, AIDS can be spread by anyone who carries the virus irrespective of his/ her sexuality.

They are bad at maths- well almost 90% of us( straight people) are too, also how can be numerical problem solving capacity related to sexuality.

They are criminals- If not given job and money, and being discriminated for lifetime any person irrespective of sexuality will resort to crime, again its not based on person’s sexuality.

If a person is a drug addict, he/ she faces hormonal changes and transform into queer- me being a medical student can confirm its utter non sense.

Most of them have to go through almost all forms of discrimination, that they choose to stay numb and in closet for years. Some people even make fun of the coming out process, and because their short sightedness and insensitivity even in today’s era queer folks are afraid to come out. The society’s notion of sexual activity for the purpose of reproduction inhibits them accept positive change. They fail to see to queer folks living together can adopt and orphaned straight baby and give him/her a proper life. We just fail to realise is along with being queet they are humans too. And sadly we dont treat them with even the basic human respect.

So what we can do to normalise everything and make them much more comfortable?

Firstly treat them as you treat anyother human. You dont necessarily have to be best friends with them but just give the basic human respect yoh will give to anyone.

If you have queer friends who confinded and opened up to you about their sexuality and gender, learn about their problems from them. We as straight people hardly have faced what they have gone through, so learn to see the world from their viewpoint, respect their struggles.

And lastly like you would do to any of your friend, help him/her during their tough times,be there for them during their panic attacks, support them cause they deserve to live too.

My personal experience and what I have learned

Back in school just like others I thought been gay is a mental disorder and just like any other teenager made a lot of jokes on them. But after I joined medical college I befriended one person from the queer community. From him I learned about his struggles as gay in the society. I educated myself and rectified my mistake, and always stood by him no matter what. Growing up we all make mistakes but educating ourselves and unlearning that toxicity is not a big deal and can be done anytime. If I treat someone differently just because his choices are different from mine,will make me the worst person on earth. They dont ask for any special treatment, what they ask is for basic acceptance and respect, which as humans we all have the right to have. Lets learn to celebrate love in all forms, afterall our gender and sexualilty is not determined by our genitals but by our brain.

In today’s society, we are very quick to judge a girl on the basis of her external features, but we hardly care to know what they have been through. We seldom have been guilty of commentating stuffs like girls are emotionally unstable, attention seekers without knowing what she has been through. So I interviewed 49 girls to know their story, their achievements insecurities, struggles, suffering in today’s world.

Body insecurities- Most of the girls I have interviewed did go through some sort of insecurity and discrimination on the basis of body features( height, weight, skin colour). The main reason being categorising beauty on the basis of it. We all have been guilty of classifying fair skin, slim figure, tall girls as beautiful. But a vast majority of girls who dont fall in this bracket have been deemed ugly by us. But why? Because from an very early age we have been taught fair, slim, tall girls are beautiful and will make a good wife in future. Our these short sightedness have led to making fun of girls who are healthy, dark toned or short as ugly. Just because they dont fall under conventional beauty standards doesnt mean they dont deserve love. Throughout our lives we have been so focussed on their exteriors we ignore the main traits like her character, values and personality.

But from where does the idea of fair, slim, tall girl will make a good wife stem from? Well few months back I was reading an article on psychology of choosing sexual partners in pre historic times, where I came across a fact that a girl who had a slim figure denoted she is properly nourished to carry a baby. Proper breast size denoted she can produce healthy milk for the new born. Wide hips indicated, easy and smooth delivering of baby without any complications. Fair skin indicated that she stays indoors and can give proper time and attention to the baby. Thus men chose woman who can be a good mother on the basis of this and thus the obsession with so called pretty body traits came to limelight. I personally found it pretty absurd. Reason being even in the absense of those traits a girl can be healthy and properly give birth without any complication. And for being a good mother and a wife and most importantly a good human more than those traits, it comes down to her personality, her values, her character, her inner strength to fight and solve problems. Some people will argue that those are biological traits, for them I will state biology means evolution and its 2021. If our ideals havent evolved from pre historic times, we have failed as a society. In todays competative world what’s inside us counts for a lot more than whats outside. We didnt think for even a second before body shaming her( she might have been suffering from some metabolic disorders). We just think our appreances are in our hand. In most cases its not. If we are little more considerate and scientific in our approach, most girl wouldnt have to go through, what they are going through today. Passing stupid jokes on her apprearance and humiliting her doesnt make us cool, just shows are petty mentality.

Harrasement-

You will be surprised to know that almost, every girl has faced major or minor harrasment. The reason? Lack of sex education and porn addiction. Trust me when I say this, all 49 of them did face unwanted touching, groping, absurd sexual comments or emotional torture. Also the sad thing is most of the time it came from someone close like a friend, teacher or relative. Problem is if they complain to someone like their parents, most of the time, they lay blame on her. The common things they have to hear is, Its because of your western dress, its because of your friendliness. I mean how stupid and absurd it sounds. If it was because of western dress then infacts wont have been molested, girls in traditional attire won’t have been groped.

Emotional torture-

You know the problem is, we tend to forget they are humans too like us boys. They get angry, they make mistakes, they undergo heartbreaks. We either treat them as sex objects or as goddess and in my opinion, both are toxic. While there shouldnt be any doubt on why considering her as object is toxic, considering her as goddess makes us believe they are perfect. But just like we all humans make mistake, they too make mistakes but since we consider her as goddess, according to us if she isnt giving her 100% she doesnt care about us. Maybe she has lost interest and is seeing someone else. Thus begin a toxic relationship and emotional torture on her. If we could cut some slacks for her give her some space to be weak, I personally feel it will end 80% of toxicity and emotional torture. What they need is a little more considerate us, not a tough deal.

Who are gold diggers?

My answer we all are. I mean lets be honest we all wanna be rich. But why girls are labelled as one? Because if our stereotypical thinking that she falls for rich guys. Well a small proportion of them are gold diggers not gonna lie, a vast majority of them arent. And why wouldnt a girl choose a financially stable guy. Her parents gave her a financial good life, she herself earns a good salary so why would she decrease her quality of life by dating a financially instable guy. Even we wont do it if we are in her place. A gold digger is someone who will only date a guy for his money and will subsequently leave him for a richer guy. While I cant deny the presence of girls like them, most girls will not only consider financial status but also other characters like his values and personality. Think of it this way, if two people are together just for sexual favours its called a hookup, but they are together not just for sex but also companionship, support, friendship, its called a relationship. Similarly if a girl is with a guy for his money thats gold digging but if she is with him considering all his strengths, flaws and ofcourse good financial condition its love. Vast majority of girls are earning quite well handsomely, they dont need a guy to financially take care of them. So next time before calling her a gold digger think practically.

Pseudo feminism-

Well feminism is meant for equality amongst all genders not just girls. But few girls did take bad advantage of this and thus pseudofeminism arised. It not only affects boys but girls too. Fake molestation charges not only ruin a boy’s life, it also makes us loose faith in girls and thus a real victim has to suffer. Because of some attention seeking girls and vast majority has to suffer. Next time nobody will be willing to hear a real plight of a girl because of all the fake accusations. It just takes woman empowerment back few generations.

What does she mean when she says respect woman?

Well she means treat girls around you like you treat your mothers and other boys. Dont criticise her for things you wont criticise another guy, or neither does she mean overvalidate her with unnecesarry compliments( its creepy to be honest). Just give her what she deserves not more not less. And definately dont humiliate her( or anyone) in public. If she has made a mistake privately correct her through constructivr criticism.

Consent and will-

Sexual activity( or any activity) requires both will and consent. Will is the power of mind to do something and consent is the permission given to do it. Consent alone isnt enough. One of the girls I interviewed told me she was constantly asked by her senior in college to go on a date. She unwillingly had to because she feared saying no, afterall he is in a position of power. Though consent was present, the will wasnt. We generally miss the will and are only bothered about consent. This fact has been misutilised by people in position of power. Afterall if two of us are engaged in an activity, so equal will and consent to participate should be present too.

Lastly suggestions for boys( or society) from the girls were, make them feel comfortable. Dont take undue advantage of her friendship and trust. Think before you speak cause we dont know the vast majority of her struggles we just see the tip of it which she is comfortable showing. She body isnt a sex toy, its just like our body which is precious to us. Her emotions stems from years of judgement, harrasement, bullying by closed ones. Before calling her maniac, try to know why is she behaving in such a way. Even if you cant help her, dont make it tougher for her.

What is exactly an Inner child? Well, psychologists defines it as, ‘a part of our mind which deals with the emotional experiences of our childhood.’ Think of it as a lens through which we view our childhood. The way we percieved certain events back, which directly or indirectly affected our self esteem and triggering responses in certain cases. It also directly or indirectly influences our choices like career, relationships, parenthood etc.

Why exactly does it happen?

Well in our childhood( till age 8-9years) we are in an altered state of consiousness, and too young to see the bigger picture of why certain bad things happened to us. We tend to be egocentric back then and think each and every bad thing which happens to us because we were not good enough, not considering the other factors which might have led to those things. We tend to impart self assigned meaning to each and everything and happens to us. For eg- If dad comes home from work in a grumpy mood regularly, we tend to think thats it because of us since we are not good enough he doesnt loves us anymore, not considering the fact that he might be in tremendous work pressure or other stuffs which might have led to the grumpy mood. We tend to make everything about us. What it can lead to is in adult life if our partners return home from work in a grumpy mood, it might sometimes trigger a childish reaction from us because of our wounded inner child. It can lead to unnecessary arguments or being defensive and distancing ourselves from them( coping mechanisms) thinking they dont love us anymore. This happens cause we keep retelling ourselves the same story.

Types of Inner child wounds-

Guilt wounds- It develops when in our childhood our family members makes us feel guilty on small things. They generally do it so we dont do bad things but it has several repercussions.

– we feel sorry or bad for everything

– we dont like to ask for anything

– we use guilt to manipulate others

– we are afraid to set boundaries

-we normally attract people who makes us feel guilty

Abondonment wound- It develops when one our parents ( generally in divorce cases) or family member leave us. It also develops in death of family members.

– we fear to be left out always, while with friends or planning for any trip.

-We ate being alone, thinking that no one cares or loves us.

– We tend to be over dependent on our partners or friends for emotional support.

– we threaten to leave even at slighest of misunderstandings

– we attract emotionally unattached people.

Trust wounds- It generally develops when someone in our childhood breaks our trust. It can be our parents, friends anyone.

– we are afraid to be hurt, so we are always emotionally defensive

– we dont trust anyone, and find ways to not trust anyone

– we feel left out and seek for a lot if external validation

– we normally attract people, who dont feel safe.

Neglect wound- It develops generally when our parents dont give us the necessary attention and also when they praise someone else infront of us, neglecting our achievements.

– we struggle to let things go

– we have low self worth

– we get angry easily

– we struggle to say NO

– we repress our emotions

– we fear being vulnerable.

How to heal inner child wound?

Well first step we need to acknowledge the fact that we have an wounded child within us. We need to find our type of wound their respective trigger. We have to use the trigger as a guide to get into the roots of the issue. We need to tell ourselves whatever happened wasnt because of us, because of the situation and also mistakes made by our family members afterall they are humans too. We need to ask our inner child what needs to be considered and also talk to our friends and partner about our emotional needs and triggers.

My personal experience-

Well I suffered from abondonment and neglect wounds as my dad didnt live with me and visited me once every 6 months back then. Also my parents used to give more attention to my cousins and they did tend to neglect my achievements and also compared me with each and everyone. I grew up thinking I wasnt worthy of love and affection, and thus did affect my relationships and friendships. I used to get triggered by late replies and not getting attentions from friends in my late teens. I always wanted to be the centre of conversation to feel important. Thankfully I worked on it and got my closure and subdued my triggers to a great extent.

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I guess we all been at times being in a place where certains things have been expected out of us, also subconsciously we all do expect things out of us and out of others, no matter how much we lie that I am not expecting anything. Well just like everything expectations too has its pros and cons, and to a large extent affects our mental health.

Well when we expect things from ourselves performance wise, we do just put an added pressure on us. At times the added pressure does motivates us to go the extra mile but also at times it just becomes a huge psychological burden and we fail to strive under that added pressure. When we expect a certain result and we fail to achieve that, it just creates self doubt, low self esteem, anxiety, depression and in severe cases personality disorders.

Where do expectations stems from? In simple terms our past performances. Well if we have done well in a certain subject test in the past, we are bound to expect from ourselves to do well in it in the future too. Thus two things can happen, our expectation and goal will motivate us to study longer, train longer to meet certain level of expectations or we will crumble under its humongous pressure. Time and again we all have expected things out of us and failed to reach that. There can be several factors affecting the result, like our state of mind at that time, our surrounding, parental pressure and also our performance. But everything we fail to meet that expected level of performance we blame ourselves not considering that others factors with have led to the downfall in which we have no control. We need to analyse every result on the basis of factors which we can control like our dedication and hardwork and factors which we cant control.

How bad can expectations be? Well apart from mental health issues it can lead to formation of toxic psychology. Seldom I have seen in teenagers when they crush on someone, they are ready to do anything for them. But at the same time they invariably expect the other person to reciprocate it. And if the other person doesnt it leads to anger, jealousy, frustation, self doubt and thus creating a toxic environment. My suggestions to would be if you do something for someone dont expect anything back. If you are the type of person who will be expecting things back its better you dont help the other person. Help only to feel good from doing that chore nothing else.

Parental expectaions-

All of our parents expect things out of us. Sometimes its way too high, that we cant fulfill it and thus we feel like a big disappointment to them. Be it career wise or social behaviour, our parents do expect us to be at our best everytime, which is simply not possible. Its for our own good to cut some slacks for us and remind us that as humans we all mess up time and again.

How to control our mind to lessen the burden of our expectations-

In Shri Bhagwat Gita Sri Krishna said, attachment to a goal leads to frustation on not achieving it, and greed when completely achieveing it. We need to stop ourselves from getting attracted to the result and start enjoying the journey of doing it. Start enjoying and loving what we are doing and extracting maximum joy out of it, rather than thinking I will get this If I do this. Well if we fail to get that, then its really tough for us to cope mentally. Enjoying what we do keeps us happy and also increases productivity. Start everday from zero just because you did well yesterday doesnt mean you will today, stop expecting results out of you on past performance. It also stops us from preventing complacent.

My personal story-

While preparing for my pre- meds I expected a certain rank for almost two years. It did add a lot of pressure on me. Finally when I failed to get that rank, I faced self doubt, low self esteem, depression, personality disorder. Even though I got into one of the prominent colleges I wasnt happy and it did affect my performance in college both academically and non academically, thus being a victim of severe depression for a long time. Though I moved on a lot from that mental state by abiding to the above techniques to control expectations, I still have a long way to go to achieve complete mental fitness.

I thus concluded by saying expectations are not bad always but it depends on us how we deal with it all and doing the way which best suits us.

Well our parents are supposed to be our first best friends and our confidants. But thats only in bollywood. In real life, like any other humans they themselve come with a lot of expectations from us by imagining us as the perfect ward, the perfect student, the perfect guy/girl next door about whom the typical neighbour aunty only speaks good things about. Well thinking the best for us is by no way harmful but expecting and forcing us to live upto that imaginary standards just degrades our self esteem and mental health further.

Well just as said in kota factory, ‘ parents ke methods galat ho skte hai, intentions nhi’ which literally translates to their intentions are not bad they want the best for us, but the method of implementing isnt ideal. Let me tell you a bizarre way in which parents motivate us is by comparing with someone better than us( generally that sharma ji ka ladka). They think it will make us push our limits and do better. But sadly it doesnt most of the time. What it makes us believe is we are not good enough. It forces us look at our flaws and shortcomings and not focus on our qualities which depletes our selfesteem a lot. The guy/girl with whom we get compared regarding our boards result may not be a better student than us. Just that he/she might have a lucky day which we didnt during exam. It might happen he/she is strong in science but we are strong in arts subjects. But the way our parents portray it we genuinely doubt ourselves. And well our parents never cared about how good we are in extracurricular activities. Most of the time they care just about our marks and rank. Most of the time rather than reassuring us about our faliures, telling us its ok to fail no one is perfect, they just make us feel worse about our faliures with someone who was better than us in that particular exam.

Career choices-

Its no surprise that in most Indian households taking up science for further studies is considered a sign of brilliance and taking other streams( no matter how good or passionate we are in it) is deemed as a faliure. I mean forcing someone to do engineering, who is passionate about journalism jis just waste of a talent plus waste of degree. Also that person throughout his/her life will consider him/herself as a faliure for not been a good engineer and not living upto our parents expectations.

Looks-

It is not a hidden fact that in India being fair skinned, tall, slim in the defination of beauty not realising being different from the above notion is special. Our parents most of the time kill our self esteem by comparing us with someone taller, fairer, slimer. This creates a lot of mental health issues in us like eating disorders, overuse of cosmetics, anxiety, depression and in many cases suicide. Not just that many of us made to feel ashamed by the presence of birthmark on face and skin.

Easily influenced by the societal norms-

In India a guy and a girl is severly judged by how good a husband or a wife he/she will be. In case of boys we need to have high income, a govt job( about which we might not be passionate or good in) a tall height, a car, a house. For girls its fair skin, slim, soft spoken, always agreeing with elders( no matter how shitty their opinions are), good cook, good mother, not talking to any other boys apart from family members, not going out, not having fun. And if we beg to differ from this norms we are levelled as disgrace to family and everyone. In many cases we are boycotted. Our parents and relatives stop speaking to us. We are isolated with our pain and misery. No matter how talented we are we anyhow have to comply to those norms cause for them only that matters nothing else. Also raising our voice for our freedom makes us characterless to our family.

My personal experience-

Growing up just like any other Indian teen I loved to play outside in the sun and everyday right through my teen years my mom sarcastically taunted me about my tan calling me african and saying no girl would ever like me. This forced me to use all sorts of fairness and sunscreen plus a lot of anxiety regarding my looks. When I was preparing for my medical entrance, I always had to hear we did spent a lot on you, make sure you crack neet at anycost or that money will go to vain. Even after I cracked Neet, I was taunted about my rank. They never cared about my efforts they just cared about what my performance was so they can boast in front of relatives and others. I always self doubted myself, felt insecure and anxious cause of it. It took me a lot of efforts to accept myself and be happy with myself. And the worst part is we cant share any of this with our parents who are supposed to be our first best friend.