A nudge from life

Here I was taking life as it comes,
Learning to calm and quiet myself
I was almost feeling like a person
When I was given a little nudge by life

I sat up and took notice of it
Looked around and told myself
Its okay and that I will be fine
Even if I am given a little nudge by life

I took control of my thoughts,
Gave a good hard stare to the events
Told them they cannot scare me
Told myself, so what if life gives me a little nudge

I made the best of the situation
I did the best under the circumstances
I learnt the strength of my family
When I was given a little nudge by life

It also taught me that I can manage
That i can look after myself
That others are capable of looking after themselves
When they are given a little nudge by life

And so I learnt that there will be in life
some little nudges and some large nudges
The way to go is to go on with life
When it gives you a little nudge

While raising a child, do we sacrifice as parents?………..food for thought

Recently I read a post that mentioned about a mother’s sacrifice being the greatest and it set me thinking.  The questions I had in mind were, does not the father make any sacrifices? Is it really a sacrifice or do we raise our children for the love of seeing them grow?  Do we do it to give them a chance in life?

To me something is amiss when we say we sacrificed while bringing up children.  As parents we love and cherish our children and aim to provide them the best and all our children deserve the best.  We all do it because we love our children so where does the  sacrifice fit in, in the scheme of things.  What is it that we abandon, surrender,  renounce or forfeit? To me these are very strong words and are we therefore burdening our children with a sense of expectation from them, a duty to give back?

To me raising a child is akin to allowing a seed to grow, become a sapling, grow into a tree and flower, fruit and seed.  In the process, the seed gives way to the sapling, the sapling to the tree which them flourishes.  The seed sets free the sapling to grow into the shape and form that it wants to take.  Similarly, mine, as a mother and a parent is to allow my child to grow, take their path and role in life. To allow for this growth there are some aspects that are important to us as individuals that we let go at certain time or for a certain span of time in our lives, for our children to bloom but would we name it sacrifice or would we name it cherishing, caring for our children to blossom.

Letting go of a chance in life to allow our children to bloom is exactly that, “letting go of one chance”.  We feel the burden of having let go of something for ourselves, while raising a child only if we let it pester us and do not find opportunities to pick up those at a later point in time.  Careers can be rebuilt, opportunities come again, a chance that was, can be taken again, a hobby resumed, a pleasure trip re-planned.

Personally, I have chose to step back in my career and take roles that allowed me the flexibility to give me time with my daughter.  It was a path I chose voluntarily and if I am to look at what could be perceived as a loss would be a higher designation, a higher pay.  However, I have always had a career where I had a role that I liked performing, I performed well and leave behind a good legacy at the organisations that I supported or worked for.  I have had time for myself, my friends and to do things that I like to do.  Is it a sacrifice? To me not, because I chose it for myself willingly.  It was to make my life more meaningful for myself and give myself the opportunity to have more time with my daughter.  

My mother too, I am sure, has in her own way chosen to give some and take some when i was growing up.  She has never once said that she sacrificed for me.  She expected the best from me and my sister and we have never heard of any sacrifices made for us.  I am sure there were times when my parents have given up something they wanted or desired and our needs took precedence over theirs but we never heard about it.   I believe that this is what made us into the strong individuals we are today with a strong sense of self.

This is true for all parents, whether it is a mother or a father.  We all should revive what we may have given up while raising our shining stars so that we have no sense of regret, no sense of having given up.  What we do is mostly what we choose to do, we do have the freedom to choose and therefore have the freedom to change that feeling of having made a sacrifice into having created an opportunity.