The Prescription of Life

Ever wonder why kids are such a huge source of pure joy and love? Children are always their authentic selves, they know how to love unconditionally, they know how to laugh and live with joy, they know how to express emotions, they know how to bounce back from a fall or failure or disappointment. Cry and move on. Laugh, love, eat, play, sleep. They don’t have pre-set filters of judgement or expectations.

What happens then as they start to grow older? We adults step in and start brainwashing them. We start programming the prescription of life in their innocent little brains. We have to be good and responsible parents after all. Our parents and grandparents did that, we must impart the same knowledge to our kids to secure their future.

You must study hard and get good marks in school. Why don’t you stop watching TV and focus on your homework? You must tidy your hair and look pretty like other girls. Why don’t you dress properly? Look, your so-and-so friend or a cousin does this and that, you should also focus on doing this and that, or worse, be better! You’re so fat! Why can’t you stop eating and go play sports like your sisters and brothers? Why are you so afraid all the time? It’s ok, you don’t have to worry and be afraid. We are here for you. Be bold!

Fast forward to adulthood and.. If you’re a girl, you shouldn’t talk so much. Girls should be polite and soft spoken, oh and fair and pretty! Don’t go out in the sun and play! You’ll get dark. If you’re a boy, you must get a good job and take care of household responsibilities. You must be bold and strong!

It’s now time to get married. It’s very important to find a life partner. Once you have a life partner, it’s time to start a family. Sooner the better. Now it’s time to buy a house. If you already have one, then how about a bigger house? Oh and then cars, small one then bigger one. And the prescription goes on... oh, but wait, what happens when life doesn’t go as prescribed?

You might just fall into the unfortunate “bechara” victim category and maybe even be doomed for life. Even if it’s not that bad, the labels will stick with you for life, if you let the prescription dictate your life.

If you’re an orphan, or a divorcee, or you lost your job, or you can’t have a child, or you can’t meet the gender stereotypes, or you don’t have a big house or car or something else on the approved prescription of life —- something must be terribly wrong with you or lacking in you. Everyone is suddenly so sorry for you. You are a poor victim of life! How did one get there? If the prescription hadn’t dictated our decisions and actions, maybe we wouldn’t be there in the first place?

Take marriage for an example, mainly because this is something I’ve personally been through not too long ago. Marriages and the inherent intimacy it brings between two people is a very complex give-and-take dynamic. And it’s an evolving process. While there is no guarantee of what that dynamic will be with any form of marriage – arranged or love, simply to make a decision to marry someone because society dictates it, is a bit scary. Aren’t the two people coming together to make their life’s biggest decision in the best position to determine if the dynamic will work for them? And even after the decision is made, aren’t they allowed to continue to decide if the dynamic is still working for them or has it become so toxic that it’s eating away their soul instead of fueling it? It’s their life after all!

But somehow, across many cultures, society and family still gets to have the upper hand in passing the verdict. “Oh, you’ll adjust. Give it time. Make it work”, elders say. Really? How? If two people don’t connect with each other and don’t fulfill each other’s emotional needs or are not invested in making it work, how can that marriage be fulfilling? Sure, it might last forever within the confines (or shackles) of social norms and pressures, but is that really a life anyone willingly wants to sign up for? Who would willingly want to be unhappy and unfulfilled in life?

“If you have challenges in your marriage, why don’t you have kids?”, is the next best advice. If you already have one, why don’t you have another one? You’ll be so busy that you won’t have the time to think about relationship problems then! According to the elders, kids help with keeping the marriage together because they force both parents to come together for co-parenting.

Having kids places additional demands on the marriage, and those demands often pressure the weaknesses and challenges in the already strained relationship. If a marriage dynamic is already disturbed, how can having kids solve the problem? It’s only going to exacerbate the problems. Increased fights and arguments, emotional unavailability, stresses of managing the children, all of these will eventually catch up with the parents and affect their emotional and physical wellbeing in the long run, if not in the short run.

Sure, as with most things in life we grow through, it’s normal to have differences in marriages. After all, it’s a merger of two unique individuals who have come together to share life’s journey and grow through it.(In fact if there are no growing pains, I would argue the individuals have stagnated and that’s a problem in itself). There are also ways to tackle these differences — peer support from friends, getting professional help – therapy, family counseling – to work through the differences. But if you have tried it all and it’s still not working, do you still have to be forced to serve a life sentence?

I have seen many relationships who have still survived through differences and turbulent dynamics, including my own parents, who frankly, did not get along for most of their married life when my sister and I were kids. Sadly, my sister, being the older one, took the brunt of it. I was sheltered for the most part.

Even with the best of intentions, what example are you setting for your children? What messaging are you giving them about what healthy relationships should be about? How is their emotional health being impacted? How are they dealing with your day-to-day fights and arguments?

I want to revisit the prescription of life I started out with and for a minute take a different approach to it.

If the kid is watching TV and not doing his or her homework, why is that? Are there feelings of neglect that are resulting in an avoidance behavior as indicated by the child escaping homework and finding comfort in watching TV? Or perhaps there something else going on there?

If the child is over-eating, why is that the case? Emotional eating is a common phenomenon in both children and adults. Is the child seeking security in food because there is insecurity resulting from something at home or in school?

By telling the girl child to look pretty, are you otherwise implying the child is not pretty? Or by telling the boy child he shouldn’t be scared, are you implying he is lacking something he shouldn’t?

Why are we setting idolized standards of what is pretty or strong in the first place and if someone doesn’t meet those standards, that they are doomed to a self actualization behavior for life driven by the thought that they are not pretty/strong resulting a life long toxic pattern of constantly trying to look pretty or being strong, in both cases harboring deep rooted insecurity.

Why can’t we stop telling our children and adults what they should do? Why can’t we start just letting them be who they are and help them develop and live their potential to do the amazing things they can do if we let them be and feel whole and complete?

Why do our lives’ purpose get limited to building families and raising children and accumulating wealth? Is there a bigger reason for our presence here on earth? Is there something larger than ourselves that we can contribute to the world through our existence? Not everyone will have the chance to find out the answer to these questions or to find a bigger purpose. And my point is not to say that people shouldn’t get married or have kids or have homes to live in.

Marriage is a beautiful partnership of two souls and bringing up children is, in my opinion, the most rewarding and meaningful life experience one can have. My point is that having these things against your will or if they are not working for you, just because society prescribes it, is maybe akin to not living one’s life potential but instead being chained to the shackles of society’s prescription. Ones that are so strong that you cannot even imagine getting out of them, once you are in. Because if you dare to do so, you risk being labeled or judged as being incomplete or somehow inadequate to live an otherwise normally prescribed life.

In an ideal world, marriages should imply two people coming together to add to each other’s life and help each other grow and live their potential. Interestingly, it’s so obvious from the outside which couples truly function this way and which ones have simply come together for other reasons. “You need to be each other’s best friends first” — is the advice one perfect-for-each-other couple gave me recently.

In an ideal world, we are bringing up children who are comfortable in their own skin with their own strengths and weaknesses. We are addressing their insecurities in a safe environment rather than ridiculing or scolding them for not performing according to the prescription we have set for them. We are trying to get to the heart of the issue or problem to prevent life long patterns to develop. Only then can we say we have been good parents. Not by simply pressuring our children to work harder, sign up for a hundred after school classes and make them perfect replicas of a idolized image.

So what if someone is an orphan? So what if someone is a divorcee? So what if someone got laid off from work? So what if someone dropped out from school? So what if someone is not married or doesn’t have kids? So what if someone doesn’t have a fancy house or a big car? So what is someone has different gender preferences or characteristics?

Self worth and self esteem should not be dictated by how we match up to the prescription of life. Because that can and will result in low self esteem, depression, unhappiness, lack of confidence and a lowered zeal to pursue our strengths. Self worth and self esteem driven by a recognition of our unique strengths and abilities will hopefully lead us towards a life of contentment, happiness and a humble acceptance of our place in this world and the purpose of our existence.