"Mind over Matter"

                                              "Sada Na Baghin Bulbul Boley 

                                       Sada Na Bagh Bahara'an 

                                       Sada Na Maa Pey Husn Jawa'ani

                                       Sada Na Sohbat Yara'an"

Hi everyone,

At the age of 57, I see myself standing in a place where I thought I would never be. A place where your husband looks at you differently as you are getting stripped of your youth and all that comes with it, a place where you start to realize that you need your children more than they need you, a place where you have a rude awakening that they are bigger than you in each and every sense of the word, a place where society forces you to take a back seat. 

It is the time when you start walking on the 'Pul Sirat' of life. It is the time when you let go of your heart and hold on to your mind. It is the time when your mind needs to kick in big time and become your balancing stick. Quite often you shake like a leaf inside, but the world doesn't need to see that. All it needs to see is a strong, dignified, wise, and put together woman who hasn't just landed here claiming all these virtues, but rather, has been through the mill and earned it. 

Although, like everything else, this doesn't happen overnight, it seems as it did!

In the photograph I attached, I see my two year old trying his best to get away, while I am trying my utmost not to let him slip out of my protective hands. Now after 32 years I look at this photograph and see very different things:

Things were never in my control; I just thought they were and that kept me going. There is a bigger force up there who is in charge, who gives and then takes it away, who takes it away but then compensates, who gave me limited knowledge, a tunnel vision of sorts, so I could live in my own small world thinking I had power.

You can wallow in self pity and mourn whatever you lost as a woman until the day you die, or you can put yourself on a pedestal with a few medals around your neck, where you can become untouchable, where you can be E.F Hutton and "people will listen", where you somehow develop a Midas Touch, where you realize what you have gained outweighs what you lost, where you give a lot more than you take, where you cannot afford to look down or you will fall, where you don't allow yourself to look back for risk of becoming stone.

Individuality is a beautiful thing. "You come into the world alone and you go out of the world alone" is not only the biggest reality of life, it is perhaps one of the very few philosophies that has logic attached to it. As a woman, one must apply to life as you often stand alone!

I am enjoying this stage, or rather, myself, on this stage called Life. I drag my middle aged bones everywhere and test their limits. I cannot wait to get old enough to play the card of senility!

Much love,

Shehla

"Justified"

Hi Everyone,

       After my guests left last Fall, I was trying to get my house back in order. One Tuesday morning I got up, much later than usual, and I was quite surprised at my sleeping in, as it is highly unusual for someone like me, who is up at the crack of dawn every morning. In about 30 seconds, I realized that the previous night I had a strange nightmare that a scary monster had eaten three of my children and was coming after me. My disturbed sleep became my justification to wake up late. 

     After solving that world mystery I was relieved. I did my Kaza prayers and came downstairs. I opened the fridge, stood there with my face stuck in it for three minutes (that is a long time standing in front of an open fridge.) I had trouble deciding what to eat, or rather, what not to eat. Soon enough, I opted for an omelette delight and grabbed an egg. I did this knowing very well due to strong heart disease history in my family, I shouldn't be having eggs at all. Still in doubt of my decision, and debating this for a while, I walked up to the window, and all I saw was a damp, dreary depressing day outside. All these weather related factors assured me that eating this, full of protein egg in the morning would energize me enough to 'combat' the horror right outside my door. I swiftly grabbed another egg and enjoyed a 'two-egged' omelette breakfast.

      I did my daily routine chores, laundry, dishes, kitchen cleaning etc, and went back upstairs to straighten my room, took a shower, and then stood in front of a mirror for a long time to straighten myself up. This of course took much longer than straightening up my house, (of course the bigger the mess, the longer it takes). Once I got to the point where I looked presentable enough to the world, I grabbed my jeep keys and cruised to the nearest shopping mall.

     Although I got a lecture from my husband not even 24 hours ago about the bad state of the world economy and particularly our household, I found myself standing in front of a perfume counter (my husband's lectures affect me like a '24 hour flu'). Against my better judgement and with no intention of messing up my budget that month, I still walked away with the latest fragrance, justified with the unrelentless persuasivenenss of the sales girl, and just to help the economy a little bit, (while hurting my own a lot). If nothing else would work, "you only live once" would come in handy. 

     I came home, called my sister in Pakistan, checked my emails, went on Facebook, posted some silly and non-stilly stuff, and then started calling all my children and started leaving harassing messages about them not picking up. I justified these harassing calls by the natural worry I have for my children. Pretty soon it was time for my 20 minutes walk on the treadmill which I did not do, justified by the fact that the hour long walk I took in the shopping mall was more than plenty exercise for one day. 

     Then it was time to cook dinner. I opened the freakin' fridge again, stood there, looked at all the leftovers from the past 2 days and singlehandedly vetoed the idea of making something savory and justified by being extra sensitive to world hunger at that moment. I convinced myself that all this food would be wasted if I cooked something fresh and actually decided not to cook at all until every morsel of the leftovers were gone.I went to bed early, of course justified by the fact that I did not get enough sleep two nights before. 

     The next day I looked back at a very typical day of my life and was astonished at the fact of how many times I justified my actions and non-actions throughout the course of the day. I had perfect reasons, or rather justifications, for doing things that I did, or rather wanted to do, and even more so for things, I didn't do, or rather I did not want to do. 

     Who says the wheel is the biggest invention for mankind? And that it makes the world go 'round? I say that justification is the much bigger invention that man conveniently invented for himself, that only makes his world go 'round. As they say, "Every story has two sides". I say, every story has two justification. Try to resolve an issue between two people and you will be shocked to see that most of the time that both sides are right, or rather right in justifying their reasoning and actions.

     On a more serious note, we see so much injustice in our society, which is somehow, somewhere, at some level, justified beautifully. We breathe free, while suffocate our relationships, innocents are hung and killers are set free on a daily basis. It is mind boggling how a murderer or mass murders are justified. It is not that their case it stronger, just that their justification is strong enough to let them go. 

     In my experience, very few things in life are our prerogative, for the rest of our actions, we need some type of justification. We exercise the self endowed right of justification very liberally and think it is a very benign way of keeping our conscience at peace, which at times can play our best friend or our worst enemy. 

     Since we can't take everything to the court of law to get justice, we should be accountable to the court system that is built in our beings. Luckily, we were born with it. If we somehow stop ourselves from walking away with so many things, at so many levels, and instead becoming accountable to ourselves before we become accountable to anyone else, this world, or at least this small world we create for ourselves, would become much more bearable to live in.

     I totally believe that injustice starts from within and then starts to spread like the plague, a highly contagious one. 

     I rest my case.

     Much Love, 

     Shehla