It isn’t easy to explain to somebody how I still find my life alright although I don’t follow mass mentality. It is easy for me to live with my views and act based on them, but it is a huge problem for many people since they tend to discount me as they think I’m weird / rebellious / mad / … :)
I’m not weird. Naturally, I wouldn’t think I am, since I don’t find my own views weird. I am not rebellious. I don’t hold these views to ‘show’ somebody, to antagonise somebody or as a reaction to some incident / philosophy. I am not mad. My views work for me and therein lies the proof. I am what I am. And I am OK with it.
It works both ways…sometimes I think they are weird :) But I don’t force them to subscribe to my views and I expect not to be forced to follow theirs. Also, it is not that I have taken non-conformism to a new level or something like that. There are certain important areas of life (ok, actually, quite a few) where my views are divergent from the majority.
I get my sense of achievement from theatre. There, I am the risk taker, the go-getter, the one to push my boundaries, willing to take on any challenge…ready to jump off the cliff and build my wings on the way down, so to speak. Monetary gains don’t motivate me as much as theatre does. I can drive a ten-year old motorcycle instead of a car…it takes me from point A to B, never breaks down…that’s all I need. I can enjoy movies on a regular TV. Plasma screen, bigger TVs don’t attract me enough to work for them. A challenging role in a play, on the other hand, will make do that. Money, for me, is a means to an end. It is necessary. But my life doesn’t revolve around it.
TH and I decided that we would have children only if and when we were ready. ‘We should feel like it’, was our criterion. We shouldn’t have children just because our friends / relatives are having them. My biological clock is ticking away, but we haven’t yet felt like having children and we’re OK with it. If we’re not meant to, we won’t have children. If we’re meant to, we will. If we can’t have our own, we’ll adopt. If people think lesser of us since we don’t have children, so be it ! So many people give us so many reasons to have children… nothing can compare to the joy one gets when one has children...children are your support for the old age (in India children are expected to and do take care of their old parents…in most of the cases at least)…every one of your peers has children and you will feel left out…who will carry the family name forward ? etc. etc. But none of this manages to affect TH or I. We’re not feeling like having children right now and that is how it is.
I can give many more such examples, but the theme is essentially the same. People advise me to conform and I don’t. Not because I want to be stubborn. But because I don’t want to follow things I don’t believe in.
To all of those who advise me to conform, I say the same thing, “That is how you feel. I feel differently. I will obviously act upon what I feel. This is what I feel today. If tomorrow I feel differently, I shall do accordingly. If that is the exact opposite of what I am doing today, so be it. I understand that people change, situations change. I am wise enough to understand that and honest enough to admit it.”
Rarely can people accept this. Either they let it go thinking to themselves that I am ‘beyond repair’ or they continue persuasion. And so it continues…
Comments
I hate conforming too, and not because I rebel. But seriously, why should I conform just because "it's been done this way forever"?
You know what, I think we could be kindred spirits :)
~Anticipated Serendipity~
(in case you don't recognize my google ID) ;)
And it really doesn't make any difference how worlds apart we are, we still get the same reaction when others find out about our life choices. I've also gotten the "nothing can compare to the joy of having your own children", at which I try so hard not to roll my eyes because what gives me joy does not necessarily have to be the same as the next person, who happens to get the most ultimate joy from his/her kids.
And it is freaky, but also, I'm feeling good that there is somebody who understands.
And exactly...what gives me joy and what gives you joy could be totally different things...why can't they see that ?
Yeah, seriously... why do people assume that everyone else must be like everyone else?