"Who am I?" That is a kind of a question that can haunt us throughout our lives. We all go through an identity crisis at some point in time in our lives. I am not being gender biased. But women seem to go through the trauma of an identity crisis as soon as they start bearing children.

They are torn in different directions. They had a different identity before they got married. After getting married they have to adapt and this involves changing themselves. When they bear children, they have to change themselves again. It does not end here. It continues till they reach their graves.

So, what is this thing that seems to be lacking within us? Is it the people around us? Does the situation influence us? Or have we been designed in a completely different way? Perhaps it is something else altogether.

Around 6 years back I realized that I had conceived. I was fine medically. But there was something happening to me at a mental level. I was proud of the entity that I had helped create and my baby was as cute as a button. But at that time, I was mentally occupied by a completely different set of thoughts.

I wondered if I could still be the same person that I had been earlier on in my life. I thought about whether my interests would continue to be the same. I was now striving towards achieving only my short-term goals because I was doing my best to enjoy this phase of my life.

I could never turn back the clock now because it was an irreversible change. I also knew that this was just the beginning. The journey ahead was long.

I knew no one could help me out here. I had to understand a few things myself. But I took the effort to do so and I am able to understand myself very well now. Every woman has to undergo this change. It is essential for all of us to understand that we should never expect our surroundings to change according to the situation. A lioness does not expect the lion to understand the changes that are taking place within her. A lioness does not stop hunting for food during this phase. The same rule applies to us too.

Giving birth to a child should not create a void within us. It should not stop us from doing what we are doing. There is no need for us to even change the direction of our lives.

A woman takes a leap from her current state to a new state only to complete the lifecycle of a human being. That is the whole point of our existence. Why do women put themselves on the back burner while completing this lifecycle? This is a natural phenomenon.

We can never be our own shadows. We know what we are, who we are and what we can be and where we want to go.

When we women first begin our family lives, we understand what we have to cater to. We realize that there are certain things that we have to do on a routine basis. We also know the best way to go about it. These are the things that we are aware of. But how many of us have really thought of how much more we are capable of?

How many of us follow our instinct and think about what we are best at? Do we ever think about how we can reach where we want to? Do we ponder about such questions?

We somehow stop ourselves when we reach this stage because we feel that we have made it through the most difficult phase of our lives. It is actually a myth that having a baby is the most difficult phase. I believe it is a phase in which a woman realizes how gifted she actually is.

She finds all the power within herself to accomplish her goals.

It is a journey where we get to know ourselves better.  We are plagued by fears and the question that now haunts us is, ‘To be or not to be.’ I strongly feel that if we choose ‘To be’ we are on the right track. We do have to face situations in which the people around us start questioning our ability. The only solution here is to push ahead and not show them how hard we are working.

We have to prove this to ourselves. We are not in a competition with anyone else. We have to look back to see how far ahead we have reached from where we were initially.

There will be times when we feel we have reached our limit. Let’s not stress about reaching our destination quickly. Just understand that we are moving on at a slower speed but we are still going to get there. We should not stop moving ahead.

It is fine even if we move on at a snail’s pace.

Phrases like ‘You don’t know’ ‘Are you aware’ and ‘What do you own’ will threaten our strong resolve. I recommend that we all learn to turn a deaf ear to all these remarks. Let’s just say things like ‘I am closer’ ‘I am capable’ ‘There is no one around me’ and ask ourselves questions like ‘What does this mean?’ ‘Who can I approach so that I can understand myself better?’

I am a living example of failures but I am happy that I am still failing because I know that my learning curve is moving ahead in the right direction. These small failures that I experience in the background of my life prove that my learning curve is moving up. We just need to know this.

And that is how we will make the transition from being  'unaware' to 'aware'.

Motherhood is a natural process which is just as normal as eating, sleeping, and drinking water, getting up and growing up. Let’s welcome it with warmth and live it the way we want to by doing what we are doing. We have to help ourselves so that we can move ahead in our lives and look forward to new challenges.

Share This Story