what is Empowerment to you?

Since childhood, we as individuals are conditioned to some basic rules of life; of course In India, one is not academically empowered unless a Masters / Post Grad is secured.  Look for a job immediately after finishing the studies. You are not financially empowered unless you have a job or until you join your family business. As soon as your phone starts getting regular credit alerts, it is time for another empowerment.  We all know the societal empowerment drill – marriage, kids, work and save for kids’ future and just work more. This time, we not only work for self-empowerment but also empowerment of our kids. After all, all the properties and bank balances that give us a feeling of being empowered are for our kids. Why should we let them figure out their own ways for self – empowerment? No, we will pamper them; we will give them the best of comforts, won’t we? And, the biggest learning for empowerment that we will pass over to our kids – Empower yourself exactly the same way we did to ourselves – don’t break the rules, follow the routine.  Publishing a mythological script on the typical Empowered Life – The Indian Style does not feel like a weird idea at all J

Is empowerment only confined to financial, societal, academic and family achievements? We have a set pattern of life – 5 day work, 2 day party (movies, shopping, eating out etc. etc.), annual holidays, more than occasional festivals. So what’s wrong? We are empowered by the usual yardsticks.

Wait a minute, think again – Are we really fully empowered?

When was the last time we did something beyond the usual empowering ways? How about skipping that weekend movie and going to the nearby old age home and sharing a laugh with senior citizens? How about giving a day off to the maid out of turn? How about cooking two extra chappati and giving away to that little girl who eats dust day in day out while her mother works at building a palatial house for us? Obviously, let’s get the Tuesdays and Thursdays and all those days out when giving food (yes, I am not talking about the 5 bucks. Parle G biscuit pack) is customary – only because it is a ritual and we have have to follow it. How about not wasting 5,000 bucks on putting your child into that digital games zone instead taking him out hiking for some real action experience? Why not clicking less of selfies and savouring the real moments more? Why not not think that I don’t have the time or my life is too busy and run a weekly children’s fun club. Why not make no –purpose friends for a change and why not not buy clothes this Diwali for ourselves but for the less privileged rather than donating old, worn out, thrown pieces and yeah

Why not gang up with friends and do a potluck for a children’s home and also eat & play with them rather than spending thousands on eating at a fashionable Italian eatery and then cribbing about the calories intake and then shelling another thousand into the profit banks of the Silver’s Gyms, Freak Firsts and the Palwarkar’s.

Emotional, mental, spiritual and life empowerment – May not be high in the order for many of us but indeed can be at par with the regular ways of an empowered life. Lets do something for someone selflessly – Share a smile, give a hug, spend personal time than a wass’up msg, walk together or simply do nothing, just stare at the open sky and count our blessings. Why not revamp the cliched rules of an empowered life? Bring a change and empower ourselves within, become a change for our kids and for all those who just keep thinking – yes, I will do it, someday…