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Is fulfillment a part of your life? Are you happy with what you do? Maybe it's time, you sit with yourself and answer these questions to yourself.
Is fulfillment a part of your life? Are you happy with what you do? Maybe it’s time, you should sit with yourself and answer these questions.
It was a winter evening. I and my friend were enjoying a plate of Momos in Dilli Haat, which we both loved dearly. We generously dipped each piece in the spicy chilli sauce and gorged our plates sinfully. It was a happy day, with good weather, food and a lovely friend to talk to.
Our conversation turned towards ‘the definition of being fulfilled in life.’ ‘What is that one thing that makes you feel fulfilled?’ she asked. I, in my simple observation replied that ‘I have a 9-5 job, I earn for myself and contribute to my family, and I feel that my life is fulfilled.’
I posed the same question to my friend and her answer left me in awe. Not because she said something so far-fetched but because her truth was so simple.
My friend is a doctorate. She creates art and sells her creations.
My friend is a doctorate. She is married and has a beautiful child. She chose not to work and rather follow her passion. She creates art and sells her creations. She earlier had a corporate job, but that single experience left her so drained out that she made it a point to never associate with it again. I found this decision rather weird and personally tagged her weak. She has a flourishing painting business now and sells her art in various places, Dilli Haat being one. People even buy her work from her exhibitions. In the art circle, she is a known name.
She told me that she feels fulfilled every day for different reasons. First when she rises with the sun and goes for a run. Seeing the sun rise makes her feel alive every day, she told me.
Then she continued that she feels fulfilled when she sees her daughter. After her baby arrived she has always stayed by her side. She has been the first witness to all her daughter’s first feats – starting from her yawn to her first steps. Her resolve to stay away from the corporate world was made even stronger after her daughter arrived. “I did not want to miss out on my daughter’s life”she added.
Thirdly she said she feels fulfilled when she lovingly cooks for her little family.
Finally her painting shop. Following her passion and earning from it is one of the greatest blessings she believes she has. It was a tough decision, though, and required a lot of hard work to actually carve out a niche all by herself. She can now proudly call herself an entrepreneur.
‘You know Priyanka, I spend an hour to eat my breakfast. I relish every bite that I take. I meditate and have the time to reconnect with myself. I water the flowers in my garden. These little pleasures give me immense satisfaction. Had I been in the corporate madness I would have missed out on so much in life,” she said with a smile.
As I made my way back home I could not help but think of my own life. It is a five days a week blur.
As I made my way back home I could not help but think of my own life. It is a five days a week blur. I have never seen the sun rise. I eat food out of machines and cans. I don’t get the time to exercise. I do not exactly do what I like. Mostly, when sometimes I do something worthwhile, the piece gets tagged under the company’s name and not mine.
I always prided at being an independent working woman. I always thought that those who are not in the corporate world miss out on so much, the money, the corporate parties, the new friends, and the independence. But looking at my entrepreneur friend I realized it is actually the other way around. I am the one missing out on my life.
On the metro, my friend’s question reverberated in my ears. “What is that one thing that makes you feel fulfilled?” Well, this is a question I realized that I still needed to find an answer to. What about you?
Cover image via Shutterstock
A Social Media Content Writer by profession. A writer by heart. A genuine foodie. Simple by nature. Love to read, create paintings and cook. Have impossible dreams. At the moment, engaged in making those dreams read more...
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UP Boards Topper Prachi Nigam was trolled on social media for her facial hair; our obsession with appearance is harsh on young minds.
Prachi Nigam’s photo has been doing the rounds on social media for the right reasons. Well, scratch that- I wish the above statement were true. This 15-year-old girl should ideally be revelling in her spectacular achievement of scoring a whopping 98.05% and topping her tenth-grade boards. But oddly enough, along with her marks, it’s something else that garners more attention – her facial hair.
While the trolls are driving themselves giddy by mocking this girl who hasn’t even completed her school yet, the ones who are taking her side are going one step ahead – they are sharing her photoshopped pictures, sans the facial hair, looking nothing less than a celebrity with captions saying – “Prachi Nigam, ten years later”.
Doctors have already diagnosed her with PCOD in their comments, based on photographic evidence. While we have names for people shamed for their weight – body shaming, for their skin colour- racism, for their age- age shaming, for being a female- sexism, this category of shaming where one faces criticism for their appearance has no name. With that, it also has zero shame attached to it.
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