I hope to express myself as best as I can, to justify the use of this title for this post.
Now…continuing from my previous post…
I sat next to him, listening to all his ifs and buts, in case the inevitable had happened. My mouth agape, I was slightly in awe of this husband of mine. Among the many others who are afraid to talk about death or its effects on the family, here was a man whose mind had worked overtime thinking about all the probabilities.
When he asked me if I would have continued the business in his absence, I took a long time, actually a few months, to think over that question. I gave it a lot of time and thought deeply over it. The first task was to understand as to why did I even go into this business with him. I found many answers like – I like food, cooking, cooking for others but none matched the passion and drive required to run a business which my husband possessed. It involved more than the love for cooking or food. It needed great vision, deep passion, courage to face challenges and a deep routed confidence to handle the extraordinary amount of work it required. Slowly and steadily the entrepreneurship will become a part of you which you just cannot leave it at the shake of a hand. I comprehended all these requirements of running a entrepreneurship and along with it came the understanding that I am just not that kind of a person which a business requires.
So many questions arose inside me – If I was not passionate about running a business, how did I even become part of one? What was that thing that held me there? Why didn’t I even think of all these before?
There was only one answer to all my questions – I was there, as a tiny part of the business, to be of some help to my husband. Every question I asked myself lead me to the same answer that I wanted to be of some assistance to my husband. I don’t know if it was the right thing but at that moment it felt right to assist him and I did it.
Now, when he put across the question of running the business without him, as an improbable thought, I realized that I won’t be able to do it alone. I certainly didn’t possess that passion to do it alone. And that led to the enlightened thought that it will be best that I reduce my involvement in this venture.
Yes, I was there in the business to help my husband. No doubt on that. Now, the thought process has changed. I wanted to help myself first before I help anyone else.
Those months were very trying times for me as I struggled a lot to overcome the stress of my husband’s hospitalization and then to find ways to help myself.
I had trouble sleeping at night. I stayed awake and watched television without knowing what I was watching, as the mind was not stable. Too many thoughts plagued me about the time I spent in the hospital sitting by my husband. I was sluggish. I lacked the josh to get out of bed everyday to cook, a task which I loved doing. I was also going through menopause which confused me a lot.
When one of my friend suggested to me to join a yoga class, I started looking for one. And I had already tried yoga classes 3 years back; one thing I realized – I was never disciplined enough to practice at home when there was no class. So, I started looking at classes which can inculcate that discipline in me. Then I found the perfect one.
And I joined a Yoga teacher training program. I just needed the prod that to become a teacher I need to practice daily so that I can inculcate the same to my students. That was the missing block since long. Also I found an amazing teacher who introduced me to meditation, helped me to overcome my sleeping problems and suddenly I was back on track. I felt I deviated from my life’s purpose line for sometime and felt comfortable to come back.
There is this subject on yogasutra as part of my course and it talks about svadhyaya as the study of self – at various points of our life, to assess our life and what we are doing with it, to reflect on our decisions, to make sure that we are on the path of what we want to do in our life or ensure that we are doing what makes us happy.
I understood that all along, even before I joined the yoga class, I had been doing svadhyaya without knowing about such a concept. Learning about this concept and other life changing ideas has put me in a path of self-love and not being guilty about it. It is only when I am healthy physically and mentally, can I help my family and others too.
Thank you for being with me all through this month of ramblings 😀
