Strong and Tender
Learning to accept the softness in me
Recently, I was reading my old school and college time diaries and found one common thing in all of my writing and that was I always wanted to be strong. I have given assurances to my dad in few of my handwritten letters saying that his daughter is very strong. Who told me from my childhood that I have to be strong? How strong I have to be? Did I see a need of a strong woman in the world I was living? How does strong woman look like? Do they participate in the wars, or do they carry heavy stuff?
Don’t get me wrong here, there is no problem in being a strong woman. The problem is trying to become something blindly and loosing or denying parts of yourself in the process of becoming that. Also, that something can vary according to people, culture or country. Being strong is just an example. There are other physical, emotional or mental traits/labels that we are trying hard to become, acquire or possess from our childhood without understanding their source or intent behind it.
I will give you another example of a physical trait. In my own country, a woman once asked me, you are so fair, what do you apply on your face? (Not that I am the fairest woman in my country.) In the country I live now, I will not be counted among fair women. Infact I am labelled as a woman of colour or brown woman. Not that anyone ever called me that it’s just a term used there. Also, there is a difference between wanted to be fair and wanted others to call me fair. When you want to become something for the world without analyzing what it is or why you want to become that, you are choosing a path which can be very exhausting. When you want to become something because it is your soul’s desire to be then you will make efforts to become that and need less validation from the world.
If you have deep desire to become something, always be curious about the source of it. The goal is not to become something as others told you to be. My childhood desire to be a strong woman has made me denied the soft and tender parts of myself. Because of that I still struggle to ask for help. I still struggle to say no. I still struggle to accept that I am tired somedays without even doing anything. I still struggle to give up on certain situations, things or even people. You can be strong and still ask for help. You can be strong and still say no to certain things. You can be strong and still the first one to give up on things, situations or people that drain you. You can be strong and still can rest without needing to earn it. You can be strong and still accept all the soft and tender parts of yourself.
As promised in the last substack that I will share something that caught my attention, eye or soul every week. This week that caught my soul is my childhood photo, a photo of a four year ‘Harneek’ who wanted to become strong.
Lots of love and healing to you,
Harneek!