Making peace with Disappointment

It's Likely that When my mother had me, she had 270 days of pondering,

What she would dress me in,
What she would teach me,
How she would hold me,
How I would grow up to be,

Form whatever little i know of my mother, she wanted me to be Strong, resilient and Kind,

as a child, I once helped somebody get their luggage on board while the train was moving and my mother was proud of me, ever eager to find meaning in small moments, recounted the story to my father, His reaction was of indifference, Something inside me withered. Not all at once, but like a candle suffocating in its own wax, i still get teary eyed thinking of it,

Some wounds do not bleed, but they never heal.

while she endured the pain of labor, while her body stretched, her hip bones literally shifting to make room for new life and a cascade of hormonal changes ensuring she forms an unbreakable bond with her offspring, my father’s role in my creation was... significantly easier, he had about 2.7 seconds to contribute and then roll over with a sigh of accomplishment.

Of course, the universe has a way of balancing things. It gave me my mother’s unconditional love, but it also gave my father the weight of seeing his own dreams reflected in me, after all, in evolutionary terms, a father’s fitness is measured by his offspring’s success

And what does a father do when he realizes his child is not a natural genius, not an exceptional athlete, not a prodigy in any field?

He remembers. And he makes sure I don’t forget either, he has been running Version 1.0 of "You Have Disappointed Me" for years without a single software update.

I won’t go into how flawed he is, because, let’s be honest, at least half of you are already nodding, thinking, "Haan yaar, mere ghar bhi aise hi scene hai".

But lately, I’ve been trying to make peace with being a disappointment. It’s a full-time job, really. Every time my father reminds me of some 21-year-old who cleared the UPSC exam while I, at my age, have “achieved nothing,” and i have yet to produce status or resources that would have made me a desirable mate in any hunter-gatherer tribe.

I don’t argue. I just stir my coffee, nod sagely, and ask him if he’s taken his diabetes meds.

The human brain is wired to overreact to negative stimuli than to positive ones, an adaptive trait that once kept our ancestors from being eaten by leopards but now mostly fuels generational trauma.

I spent years breaking myself, trying to prove something, only to realize I had taken my mother’s quiet, unwavering love for granted. That’s what I focus on now,

Not to win something or grind, that would doing the same performance that ruined my soul, The kind that doesn’t hinge on my place in the social hierarchy

If only my father had the awareness about concept as simply as survivorship bias and bell curve, maybe i could spared a lot of misery.

But then again, what would we even talk about at dinner?