A couple of years back, I had attended another meditation session in Dharamkot with the theme Mudita. It was one of the profound sessions that I have ever attended in my life. Mudita and Ubuntu, both of these concepts are very close to my heart. In both of these concepts, you put others before you. Mudita is feeling genuinely happy for others and ubuntu is a concept where instead of competing with others, you cooperate and lift up others. I personally, feel the path to true happiness is when you develop compassion and empathy for others. Most religious texts also emphasise this. So Christians says “love thy neighbor as thyself”, Hinduism says “Atithi devo bhabo”, and Buddhism of course, emphasises on Mudita.

I believe self-love is extremely important. It is impossible to love others if you do not love yourself. It is almost like the instructions we get on flights that say, “first put your own oxygen mask and then help others”. I am a huge advocate of self-love.

But here comes the pain point. In today’s age of Instagram, influencers are often promoting self-love in a way that is toxic. Not everyone has the intelligence or awareness to understand how healing truly works. They may just use the shortcut way to healing by using Instagram reels and that could actually be counter-productive. Healing takes years, and it is a slow process. A huge amount of inner work is required. Those of us who are on a healing journey know how difficult it is. But new-age healing promotes quick fixes and that can cause more harm than good.

Firstly, everyone has different types and perhaps grades of trauma. I am not sure if this will be correct to grade trauma but common sense tells me that your mother calling you fat is a different trauma than your mom selling you to a brothel. And let me tell you, not everyone has the privilege to go for healing. I am not diminishing anyone’s pain but I am kind of bored of the misuse of the words like trauma, healing, therapy etc. It has become fashionable to call yourself a victim even though you belong to one of the most privileged group of people.

My mother’s family came to India during partition as refugee. The horror they went through is unimaginable, while I never heard any of my uncles or aunts give up on life for that. My mamas and masis are one of the coolest and funniest people I have ever known. While I see some friends of my child who have grown up in posh houses, goes to the finest schools, moves around in chauffeur-driven swanky cars and behaving as if their trauma is unimaginable. Well, even when the wifi signal goes off, it is a trigger for them. And I am not kidding. They are regularly taking pills and going for therapy. I wonder if it’s trauma or boredom.

I am a patient advocate and I know how important therapy is for those who genuinely need them. But just going to therapy because your parents can afford 5k/per hour every couple of days is something I find sad. There are orphans abused and battered. In India there are hungry kids who doesn’t get two meals a day and medicine when they need it. They have real trauma but therapy isn’t affordable for them and I see rich wives and teens going to therapy as often as they go for movies.

I believe in cutting off toxic people from life. I have done that. However, these days, people in the name of self-love is cutting off anybody who disagrees with them. Like if you want a 10k dollar bag and your parents disagree to buy. The parent is toxic and they wish to cut them off. Somewhere, we also need to compromise. I recently met a woman, who is not willing to meet her dying mother because many years ago the mother did not agree to her marriage. I agree, that some pain are difficult. However, sometimes self-love also means forgiving others. No amount of healing crystals, and tarot reading, and expensive sessions with healers are going to work if you do not nurture empathy, compassion, and forgiveness.

Many will probably not agree with what I wrote. Everyone has their own take on life and belief system. I shouldn’t judge. I wrote what I feel. I believe, healing is a holistic process that is based on unconditional love for yourself and others. I practice it and encourage others to practice too.

Joining Vinitha‘s two hundred and forty-ninth edition of Fiction Monday with the word prompt Signal.