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Redefining Completeness

by Srivalli Chilakamarri
(Puducherry, India)

The sound of the rain, the smell of mud and my fingers feeling the rain drops falling hard.

When everything goes wrong and you wonder what to feel, nature reminds you that all you need to feel is to feel yourself and love the way you are. This moment I fell in love with the way I could sip my tea with all the beauty of nature I was surrounded by. All I want, is to pause this moment. We destroy our happiness and inner peace with ties we make and the world we create. And while I was thinking about it, my phone rang. And the moment was no longer in pause.

“Hello”, I said. I could hear him say so many words fast and loud. All I knew then was I could no longer hear the sound of the rain. I heard him and I said bye and hung up. I had nothing to argue or apologise. That day I realised that I was happier alone. And by alone I don’t mean I love loneliness. I mean I love when I’m alone with myself and the positive world that nature gave to me.

Next day I walked to my work and I randomly happened to see little yellow flowers growing so beautifully in one corner of the road almost engulfed by a weed. A rain droplet on its petal made it look more complete like a painting made out of an artist’s heart. I wondered to myself how I failed to notice it all these days or whether I did and I fail to enjoy the beauty it held. After all beauty lies in eyes of beholder.

I called it a day at work and avoided few people who want drama In life. In the evening the climate was even better. The clouds, the breeze with smell of life and the birds chirping. As I walked back, I could see the golden sun. I went to my room and took a shower. I looked at myself at the mirror and I felt like talking to me. Looking at me I didn’t want to see a girl who cried for a man or apologised to a man just so that he will feel better or used all the brain cells on a man and his happiness. I took a deep breath and asked me why? What made you feel like saying yes or getting into something called relationship? The ego defence in me said that you don’t become what you’re without some pain. No one becomes what they are destined to be, until they face some pain. For now, at least me. We all tend to believe in happily ever after or at least happiness in being together. I don’t know if it’s true for everyone but today I feel we are made to believe that way in our society because that’s how our system has been for years.

I sat down on my bed and took a note book and wrote my name. I had no clue on what to write but I wanted to write something because I want my eyes to read what my soul wants to say. As I sat there wondering, my phone rang. This time it’s not a

call like before. It was my dad. “Hello”, I said. We talked about our day and he told me that my cousin is getting married and finally she is getting settled. We hung up and I was still stuck at the word settled. How could my sister who is an IT consultant not be settled when she got a job that she loved and started earning pretty well and be settled when she found guy? I wondered.

I started penning my thoughts.
Is settlement for a woman lies not in what she has become but in getting married? What are men made of that they’ve so much pseudo dominance in society? I call it pseudo because I believe we give the dominance. I was never a feminist or anything titled. I am just an ordinary girl wondering how and why and when and where men were made to be whatever they are. I am clearly not wondering only just about the preaching elders. I wonder why a woman achiever feels complete inside when she finds a man and calls him her better half. Why we, the women don’t feel complete with our own world, our career and our self. Do we need someone to complete us or for just companionship? If it’s just companionship why were such words created? I think the answer is in our way of thinking. Simple. Just how success is defined by society, completeness is also defined by society. I don’t want a time turner to go back and see where it all started and how it started. All I want at this moment is liberation from this old school thought. I wish liberation for everyone but when I wish so I’m defining something new for everyone which is again back to old track or defining how life should be. My wish made me realise how it all would have started back then. You want people to feel good the way you do so you simply define the path. Aah! Simple yet complicated. For now I was clear and felt good with myself. And that’s because I found what I want to be. I want to be a woman who feels complete with herself. I don’t have to be something that others feel is the path of life or society ways to feel complete. That moment was definitely the best moment for me because I could appreciate all the little to big achievements of my life. I think we all know that we are worth something until we let ourselves feel incomplete and believe that a man made us feel complete. By doing so we are giving him the pseudo space to make us feel better or worse. Why? I am not against companionship. I am just against with the way the society makes us see it. A single woman, a working woman, a woman studying, a single mother, and also a married woman are complete for what they are and what they made themselves to be. Better half is the better version of our own mind that completes us.

I smiled to myself closing the note and walked to the kitchen to make my evening tea as my better mind and the climate made me feel my inner peace and completeness.
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Oct 06, 2019
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Complete Woman
by: Your Name: Kiran Jhamb

Superb title - precisely sums up the story/situation. Reading it, realizing that empowered women like you have emerged, I was reassured that the social scene is changing for good. More power to you and your pen. We can be complete in our way.

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