Us Magazine and Star Stickers

Motherhood aside, I must confess, I am an obsessive follower of the online versions of Us Magazine and People. Even as I sit here now, I am actively resisting the urge to check in and see what plastic surgery has done to Heidi Pratt. Given my extreme lack of time these days, I’ve begun questioning why (and millions of others) love to be voyeurs into the lives of the rich & famous celebrities.

I was born to Indian immigrants in America during a time when doctors and engineers were given green cards due to their education; to their home countries, these were sort of celebrities. Freed of the difficulties of India by the US’s meritocracy, they bought Mercedes, took vacations and had big houses. My father, a doctor, was often viewed as exempt from every day problems because of his earnings. How could someone who lived on a lake, traveled to Europe, and sent his kids to boarding schools have anything to worry or be unhappy about? Many family members in India admired, gossiped, envied, and followed his and his family’s lives with curiosity.

However, the atmosphere in many of these immigrant homes (mine included) reflected none of that. Ours was not a home in which we had no money problems and worry was non-existent. Instead, when there wasn’t a problem, future ones were anticipated. Life was often lived forward in pursuit of achievement of future goals, diluting the experience of what everyone seemed to ultimately envy – an above ground existence in which the present was full of nothing but peace.

Because I saw that many of my American friends did not live in the same restless way, I began to believe something much different than my parents', particularly my father who set the tone in our house. I felt that because he had been born and raised in India where opportunities were few, people were many, and ruin was always just one unforeseen problem away, he was trapped in American society in an outdated mindset. I believed that he was right that hard work and persistent diligence were the keys to success, but he was wrong that the only place to put that energy was into medicine. I also valued financial security, but began to value quality of life as equally important if not more. I felt having a vision and anticipating future pitfalls was a must, but I refused to be inflexibly shackled to worry. Also, I grew determined to answer the questions he could not answer. What if what I wanted (which was to write) wasn’t a guaranteed path to financial security. How to think creatively? How to reconcile my embedded longings with the realities of life?

Fast forward to thirty-three. Until recently, I’d believed I’d successfully answered these questions and sent into motion the life that I’d always wanted. I left Wall Street at twenty-eight, setting the tone in my life that money was not everything. I successfully managed to independently consult for five years, eliminating old fears that the conventional was the only path to success. I live in China now and despite not having been published yet, I do get to do what I love– raise my children and write without worry about financial ruin. However, recently, as I stared at Reese Witherspoon walk hand in hand with someone other than Jake Gyllenhaal (who I loved as her companion by the way), I found myself wondering – why the hell do I still care? Living my own life should be satisfying enough, shouldn’t it? Especially because I fashioned it the way I wanted it?

These musing happened in conjunction with a recent surge in Manika’s two-year old negative streak (of course, kicked off right after I wrote a testament to how pleasant she’d suddenly started being). I’m not sure why she started feeling that way, but as the days wore on, I began to see she was getting stuck in a mental rut, kind of like mine. I closed people.com and decided I needed to do something to kick both of us forward.

So I started a positivity campaign. Every time she tried to put her finger in the electrical socket, I didn’t just scream no, but said, “Let’s find something you can play with.” Each time she refused to wash her hands before trying to manhandle her brother, I offered her a sticker if she decided to be “positive and helpful.” After each meltdown, I explained to her that yes, she could feel extremely upset at having the television turned off, but she could decide to smile now. Then I tickled her until she actually did smile.

In the process, I began to see something clear about the human ego (of which two year olds have an overwhelmingly raw abundance). It is an extremely negative and discontent thing, and it likes to topple contentment as often as possible. I began to see my online interest in a similar light. Before typing in the Us magazine URL, I can feel a multitude of things – happy about the sunshine, warm towards my son beside me – but after ten minutes of viewing, my life changes before my eyes. I suddenly don’t have enough money, or haven’t accomplished enough, or have too much mommy baby fat around my midsection. My ego rests happily on its laurels, having happily reminded me how much I have to be discontent about. Why this path has become so comfortingly familiar is a question for a shrink, although I could probably intuitively argue that it has something to do with my upbringing. However, regardless, it is as wasteful as a tantrum about not getting a chocolate and all it does is make me want to be thinner, write a famous screenplay and go shopping.

So I’ve started applying the same lessons to my life that I’ve been giving to my daughter. Each time I want to feel angry at the exhaustion of motherhood, I focus on something cute about my children. Each time I want to yell at my husband for being late, I try to focus on the fact that he’s slow and tired because he stays up late to give my son a bottle to let his wife sleep a little. Each time I want to curse China for the things about it that I can’t stand, I remind myself that it’s because I’m here that I have time to write this blog. And each time I want to open a celebrity rag, I try to open a blog entry or my novel instead.

The net result is that I’ve felt time slowing down, literally. My mind spends less time thinking about deficits and the negative possibilities of the future. It spends more time admiring Manika’s Chinese skills, Avik’s cooing, or my husband’s thoughtfulness. The mental space allows me to see that the future comes anyway, that anticipating it does not actually change much of the unfolding of the days. As new habits form in my head, I see my daughter trying to follow me. She says, “okay” more. She picks the smiley-faced sticker more. She giggles. Just as my father made the large move to America to make a better future for his family, I feel this mentally large move is equally important to the future of my family. In this way, I’m proud to follow in his visionary footsteps.

Does that mean I’ll never look at a gossip rag again – probably not. But at least going forward, I’ll try to be more aware and really, with two children, that’s pretty much all I can do. I’ll take in the fashion and news headlines. I might even feel a little better that my life isn’t drug or paparazzi ridden. Then, hopefully, I’ll give myself a mental star sticker for closing the browser and I’ll go back to living my life with a little less judgment and wishing, and a little more just being me.