Unabashedly Me at 40

Twenty years back I would have shuddered about this day. 40 is when roses and butterflies end, so I thought. Today I stand on that milestone and realize otherwise.

Nah, I have no interest in recounting my journey, my successes and failures. They are important to me but not of much use to my readers. Let me, instead, show how 40 is not a bummer, it is coming into being.

You see when we are in our twenties, we are called “young” and “free” but how and what of that is already inscribed! The way we dress up—what colours we choose, what earrings we wear and the shoes and the tops and skirts or the jeans, are already always chosen. The little quirkiness that we call as “rebellion” also somehow fits into a pattern—all rebels look the same! And our freedom to go here and there and meet him or her or do this or that is also, on one hand, curtailed with Indian fears of jobs, career, future, money, marriage prospects or, on the other hand, driven by contemporary social passions and addictions. There are crazy desires-- sensual, material, and romantic and very little confidence to fulfil it, if any. And if one fulfils, the satisfaction is never to be had. Like bees gone crazy by smoke, twenties is a painful time—a crazed futile search for that oasis of life.

Because to be young and free is an arduous long journey towards self.

What is after all “being young”? Is it the amount of blood that can course into muscles and vital areas? Is it the ability to run marathon? Is it when you have (if you are lucky) a perfect set of teeth? Is it the ability to shout, to hope, to have big dreams, and to hope again?

I realize now that being young means being uncluttered, an ability to lose baggage, an ability to be open to experiences, to heave into life, to be utterly present to the fragrances and sounds around—to be light in the soul, to be in the light of soul.

And freedom comes only when you are young. To soar beyond social demands, to whistle through ideological pressures requires the vibrancy and the blood and passion of youth. And if there is one purpose of life, then it is this—freedom. Beyond achieving this or becoming that—it is becoming what you always were.

But youth and freedom comes only after an arduous journey towards the self.

As I stand today, at 40, I realize that the journey has required me to seek, retrieve, dust and polish the various parts of me that were either discarded or unnoticed or fragmented or uncared for. Entering into 40s has meant for me bringing together all aspects of that self—the creative and practical, the sensual, social and spiritual and slowly beginning to thread together for that quilt of life. It has required a certain honesty, a certain integrity and courage to welcome all aspects unabashedly. It has come with turbulence in life, it has come as a tempest, it has come subtly as a quiet overwhelm. But to ride life, one needs to learn to be the Queen of the Wild Seas.

Today I sit more whole than ever before and unabashedly me.

More assured of myself, more unapologetic for being me, more willing to experiment, more ready to take that well-planned leap, more particular about my path and the values I follow, and yet more inclusive than ever before, more forgiving at the same time, more willing to let go and finding joy in the same.

And better still, more willing to acknowledge my flaws, my imperfections, my lackings, more ready to accept my vulnerabilities, more unashamed to ask for help, more quieter in receiving advice, and a greater ability to lose gracefully and transition. A certain sense of easy self-awareness.

And even better, is that coming of a certain wisdom, that intuition of a higher order of things, of greater goodness, of that dimension that often doesn’t make sense except when it does. A certain wisdom that brings in humility and detachment ever so slowly but surely. Yeah, all is well indeed. It always was.

I watch myself emerge as a wise woman that I had always wanted to be.

I have always loved Maya Angelou’s poem “Phenomenal Woman.” But today I understand the meaning more deeply.