Be You Series - A kind of social distancing we should practice throughout life

In my last blog, I wrote to my daughter about importance of knowing "who you are born as". You can read that blog here.  In this blog, I talk about how to lead our life so that you can preserve "who you were born as".

In COID-19 times, Social Distancing is known to everyone. However,  social distancing is not a new norm. One of the most important aspects of "Being you" is social distancing - the kind of people you choose to not interact with in your life. Most parents try to teach this to their kids as a first lesson as their kids step out for school.

My father always used to stress on "association" popularly known to many of Indians as "Sangat". Although everyone knows this proverb  "Your association has the power to either make you or break you", however , I have not seen many practicing it. 

But believe me or not , the associations you have in childhood - with distant relatives, friends & acquaintances, have a profound impact on who you become and whether you can preserve the "Being you" you were born as.

Lets take you down the memory lane to my childhood. Let's talk about how I managed to maintain social distancing by choosing to decide who I hang out with. 

My hope is that I can inspire you to carefully choose your friends so that they can have a positive influence in your life and vice versa. This blog is not to create a false sense of arrogance or attitude in you, of course you need to be humble in talking to anyone in your life. However, not every one can be your friend. Remember - Friends with bad habits bring bad habits in you and friends with good habits bring good habits , the choice is of course yours .

So lets start the journey -----------

 How does a 6 year old child even know about the fact that he/she has to chose association ?

In my early childhood, our parents will gate who they meet as family, who comes to our house, and avoid family get together that can bring bad exposure. We did not have television at all in our house until I was 7 years of age. When we got television, my parents will gate what we  watch and how much we watch. Now, this may sound familiar to most of you especially if you are an Indian reading this. However, there is one more thing my parents did - they explained to us over and over again - why these rules exist. And they found novel ways of explaining this by telling us -

1. Hindi Proverbs - "A true friend is also your true critique'  
2. Hindu mythological stories like Ramayan - imagine if Kaikeyi didn't have a manthara (bad influence) in her life :) and 
3. Mahabharat - Kaurava's had Shakuni's association (bad influence) and Pandavas had Krishna's association(good and godly influence). You know the rest :) :)  

For my international readers , click the links for a glimpse into Ramayan and Mahabharat.

Don't they say - picture is worth a thousand words . Through these stories , my parents made us imagine a world with good association and a world with bad association. I  stored this picture in my mind. And from here the journey to carefully choose my association started and is still on ...........

At year 8, here comes my first test to choose friends at school and at my community ---

My father's government job took us to a very small place (Sidhi) in India. The place was so small that it had only 1 English medium school - meaning we didn't have a choice. Our house was in a government owned gated community but people in the community had varying levels of education or no education at all. More importantly, due to social backwardness , there wasn't a focus by parents on  right parenting for their kids. This meant that we had children who were used to whiling away most of their day's time just playing, trash talking and talking slang. Within days of being there, I realized, I will have to be very disciplined in who I chose as my friend. I remember - I ended up making only 2 friends. I also requested my friends that we speak in English as much as we can so that we I can avoid an accidental usage of language that I wouldn't appreciate.They say its the quality of friends that matter and not the quantity - I still have found memories of the 2 friends I had and I still looking for them on Facebook.

At year 10 and till year 18 -- critical stage as it includes transition from childhood to boyhood -- and my most memorable years --- 
 

Woooohooo, we finally got out to of that the small place (Sidhi) and came to a tier - 2 but amazing city called Jabalpur. There are two critical decisions that our parents made to ensure we get the right association -

1. My father ignored advice of his peers and enrolled us in a less ranked school . His research suggested that high rank schools were good in imparting education but kids from such schools end up being most naughty, use foul language and tend to disregard cultural value. 
2. He decided not to get house in a government owned community given our experience in Sidhi. He rather took a house in a community so that we can get better association.

While we may not notice but our parents always were very thoughtful about our associations. They also want us to learn the same so that when we become independent we make the right choices.

My elder sister and us (twins- me and Neelesh ) went for our first day at school. First day of school was very weird. Here is an English medium Co-education school but girls sat all on  one side and boys sat all on other side and there was no communication at all between girls and boys. My first task was to break this mental barrier as I knew at that time guys used to be more sober when girls are around. More , importantly, I was not used to the discrimination/separation at all.  This was easy to achieve, I just started talking to girls and started influencing them to communicate more and more. I made three best friends - Meenal , Nilima and Priya - Wherever you are I miss your friendship.  So the first battle at new school to make good association was won.

Sneaking in into the guys gang needed strategy. My twin brother was a big help here. Let me also introduce him to readers - we were shadow of each other and more importantly he(Neelesh) was my protector/shield. Through my brother, I sent the message to the guys that I have a no-non sense attitude and I am not going to tolerate trash talking. My brother also told them that there is a lot you can learn from Umesh and that he always tops at studies.

There is another smart thing we did, my brother told me to stand up for class captain. I knew girls were on my side and my brother ensured guys will be also on my side :) I won by landslide and that gave me opportunity to start making rules.  First rule was everyone will talk in English during class. Second rule was no trash talking within class , specially no trash talking with me as I won't tolerate. Third was that we all will focus on topics of studies and sports.

Six months into the school, the culture already got better. My sister and I were among-st toppers in school so we had positive influence on teachers. My brother was good in sports and popular with boys. Students respected me and tried to follow rules. They knew not complying with rules will mean either teachers will confront them or my brother will. We all lived happily and respecting each others boundaries.

So the school years were set . I did not have to take any tension of having bad association. I had two shields protecting me -- my will & influence and my twin brother  :) :)

The toughest phase begins when I left my house at 18 to go to southern part of India to do my engineering .....
 
I decided to do my engineering at AIT in Chikmagalur, Karnataka, India - a hill station town near Bangalore. Bangalore at that time was fast becoming IT hub of the world and Karnataka was most sought after destination. I could sense a very different culture at the education institutes - students very much focused on studies, very serious about their future and English was the only language in campuses.

Yet, I say this was the toughest phase because this is the first time I was going out of house. I wont have shield of twin brother and my parents. Also, this place was 48 hrs away from my home which meant I can only see my family once in 6 months.

My biggest decision was to decide whether I will chose to live in Boys hostel or somewhere else on rent. Ragging laws were not that strict at those times and  buys hostel was known to be an hostile environment for first year. I wasn't inclined to live in the hostel. I am not the kind who can be forcefully ragged and I am also not the kind to succumb to any pressure from seniors.

Thankfully, my father had a family friend (my aunt - Kamakshi) and her family. So with their blessings, I had a house for 30 days before I could decide where I am going to live. They had a tradition of keeping an engineering student from their extended family every 4 years and that's one of the reason there house is named - Vidhya Mandir (Temple of Knowledge). And luckily, I could create enough family bonding with them that they blessed me to stay with them for all four years. My issue of association my place of stay during engineering  magically vanished.

This family is direct descendants of one of the best known Hindu shrines - Sringeri Muth . The place became my second house and my aunt became my second mom.  I am lucky to have three mom's - my mother, my wife's mother and Kamakshi. More on Moms in this blog.

This association with Kamakshi and with her family taught me so much about Hindu religion  about being a Brahmin and about the positive Power of God. I  also learnt to eat traditional south Indian feast, wear  traditional south Indian dress, learnt Indian spiritual songs and found my spiritual Guru - Pontiff of Sringeri . I was not only doing Bachelors of Engineering, I was also doing Bachelors in Spiritualism. I also was taught the local language Kannada by my aunt.

While one battle of association was won, I had the biggest battle at college pending. Right from day one, I started getting calls from North Indian seniors that I should follow ragging rules - wear dress code and always keep eyes low. I refused by saying its my choice what I wear. Also there is no way whatsoever that I was to lower my eyes. Of-course, they did not like it but because I was not staying in hostel and was having local connection , they could not threaten me more.

They made attempts for 6 months but without threats. They also wanted me to visit hostel for ragging during off hours and I will of-course not do that. I told them whosoever wants to talk to me has  to talk to me during college hrs and within college premises.  This escalated and I got boycott calls from the group. I was told that no north Indian will talk to me. I wasn't worried, within first 3 months I had impressed many north Indians to be my friends especially the ones I wanted too.

The local South Indian seniors group also started to notice me. I will go with them in college bus from town to college.They will see me mingling with all in the bus, talking local language (Kannada). Thankfully, by now, I knew the head of computer science department. He happened to be my aunt's friend's husband. I told this local group that if I am pressurized more I will report. 

While , they stopped threatening but it took a while for them to accept me. Here again,  I was not at loss, I had many many local friends including seniors who believed in me and liked me. I wasn't going after quantity of friends anyhow. Within, 1 year - two semester after - I was the top 20 % of student in the college and top 5% in my class. Students were impressed not just by my knowledge but they liked me for who I was. I was now a known name within faculty and within college students that no one could not touch me or mess with me. I was able to create a shield around me that will deflect non-nonsensical behavior.

At 22 years , 4 years after living away from family and without the shield of my twin brother here I was - Umesh with the same core qualities he was born with -- I could preserve my self. "Always be you " was my mantra for myself and others. I knew the force was with me and will be with me as long as I have the will.