Strength TogetHER 5- Session 3

October 3, 2020

"Positivity is not the only emotion we know. Human beings are known to have a wide variety of emotions. And, experiencing them all is totally okay."

People always share about how to be positive. If we scroll our social media for 5 minutes, we will land upon at least two quotes about positivity and happiness. But the way I figure it out, positivity and happiness is just an add up. To not feel any happiness is what I call normal. If I had to rate the emotions out of 10, I would rate negative emotions below 5, no emotions a fair 5 and positive emotions above 5. And trust me, below 5 is what an average human normally experiences and it's totally okay.

To normalize all these emotions and to talk about how feeling low is sometimes okay Strength togetHER cohort 5 had its 3rd session on 3rd October, 2020 with the topic "It's okay to be not okay". To help us and guide us with the same topic, our moderator for the session was Ms. Aayusha Gupta, an enthusiastic Chartered Accountant who has recently started her own practice firm. She is also the secretary of Dharan Toastmasters Club and an amazing public speaker. 

We all know that everyone at least once had a bad day. We wanted to hear all of our participants' stories but due to time constraint, we had 5 speakers to share the stories / experiences so that the other peers could relate, hear, learn and add up to their stories.

• Our first speaker's story was quite unexpected as she couldn't remember even one incident where she was sad. She explained how she thinks that she either hadn't encountered any sadness or she had a good sadness cope up mechanism. As she did not remember one of her stories, she taped a tale of a friend who constantly felt low. Our speaker said that she would always advice her friend that to be not okay is normal.

• Everyone of us may have experienced how heart-wrenching it is to lose friends. Our next speaker had a story about being left by friends to which we all could relate. Really, losing friends is really hard specially when one likes to socialize a lot. But on the positive note, our speaker eventually learnt to let go and convinced herself that it wasn't the end. And like how every happy story proceeds, our speaker also has good friends now. And when she reflects back to her past with toxic friends, she realizes how it was okay to be not okay.

• Mirroring the topic of our session, our third speaker beautifully explained how she has hard times every now and then. She claimed how she accepts the sadness as reality she can't change. She said, "I am not the only child of the God to be always blessed with good days." And as a matter of fact, no one is blessed with just good days. Everyone has ups and downs every now and then and it is totally okay.

•  No one likes being called a cheater specially when you have not even cheated. Our fourth speaker had a tragic incident during her school days when she had accidentally left her notebook inside her examination hall unknowingly. When the teacher noticed it, she was startled and surprised. No matter how much she tried to explain the scenario, she was shut up . She spent the entire night following by sobbing until the time she decided that it was just one chapter of her life which was tragic and how she must make the proceeding chapters a glorious one. After all, just one bad day does not define your entire year or your entire life.

• A grateful person realizes everything she has and a kind person wishes to do something for the people who are struggling. Our grateful and kind speaker came across an incident when and old man was knocking door to door in search of job despite of the burning heat of the city roads. She was melted by the old man's action and wanted to do something for him but she wasn't allowed to go out. Feeling pity and helpless for the poor man's state, she decided that she will never take anything for granted. She was so emotionally exhausted after that incident for several days, so one fine day, she just wished the best for the man and his family and started for a new positive approach on life. She said how a sad day like that became the road for her new outlook on life.

 After hearing all the stories and commenting on each of them, our moderator introduced us to her friend and our special guest for the session, Mrs Bijaya Mishra. Mrs Mishra is a humble person, a doctor and a happy mother of two children. She said how the world might see her as a happy-go-round person but she has her own battles which she is fighting. There were many things she said which made us ponder for a while:

☆ Troubles teach us how to become resilient.

☆ Scars are the proofs of the battles we have won.

☆ Take your own time. Growth doesn't happen all of a sudden.

☆ Be gentle, step back if needed, reward yourself and wear your own medal.

Our special guest was really a good motivator and a good speaker. After the interaction with our special guest, our moderator gave us some take-home-advise so that the impact of the session wouldn't be just limited within the 90 minutes. She shared a picture with a beautiful message and conveyed us some really helpful advise:

• Be kind to our minds.

• Do what we love and embrace everything that makes us special.

• Take breaks as it is better to pause than to stop.

• Give ourselves time and celebrate our uniqueness.

• There are things you can do to improve your mental health. For example: Journaling!

It was a really calming session in this hour of chaotic world which is frightened by an ongoing pandemic. We LIVED this 90 minutes via a virtual world of Zoom and shared smiles with each other. We promised to take small sturdy steps to improve ourselves and be grateful for our bad days as it paves our path towards the sunny beautiful days. I hope, not just us who attended the sessions but also everyone reading this right now will stop hoping for just good days and happiness every time. May we be constantly reminded that too much sunshine makes a desert where not even a single flower grows and sometimes we need the sulky rain for our own good.

Written by: Aastha Shrestha (LOKOPAKAR)

Edited by : Barsha Tamang