#7 How do I feel about having a child—You ask?

I got asked this everyday for the last year, but I never respond with what I truly feel, here's my real response.

This is a slight change of pace from the usual programming on this newsletter. This is about feelings. So more about the gut, the heart and slightly about the mind. While all this perhaps get’s processed in the mind, but just so we both know what to expect.

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All through our pregnancy and the year that has passed since our little one was born, I got asked how I felt about it at least a zillion times. People ask you this fleetingly and hence, you fleetingly respond by saying something like, I feel delighted, I feel awesome, I feel grateful, and the likes. While true, these descriptions are far from what you truly feel inside your heart. In your heart you haven’t processed the feeling yet, you’re processing it as you go along—every time you look at your child, pick them up, or just look at them while they sleep.

It was my baby's first birthday this week, and I feel the time is right to share with you what I truly felt when he was born and some other deep feelings about parenting.

While this is me reflecting on some of the core feelings I had during this year, my intention is for you to benefit from knowing what is the range of feelings one could end up having in terms of their child in their first year.

So as I was saying, people ask, how do you feel, a lot—ever so fleetingly but extremely regularly.

One way I can put it is that the feeling has been: Bring him close to your body, your face. Touch him to your skin. Kiss it or even “Eat it”. This has been consistent all year through. This is the short version. That’s it. Go do your thing.

The Long Version

Humans have evolved to bring close to themselves anything that they love extremely. The most basic things we love but don't realise we love them, are just the basics. Think food, think shelter, think a means to peaceful sleep, all these things give us survival, utility and a means to get more and more of the things we love. Without them we can’t function, we love these things so intensely that we have organised our lives in a way that there is never a dearth of these things. Only when we are bereft of them for a while, do we realise how much we loved them.

Basics once acquired, the most intimate love we have is for other people and other things close to our hearts (let's call them passions). Whatever we love we either consume, make it one with ourselves. Like how we eat food and then it becomes us—literally: bones, muscles, blood and so on. Or we acquire and keep those things close to us—think our partners, our friends, material belongings. We use these in various ways to be able to lead a life that is abundant in more and more of these things we love. Basically we are living our lives maintaining ourselves and our surroundings by doing the grunt work day in and day out in order to engage more and more with these things we love, these things we love make us feel alive.

Imagine someone who loves a new cashmere shawl they’d bring it close to their face touch it on their skin and feel pleasure. The same way, anything when we fall in love with or are extremely attracted to we bring them close to ourselves, touch them to our skin, and invariably keep on doing it from time and again. When sports stars win tournaments that they have dreamt of winning all their lives, they get given those cups, the first thing they do is to hoist it above their head and then very quickly bring it close to their face and kiss it. Some even try to bite it.

Becoming One With What We Love

Pretty much that is what our experience of things we love is. We bring it as close to us as possible, these things become part of our identities, if possible, we eat them, if not, we bring these things close to our skin for as long as possible, we try to become one with these things. This merging of identities is what I am calling love is.

Now, what happens when something (or in this case someone) literally has come out of you (from the insides of you). This baby, this person is first yours, first from within you then anything else in this world. Devoid of any personality of their own yet, and hence you subsume them in your own personality. I felt like, my son is me just out side of my body. As if our identities had merged. No wonder then that it is advised if you want to please someone, love their child.

How do you feel about anything that is this close to you?

After survival, the first and last thing that humans want around is their offspring, their baby, their child. All you want is that this child remains happy, healthy, able and sound. All you want is for them to survive and thrive. And the responsibility to ensure of that was mine and mine alone on that first day when I held him in my arms and today when he has turned one.

That’s how I feel. And whether I bring him close to me and kiss him from time and again, oh yeah, of course, I do. I feel that urge to eat him even. (It's a real thing humans feel for things that are extremely cute, it’s called Cute Aggression or Playful Aggression, read more¹.)

Like sudden rages of love, that make me grind my teeth, make me squeeze him in my arms, make me kiss him endlessly.

But that is not to say that there haven't been other feelings. There, in fact, have been many more intense not so positive feelings. Feelings that can scare a weak heart. If you’d allow me to explain I could include it in future articles, just reply to this one or leave a comment saying, “tell me more.”

What do I make of this feeling though. What is it that is happening when you look at it from a 30,000 feet view. Borrowing from J Krishnamurti’s description of what we’re all seeking to achieve, from The Collected Works Volume 8. Here goes, along with my commentary to give context about our topic.

The rich want to forget themselves in night clubs, in amusements, in cars, in travelling.

I say, the rich with money or rich with youth even. As youngsters we’ve all found solace in these things. Or when we want to feel young, we still do.

The clever ones want to forget themselves, so they begin to invent, to have extraordinary beliefs.

Don’t we all, at least, want to do this. Or are trying to do this already.

The stupid ones want to forget themselves, and so they follow people; they have gurus who tell them what to do.

This too we see rampant in the society. When we feel weak in our minds we need help.

The ambitious ones also want to forget themselves in doing something. In doing something to build something bigger than themselves.

So all of us, as we mature, as we grow older, want to forget ourselves, and so we try to find something greater with which to be identified.

This identification with something greater, nicer, a newer version of you even, is for me at this point nothing but bringing up my baby son. It is a chance to bring a better, kinder, more compassionate and well rounded person into the society. And for now, this is the dead-centre-front-seat of life for me.

So that is how I felt, from when he was born to now.

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The phrase “dead-centre-front-seat of life” was first used in another article on this publication. Read the full story below:

We're Living the Obscure Dream #5

Art Products for you to enjoy!

In line with the duty and basis of life that I feel my baby son is for me, I made these two artworks to embody that.

First one is Dharma. I started picking up the concept of Dharma first when I was little and would watch the TV series, Mahabharata, produced by B.R. Chopra and based on the great Indian epic Mahabharata. What it means for me today is multifaceted. It is deeply rooted in Indian philosophy, particularly within Hinduism, Buddhism, and Jainism. Its meanings can vary significantly depending on the context, but it generally encompasses Cosmic Law and Order, Moral and Ethical Duties, and Right Living. So it is about the cosmic way of things, about our duties as righteous humans to live a life of virtue and integrity.

And the second one is Karma—A concept of action, work, or deed, and its effect or consequences, often related to the principle of cause and effect in individuals' lives. Enough has been said and written about Karma. All in all it is a eastern religious concept about good intent and actions lead to good karma and happier rebirths, while bad intent and actions lead to bad karma and bad rebirths. Karma is often misunderstood as fate, destiny, or predetermination.

Did I mention, I’ve been using the Shine phone wallpaper that I shared with you’ll last week. And it is such a delight every time I pick up my phone, it says right above where I unlock the phone from with my thumb, SHINE. To be reminded to shine all day, just makes going through the day a tad bit shinier.

If you still haven’t downloaded, you can go ahead and do it for free using this link.

Until next Sunday, hope you find joy, wonder and calm this week.

1. An article from Hindustan Times by Zara Murao, on our brain’s need to channel a sensory overload of finding love for a child. “The rush of feeling we experience is so intense that it registers as a kind of stress. The body and brain begin to look for a release, and an effective method of somatic release is biting down. (Another example of somatic release: fidgeting when nervous.)” - You can access it on Stark Library.