Category: Relationships

If you are lonely in each other’s presence, it’s probably best to separate!

Loneliness is a virtue if you are alone, a learning if you are in a crowd and a curse if you experience it in a relationship – particularly in a marriage!
Someone who read my recent blogpost on Bajirao Mastani (http://avisviswanathan.blogspot.in/2015/12/what-we-can-learn-from-kashibai-about.html) shared her perspective: “I don’t think Kashibai deserves to be deified for her choice of separating from Bajirao. Perhaps, she was uninteresting and very traditional, housewife-ish? Perhaps Bajirao found Mastani very refreshing, vibrant, oozing mohabbat from every pore…perhaps the trappings of being a Peshwa and being bound to tradition – wife, kingdom, mother, army – shackled Bajirao and he just wanted to break free? And Mastani’s offer to be his companion gave him that exit route?”
Hmmm….! In the absence of the real Bajirao, the real Kashibai and the real Mastani, you can’t entirely disagree with this reader’s point of view. Besides, if that is what drove Bajirao go with Mastani, nothing wrong with it at all. It is definitely a better choice than being lonely in a marriage – which, interestingly, leaves your spouse lonely too! In the movie The Lunchbox(Ritesh Batra, 2013), Lillete Dubey, who plays Illa’s (Nimrat Kaur) mother, poignantly alludes to how lonely – and dreary and traumatic – her Life has been until her husband’s passing away. In fact, she confesses, not in a grief-stricken state of stupor, but in a moment of absolute clarity, that all she really wants to do, to perhaps celebrate her new freedom, is to eat parathas! The reference to parathas is purely figurative. It could be anything that you love doing – anything except feeling lonely in a relationship, anything except suffering alone, anything except being shackled!

A marriage is nothing but an arrangement, equivalent of a business contract. If, for whatever reason, it doesn’t work out, the arrangement must be dissolved. There’s nothing to grieve about, feel sorry for or berate when a marriage fails. A marriage fails because the two people in it have stopped looking forward to each other. They can’t relate to each other anymore. They are lonely in each other’s presence. How much more banal and painful can it get? When you put up with loneliness of this kind in a relationship the entire responsibility of your suffering is yours. Remember: you have a choice. And that choice is to opt out.


I am not trying to suggest that all of us must break away from our marriages. All I am saying is that if you are unhappy, lonely and suffering in a marriage – or any relationship – exercise your choice to break free. The brutal truth is none of us has too much time left here. This Life has to be lived – each moment is to be celebrated and you must be happy every step of the way! When something or someone pins you down and makes you lonely, sad or unhappy, either get it or them out of the way or you get out of the way yourself! Simple!!


What we can learn from Kashibai about relating and relationships

Don’t cling on to any relationship that makes you unhappy. Just step out and free yourself!
I watched Sanjay Leela Bhansali’s (SLB) epic historical Bajirao Mastani earlier this week. True to SLB’s style it is awe-inspiring for its grandeur, finesse and story-telling. The film recounts, with some cinematic liberties taken, the story of Bajirao I (played brilliantly by Ranveer Singh), the Peshwa (Prime Minister) of the Maratha empire, between 1720 and 1740. In this time, while on the one hand Bajirao leads the expansion of the Maratha empire across the North, South and East of India, he takes Mastani (an amazing performance by Deepika Padukone), the daughter of the King of Bundelkhand, as his second wife. In the backdrop of the political compulsions that govern the Life of the Peshwa, SLB’s Bajirao Mastani tells the story of the unbridled love between Mastani and Bajirao – even as Bajirao’s first wife, Kashibai (a solid portrayal by Priyanka Chopra), comes to terms with losing her husband to this “other woman”. SLB’s work, as usual, is pure poetry on screen. The romance between Ranveer and Deepika makes Bajirao Mastaniseem so real in front of your eyes – as if you are in the 1700s, in Pune, in the midst of the Maratha empire.
But the real hero of the story, according to me, is Kashibai. For a simple reason – she operates, all through the narrative, from her core of inner peace and as who she believes she is. Yes, she is shocked when her husband falls for the aggressive and maniacally-brazen Mastani – who, to compound matters for the staunchly Hindu Maratha society, is a Muslim! So, Kashi does grieve initially. But she soon chooses to stand her ground. She has done no wrong. She has caused nothing to warrant losing her husband to the “other woman”. It’s her husband’s choice. In one epic scene in her personal chamber, where Bajirao goes to take her leave before embarking on his final military mission, Kashi tells him not to ever come back to her room – meaning, to her! There was no drama as Kashi expresses herself. There was just a firm, stoic, acceptance of what is and a decision to move on – “you have another woman, that choice is unacceptable to me, we don’t relate to each other anymore, so, let us separate.” Even when she rushes to his side later, as he lies ailing, she has this clarity that she’s there as a caregiver and not as one necessarily in a relationship. And that perspective that SLB brings out, and which Priyanka beautifully portrays, offers a key learning for all of us.
The tragedy with most marital relationships is that they try to lock in, actually hold as hostage, people within a legal and social framework. Just because you are married to someone, you have to suffer that person for the rest of your Life – however disenchanted that person may be from you or however distant you may have drifted away from that person. There’s nothing wrong with marriage as a concept – except that the way it is insisted it is practiced has rendered it totally useless. The truth is, over time, everything and everyone changes. The circumstances in which people come together change. Biologically people change – with ageing. Emotionally people change. So, like Bajirao, people get drawn to new liaisons. To be sure, Bajirao here is not a gender-specific metaphor. There are so many contemporary women who seek meaning in companionship outside of their marriage – and there is nothing wrong with it. They key is not to feel trapped. It is important not to suffer. And Kashibai teaches us how not to suffer. She can’t relate to a philandering husband, she can’t accept her man sharing “love meant exclusively for her” with another person. Simply, she can’t relate to her new ‘Peshwa’. So, she divorces him by banning his entry into her chamber.

Kashi’s must not be as a reel-Life choice. In real Life too, indeed, it is so, so simple. If you are caught in a relationship that’s making you unhappy, just step out of it. Be open. Have an honest conversation with your spouse and opt out. There’s nothing wrong or sinful about such a choice. In fact, it is grossly unjust only when you kill your inner peace and happiness only to protect a relationship – per a social and legal definition – which is long dead, which is, seriously, not there anymore! 

Sometimes, it is best to lay a relationship to rest a.k.a Relationship In Peace – RIP!

Life is so incredibly demanding. Sometimes, you may have to have the most uncomfortable conversations even though you may never want to have them. But have those conversations and liberate yourself, despite the pain that they may entail, because without them, you will agonize, grieve and suffer.
Let’s take an example. You just don’t have the chemistry going with someone in your Life. You have tried. She or he has tried. But it has never worked out. Over the years, you find that your equilibrium is lost in this person’s presence. And you take ages to recover every time from that ‘encounter’, that ‘conflict’ or even that ‘chance meeting’. So, you are now in a hermit mode, having ‘retired’ after being ‘tired of trying’. Not out of ego, not out of hatred, but out of wanting to just anchor in peace. Peace for you and peace for this other person. And then you get a call from ‘a someone’ connected to both of you, inviting you to consider a truce; appealing to your sense of maturity, to your conscience to let go of ‘past issues’, of ‘baggage’, to forgive and to ‘resume’ ties. This is the time that you must take charge of your Life. Ideally, you may want to duck this peacemaker’s call or conversation. You may want to hide from this opportunity. But don’t. Stand there. Be in the face of it and evaluate the opportunity objectively. Examine if you believe that the chemistry with the person in question can ever be restored and made to work. Examine if you and the other person, both and not just one, really will benefit from this ‘reunion’. Examine if you will be happy meeting this person. If the answer is yes, and only if it’s a yes for all three statements above, proceed. Else, stay away. Peace, inner peace, for both of you, is more important than a sense of reason and victory for the peacemaker. Not that the peacemaker means any harm. Or is doing something for ‘showing off’ (not that there don’t exist such pretentious peacemakers on this planet!). But just that, it is important for each of us to know what chemistry works, with whom, when and where. And more important is to employ this knowledge intelligently and profitably for all concerned.
Chances are the peacemaker, and observers, will opinionate and even chide you for being ‘bull-headed’, ‘heartless’ and ‘unreasonable’. But you explain your point of view while remaining unmoved. Just double check if you are not operating from a position of ego and hatred by asking yourself the following questions. If there was an avenue for rapprochement, would you have waited for a peacemaker to broker a deal or would you have reached out? Do you wish this other person well or are you still seething with rage? Have you been at peace in all this time that you have stayed away from the relationship? When you ask and answer these questions, truly, honestly, you will be able to confirm if your ego is coming in the way or if peace is the way. If it is the latter, have the difficult conversation with the peacemaker, any observer or even the person in question. This conversation must be gone through to free you of any pangs of guilt, of any emotional burden. Don’t avoid it. “Remember”, as American novelist, Nicholas Sparks, writes in “Message in a Bottle”: “Nothing worthwhile is going to be easy.”

So, a simple rule of thumb to feel unburdened and free in difficult relationships is to 1. WANT the peace 2. HAVE uncomfortable conversations although you may want to hide from them. 3. DON’T operate from ego or hatred. 4. DO what’s right and best for both people involved__you and the other person. 5. DON’T try to be a martyr or a hero__just be who you are. And, fundamentally, recognize that it is sometimes perfectly fine__and the best thing__for some relationships to be laid to rest, a.k.a, Relationship In Peace__R.I.P!