The dawn of the New Year or the eve of it is most often than not, a time for many of us to make plans for the coming year, to review the past and resolve to do-undo a lot of things. A time to initiate changes in many lives – ours and in that of others.
Looking back at this time, at my own life I marvel at the way life has taken me from what I thought I would be to what I am today. I changed – a change that I had not foreseen or planned for and yet made.
I dreamt the normal dreams of wanting to do well in life, get a well paid job, have the necessary comforts of life, have a good family and live a life of peace. I studied well and went on to do my Masters, and without any effort was placed with a good firm.
After marriage, I moved to Mumbai. My husband and I were both task oriented personalities, workaholics. Completing project schedules on time and testing application errors and debugging programs excited me to the core. Work schedules, tight deadlines, late working hours, increments in salary, daughter frequently falling ill became the normal scene in our household. In spite of all this we were not unhappy with life. But I soon started showing signs of pain and swelling in my joints and was diagnosed with Rheumatoid arthritis.
We moved to Bangalore where my parents stayed so that I could have help and soon became a family of four. Work, health issues, children, school, church, friends and each other – so many things to juggle between. A major turn in our life happened with my husband meeting with an accident on his way from work, a head injury and its effects forcing us into an option of him resigning from his current marketing job involving a lot of outstation travel. We started to set up our own business and so now came the pressures of a medical condition with a start-up business, so I felt I had to keep my job at any cost and do more than my best at work.
I excelled at work, winning appreciations in every project and a few awards. My husband and children stood by me through all the demands of my work place. I enjoyed my work and loved all that I could accomplish – implemented project solutions, appreciations and additional responsibilities became a place and way of self worth for me. It was at this time that my daughter was entering into her teens and with it came the natural confrontations and arguments with her. Home was a place where I was a very different person, irritable, angry and impatient. I was two persons – one at office and another at home, my children especially my older child bore the brunt of all my frustrations. Also my health was getting from bad to worse. I was already diagonised with arthritis, wheezing and High Blood Pressure – but I did not know what to do. Prayer which was a part of my everyday life took a back seat. I then one day started showing blood strains in my morning sputum and in my tests there was a doubt of it being TB which needed confirmatory tests.
I came crashing down. I wondered at the purpose of all that I was doing, earning reasonably well but never having the time to spend with my family or time for myself or anything in particular. It was a rat race.
Me and my husband came on to our knees and asked God for healing and forgiveness. We realized we needed a change in our lives. Our prayers were answered and after six days when the confirmatory reports came, my case was one of wrong diagnosis, the blood was due to acute wheezing and infection in the lungs. I knew I needed to change the current life style but what do I do? How do we meet our financial needs? Will we be able to meet the needs especially at this time when the business has not even reached the breakeven point. But every time I sat down alone to think or to pray, the need for a move or change from my present situation pressed on me and it made me unhappy and depressed for no reason that I could relate or pin-point.
One day as I prayed I felt an assurance for us of God’s provision to us as a couple personally. I also felt a deep need to be spiritually fed for my daily sustenance. With great fear and reluctance I decided to quit and join Urban India Ministries which worked with strengthening family relationships. The decision was loaded with uncertainty, fear and above all warnings and suggestions from friends and relatives. But this was a decision that we had taken and I often wondered how the children took this major change in our life and in our finances.
I was initially placed in a project which dealt with educating values to teens and also dealing with the day to day problems they faced. It was a time for me to really understand today’s teenage problems and I began to understand my teenage daughter better – a blessing at the right time.
Almost three and half years after this change, one evening as I was sitting and teaching my daughter now getting prepared to write her Board exam, the phone rang. It was the client whose project I had handled at my previous organization. The next phase of the project was to be tendered out and he wanted me to join them as a technical consultant for a short term. He suggested that he could offer me an amount which was huge and I beamed from ear to ear not only because of the amount offered but a feeling of worth knowing that the customer had trusted my skills enough to call me even after three and a half years. I did not realize that my daughter was picking up every conversation and was waiting for me to keep the phone down and as soon as I did it she said “Mama pleeeeease do not go back………….”
This was it; perhaps this was what I was waiting for, a confirmation that I had made the right change in my life. It meant a lot to me to know that my children approve of what I did and what I am doing even if it meant a loss in the eyes of many of my acquaintances.
But today after almost seven years, I hardly see a difference of what I could have achieved otherwise, I have done almost the same I had planned to do and probably much more – given my children education in the best institution in the city, gone out on family outings and holidays, enjoyed a major change (for the better) in my health situation and above all time and energy to raise a happy and fruitful family life. It has also helped me to reach out to others in need in the bargain – there was a family friend who was at cross-roads about a major change in his job situation – a change from a salaried job to a business he desired to start – and it was nice to hear from him that “your decision and life has inspired me and gives me the courage to make the change”.
I have enjoyed both parts of my work life equally well and have been enriched by both. Moving from the first place was loaded with fear of where, how and what. But I also knew that I could not continue much longer in the place where I was, it wasn’t helping me nor was it helping my family. I had to make a choice. I am glad that I made the choice to move from a well familiar ground to an unknown territory for the sake of myself and for my family. It was only when I exercised my right to choose that I was able to also exercise my right to change. It’s worth it to see that the change has made an effect not only on me but has also influenced my family and friends and has served a greater purpose in my life than what I could comprehend.
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