Our parents are our gateway into life. In Sikhi our families are our first sangat, this could be both good or bad. Some people are born into families where their families live closely with Sikhi. They are taught from a young age about the gurus and the values of sikhi. On the other hand are families who don’t live with Sikhi in their daily lives, maybe a reminder once a year is Vaisakhi. Either way we’ve grown up with expectations from our parents. Expectations of being smart, making them proud or growing up as a knowledgeable gursikh.
And it’s tiring.
We know our parents love us but it's a different type of love. It isn’t always expressed in the same way as our other peers. For lots of desi kids our parents love was something that wasn’t always visible to us. It was shown by our parents buying us fruit that we once said we liked in front of them. A connection point for many desi kids is Jus Reign. Through Jus Reign’s videos a lot of us desi kids realized that our family life had been so similar growing up. We all had to face these expectations from our parents. It’s easy to make jokes and cope with our somewhat traumatic childhoods through comedy but it’s still hard having their expectations on our shoulders.
There are many reasons for these expectations. A lot of the reasons stem from our differences. Lots of our parents grew up in India or Pakistan. My parents grew up in poverty in India, my dad grew up sharing a one bedroom house for their family of 9. They’ve worked hard their entire lives, making a life for themselves and for their families. They moved to different countries where they didn’t speak the language but they still worked hard. And now I’ve grown up with the reminder that, “I worked so hard for you” and it’s so easy for us to say “you didn't have too” but talking back has its own punishment. It’s hard for us to handle these expectations. But after a while we learn to just deal with it. This has problems of its own; it can cause depression and anxiety for us.
The best advice I’ve heard for these expectations is to let go of our Moh (attachment). We also have attachment to the idea that our parents are supposed to be there for us. We have to let go of our expectations of our parents in order for it to be easier to let go of their expectation for us. And it isn’t easy for us to let go out of expectations but it's little steps that help.
To hear a better explanation of this please listen to the Gurmat Colored Glasses podcast of families: https://soundcloud.com/gurmat-colored
-Amanpreet Kaur,17, WI
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