CHILDREN

Just when I was beginning to lose my focus on Psychology, I witnessed an incident that put me back into perspective. A child crying in the hospital as her mother was wheeled into the emergency room. One often hears of the fragility of a child's mind but seldom sees it firsthand. Children work in strange ways that is beyond our comprehension. What we can understand is when they imitate our behavior and try to be like adults. We can also understand them when they behave like the opposite of adults and throw childish tantrums, but what we fail to grasp is when the blend in their adult-like maturity with their childlike innocence.

They have their mother's blue eyes and their father's sharp sense of hearing but what they see and listen is entirely different from what we look at or hear.Most importantly, their perceptions and reactions to situations are unfathomable. The little girl shrieks in pain, her face turns red and she cannot wrap her head around the fact that her mother is injured. Yet, when her mother is wheeled out, she inhales deeply and looks into her eyes and says- "get well soon". Strength radiates through her small four feet frame, even as she wipes those endless tears away.

"You are strong" is a phrase that people have been consoling me with for the past few weeks, given the recent hospital experiences that I have been through, and I cannot think of a less befitting phrase than that. Over the months, I have mastered,shall I say, the art of repressing feelings and ignoring those questions and doubts that are bursting through the surface of my sub-conscious. It is somehow easier to pretend that these questions of an uncertain future and the moral dilemmas, are of no importance and it is best to forget them altogether. It is easier to suppress the turmoil brimming inside, threatening to burst into my consciousness and engulf me in a process of self-realization. Instead, I put on a smile on my face, a cheer in my voice and live out my day through its mundane routines. For this, I am complimented each day as being "a strong girl."

The little girl did not hesitate to face her fears. She cried in pain in spite of the stares from strangers. She embraced her pain and felt it pierce into her. She allowed herself to be honest with her feelings but when her mother came in she knew she had to be there for her and so she wiped her tears and looked at her. Her eight year old mind was still unable to accept that her mother's condition and yet she displayed the unnerving strength of a mature adult. This blend of emotions is so becoming of the children around us. They work in strange ways and we continue to be baffled by them.

It is this wonderful nature of children that enthralled me to unravel their psychological mysteries.