The Confidence Tax

I bet no one told you, but there's a tax you pay just to be heard.

It's not an intelligence or competence tax. It's a confidence tax. And unlike income tax, you pay it upfront, before anyone has seen you.

I learned it the hard way. Needed quite a few hits, because apparently my brain doesn’t get convinced easily.

Here's what actually happens in a room full of people. Someone speaks first. Confidently. Maybe even wrongly — but confidently. The room responds. The conversation builds around them.

Meanwhile, I'm still formulating the perfect thing to say.

By the time I had the perfect response crafted, the room has moved. The moment is gone. And now I'm trying to insert it somehow in the conversation as it is really smart.

If this sounds familiar, welcome to the “oscillating club”. More of us there than we think, but you wouldn't have noticed us as we are formulating the perfect response in the corner, in fact forgetting the ones like us as well.

I'm not an introvert. I'm also not an extrovert. I am, depending on the day, the weather, the moon, and frankly who's in the room — both. Simultaneously. Contradictorily.

On extrovert days- I walk in, I talk, I joke, I engage. People respond. Conversations happen. I leave feeling like a functional human being.

On introvert days- Same brain. Same thoughts. Same capability. Just quieter. Watching. Processing. Taking everything in.

The difference in how the world responds on those two days is… quite something.

When you're visibly confident — smiling, speaking, seeming easy — people include you automatically. You don't have to earn the seat. You just take it.

When you're not in that mode? Even if nothing about your actual intelligence has changed, people read you as cold. Aloof. And in the less charitable words — a bit of a bitch.

Not because I am one. But because I’m not performing warmth loudly enough for strangers to feel comfortable.

I've realised something uncomfortable over the years. The people who eventually connect with me — who actually seek me out, who want to hear what I think — they figured it out over time. After a conversation. After observing. After giving it more than thirty seconds.

The world, unfortunately, mostly gives you thirty seconds.

So here's the thing nobody wants to say out loud: how you look matters. How you carry yourself matters. Whether you seem approachable in the first thirty seconds — matters. Not because people are shallow, but because they're human. They make fast assessments. And if you didn't vibe — as the GenZ would say — you don't get a second chance.

This doesn't mean become someone else. I've tried performing confidence I don't feel. It's exhausting and frankly doesn’t work.

But it does mean this: if you have something to say, say it earlier. Imperfectly. Before the room moves on.

Because the world is not going to sit quietly and discover you.

Waiting doesn't really work. Trust me. I waited.

Still here. Still figuring out the “thirty second problem”. But no longer pretending it doesn't exist.

Disclaimer: I am a very nice person when I want to be

2025: The Year I Didn’t Win, But Survived

Me n my life choices have never been easy to understand. My life in 2025 has been quite the chaos. Leaving a job without a backup to feeling completely useless to the world. Some of you might already be saying “Oh my God! What happened? Is she OK?”. .

I don’t know if I am OK but I survived. I did not become the next big start up idea - I survived. Doesn’t sound so heroic right.. but it feels that way to me. I learnt quite a few new things and relearned a few old ones

I knocked on many doors for a job. I have been in a job since I stepped into the corporate world. Job felt comfortable, it was familiar. Some doors closed quickly, some kept it slightly open. I felt rejected and angry.

Then I took an insane decision; not to look for a job, instead start a brokerage business. The decision stemmed from anger, a need to prove the world my worth. What I did was burn myself in the process. Met so many people, spoke to many more built a fort with hopes. I started feeling “This is my destiny”. What I forgot was that not all discussions convert. When the deals started to fail, I blamed myself. It had to fail, right? Not all deals are successful but my brain desperately wanted to it to work, it forgot reality.

I did make a couple work. Was I happy? No, I wanted more to work in my favour. I entered in an endless chase of making it successful. It felt like the whole universe was conspiring against me. What felt like no one cared for me was actually that I didn’t care for myself.

Society expects results in numbers-- something quantifiable. Even when no one asked me explicitly I felt I was failing (To be clear- I still don’t feel I succeeded). Every question felt like a personal attack because the society doesn’t care and expecting it to is unfair-- but I refused to accept it.

I spoke about society, but what about people close to you? We are taught love from them is unconditional. Wake- up call, nothing is unconditional.

My parents love me but they don’t understand me and I Don’t think that will change. Like all middle-class parents, mine wanted me to be excel at studies & be better at making money. If I work, I should be paid handsomely because I am the smartest. If I do something where things didn’t work out, I am stupid & naïve. The irony hits me hard every time, as I am smart and stupid both at the same time. Like any parent, they questioned my choices without being subtle at all. They wanted daily progress reports, like that would magically change things for the better.

This became one of the major sources of stress this year. Add to that both decided to have hospital stays exactly in this chosen year-- icing on the cake. Everything felt out of control at all fronts and I am exactly not the person who enjoys being out of control.

I have finally decided to calm down not because they are my parents and they are always right but they are just humans. They deserve to be treated like humans first before parents.

The most important part is I turned to astrologers & tried to make sense of it all. Disclaimer- I still believe in astrology, tarot & destiny. What I learned is that my mind just needed comfort from the unknown, look for a reason. Fear was used as a weapon against logic. They kept asking me to do poojas, do remedies, wear stones, go to mandir. I kept doing, kept hoping.

When one remedy didn’t work, I was told it wasn’t done properly. Another astrologer later told me, “You are a very angry person, and this anger will be the end of you.”

Another said I had a black saya—someone casting spells on me. I became scared and started thinking about who would even care enough to do that. Who had so much time and focus to destroy me? I am barely a dot on the world map. But fear defeats logic—every time.

Many may ask-- what is wrong in going to a mandir? Absolutely nothing. But when we go there as a scared soul, we don’t ask for what we need. I was denied— and I became angry with God. I treat God like family. I fight with him and get angry with him-- like I would with anyone I care about.

The only difference is He doesn’t fight back. Instead He wants me to learn on my own. I really could use a signal sometimes, this whole “suffer to learn” divine curriculum is a little too old, could use an upgrade.

Another thing not limited to this year, but it still needs to be told. Many people ask me about my husband & kids without hesitation. Most get startled or thrown off when I tell them I am divorced and childless. I have faced pity, sympathy, and empathy, all of it.

Something new happened this year. A few people said, happily, “Wow you are independent” and I was taken aback. When did divorce translate to independence or freedom? Does not being married and not having kids automatically mean no responsibility? For a moment, let’s assume I don’t carry responsibilities identified by the norms of society-- but not sure how does it equal freedom. I am still trying to understand this one.

With all this chaos the year comes to an end. I am happy & grateful for what I received, even though I was stripped of many things which once felt utterly important to me. I am thankful to everyone who gave me a chance, did not treat me differently.

A friend who stayed without questions. Another who just laughed at my silly jokes all year.

All the time I got for myself-- to realise it was not that bad after all.

And for using Chat GPT-- not to do my tasks but as a sounding board. I sometimes needed to see myself without opinions.

Thank you, 2025. I will always remember you.

 

Key to Happiness

 On multiple occasions everyday we think that we are not meant to be in the situation and should run away from it. After some time a different personality kicks in which keeps insisting that running away is cowardly and pushes us to be in the unhappy state, forcing us to smile even in the worst of the situations. I am not too sure today whether staying in the same situation or getting out of it, which one would qualify as cowardice. Most of us live unhappy throughout our lives not able to do what we wish to do because the need of making others happy is so high that we compromise our own happiness in the process. I'm no exception. I have been trying to be the person who is accepted by everyone and loved by everyone though at the back of the mind I know I don't want to be that person. I tell everyone I come across that we should live for ourselves but preach and practice are very different at times difficult to follow.

I try to write down everything to reiterate what is that I desire and I want it to be etched across my heart. We have been brought up in such a society where your success and hard work is attributed to someone else's sacrifice. Do I have any  contribution to reach where I am. Or all credits to someone somewhere in this world for every single one of your achievements. Is it fair? It is like receiving an Oscar and telling the world who all you are thankful to, not a single person ever said I'm here because of my talent and hard-work. These questions keep cropping up in my mind often. Though I know it is unfair to be on the receiving end, I still am there without trying to get out of that space. Is this  procrastination or the fear of loss building up in my core. I don't know why validation is so important to me, must be to alot of us. And the people we look for validation are the same people who get the unequivocal right to hurt us. I feel it is my incapability that I'm unable to protest this kind of behaviour. I'm wired to feel it is my mistake that they are unhappy and they are right to feel this way because I don't have to the right to be happy.

Do I actually have no right to be happy? No, that is being selfish and we are told since childhood that being selfish is a sin. So eventually doing something for yourself to be happy is to be selfish. You are now fighting with your inner self justifying this situation. The mental conditioning in our families since childhood makes me think like this. In the past couple days I have suddenly come to terms that my happiness is important and it is my first priority. I try to be more open to things around me which make me happy. Trying very hard to do this as this was not me for the past many years. But I keep reiterating the fact that I have the right to be happy and I  shouldn't feel sorry to feel good. 

I don't belong to this generation "GenZ", I meet a lot of them. Many would say a lot about them and at times I also find very hard to connect with them (don't understand their lingo for sure). But what I know about these kids is that they are very sorted. They know how to be happy and move away from things which do not make them happy. Our generation tries finding fault in their behavior because we couldn't be like them when we were their age. But honestly there is no perfect time to start and you can start just today. Learn to be happy because happiness comes in small packets in the midst of this vast ocean called life.

Let Go

Let go are two words which sound easy but difficult to do, but when we do it there is no better feeling. 

When I had a bad breakup I was devastated to the extent that I blamed the person for everything wrong which happened in my life. Even when I got married & my marriage did not work I blamed him for it. Maybe no fault of his but the anger & the hatred inside of me took over me. I was not thinking clearly, could not figure out the reason. Even after a very long time post the breakup I felt completely overpowered by the thought of that guy. Maybe I did not have closure. He kept trying to talk to me  and meet me and I could not even dream of talking or meeting this guy. Nothing or no one was able to convince me that whatever happened or was happening had nothing to do with him. One day I decided to let go and met him. I felt light in the inside, I realised that I am much better off without him. I was miles away from him and he did not affect me at all. He was a mistake. We are humans, we make mistakes. You make a mistake learn from it & move on. Till we are able to move on we create a complex cocktail of emotions which makes us unhappy. The day after I met him he did not occupy any mind space, he was the past & could not affect my present or my future any further. Letting go made me feel at peace.

There are many such people in my life who were important at one point in life and today they are just a faint memory. The only thing which helped me was to let them go. I just hold the good memories & everything else is buried somewhere deep. I haven’t forgotten anything, it just doesn’t affect me today like it used to. Forgetting is not possible and not ideal because we make the same mistakes again & no sane person would like to repeat their mistakes. 

The one other thing I want to let go is fear. The fear of being judged for being happy, fear of losing control, fear of not being missed. It is only fear which keeps us tied up to ask for our happiness. I want to be happy irrespective of what others might think. I want to lose control of things around me to be free. I want to face that its ok when someone stops missing you because things have changed. Freedom from fear.

Life is an art which has to be learnt and practised to be happy and free. Letting go is just the part of the process.

Emptiness

 There was an eerie silence when he entered the room. Everything was exactly the same last time he saw two years back, only that there was no one to open the door for him. His eyes were wandering in the room & he saw Piya’s picture smiling at him and he felt like the last two years never happened.

He slipped into the past. He could hear her sobbing lightly at the kitchen counter. One part of him wanted to stay back, hold her & tell her that all would be fine and teh other half told him that he could not bear being around her anymore. The past 10 years had all been good but somewhere they had drifted apart. No one could have been blamed for what had happened it was all them. They were busy becoming successful, making money, going on foreign trips enjoying lavish parties. There was so much adrenaline in the air that they could not see that their happiness was waning away. They forgot enjoyment and happiness were not the same. They were two people living under the same roof who had forgotten to be partners. They forgot the vows of sticking together through think and thin. They had given so many wounds to each other that the world could see the scars through their eyes. They could not hide the pain of the scars. Mohit had to leave because the only way to heal was to stay away, no one could have repaired them at this point. There eyes had so much pain, their love for each other had become painful. They forgot that love was about giving. Silence had crept in between them slowly. The great wall was built between them which could not be crossed by either of them. They had been staring at each other from the opposite ends of the bridge for long but the vision was becoming unclear. Parting ways seemed to be the only solution.

He walked out of the house. He wanted to heal and he buried himself in work. He did not know if he was healing or he had just put all of it in a small box under lock & key & threw the keys in the ocean. A man who had his whole life on social media now barely spoke to anyone. He had closed himself and the past two years he slowly had only faint thoughts about her. He could hardly remember if he was married and spent ten years of his life with this woman. She had become a faint memory, a blurry one.

Sometime last week he woke up in the morning and he felt light as if a burden was lifted from his chest. He felt the sun shining on his cheeks and when he opened his eyes he could see Piya smiling at him. He immediately closed his eyes again & when he opened them again she was nowhere. His heart was racing and he picked up his phone & made a call to her. Her phone was switched off. He kept calling her throughout the day, but could not get through. He was getting restless & anxious, he had to fly back to see her. He could not get anything till the next day. On the way back he faced sudden pangs of happiness and worry.

When he reached the guard was surprised to see him. Nobody knew where he was and could not reach him when Piya had met with an accident a few days after he left. She was lying on the bed under a comma all this while. She waited for him to come back. The woman he loved the most was no more. She was gone. He could not kiss her goodbye.

He lied on the floor motionless looking at the ceiling and he could feel emptiness.

The Suitable Girl

I'm inspired by the title of the book "A suitable boy" but the contents are not at all related. 

From my experience I derived a definition of the suitable girl - the girl you can take home to meet your Mom. On multiple occasions I have heard 'she is not "marriage material", can't take her home' and my instant reaction is -Are we still in the 70s? We are in 2022 and our thoughts are straight from the times when women were home bound or in a few professions. Surprisingly the same family has separate rules for their daughters. 

When I talk about this concept of marriage material, there is a huge contribution from our film and TV industry defining the ideal Bahu or Wife. The smart, beautiful and modern girls are always shown in a negative character. The ideal Bahu is chosen by the family against the man's wishes (he leaves his hot girlfriend in the process), the young bride is always clad in a saree and however she is her husband accepts her at the end (I just had a small laugh imagining it all 😂). Well, I wear western clothes, go out for parties, have a good job, so that makes me a non-ideal life partner or actually the vamp. The same man who could be my boyfriend could not introduce me to his family because I'm too modern for his family. Two questions comes to my mind immediately - didn't you know your family before meeting me, why this sudden realisation today and why did you think that I would be ok with all this. Guys! parents don't always know the best.

I honestly don't blame only men for all this, women are equally responsible for all this. I work hard for years to earn a degree, get a good job, earn good money and one day I see one guy coming to me showing me dreams of a rosy future and I let go of my self esteem. Men have the right to a male ego and I don't even have the right to have self esteem, wah re wah duniya. Women are conditioned such that they protest when others are facing these problems but don't even see the problem with themselves. This instance reminds of a friend of mine who was in an abusive relationship and refused to get out of it for sometime and kept saying that "I am sure I can change him, he will become a good person, I will just have to put a little more effort, a little more patience." I knew none of it was true, she cannot change anyone if they don't wish to change, no matter how much patience she would have shown the end results would have been the same. To love someone doesn't mean that you cannot have your own identity. You have the right to be yourself and have your own space. Live your life on your own terms girl. 😉

To all the families out there if your daughter deserves an adjusting family or can stay away from her in law, why can't your daughter-in-law choose the same. She is also someone's daughter, she didn't have to wear a saree at her home, she didn't have to cook for the family, her father treats her as a princess. Aunty- You must have done a lot when you were a new bride and your MIL was not cool with you enjoying your life but to be true you can be the cool saas and enjoy with her instead. Teach your boy he doesn't have to be a Mumma's boy or a hen pecked husband, he can love you both and manage not to be sandwiched by just being a little smarter. 😎 And please remember that your Bahu is not a baby producing machine, you really don't need to worry that hard. Miyan Biwi are adults, they will definitely plan when they are ready. You becoming Dadi is not that important, trust me. They will just leave the kids with you and go on a vacation.

Women love to enjoy their lives just like men do, they also love to party, go out with friends, spend some me time and I can go on with an endless list. Find out what you want and then only you can find the "better half".  The girl in your office is also just another girl, she might be dominating and assertive but that is all which makes her so attractive. Try telling the world what you want might work for you.

With love

From all "the unsuitable girls"😘

A Girl born in India

 For starters this write up is not a take on feminism. I don’t like to call myself a feminist but rather an equal opportunity seeker.

Born in a middle-class family in the mid 80’s I was conditioned to become a teacher in my formative years. I used to love to play ‘Teacher-Teacher’ because the only profession I could see women in, reason being very simple- this job is not hectic, and you will be free by the afternoon to take care of your family. Isn’t the sentence wrong in every way possible, firstly being a teacher is not at all easy and I respect every teacher whoever had to deal with me & many more like me, secondly taking care of the family is not easy either, that is a full-time job irrespective of where you are, who you are; you are never free. As I grew up, I wanted to be a doctor, again for all the wrong reasons- one being saving human lives is important and this is the only job which could earn you respect. It is one of the most respected professions in the world today but choosing a profession just based on social status, is it worth it?

I wanted to become a journalist and my mother made a statement I cannot forget till date- who will marry you? Really is that what it boils down to. I am an engineer +MBA worked in world renowned companies, holding important positions. But all this in vain because it took me a long time to find a groom and post that the marriage ended up in an ugly divorce. And currently I am single which seems to not fit the societal norms & everyone I come across keeps telling me “You should settle down.” I have an objection to the terminology “Settle Down”. I am not unsettled, I fend for myself, I go out when I want, I read when I want, I buy what I want. By settling down do you mean to take away these small bursts of happiness from my life. I tried doing that, didn’t work that well.

By the above I do not profess to not get married or fall in love. You should do that, make mistakes, learn from them & move on. Learn to live to your will, live with a person who respects you & your work & not the one who says he loves you. Love disappears but respect & friendship and companionship stays. Another reason you should not get married is to have kids, if you really want to be parent adopt a child. Society wants you to get married, have kids and get stuck forever. Famous quotes “If not for yourself, think about your child how will he grow up without a father”. I not being married to the father of the child does not make him less of a father, does not take away his rights & does not absolve him of his duties. We are humans & we have the right to make mistakes, but those mistakes should not become a lifetime of suffering. Took me some time to get out of the shell but I dated after the divorce. I judged every person I have even spoken to because of that one bad experience. I learned a lot during this phase, and this helped me clear my head about my ask. I also made a few friends in the process. I don’t regret any of it. I am happy that I have grown up as a person, even if it is little. Still more to go.

I don’t want to get any special treatments at work for being a woman, I only expect you to give me the same respect & recognise me for my efforts. I do not want you to open the car door for me but accept what I wear. Please do not tell me how I should talk or what I should say, I know what I am doing. Please don’t tell me to get married or have babies, I know what I want. Please don’t think that I went out for that coffee because I am romantically inclined, I just like you, if you want to know what I want, ask me, I will tell you.