The rainbow colours of motherhood

Often caught with the roles and responsibilities of motherhood, women find it hard to navigate through the journey of developing their individuality.

New Delhi: Culturally, we view motherhood through a rainbow coloured lens of numerous emotions and feelings, which makes it look easy, satisfying and beautiful. While it is a beautiful creation of nature, sometimes we get blindsided from the weight on the shoulders of overwhelmed mothers.

Often caught with the roles and responsibilities of motherhood, women find it hard to navigate through the journey of developing their individuality. This results in a physical and emotional fallout, lack of self-respect and sometimes even losing confidence.

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Samira Gupta, a life coach and Image Consultant said, ‘if mothers are not happy with themselves, they will not be able to make everyone around them happy. They have to learn to fill their cup first’. Here are some tips to build the lost self-respect and confidence:

Get rid of the cloud of expectations – Most mothers spend their lives fulfilling others expectations. In the quest of making others happy they forget to honour themselves. This leaves them stressed, un-fulfilled, un-happy, angry or sad. When we feel such negative emotions, we tend to transmit them into our families.

Work on your internal well-being – Self-respect and confidence are feelings that well up from within when you make time to do the necessary internal work. This could mean fulfilling your dreams, developing your professional life, travelling, or even taking the time in the morning to rejuvenate your soul.

The feel-good factor – Feeling good about yourself can happen through big social validations or through daily personal appreciation. This feeling can be felt in as little as 5 minutes in a day. You don’t have to go on a week-long retreat, or spend a lot of money in a massage parlour. Journaling, meditating, exercising- whatever works for you, do it every single day. It changes everything.

Take care of yourself for your children – Our children watch every single thing we do, they are watching this too. They will model your behaviour from what they observe. If you are a person who actively takes care of themselves, loves themselves, they will do that too.

Nurture yourself – It is a motherly instinct to nurture, and the one person they should nurture throughout their lives is, themselves. Coach Samira always advocates for mothers to engage in non-negotiable self-prioritisation and to get rid of the ‘mom-guilt’.

When you indulge in these practices, a sense of elation will beam out of every cell of your body and transmit to your families. Naturally you will feel happier, more grounded and calmer.