Loving, Living, and The Rest of It

I love my life.

It’s taken a while. The road has been sometimes long, often bumpy. But I’m finally at a point where I am who I’ve always wanted to be, and never believed I could become.

Growing up in India, a woman, I was always taught to be inferior, secondary. I wasn’t good enough on my own. I needed a man to feel complete, to be complete.

Even though I knew I was smart, even though I knew I was better than many of the men around me, even though I didn’t need or want a man, every day I’ve been single, I’ve been made to face the fact that my own society, my own family, my own culture, won’t think anything of my accomplishments.

It didn’t matter how successful I became, how much money I earned, or how many lives I changed. What good was I if I couldn’t even find myself a husband?

Well, you know, fuck that.

I’m intelligent, I’m independent, I’m happy being the person I am. And every time I’ve refused to be part of a soul-sucking relationship, it’s been a choice.

Maybe it’s because I was taught to believe that men were supposedly “better” than me that my relationships have always been a competition. And every time I’ve realized that I’m smarter than the man in question, I’ve left.

At the beginning of the relationship, they would somehow “save” me from the mess that was my life. And towards the end, they’d put me in a bigger one.

Growing up, we’re always encouraged to believe in that one true love who will come and turn our lives around. He’ll take care of us, rescue us from our problems and our lives and make everything better.

Because that’s what love, true love, is supposed to do. It’s supposed to heal the wounded, make believers out of non-believers, it’s supposed to save us from our own mistakes and bad choices.

Bollocks.

The problem with being “saved” by men who don’t know any more than you do is that you put them on a pedestal and worship them. Love goes out the window, and all that’s left is blind faith.

Enough bad relationships. Enough deceptive men. Enough compromising on the important things in life. I don’t want to have to look back on my life and tell my children that I settled for second-best because walking away was too hard, because I thought I was out of options. We are never out of options.

I decided I would never compromise in love. That I didn’t need to be “saved.” A condescending asshole deciding his way was better than mine was never going to turn into a lasting relationship. And I finally discovered what I should have been taught in the first place: I was fully capable of saving myself. If I needed saving at all.

Instead of sitting around waiting for that knight in shining armor, I donned the armor myself.

I’m twenty-six years old. I live by my own rules. I’m traveling, I’m writing, I’m learning and growing. I’ve traveled around India, I’ve lived in Ghana, I’m heading off to America. I have friends who love me, parents who drop everything at a minute’s notice for me, and a boyfriend who adores me. I’m growing personally and professionally, reaching heights I never thought possible.

I get up every day knowing I didn’t make a compromise or surrender my ideals and dreams for anyone. I know I deserve the best, and I’ve gotten it. I’ve seen and learned that my choices are what have brought me this far, and every time things go wrong again, I continue to have that power of choice. I don’t have to give in. I don’t have to take the bullshit. I don’t have to keep forgiving people who repeatedly hurt me. I can choose who I’ll let into my life. I can choose the woman I want to become. I can choose my own means of happiness.

And I’m happy. Pretty darned happy.

That’s a choice, too.