How Cultural Prisons Can Break In Just One Minute
friday morning
country victoria feeling relaxed and a
little happy
as it’s the last day of school
as i get out of the car i hold my skirt
as it blows up in the wind
and as i walk into the school grounds i
can hear laughter
and chatter and shouts as friends meet
up
on the last day with excitement
i quietly make my way through following
my normal routine
straight to the locker and then on to
class
i don’t have a lot of friends so i
bypass the socials and head straight in
to start my day
the teacher calls us in and checks off
the role
after lunch sitting quiet in the library
with my friend christine i realised i
could very quietly ask her the question
that had been burning in me since the
day i met her
i quietly lean in and ask
why aren’t you wearing your engagement
ring
stunned by the question christine stared
at me
for what felt an eternity
before she laughs and said no one gets
engaged at this age
silly why would you even ask that
i instantly feel stupid
so stupid and embarrassed
with waves of shame rushing over me i
jump up
out of my seat with tears blurring my
eyes
i walk as quickly as i can to the
bathroom
leaving my pencil and books on the
library desk so i just couldn’t bear to
sit there
another minute in the bathroom i look in
the mirror
choking back tears i was 11
i’m indian and in just one moment
with just a few words i knew
i was immeasurably different
frozen fragments of sentences started
hurling themselves through my mind
you don’t need all of that just focus on
the basics
you’re getting married at 16 it’s
promised
you don’t need a degree to start and
raise a family
words which are part of the rhythm of
traditional
indian life where girls just like me
every day are promised in marriage
before they are born
words which told me at the age of 11
that i had no choice that placed me
firmly in my cultural prison which had
me
sleeping through the next four years
until my engagement party
which was organized for the entire
indian community
in a tiny little town
and the truth is i was actually excited
i’d always been told to dress down and
not draw attention to myself
as i was spoken for and this was the
first
time i could get my hair done and wear a
pretty dress
it was my day to shine
which is why i was surprised when at the
party
i looked across the room and saw my
parents have a very public argument off
to one side
i watched in disbelief as my dad stormed
out of the party
all i could think was why can’t they
just keep it together for one night
this was the first time it was all about
me
the next day my dad summoned me up to
his office
my dad was an industrial chemist and a
perfectionist
so my brain was racing to try and
understand what i’d done
wrong had i not packed up or cleaned
something
instead when i reached his office door
i was met by the most compassionate face
it was not what i was expecting
after we sat down my dad held both of my
hands
and asked me just one question
is this what you want puss
do you want to get married to this man
my dad was my adoptive father and he’d
learned about the engagement at the
party last night
and was furious
i sat there dumbfounded
i had no idea why he was even asking me
this question
as i wasn’t even remotely aware that i
had a choice
but i did have a choice a million
things ran through my mind
confusion excitement nervousness
the time it took to answer my dad felt
like it
stretched forever
and i finally plucked up the courage and
spoke
no i said no
dad i don’t want this
the power i felt in that single moment
was extraordinary to be heard
and seen it took a split second and few
words
to totally change my view of the world
to break me out of my cultural prison
i slowly grew into my new freedom and
during the next decade i married a man
of my choosing
started our family and lived in asia in
the middle east
pursuing a corporate career and
settled into a beautiful life believing
my prison to be behind me
because february 14 2004
i held for the very first time my
beautiful daughter
that my husband and i had just adopted
from india
she was six days old
and as i look into her dark beautiful
eyes
something just clicks and suddenly
everything i’d experienced in my life
falls into place
everything makes sense in this moment
holding my new baby girl i realized that
i broke the unhealthy
cycle of my culture so i could create a
new paradigm for this young girl
and that would have a ripple effect for
years to come
it was the most incredible moment of my
life
i felt empowered and unstoppable
as i felt the enormity of what i’d just
done for our daughter
and then at the age of 30 i was offered
a very senior position to work for a
company in thailand
the job was a huge stretch and far
outside my comfort zone
it felt like i was in a dream as i
honestly thought they’d called the wrong
person
in that moment as my insecurities
surfaced
i realized i had not escaped my cultural
prison
i had simply stepped into the ante room
carrying the weight of generations
of good indian women all i thought i had
left behind
was still present
yet this woman who was offering me this
incredible job
saw my capabilities not my heritage
and in that moment with just a few words
any bars that still held me inside the
prison my culture had bound me in
broke but they did not disappear
a successful stylist working with women
to break out of their
self-made and culturally driven prisons
i had created a thriving business
then at 39 in 2011
my business in brisbane was devastated
by some of the worst floods in history
forcing me to close my doors facing
bankruptcy
and as i lay on the bathroom floor at
2am
crying inconsolably into my husband’s
arms
the voices of all of my ancestors raised
in a
deafening internal crescendo
who did you think you were to start a
business
you were just an indian girl
you should have stayed quiet voices and
beliefs and patterning
that i decided no longer had a right to
run
rampant through my mind i had accepted
the bars of my cultural prison at just
- i’d been able to bend those bars
enough to escape
at just 15. i had realized those bars
still haunted me
at 30 and at 39
i decided to stare down the generations
before me
to remove the prison bars for once and
for all
because i was fortunate enough to have
my aussie dad
who in just one moment and few words
changed the course of my entire
life
without who i wouldn’t be the woman i am
today
stands tall and who honors her heritage
and culture
but there are hundreds of thousands of
girls and women
around the world today whose lives are
still
predetermined by their culture
when i find them or they find me
i remind them they have the power to
change
to break out of their culturally driven
prisons
of shame
i tell them they have options
i worked hard to break the shackles that
would have been my life
and so can they and we can all
take just one moment to ask the most
powerful question of
all is this what you really
want and when you leave here
look into the mirror lean in
and ask yourself is this what i really
want
and then listen to the whispers of your
soul
as they give you the moment of courage
you need