Deteriorating mental health and unpropitious parenting

The Adults of contemporary era are quintessential tough people, continuously trying to break the generational gap, handling mental discrepancies, abandoning socio-cultural taboos, and most importantly yearning for individuality. Everything we long for can’t be attained single handedly, and if someone gets some potential to achieve it, he must be hindered by the society he inhabits. I am nowhere dissociating family from the society and by family I mean our parents who did their best to brought us up as adults, but being a part of the society that has nothing except toxic ascendency make them adhere a lot of the characteristics that needed to be demolished way earlier when their first child was born.

The sad part is we cannot get out of the cultural regime that cages our dreams without a will to demean ourselves in front of society and not coming up to its standards. By following the socio-cultural norms parents make the life of a child nothing less than a hell. They try to surpass every hurdle that comes in the way of that standard so that they could live in peace after attaining it. Unconditional love of parents is undoubtedly a thing to be cherished forever but the toxicity of the society shouldn’t be entertained alongside, which makes a child confused that whether they are being loved or being manipulated which accumulates some deep fear of coming up on the standards in the adult version of that child. Societies where mental health is not treated aptly or not considered as a serious matter produces dunderhead only.

In Pakistan or all over the world middle class suffers the most in regards to their mental health because the head of the family is busy in maintaining the financial stability and grind the individuality of the wife who takes care of the children in  the house and faces other hardships as well, where she without taking a breath of relief competes herself and the entities she acquires with the society she lives in ,resulting in the total disruption of the child’s mental health because that is the only entity they hold which will make them feel accomplished. On the other side parents who hold their past adverse experiences with them and didn’t heel from them will for sure inculcate the negativity they nourished inside them from a long time in their children.

Parenting is extremely important for the synthesis of well-being of the upcoming adult. Society tries to perpetuate unattainable standards. We don’t live a life we live a pattern. Deconstructing the patterns that are holding us back starts when we notice the themes that dominate the way we live our life: the patterns that we have learnt from childhood in order to feel worthy and loved. Until we do this we will continue to replicate past emotional experiences, which can make us feel stuck and affect our mental and physical wellbeing. Now as being adults we try to rejuvenate the concept of individuality for this we need to start from a very basic question that who you are? How do you know who you are? I quote Dr. Jordan Peterson here “You are complex beyond your own understanding; more complex than anything else that exists, excepting other people; complex beyond belief. And your ignorance is further complicated by the intermingling of who you are with who you could be. You are something that is becoming and the potential extent of that becoming also transcends your understanding.” Everyone has the sense.

I believe that there is more to them than they have yet to allowed to be realized. The potential is often obscured by poor health, misfortune, and the general tragedies and mishaps of life. But it can also be hidden by an unwillingness to take full advantage of the opportunities that life offers- abetted by regrettable errors of all sorts, including failures of discipline, faith, imagination and commitment. Every adult has made it through where they are now by constantly battling with their inner demons and trying to change the perspective of society or parents but didn’t lose the tenderness of their heart. We cannot change anyone’s perspective nor is even it in our control. Most we can do to not make a benchmark of living for coming generation and let them feel liberated by their own experiences and let them see the world by their own eyes and not ours.

Author: HIRA ARSHAD