Promoting a culture of open conversations
I love to talk, it is my way of sharing my stories, connecting with people around and understanding the world, through endless conversations, detailing and dissecting what I know and what intrigues me. It is not rare for me to have my personal and professional epiphany moments while chatting merrily with a friend or colleague. I make sense of my experiences and emotions through my exchanges with other humans. And hence instances when I can’t share what’s on my mind leave me feeling lost and alone. In fact the lack of space for vulnerability makes me even more vulnerable inside.
I have been known to be a talkative person even as a child giving all my teachers a hard time and people who know me will tell you how impossible it is for me to shy away from a conversation. And I thought so too, till I realized that I was selectively blocking some experiences out of my memory and suppressing associated emotions in my subconscious, disconnecting my outer personality from my actual self. And why was I doing that, well mostly because I was not ‘supposed’ to talk about certain topics like sexual abuse, menstruation, body image issues, depression and brave out certain emotions like guilt, anger, fear in my head, on my own.
In our culture, several topics are considered taboo and are not discussed openly. As a teenager, I remember crying for hours after a man on the street groped my breast but being unable to utter a single word to my mother, even though she was visibly concerned about me. The hushed nature of such conversations renders the survivor helpless. In my case, it left me feeling dirty, instilling a fear of the dark and reinforcing my distrust in men.
Even when these topics are broached, the weight of the ‘tabooness’ ends up overpowering the conversations. This not only compromises honesty and authenticity but also fuels the vicious cycle of tabooness. For example, someone experiencing chronic depression might gather the courage to share their story with a friend or a family member, but in the absence of an empathetic response, they might find themselves lost and even crushed by the burden of secrecy that such taboo topics entail. It is also important to note that this friend or family member is most likely to be a loving and well-intentioned person who does not have the skills to converse on these topics. Hence, by marking some conversations as a no-go territory, we as a society are continually compromising our ability to navigate these territories collectively, letting each other down in times when we might need each other the most.
I consider myself fortunate to have had the opportunities to participate in reflection and sharing spaces that helped me give words to my entire story, and not only the glittery parts of me which were acceptable and attractive to others. Owning my story has greatly empowered me, begun a journey of healing and enabled me to lead a more fulfilling life.
Further, talking about difficult experiences and emotions with other people in various contexts has made me realize the common ground that exists amongst all of us as humans. To quote a friend, ‘we are more similar than we are different’. I have experienced this similarity in listening to other people’s experiences from across the world and observing how we seek the same securities and struggle with the same fears irrespective of socio-economic and cultural context, or even the situation itself. Such authentic and vulnerable exchanges also provide the opportunity for us to understand each other beyond stereotypes that we might hold.
I dream of a world where we as a society learn to mutually co-exist and cooperate, where we would come together to hold each other in difficult times and rejoice in our collective journey. With a background in civil engineering and development work, I have been co-leading a non-profit, People for Parity (PFP) for 2 years. As part of PFP, I have run gender programs for educational institutions; police and NGOs across several states as well as having designed and facilitated interactive reflection and learning spaces for over 1,200 participants.
Open café is an attempt to deploy technology to the above end and is envisioned to facilitate conversations on taboo topics, especially around gender and mental health. I believe that through reflective activities, an interactive interface and vibrant online community, this platform will create space for people to share their truths, experience solidarity and build a deeper understanding of one's own self and others. This will reduce the tabooness of certain situations and topics that are an integral part of our life experiences by both creating awareness and seeding discussions.
The website opencafe.org will be launched in the next few months with theme based discussions and interactive activities. We are looking for a passionate dynamic young entrepreneurial soul to join us as the CEO and for contributors to our blog in the meantime.
