What Narratives are we offering our Children?

The COVID-19 pandemic has had immense impact on human and economic activity in recent memory. It has pushed many global economies, including India, into an economic recession and disrupted life as we know it for adults and children alike. With schools being closed since March 2020, this has been the longest since children have been out of school. 

Over the last few months, the Indian government started opening up the country, its industries and daily activity. However, schools continue to remain closed for physical engagement while online classes have started since September.  

In all this, I wonder, if we think about what narratives we, as adults, are offering our children and young people at the time of such loss, anxiety, distress and disruption of life as we know it. 

The Indian government announced a country-wide lockdown with a 4-hour notice. This disrupted life, livelihoods and incomes of millions of people, largely from vulnerable backgrounds. Overnight, millions lost their daily-wage jobs, were left with unpaid dues, debt and without homes and sources of income. Over the next few months, we saw with horror one of the largest migration of families within a country as millions walked thousands of kilometres to get back to their homes, villages and safety carrying their children and meagre belongings. I saw with helpless grief as images of children on their mother's laps, father's shoulders, sleeping on suitcases on footpaths and pavements as they made this journey home. 

Ever imagine, what Narratives children and young people picked up from this suffering? Why do we have to walk? Why did we have to leave our homes in the city? Why isn't someone coming to help us? I a hungry and thirsty, why am I not getting any food and water? Why is the government not coming to our aid? 

The story of a young father who sold his mobile phone to get some food for his stranded family and then died by suicide is an image that I will take to my grave. Do we wonder what his 14-year old daughter is picking up as a narrative? There is no one for us. We have to fend for ourselves. It is easier to die than to live in so much suffering. 

As families, who did manage to reach their villages, they were ostracised, not allowed to enter the villages in fear that they might be carrying the virus. Families were stranded on the outskirts of their villages and towns, helpless, hopeless, hungry, thirsty and on the verge of giving up. States decided to shut down their borders and soon hundreds of families were stuck at State borders - not been able to crossover and not being allowed to come back too. Bunched in crowded camps until the government could decide what to do with this situation, many feared for their lives and lives of their children. 

What narratives do we think children picked up then? I am not wanted. I am an inconvenience. I am a discard. I am a virus spreader. Worry, anger, frustration, fear, neglect, loss of dignity and identity were all possible emotions that children felt. 

With school closures, millions of children lost their only source of daily meal that they got in school. For many children, school was a safe refuge from the violence and abuse at home and it was no longer available. For many children, school was a safe space from a unsafe neighbourhood while their parents went to work and now they had to spend all their time in these unsafe neighbourhoods. For many parents, school offered a safe space of care for their children and gave them the strength to go out and work in the hope that their children are safe and learning. The burden of learning now fell on parents who themselves might not have gone to school. For many children, school gave them safety from their abusers and now they had no safe space leaving them vulnerable all the time. 

With dwindling cash resources, children have to go seek work to support their families; girls are being pushed towards early marriage and are more susceptible to trafficking in desperate family situations. 
With the advent of online classes, there was hope of a pivot towards online learning resources to re-engage children. Yet, early reports have shown that online classes are not working for the most vulnerable with limited access to devices, internet and network issues and unconducive learning spaces. 

There have been cases of adolescents who died by suicide because they were unable to join online classes. There have been cases of enhanced bullying in online forums by teachers and peers. 
In all this, what narratives are our children and young people picking up? That, they do not matter. They are not important. 

In all this, No political leader has reached out and spoken directly to children and young people, giving them hope, assurances and strategies that prioritises their wellbeing, safety and learning. As the country starting opening up, it was important to revive the economy first and not prioritise opening up of schools and colleges so we can help children and young people heal first. Examinations were conducted in the midst of the pandemic putting young people at risk of contracting the virus. 

As people step out of their homes, they decided it was 'back to business' when markets got crowded and busier, when religious places got crowded and when restaurants, shops and malls got crowded. In all that, we told our children - you are not yet important. your learning is not important. young wellbeing is not important. your future is not important. 

As people stop taking precautions, stop washing hands and wearing masks. Start organising weddings, get-togethers and celebrating festivals while schools remain closed and young people continue to live in confusion, distress and anxiety, we are telling them, you are not yet important. 

As young graduates live in anxiety around their future because there are no employment opportunities, there are no adults given them assurances of a secure future. 

As we adults continue to ignore one of the most important stakeholder, our young people, we are telling them that they do not matter. 

Young people are watching us. learning from us. learning from our actions. learning from what and who we choose to prioritise and we are indeed failing them. 

This trauma that children and young people are experiencing is going to make place in their bodies, deeply entrenched in their being and yes, while some young people will come out stronger, most won't. Most will carry this trauma and it will shape the adults they will become in the future. Adults who don't care; who don't show up for young people; who don't stand with young people; and those who choose individualism over the collective; choose Ego over the Eco, choose development over wellbeing, choose economic growth over biodiversity, choose GDP over the planet. 

We still have time. We can show up for young people differently. We can show with our actions and words that they matter. That their safety, wellbeing and their future matters to us. 

Let's acknowledge and accept that we are failing our young people and commit to changing that. 

Lets think about what could be our most compassionate offer to our children and young people? 

Let's prioritise safety and care, take precautions to stop the spread of the virus, come together as a collective human force, as a nation to fight this pandemic. Let's show our young people that we can listen and support each other. Lets show more kindness and care for each other. Let's hold our political leaders accountable. Lets invite them to talk to us with plans, strategies, ideas to combat the pandemic. 

Lets support government directives and initiatives designed for our safety. Let's show up everyday as a role model that we want our children to become one day. 

Lets give our young people newer, bolder, kinder narratives that build in them the capacities to help us, our communities and our planet to Thrive. This pandemic has given us an opportunity to let go of the past and embrace a new future with love, care and kindness. Lets show our young people that we truly care and are willing to change. 

Resilience in Adversity

In many conversations, around the world, I have had well-wishers who have always remarked that children who grow up in adversity have more resilience, so they are likely to do well in life. I have always cringed at this naïve correlation between adversity and resilience. I agree, some children growing up in adversity do have higher resilience, but that resilience needs a champion and needs a support system for it to truly help a child thrive.

A powerful way to explain this is through the story of Poorna (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poorna:_Courage_Has_No_Limit), one of the youngest girl to climb Mount Everest at the age of 13 years and 11 Months. If you haven’t seen this inspiring true story made into a movie by Rahul Bose called ‘Poorna’, do watch it and one will understand what I am trying to say.

Poorna is born and grows up in abject poverty. She has loving and supportive parents, but they don’t know much and are easily influenced by people and circumstances around them. Her first champion is her elder cousin sister who teachers Poorna her first life lessons, about not giving up, having a dream and doing everything you can to achieve your dreams. Even choosing to run away from home. It is in this relationship that Poorna’s tenacity and resilience are seeded.

Poorna’s father does put her in a government residential school but not because he is invested in her education but because he doesn’t have money to get her married immediately. When left with a choice to be in school or leave this new school (which has not been what she expected), she chooses to run away again. Not a choice made from resilience but out of disappointment. She doesn’t yet have the life skills to make a healthy life choice. Had this choice become true, she would probably have got married soon and her life trajectory would have been different.

Here she found her champion, IAS officer, Dr R S Praveen Kumar. In his very first interaction, which is beautifully captured in the movie, he shows care, respect and creates safety and trust in the relationship which helps Poorna make a different choice. One can see, she is now building her support system – Her parents, her sister and now a caring adult who is invested in all children like Poorna.

During her school break, when she is planning to come home. Her sister comes to her support again. Her sister has her back and does not want Poorna to end up with the same fate as her. She must make a difficult choice again. ‘Do I go home, and risk being married off or do I go for a rock climbing trip?’ She chooses rock climbing and life changes forever for Poorna.

Praveen opens opportunities for young people like Poorna. He visits the program. He remembers her. He talks to her with respect and care. He gives her the sense that he is backing her. Poorna’s confidence is building. Now she has more supporters. Her rock climbing instructor who is tough with her but also encouraging. He notices that Poorna is special and validates her. He teaches her new skills and new ways of being. Praveen and her instructor now start building her vision, her aspiration and the medium of rock-climbing, intrinsically rich in developing Life Skills, becomes her tool to achieve her dreams.

Praveen pushes Poorna to find her reason to climb the Everest. For a purpose is key to accomplish such a challenging task and without purpose, he knows well, that she might give up when faced with difficulty. Poorna finds her purpose in the death of her sister and then there is no turning back.

All through the story, Praveen is also deeply respectful of Poorna’s choices even if they seem different from his own choices for her. This is critical for one to be truly a champion for young people. It is to know that the goal is for young people like Poorna to learn to make their choices for resilience emerges from the difficult choices we make in life. When Poorna decides to go ack home at the death of her sister and not pursue her dream, Praveen, while disappointed, does not show it, but backs her choice. When Poorna decides to make the Everest summit despite her illness, Praveen backs her again and lets her make her own choice. This will stand in good stead for Poorna for life.

And as one can see in the movie, the rest is history. Praveen, her parents, her sister through the poignantly beautiful letter she leaves for Poorna, her instructors, her colleagues like Anand are all her champions now. They are all seeding tenacity, resilience, healthy choice making, self-awareness, critical thinking in Poorna through their interactions with her. She has a village of champions now. 

That’s how Poorna learns to soar and that’s what gives Poorna the resilience to make through the last hurdles before she finally conquers The Everest. They are all by her side through her journey.

Children like Poorna who grow up in adversity don’t naturally have resilience. They need champions. They need us. We as parents, colleagues, teachers and every single adult have the capacity to become a champion for at least one child like Poorna around us. Let’s play our role. Let’s be that Champion and then the world is truly at their feet.

A City our Children can Trust

At a Creative Dialogue a few weeks back, I coined a new vision for myself,  “A City our Children can Trust”. As I began thinking about it an inspiring imagery overtook my senses and I began to articulate my vision. What is a city? It is a community defined by a geographical boundary. It is made up of elements of governance, private and common spaces but more importantly it is made up a people who can feel a sense of ownership, pride, responsibility and accountability for this space. In my vision, the city can also be a country and can also be the world we all live in and make together.

Is it really possible for individuals to look beyond me, myself, home, family, work and everything else that we define as my space in our life? I realized it had become possible for me to think of such a vision. If we define this space in the context of the children who become a part of this space in the future, it makes up for a powerful vision of the future.

Who and what do we Trust? Why do we Trust? What comes to our mind when we hear the word Trust? For me, Trust is like a parent’s love – firm, rock solid, unconditional and ever-present. It immediately makes me feel loved and cared for. It is like familiarity. It is something I can come home too. It is a friend’s warm hug and it is a family’s sweet banter. It is where I feel I can go to anytime and all the time. It is assurance and reassurance. It is a space for freedom and expression.

A city our children can trust. What does that mean?

For me, it’s a space. A space where a child can walk and be fearless. A space where a child can walk the streets and still feel secure and protected. It is boundary-less. It is safety – physical, mental and emotional. In every aspect of the city, a child feels love and care.  The roads are clean and pollution free. There are green spaces that live in an awesome interconnectedness with development. There are spaces to play, to jump, to dance, to scream and to sing. A place for freedom!

For me, its people, who are looking after the city as something that they are care-takers of, for their children. 

They are working to make the city work for the children. They don’t own it but they take full accountability for it. It is people for whom the city is as much important as their own homes and they protect and care for it like their own home. There is mutual respect and support for each other. It is people who through values of care, support, empathy, tolerance and humility are true role models of the innate humaneness that is us.

It is a space that engages children as equal stakeholders and treats them as human beings who have a voice and an understanding of what they wish to make of this city. It is space that provides for all children without prejudice – water, food, education, healthcare. It enables children to discover their own dreams and passion and supports them to achieve it. A city that protects children from violence and abuse and upholds all their rights. It is a city that understands and respects the interconnectedness and interdependence of all universe. All creatures living in harmony.

It is a co-created space with leadership from the community and leadership understood as a responsibility, to be treated with honour and to be delivered with service.

A city our children can trust will be a space where we take challenges head-on and solve them as communities where each individual is equally important.

We know, in the current reality, we will be leaving our children a city, a world filled with challenges. Lack of resources like water and food. Spaces that are polluted and spaces that have eaten into the very fabric of human empathy. It is a reality we cannot escape. We have been irresponsible. We will be responsible for pushing our children to fight for survival. We are sowing the seeds of resentment, deceit and violence into our future. It looks bleak.

However, in this city our children can trust, it will not be the maxim of “survival of the fittest” but a maxim of let’s work together to find our solutions. Find solutions that bring us together, that create a supportive caring community. It is a space where survival is not based on wealth but on a shared ethos of love and care.

When a city like Bangalore runs out of water in 5 years, are we going to have our children fight with each other and kill each other to survive or would we like our children to respect every human being and work together to find common innovative solutions for everyone. Can we build a sense of resilience in our children that they will find hope in hopelessness and even in the toughest of times, find a way to keep their innate humaneness alive.

I am reminded of this moral dilemma in Batman when the joker has planted a bomb on two ships. One ship that has all the hardened criminals and other that has the  richest elite from Gotham city. He gives them the ultimate challenge of human empathy. He gives the bomb remotes to each ship for the other ship. The ship that would use the bomb first would stay alive while killing the other. The joker’s belief was that people will kill to survive and stay alive. A sadistic moral dilemma. The people in both ships had their own moral arguments. The rich said, anyway the other ship has hardened criminals, the filth of our city, killing them would only mean we are cleansing the city. No one wants them anyway. The criminals thought this is their opportunity to take revenge of all their hardships. This is their time to take over. Yet, when the clock struck the people in both ships chose not to press the trigger. They chose to appeal to their innate goodness and decided to sacrifice their lives because their humaneness did not allow them to kill the other.

Don’t we see that we, the humans of the present, have become the Joker for our children. We are forcing our children to make such inhumane choices in their future. In the name of economic resources, growth, development, greed, justice we are already making these calls and with each such action, forgetting our very soul of being human.

Will our children press the remote button or reach deep inside their souls to protect, care and support each other. The survival of our city would depend on these complex moral dilemmas. In the city our children can trust, the foundation of dealing with such dilemmas would be the values we impart today – not just as parents and teachers but as communities that make up our city.

Do we have the courage to look beyond ourselves, let go of our need to hoard and control and find our deep sense of love, care and support to build a City that our children can truly Trust! It is in our hands today. It will require us to unlearn everything we have known. Can we? Do we want to?

I believe we can!