How times have changed; going back to my teenage years, living in a predominantly white area, and going to an all-white school, I was so embarrassed to reveal my Indian lifestyle. For example: When the other kids asked what I ate for dinner, I would always say: hamburgers and chips (never a curry) or if asked what did I watch over the weekend? I would never dream of saying a Bollywood film.
Maybe it’s because I saw the other token Asian kid get bullied so it was out of protection or maybe it was because I was too scared to stand out and feared being rejected or perhaps it was because I had an inferiority complex. Either way I faked my identity to fit in and it was a trait that followed me for long time. A trait I regret.
Truth is, I loved being Indian and still do and wouldn’t change it for the world, but I really did envy my cousins who lived multicultural areas and could just be themselves. Roll forward 20 years, my niece is in that same school and is proudly expressing and embracing her Indian roots. There’s no shame in being different, no one should feel inferior or superior to anyone. We are unique and we all matter. We are all threads of the same source so how can anyone be more superior than the other?
We need to embrace our differences and encourage others to be themselves; whilst being role models not only to the younger generation to our peers too. Women who come on the Cleopatra Effect course have admitted to staying stuck in loveless marriages just because they don’t want to be the odd one out in their circle, or have admitted to not expressing their point of view because they don’t want to be alienated from their so called ‘friends’ or have even racked up their credit card bills so that they could keep up others just so they don’t stand out as the one who can’t afford it….
Being a modern-day queen requires us to courageously be authentic, there’s no shame in being different, there’s only shame in living in regret.
Join me on The Cleopatra Effect Course to discover and embrace the real you.
Nisha x