The world is one family
May 2023
A happy family makes for a happy world, says Sujatha Rao. And this is possible if each family member strives to inculcate love and respect for each other so that, ulti mately, the ancient Sanskrit aphorism ‘Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam’ becomes a reality
“All happy families are alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.”
The above line happens to be one of the most popular lines of Leo Tolstoy from his famous book Anna Karenina.
The desire for being part of a happy family is universal. Before we get into knowing how we can achieve this, let’s examine what is called ‘family’ from the perspective of its three major constituents: people, places, and things.
People
Over the years, the structure of the family has evolved. From the erstwhile multigenerational large families living under the same roof, the post-industrialisation era saw the flourishing of nuclear families due to the socio-economic conditions that the era cultivated.
Even as we speak, families around the world are changing, many becoming smaller, as the number of single-parent households keeps growing.
We Indians love large gatherings. Indian big fat weddings have hundreds of people, making them seem almost like public gatherings.
We even have a legal entity for the Hindu Un divided Family. In our country, movies are made to cash in on our nostalgia for joint fam ily structures, now that most of us have settled into nuclear families. Don’t we love those larg er-than-life Kabhi Khushi Kabhi Gham-like fro zen parting shots of large families at the end of the movie and try to emulate them within our own families when we have our get-togethers?
Big or small, as Edgar Guest’s poem proclaims,
“It’s the stick-together family that wins the joys of earth, That hears the sweetest music and that finds the finest mirth.”
Places
A home is a place where the family dwells. While it’s true that from the aspect of comfort, the size and luxury of the abode might matter, it appears that from the angle of its hold on the family, these things hardly matter.
When we talk of home, it isn’t the brick-and mortar structure with space in between the surrounding four walls that we are referring to. Such a structure called ‘house’ becomes
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a home, thanks to the people inhabiting that space. Though ‘homeless’ is often associated with people who do not have a space to live in, very frequently, an equally dire situation ex
ists for people who live in lavish houses but are still left feeling homeless and lonely.
Homecoming is the central theme of Robert Frost’s rather long poem titled The Death of the Hired Man, even though it explores multiple themes of family, power, justice, redemption, guilt, belonging, etc. In the poem, there is a conversation going on between the husband (Warren) and the wife (Mary) about a worker (Silas) who had helped them with haymaking but had left abruptly only to return looking quite sick during the winter.
When the husband says “Home is the place where, when you have to go there, They have to take you in,” the wife replies, “I should have called it something you somehow haven’t to deserve.”
‘Not having to deserve’ is the most beautiful way of describing one’s home.
Things
No matter what the size or shape of the family is, it is the binding ‘glue,’ or ‘thing,’ between the members that matters. Love and longing for strong family structures cut across all cul
tures around the world.
Humans as social beings
We have all heard the clichéd expression, “Hu man beings are social animals.”
A family is a cohesive unit of the macrocos mic societal structure we have built around us. Family historians have come to realise the importance of this unit as they know that it is not only the source of biological and legal ly defined relationships between kinsfolk but
also an entity where private and public sub jects intersect. Through driving proper values, these interlinks can be strengthened to build enriched societies and greater nations.
International Day of Families
Realising the importance of families in such a larger social context, the United Nations General Assembly decided in a resolution (A/ RES/47/237) in the year 1993 that May 15 of every year should be observed as The Interna
• Respect
• Optimism
• Fun
• Love
Respect
When Vishal realised that respect needs to be given while the same is being demanded, he established the practice of addressing his wife and children using words like ‘aap’ (‘you’ in Hindi, used to denote respect). His children
tional Day of Families, thereby providing an opportunity to promote awareness of issues
.
had no qualms about reciprocating the gesture
relating to families and to increase the knowl edge of the social, economic, and demographic processes affecting families. The theme of the 2023 International Day of Families is ‘Families and New Technologies.’
Some of the Challenges
• The diminishing number of extended families and the increasing number of sin gle-parent families put into sharp focus the issue of social protection.
• The digitisation of the world is reducing the face-to-face interactions leading to larger generational gaps.
• The fast-paced changes and the environ mental disruptions are driving the young er generation towards instant gratifica tion, leading to disastrous consequences at
times.
Tips to build stronger families
Most of us are aware of the acronym ‘ROFL’ used frequently on our WhatsApp chats, which expands to ‘Rolling On the Floor Laughing’ of ten denoted with the emoji.
As this expression conveys the ‘happy’ feeling universally and has a very good recall value, let’s now use the very acronym to highlight the four significant constituents of happy families as follows:
Having mutual respect amongst the members of the family goes a long way in cementing a firm bond. Especially, in a patriarchal society like ours, the sons need to see the father treat the mother with respect so that they inculcate respect for the opposite gender.
Sharing the family history and having a fam ily narrative inculcates in everyone a sense of pride while simultaneously making them feel connected to their legacy. This propagates an intergenerational self, making them feel some thing bigger than themselves.
In a society where individualism is revered, it pays to treat one and all with respect. This would also help foster in children the impor tance of being responsible for their actions.
Optimism
Pratiksha makes it a point to highlight the silver lining in the situations the family en counters. When her son was crestfallen due to missing out on meeting his friends (as he was attending only online classes during the pan demic) she pointed out to him that both his parents were working from home, which re sulted in more ‘together time,’ making her son smile in agreement.
In a society where doomsaying is the norm, it Heartspeak 17
becomes even more imperative that families nurture and grow in an environment that is filled with optimism and positivity.
Fun
Rohit fondly remembers his childhood as a pe riod of fun. Both his parents made it a point to engage the family in a lot of fun activities. He remembers how his mother would make them all sing and join in, whenever the power went off. The fond memory of it brings a smile to his face even today.
Happy families have fun. A lot of fun. And together. They find excuses to have fun even in the most mundane of activities. They play board games, watch funny movies, sing, and dance together.
They also make it a point to be part of like-minded larger communities and gather ings to have greater fun as a team.
Love
Drishti has a lot on her plate. She has a de manding job, a super-intelligent daughter, a busy husband, and an autistic son, whom she calls her ‘special’ child. She makes it a point to involve him in everything she does.
Love needs to be explicitly expressed amongst
family members. It has to be communicated through visual and verbal cues. A caressing touch, an occasional kiss, and a warm hug can go a long way in overcoming conflicts that are bound to crop up in any relationship.
While unconditional love is the premise on which families thrive, it doesn’t preclude disci plining the child when it is called for. It makes people set boundaries and punishments when such boundaries are wilfully breached. How
ever, it also makes allowances for exceptions. Conclusion
Since moralities, values, ethics, etc are best cultivated within a happy family, it becomes imperative that we do everything in our con trol to foster such families in order to build good and healthy societies with members that empathise and care for each other.
As Kofi Annan, former secretary-general of the United Nations and Nobel Peace Prize awar dee, once said, “If tolerance, respect, and eq uity permeate family life, they will translate into values that shape societies, nations, and the world.”
So, this International Family Day, let’s all reaf firm our commitment to nurturing happy and healthy families around us—one family at a time.
Sujatha Rao is a retired banker. She has been contributing articles to various newspapers and magazines over the last two decades. Two of her short stories were placed third in Times of India’s national level Write India contest (Seasons 1 and 2). Her first book titled In the Company of Stories was published recently. Her other interests include reading, traveling, practising yoga, and mindfulness.
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