On Love, Independence, and Femininity
In my second year of marriage, I sit quietly typing away in our living room, while my husband’s soft snores echo in our bedroom. The reason I am up is not because we have fought or I have been up all night with something nibbling away at my mind. But because I am nursing some heavy cramps and chose not to disturb the love of my life; to let him sleep soundly until the morning light. I will however write, to distract myself from the pain.
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There has been a tweet that I had come across quite recently regarding the urge to be hyper-individualistic and also wanting to be ‘held’. Both valid emotions stem from a sense of seeking comfort — whether in your own company or in someone else’s. And I think a lot of this is solely because of Internet culture, hyper-independence, and new-wave femininity. Again, I am not aiming to critique any of these points instead I want to understand and elaborate upon them.
We are at the peak of Internet culture in human history, where everything has to be aestheticized to appeal to the masses. Gen Z has taken over the reins and a lot of the substance being churned out has a niche audience somewhere out there that has popularized and capitalized upon the concept. Keeping the subject matter in mind, take relationships for example. Carefully curated gifs and memes, from selected works of art, movies, or books have altered our brain chemistry in the strangest of ways. We have now started using made-up stories or idealistic scenarios as the blueprint for how a relationship should be. How love should look like. How an ideal partner should be.
There is a famous picture (perhaps a photograph from a fashion shoot) that shows a young couple dressed in Pakistani attire, standing by the stove making what seems to be chai. The girl is smiling and tucking her hair behind her ear and the young man is perhaps stirring the pot. Whatever the context of the image is, the point is that we have idealized it to some extent. It has been seared into our brains. Although the image may not be far from the truth in most homes that practice healthy and wholesome relationships, the fact is that it has become a defining image for the young Pakistani Gen Z, who are currently navigating the treacherous waters of relationships and finding love.
Then comes the idea of hyper-independence and choosing to become increasingly self-reliant and self-assured. Nothing wrong with any of it, as I was hyper-independent at some point myself. I lived in an apartment that was coming away the seams, two flatmates, a job that kept me fed, and a cat whose vet bills wouldn’t stop stacking up. I was independent and I was pretty damn certain that I did not want to entertain or even engage in the thought of anything called marital bliss and relationships. I say ‘hyper’ because I was sure that I never wanted to be dependent on a man or a woman. Just myself entirely. But life as you know it, can humble you in many ways. The same year when my job had been getting the best of me, and my mental state was not the best, I met my future husband around the same time.
I learned that relationships are something that needs consistent workarounds, love is to be earned and returned, and being dependent on someone sometimes, is not a horrible thing entirely. We as humans with the hunter-gatherer DNA in our blood, can never entirely survive without a pack to call our own. Be it in the shape of a partner(s) or just a large gaggle of girls.
I have TikTok and Instagram reels to blame for the depiction of the ‘trad-wife’ lifestyle, where a burnt-out bimbo wife prepares feasts out of thin air and then bats her lashes at her rough and rugged husband who comes home after a long day of doing God-knows-what-exactly, demanding food and babying. A lot of women in my circles, disillusioned by independence and worn out by corporate life; want to give into a similar kind of lifestyle. There is some charm in performing acts of service for your partner (I would know) and that is something to be cherished by both individuals in the relationship. However, when the relationship becomes more of a transactional thing instead of voluntary assistance, that is where it becomes harmful to the self, and to people around you. In later life, I expect that Trad-wives become like empty husks of their former selves, composed on the outside and wasting away on the inside.
Being dependent is a very normal, humane urge. To have a shoulder to lean on and cry upon is the most normal ‘want’. To be ‘held’ is the softest display of tenderness. To want to maintain your own identity and rely on yourself is an admirable trait. To do things out of love for someone, or as a form of appreciation is the kindest thing one can do. The thing about life is that although it is quite short, it tends to be bounteous in so many ways. All of these things do not have to be mutually exclusive. They can exist side by side. May we not have to choose or deprive ourselves of all the beautiful examples of our humanness, that life offers us.
And now, I go back to my blissfully unaware sleeping hunk of a husband ❤
