Turning Vegetarian!

It’s been 10 complete months of vegetarianism for me. I let go of my meat eating habits in the month of January this year. It’s been a tough ride for me considering my love for non-veg food, but somehow I stayed put at the decision. Subconsciously I had been aware of the benefits of turning vegetarian since a long long time, but it just remained that - awareness. There was no motivation to make this lifestyle choice, especially when the existing option involved lip smacking food. Also my family and in-laws comprise of staunch non vegetarians and at both sides celebration has a common expression – non-veg food. So there was never any social or religious pressure on me to quit. Infact my quitting may have disappointed a few considering now there would be someone paying attention to the vegetarian dishes in the menu that earlier no-one cared to cook and if cooked, no one really cared to eat.

To tell you frankly, the day I decided that I would turn vegetarian, I did not believe that I’d travel so far without faltering. Not that I did not want to succeed, just that I thought I could not J The rationale behind this decision was as follows:

• Didn’t want to carry the guilt of being responsible for the sorry life of an animal which is bred for eating purposes.
• Didn’t want to carry the guilt of being responsible for another animals death, only so that it can become part of the food on my plate.
• Guilt or no guilt - Didn’t really want to participate in another animal’s death so that it could become food for just 1 of my meals.
• It’s a healthier lifestyle choice – Vegetarianism comes with lower risk of many diseases like - hypertension, heart diseases, stomach ailments, cancers of different types. They say non-veg food is also bad for your overall temperament.
• Wanted to test myself and see if I can give up something really dear to me.
• It’s a greener lifestyle choice, 1 less non-vegetarian meant 1 less person to breed CO2 emitting animals for.

The arguments are arranged in order of strength, meaning the first point was the strongest motivation and the last one being weakest.

I have since been questioned by people about why I did so and mostly I tell them the truth unless it is more entertaining to lie. More often than not I meet a cynic who tells me that even plants are living beings and I should have mercy on them too. I tell them if my life did not depend upon it, I would. But since it does, hence I can’t show mercy towards them(just like the idiot who asks me this question). Then there is another set of people who find it incredulous that a girl in her right mind would give up something like that for nothing(yes the points above are nothing for them). I just smile at them and tell them to consider it as one of my quirks. Another category of detractors are people who want to prove that despite giving up meat I am still an animal hater/sinner/whatever. These people are generally non-vegetarians themselves and they’d tell me how the lipstick I use has animal fat in it or the leather bag I bought 5 years ago killed an animal or the new stilettos caused a death. That’s right, but I never claimed to turn anything but a vegetarian. Although I could say that there is no match between the frequency of buying a bag or a pair of shoes vs eating non-veg food. The former, one does once in a while(considering there are so many beautiful non-leather products available) but you eat non-veg food several times a week. Since I don’t explain my choices to vindictive people, especially when they are the right choices, I just tell these people how smart they are.

That said, let me tell you that giving up meat is by far the toughest thing I have done in a very long time. It requires enormous amount of self discipline, especially when you have to occasionally cook a non-veg dish for some guests or when you have to feed a chicken drumstick to your 2 year old. Eating out has also lost its sheen for me, since I always end up peering in the non-veg section and the veg section looks so slim(in terms of number of dishes) and pale in comparison.

Everyday when I travel to work(which I do relatively earlier than most people), I see many chickens, that look tired and sick, head over feet, travelling in cramped little cages on a dingy little bicycle or a scooter, probably to their death. I feel so sorry for them but then I feel good that I am not responsible for their condition. Atleast, not anymore!

No Regrets!

More often than not , when a celebrity with a pretty much messed up life is asked about regrets, he/she will always say that they have no regrets and the experiences in their life have made them the people they are today. But this is not limited to celebrities, I often hear people around me say that they have had no regrets in life. For a very long time(mid teens to mid twenties) I really liked the sound of this phrase – ‘No Regrets!’ Wow! Makes you sound so profound, so strong, so right! Not only the sound of it, I thought that it is possible for people to feel no regrets for the bad choices they have made in their lives. But lately I find myself questioning this statement and doubting the truthfulness of people who say it.

What is it to regret something? I looked up the dictionary and it says - “to feel sorrow or remorse for a fault, act, loss, disappointment, etc.”

How can one spend a lifetime without feeling this even once? Saying that you have no regrets means that you don’t acknowledge the mistakes in your life. It means that if given a chance you’d lead your life in exactly the same way that you have lead till now. You will fall at the same places, trust the same worthless people, hurt the precious ones, rue over minor failures, miss the good but small things in life while working, all this and more even if you knew better at that time. I find it hard to believe that any logical person would want to repeat the same mistake? If you knew there was a ditch on a road, would you want to fall into it to know the experience of falling or would you be careful on that road and want to experience falling(if at all) on some other unknown path?

Makes me wonder if this ‘No Regrets’ attitude is just a tough façade over a weak interior. Such a person must find it difficult to admit it to himself/herself first and then to people that he/she just messed up. To own up and admit to oneself that the decision backfired, that the said words were spiteful and bad must be way tougher than saying “I regret having done that”. Does admitting to regret something make you a weaker person? Not in my opinion. Infact I think if ‘regret’ is something it is - first acceptance of a mistake, then it is an apology to self about having made that choice despite the ‘voice in head’ saying otherwise and lastly it is a resolve to make things better and not repeat the mistake again. None of these three things are qualities of a weak person, but qualities of a person willing to grow internally as an individual instead of focusing on projecting himself/herself better.

That said, do you have regrets in life?