I stayed with my parents till 12th grade. Then I moved to college for the next 4 years.
Even while I was in college I wasn't practically alone because I had room mates and the same thing happened after I joined work as I stayed in working women's hostel. Then covid happened and I got married during covid and moved to his parents place.
Our own space there was our room. Then 10 months later we shifted to Bangalore for study and work reasons and it was the first time in my life that I got an entire space to myself. My husband got his own space inside his college (A single room).
While I stayed with my parents my job was to just take care of myself, eat and study. When I moved to hostel I had to tackle my laundry as well. Same happened in working women's hostel but extra responsibility was to pay my rent, tackle my finances and travel.
Cooking became an extra part of our schedules wherein we make dishes occasionally.
Each and every step of this living alone process thought me a lot. Now that Im in Bangalore Im practically incharge of everything from rent to bills to food to organising. At first I took it slow with minimal to no cooking then slowly incorporated it in the schedule. I dint know how to buy groceries so used instamart on Swiggy for 6 months.
My husband got his own room and I was shocked to see him clean it and organise it in his own fashion. He also did his own laundry which he used to delegate to his dad when we lived in his hometown.
REALIZATION
It is very important for everyone to have their own space. Im saying this because when I entered my mom’s kitchen she used to give me a lot of instructions on what is where and what Im not supposed to touch because it is her space.
Samething happened with his grandma’s kitchen. She organises the kitchen in a way that’s easy for her and because she is shorter she keeps everything in the lower levels of the cabinet. She also hates glass jars because it's tough for her to handle.
After I tried organising her kitchen I realised these things.
Now the kitchen we have in our Bangalore has a lot of glass canisters mostly stacked on top of each other and it's in higher levels of the cabinet.
Similarly, Me and my husband have issues in finding out spices so I decided to label them up.
When my mom visited she found my labelling funny but that is practical for us.
We also found it difficult to open and close spice containers so I shifted a small amount to a spice box and labelled them up. I never would have learnt all these things if I dint have a separate kitchen space.
These things are only limited to kitchen but also applies to all aspects of life. I need my own space during the evenings because I have quite a few office meetings and demos occasionally which requires a dedicated environment. But when we visit our parents place its quite noisy because they watch television at that exact time because that their space and chilling hour.
My sister had a lot of fun at my place and she made green tea for herself because I have a green tea space in my house (Nothing fancy. Just a kettle and few tea bags in a basket). My sister said if she had this kind of space with kettle and tea bags she would drink it everyday and make it herself without troubling mom.
I realised that my husband started taking care of his things and arranging them once he got his own space.
Best of all is my new found love for minimalism and slow living which I realised after the trouble I faced handling all the stuff. I bought only 20 pieces of clothing to bangalore and realised how little I need. This was the start after which I started watching content about the true cost of fashion, fast fashion, slow living, minimalism and consumerism. I also made my parents and his parents aware of these things and my mom started decluttering her home.
CONCLUSION
No matter where we live it is very important to have our own spaces to tackle and do things on our own. This reduces the burden of parents or partner and gives you a lot of free time.
Sometimes its not possible to live alone especially if you have old parents and grandparents to take care of.
But here’s the live example of my parents and how they created their own space.
My dads father lives with us in the first floor of our house having his own space (hall, kitchen, bed room) while we live downstairs. He makes his tea in his kitchen and has his own tv space.
When we are at home we often wear casual clothes (lungi, nighty and night wear) which we might feel in appropriate wearing in-front of elders and this own space gives us the freedom to do so while we are also there for them.
Hence start creating you own space to try out things which won't do otherwise.
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