Scene 1: Mom walks in and sees me cutting my nails.
Mom: You are not supposed to cut your nails today.
Me: But why?
Mom: It brings bad luck to the family.(Grabs the nail cutter from me) It is Friday and you are not supposed to cut nails on Fridays.
Me: *confused* I walked into my room and had to bite the rest of my nails.

Scene 2: I was getting ready to go out and get a hair cut.
Mom: You are not supposed to cut your hair today.
Me: But why?
Mom: Don’t ask questions. It is Saturday and you are not supposed to cut your hair on Saturdays.
Me: *confused* Looks into the mirror and feels sad that I have to look the same for one more day.

Scene 3: A beggar stands outside my home eagerly waiting to get something.
Me: Takes a ₹10 note and walks towards the gate.
Mom appears in front of me like a lightning and grabs the money from me.
Mom: You are not supposed to give away money today.
Me: But why?
Mom: Because it is Tuesday. You shouldn’t give money to anyone on Tuesdays.
Me: *confused* Looks at the beggar who was watching all these.
The beggar stares at me with pity before leaving. Probably he understood my situation.

Scene 4: Was enjoying the delicious Non-Veg Sunday lunch.
Mom: You have to finish off these fish and meat before evening.
Me: What..No way! I can’t eat this much now. Keep it for later. I will have it for dinner.
Mom: No. Today is Full moon day and it starts by 7pm. You shouldn’t eat non-veg food after that. If you don’t finish it off, from next week you won’t get any non veg dishes.
Me: *confused* For the next few hours tries to dump the remaining non veg items into my stomach with moist eyes.

Scene 5: Was driving our brand new car from the showroom to our home.
Mom: I think we should have got a different color for the car.
Me: Why? The grey color looks nice and stylish. We all decided the color together.
Mom: I know but grey is a shade of black and black is considered bad luck. It is connected to “Yama – The god of death”.
Me: *confused* Drives the car with fear for the rest of my life.

I mean why?
Whats wrong in getting a hair cut on Saturday? We are engaged with work for the whole week and are free only on weekends. If that is the case, all the Saloons should have a board outside mentioning “HOLIDAYS on Saturdays” right? But I don’t see any. In fact they get more business only on weekends.

The milkman or the Newspaper delivery guy comes to collect his monthly settlement but gets chased away if it is Tuesday or Friday. He is asking for money for his work? How can we deny it?

It is not okay to eat food during an eclipse or non-veg dishes on an auspicious day but it is okay to eat it before and it stays inside your tummy during that time?

Superstitious beliefs are senseless. Just because it was followed in some generation, doesn’t mean we have to keep following it forever. Some say it is all scientific and everything has a solid reason. If so, do your ground work and get the details so that you can explain if someone asks you. If you can’t provide a proper reason then stop asking others to follow it blindly. Start questioning for things to change. It is not just these superstitious beliefs. There are a lot of other social things that people follow blindly just because it was a practice in those days. Generation change is happening at a very drastic rate. These beliefs will definitely go down unnoticed at some point of time. Most of these beliefs are not followed as severe as they were done earlier and are modified to suit our needs today. I hope this comes to a stop completely.

This post is a part my topic #Gen2GenChange that was selected for this week’s IndiSpire edition. You can read other posts related to this topic from the link. 🙂