The Missing Mantra
“Look at you. Almost thirty, unmarried, no children, no job and still in university.”
The words were not meant to be cruel. In fact, they were delivered with a smile, over a cup of chai (1), by an elderly aunt whose greatest accomplishment, as far as I knew, was perfecting the art of unsolicited life advice. But intent is irrelevant when the weight of expectations presses on you like a railway station during peak hours.
In India, we are a people of mantras. Some are whispered into our ears as babies, sacred syllables meant to protect us. Others are spoken by family members, not in prayer but in expectation.
“You should be earning by now.”
“You should be married.”
“You should be settled.”
Each of these words, repeated over time, becomes a mantra of its own, shaping reality, forming destinies. But what happens when you do not fit into the mantra assigned to you? What happens when, instead of a steady chant, your life feels like a broken record, stuck, unchanging, uncertain?
As I stand at the precipice of finishing my PhD, staring at the abyss of the job market, the silence is deafening. For the first time in my life, I have no syllabus to follow, no coursework deadlines, no predestined path. After years of education, I fear I have no mantra for what comes next.
The joke among South Asian students studying abroad is that pursuing a Master’s degree in the UK is just a glorified gap year. A short, expensive break from reality, dressed up as higher education. But what if your gap year has stretched indefinitely? While my schoolmates rushed into corporate jobs, marriage and child-rearing, I took the scenic route. A Master’s degree. A PhD. Some research work here and there. All very impressive on paper, but financially, it has meant years of unpaid internships, short-term teaching contracts and an ever-growing mountain of student debt.
The irony? Every time I express my panic about entering the “real world,” someone reassures me with, “You have so many degrees, you’ll have no trouble getting a job!” As if degrees are some kind of supernatural currency that the universe must honour with employment.
My college classmate, who started working right after her Bachelor’s, now owns a flat, drives a car and has the kind of job where people sign off emails with Best regards and Let’s circle back on this. Meanwhile, I am still sending “Please find attached my CV” emails into the void, hoping for an interview.
The great Indian belief in karma tells us that effort always leads to reward. That is a comforting thought, unless you have spent years on academic research, in which case you start wondering if your karma points have expired. In Hindu rituals, the worst thing that can happen is for a mantra to be left incomplete. If you are chanting during a havan (2) and suddenly stop mid-sentence, the silence feels almost sinful, like an unfulfilled promise to the universe.
My whole life, I have been moving forward with the certainty of a structured education system. School to college, college to Master’s, Master’s to PhD. And now, as my PhD comes to an end, I fear the silence. What happens when there are no more assignments, no more research paper deadlines, no next degree? What happens when the mantra of academia, my safe, predictable chant, stops?
I once saw a priest in my grandmother’s village lose his rhythm during a prayer. He mumbled, restarted, stumbled again and then completely froze. The older women in the gathering exchanged nervous glances before one of them did the only logical thing: she started clapping loudly, setting a beat, forcing the priest back into rhythm.
I sometimes wonder, who is going to clap for me when my mantra of academic life falters?
In Hinduism, not all mantras produce instant results. Some, like the Gayatri Mantra (3), require years of practice before their effects are even felt. Others, like beej mantras (4) (seed mantras), need time to manifest. Perhaps life follows a similar rhythm. Perhaps my success is simply a delayed mantra, one that requires patience. But tell that to my society, who treat my delayed entry into the workforce as a national emergency. At every social gathering, I am met with some variation of:
“Beta (5), when will you finally settle?”
“Your cousin already has two children!”
“You know, my friend’s daughter is working in America now!”
Indian families have a unique talent for turning comparisons into mantras. These are not chants for spiritual enlightenment but for existential dread. Sharma ji ka beta (6) (Son of Sharma’s) has become less of a person and more of a mythological figure used to haunt underachievers. But what if my mantra is just taking longer to unfold? What if, like a carefully prepared dal (7) that requires slow cooking, my career is simply simmering to perfection? That is what I tell myself, at least. Then I look at my bank account and wonder if my dal has evaporated entirely.
Unlike me, my grandmother has never once worried about being left behind. She is deeply spiritual, following a path laid out for her by a woman she calls Maa; a figure of immense reverence in her life. For over two decades, my grandmother has chanted the same mantra, a chant she believes guides her toward ultimate freedom. She once explained to me that this mantra does not just exist in sound, it travels. “It begins at the tailbone,” she told me one evening, “The base chakra. And then, with every repetition, it moves up the spine, through the back of the neck. That is where the final truth lies. When it reaches the top, that is where you find your mukti (8).” I listened, half in awe, half in disbelief. How does one stay committed to the same chant for decades? How does one believe so unwaveringly that something invisible is leading them somewhere meaningful?
And yet, here I am, chanting my own mantra of self-doubt:
“I am behind.”
“I should have a job by now.”
“I should be settled.”
When you grow up in an Indian household, you are taught that mantras can shape reality. But no one warns you about the mantra of self-doubt, the one whispered into your ears through years of societal pressure:
“You should be somewhere else by now.”
The most dangerous thing about this mantra is that it convinces you that everyone else has figured life out, except you.
Your childhood friend has a stable job. Your cousin is buying a house. Your ex-classmate is getting promoted. Meanwhile, you are staring at your thesis draft, wondering if you have accidentally made academia your permanent residence. But then, another thought creeps in: What if I am exactly where I need to be?
Maybe, just maybe, I have been chanting the wrong thing all along. In the Mahabharata, Arjuna hesitates on the battlefield, paralysed by doubt. Krishna tells him: “You have a duty. Trust in it.” Perhaps this is my battlefield. Perhaps my duty is not to compare but to continue. Perhaps my mantra is not “I am left behind” but “I am on my own path.”
India has mantras for everything; success, protection, wisdom, health. But is there a mantra for surviving adulthood? My mother has her own mantra; whenever she sets on a new journey, she repeats “dugga dugga” (Goddess Durga) like a spell.
I think it is time to find my own.
Not a mantra of fear, not a mantra of comparison, but one of self-assurance. Maybe something simple, like:
“I will figure it out.”
“I am not late; I am just on a different clock.”
“Even the best dal takes time to cook.”
And if all else fails, there is always that one grandmother’s method; just start clapping loudly until the universe gets back in rhythm.
Footnotes:
Milky tea
A fire ritual performed on special occasions
A sacred mantra from the Ṛig Veda (Mandala 3.62.10), dedicated to the Vedic deity Savitr
A monosyllabic mantra believed to contain the essence of a given deity
Child
A common term children (and future competitive parents) use for those to whom with the children are constantly being compared
The concept of spiritual liberation (Moksha or Nirvana) in Indian religions
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