Who's my latest crush?
From our creative partner in Gurugram, Haryana just outside of Delhi in India
My latest celebrity crush is the Turkish actor Can Yaman. I love the kindness in his eyes. Shhhh!!! Don’t tell him. I will be too embarrassed if he ever pops out of the screen.
When I asked the same question to my teenage daughters a few days ago, they instantly replied, “Of course, the guy in the series you were watching.” And like any ‘young’ girl with shiny eyes, I giggled.
This wasn’t as cool a conversation to have with my two girls as it sounds right now. It’s something that my life partner and I decided, since our girls entered their teenage years. #TBH The story began three years ago.
One day, my thirteen year old returned from school and shared that her friends discussed their crushes.
“What did you say?”
She responded, “I don’t have a crush on anyone.”
“That can’t be; we always like someone.” I emphasized.
“That’s exactly what my friends said too.”
I explained to her that one can have a crush on anyone and at any age. That’s absolutely fine. Acknowledging it in public isn’t a rage; at least, that’s how we’re all socially trained.
“For example, Justin Bieber can be your crush,” I said.
“Eww! He is so old.”
“Ah!” He was the youngest crush I could think of, at that moment.
“Darling, I’ll tell you about my current crush.”
Her jaws dropped, and she looked at me with such big eyes, depicting her shock as if I had cheated her father.
“It’s Fawad Khan. I just love that guy. His screen presence is amazing”
Immediately, a smile slipped her lips.
“Mom, I knew you liked him.”
“My child, you should know this. There is a difference between an attractive person and a person one is attracted to. Like, I can be around tons of attractive people, but there is a possibility of barely being attracted to anyone among them. At the same time, I can like different people from diverse backgrounds. Some might inspire me, some I might adore or revere, and a few among them I might be infatuated with. I am a mere human, and all these diverse emotions are absolutely fine.
And so is true with your father. He experiences these diverse emotions too. But we do not hide our feelings, at least within our intimate circle. It’s important to be honest with oneself, and with your partner. We do discuss everything under the sun and laugh about it. And that’s how it should be.
It’s with your father that I feel most comfortable, safe, valued, and loved. Because a crush, infatuation, liking, or admiration for any man or woman will be seasonal, but love is stronger, more stable, much deeper. Love isn’t the one portrayed in movies or romance novels. Ah! That’s another long lecture for some other time.”
My otherwise aloof teenager listened to me in rapt attention, soaking in the words. That’s when I said, “Are you aware of your dad’s latest crush? You will be able to guess because I often tease him”.
With our teenage girls, it was important we lowered our guards as parents. And since then, we have made it a point to have these free-flowing conversations at home. My husband has shared a long list of his crushes since school. I always added anecdotes to each one of them.
“Ah! That was such a pathetic choice”
To another one I declared, “You should meet her now!”
“Did you know who your dad had a crush on, when we were married?”
Teenagers love these talks. Girls often smile, looking at each other as if passing a cue. However, never assume they will spill the beans easily. They won’t lower their guard immediately. If you are a parent of a teenager you will relate to this. It’s not easy to gather what’s happening in the life of a teenager, even if the teenager here is your own flesh and blood.
However, they do come around slowly and at the most unexpected times, like when I am kissing goodnight or when I am in a hurry, especially when I am in a hurry. In one line, they reveal something that allows me to enter their world.
It’s important, we nurture a safe space for our children to embrace their sexuality, to understand the world and different relationships in all the varying degree. I want my girls to be aware of their own feelings, to be able to recognize and address them, instead of escaping or being ignorant. As parents, the best we can do is to: inform, enlighten and hang around wearing an invisibility cloak.
Our crushes depict us. They evoke our own desires, beliefs, values, and virtues. Try this out. Make two columns. In the first column, list down the names of all your crushes. Adjacent to them, write everything they stand for (like the values and virtues they emit, simply put, why do you like or are attracted to them). You will be able to find an overlapping pattern in every girl or guy you ever liked. I can assure you that you will learn a lot more about yourself as a result of this simple activity.
Your crush mirrors your own self back. And it will direct you to precisely what you seek in relationships and in life. If you try to replicate it in your life, you will be able to create a more beautiful and fulfilling life within your present relationship. Like, my life partner is a kind man and for me, kindness a pretty sexy virtue in a male. 😉
Dr. Shruti Shankar Gaur is an inclusion and diversity leader. She holds a Ph.D. in inclusive education. The University Gold Medalist, recipient of the Certificate of Academic Excellence by the Ministry of Human Resource & Development, Government of India, and being nominated for the Shiksha Rattan Award, Dr. Gaur is the founder of a start-up Research & Innovation InEducation, RIEDU. She is a passionate edupreneur, a published poet, an ardent researcher, a sustainability enthusiast,a hard-core dreamer, an empath by heart, and much more. She is a Fellow at the Center of Excellence on Human-centered Global Economy at The Digital Economist, New York, United States, and creative partner with Sankarsingh Gonsalves Productions. Her work can be explored here:
https://drshrutishankargaur.com/ and she can be contacted here: shrutishankargaur@gmail.com
Absolutely love how you unpacked this and explored it; and how you used your own family as an example to make it real and relevant. Also appreciate how you distinguish between those fleeting, seasonal states like a crush/infatuation/admiration vs. actual love that is stronger, more stable, much deeper. It's so important to distinguish between the two. When that distinction is unclear (which happens quite often for a variety of reasons), it inevitably sets the stage for problems.
This was an excellent read. I shared it with my wife and it led us to start talking about crushes the other day and I confessed that I had a crush for Anoushka Shankar - for those of you who don't know she is the daughter of the famous sitar player Ravi Shankar. Anoushka Shankar followed in her father's footsteps and became a sitar player as well. Whenever I am stressed or need to decompress, I listen to music - no words - and her music is especially calming...as was her father's music. That's the reason for my crush. I know. I know. I'm boring. LOL.