PARENTS ARE JUST THE PROGRAMMING AGENTS OF THE SOCIETY
- Madhukar Dama
- 2 days ago
- 9 min read
How Society Lived Through You While You Thought You Were Living
There is a silent betrayal that most people never detect.
It doesn't come from enemies.
It doesn’t come from strangers.
It comes from your own family —
In the form of love, protection, and "what's best for you."
This betrayal starts early.
Before you are even aware of yourself,
Milestones are waiting for you like booby-traps disguised as gifts:
School admission — not when you're ready, but when the neighborhood children go.
Marks and medals — not because you enjoy learning, but because comparison is a sport.
College degree — not based on your calling, but on market trends and family prestige.
Marriage — not out of deep readiness, but because "your age has come."
Job — not one that makes you alive, but one that earns applause.
Children — not when you're healed or secure, but because society asks: “When’s the good news?”
House and car — not out of utility, but to prove you're not a failure.
Retirement — not to rest, but to keep earning respect through family sacrifice.
Death — finally yours, but even that gets hijacked for social display.
Each of these moments is sold to you as your "achievement."
But in reality, it’s a collective agenda executed through your obedience.
Your milestones are not personal victories,
They are cultural checkpoints to prove that your family is not abnormal.
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THE HIDDEN CONTRACT
You never signed it.
But your parents did — on your behalf.
This invisible contract reads something like this:
> “I, the parent, shall ensure that my child grows up to serve societal expectations.
I will mold them to become a source of pride, not truth.
I will push them into the same trap I was pushed into, but I will decorate it as love and security.”
From then on, every decision made for you is a transaction —
between your family’s reputation and your soul.
You want to explore art?
Not respectable.
You want to marry late?
Not normal.
You want to stay child-free?
Not acceptable.
You want to leave a high-paying job for a simple life?
Unthinkable.
The moment your desire does not serve your family's standing in society, it is treated as a disease.
You are shamed, threatened, bribed, and emotionally blackmailed — all in the name of concern.
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THE COST OF COMPLIANCE
What does it cost to live someone else's life?
A job you silently hate.
A marriage where no one is truly seen.
Children born into unconsciousness and stress.
A house filled with things but empty of peace.
A body that breaks down in its 40s.
A mind that numbs itself with gadgets, gossip, and gossip-driven religion.
A heart that never finds real joy, only moments of relief.
Even your pain gets standardized.
You are allowed to feel burnout — but not to question its source.
You are allowed to cry in private — but not to rebel in public.
You are allowed to suffer quietly — but not to leave the race.
Because if you do,
you don't just shame your parents —
you threaten the entire system that runs on collective imitation.
---
THE FRAUD OF "FREE WILL"
They told you:
"You’re free to choose."
But from the start, every option was laced with judgment.
You were not raised to explore —
You were raised to conform intelligently.
“Be smart enough to get a job.
But not so smart that you ask why we need jobs.”
“Be strong enough to manage a household.
But not strong enough to question the purpose of marriage.”
This is not guidance.
It’s grooming.
---
THE CYCLE OF FORCED LIFE
Here's the cruelest part.
You swore you'd be different.
But once you became a parent, you felt the same fear your parents did:
“What if my child is left behind?”
“What if society mocks me?”
“What if people say I didn’t raise them well?”
And so you repeated the same betrayals —
packaged in new terms like "modern parenting,"
but still based on the same ancient fear:
Fear of being judged by others.
You buy them toys to prove you're not poor.
You enroll them in classes to prove you're involved.
You push them toward careers to prove you’re a good guide.
And you call it all “unconditional love.”
But what your child needed was this:
Freedom to find their own milestones.
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THE MOMENT OF AWAKENING
There comes a moment, quietly and unannounced,
When you realize:
This is not the life I chose.
And then — everything collapses.
Your job feels like a costume.
Your relationships feel scripted.
Your house feels like a cage.
Your daily life feels like acting in a movie you don’t believe in.
Some respond with depression.
Some with anger.
Some run away.
Some break down.
And a rare few — they stop.
They question.
They choose to unlive the imposed life, and start living the natural one.
---
THE COURAGE TO STOP
It takes real courage to step out of this trap —
Not rebellion for the sake of rebellion,
But healing from the need to prove yourself.
It begins when you say:
“I don’t need a bigger house to feel safe.”
“I don’t need marriage to feel complete.”
“I don’t need children to feel valuable.”
“I don’t need a job title to feel respected.”
“I don’t need to fulfill your idea of success.”
“I don’t need to obey your fear.”
Only then —
do your choices become yours.
Only then —
do you finally start living a life not borrowed from your parents' insecurities or society’s scorecard.
And perhaps for the first time in generations,
the cycle breaks.
The script burns.
And a human life begins — real, raw, unfinished, and free.
---
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“You Were Just Fulfilling Our Social Duties”
A healing dialogue between a middle-aged man and his aging parents at Madhukar’s forest hermitage
---
CHARACTERS:
Raghav – 42, mid-level corporate manager, suffering from unexplained emptiness, stress, and anger.
Madhukar – 43, a former veterinary scientist turned forest hermit.
Savitri – Madhukar’s wife, calm and observant.
Raghav’s Parents – Retired school principal father and religious homemaker mother.
Setting – A shaded courtyard beside a mud home in a forest near Yelmadagi, birds chirping, turmeric drying in baskets, woodsmoke in the air.
---
🔹 SCENE ONE: THE COLLAPSE
Raghav (staring blankly):
I did everything right.
I studied hard. I got a job. I got married. We had a child.
And I can’t feel anything anymore.
I’m constantly angry, tired, and nothing feels real.
Even my child’s voice feels like noise.
Madhukar:
So now that you’ve fulfilled every societal checkbox, you're asking why your heart is empty?
Raghav:
I don't understand. I did what I was taught.
Madhukar:
Exactly. You did what you were taught.
Not what you felt.
Not what you chose.
Only what was instructed.
Raghav:
But the instructions came from my parents. Out of love.
Madhukar:
Let’s ask them.
---
🔹 SCENE TWO: THE CONFRONTATION
Raghav’s Father (stiffly):
We did everything for your good, Raghav.
We gave you the best education, protected you from bad company, married you into a respectable family.
Raghav (voice rising):
But why did you do it?
Did you ask me what I wanted?
Did you ever stop to think whether I wanted marriage, children, this job, this life?
Mother (emotional):
We didn’t want you to fall behind.
We were only doing what every parent does.
Madhukar:
And who told you to do what every parent does?
Father:
Well… society… that’s how things are done.
Madhukar:
So you weren’t raising a son.
You were raising a socially acceptable citizen.
A pride project. A reputation manager.
An obedient performer.
Raghav:
(suddenly trembling)
So I was never free?
Madhukar:
You were loved, yes. But not trusted.
You were protected, yes. But also programmed.
They didn’t mean to trap you — but they did.
Because they themselves were trapped.
---
🔹 SCENE THREE: THE REVELATION
Savitri:
Let me ask you something.
Did either of you — as his parents — ever ask him what kind of life he wanted before pushing these milestones?
Father (softly):
No.
We assumed he would want the same things everyone wants.
Raghav:
But I didn’t.
I never wanted to marry.
I never wanted to sit at a desk 10 hours a day.
I just didn’t have the courage to go against you.
Mother (tearing up):
We were afraid.
Afraid you’d be seen as a failure.
Afraid people would blame us.
Afraid you’d become nothing.
Madhukar:
And so, to protect your image in society,
You offered your child as proof of your success.
You didn’t raise him — you delivered him to society’s checklist.
Every milestone he crossed was a contract you signed on his behalf.
Father (slowly):
We did everything society said…
And now he’s miserable.
So what was the point?
---
🔹 SCENE FOUR: THE UNRAVELLING
Madhukar (calmly):
This is where healing begins.
Not in blaming each other — but in recognizing the cycle.
Raghav:
Then what do I do now?
How do I undo all this?
Madhukar:
Start by grieving.
Grieve for the life you never lived.
Grieve for the self you buried under expectations.
Then stop performing.
One by one, lay down the roles you were handed:
The perfect son.
The provider.
The good husband.
The respected man.
Let them dissolve.
And sit.
Sit with your real questions:
What makes you come alive?
What do you fear losing — and why?
What if no one expected anything from you?
---
🔹 SCENE FIVE: THE RECKONING
Mother (quietly):
Raghav…
If we could go back, we would have listened more.
But we didn’t know any better.
Raghav:
I believe you.
But I can't live in that silence anymore.
I want to raise my child differently.
I want to not be you — not out of hate, but because the chain must break.
Father (nods, broken):
Then break it.
Free her.
Free yourself.
Madhukar:
And forgive them — not because they were right — but because they were blind.
Blind with fear, duty, shame, and the illusion of reputation.
You are the first in your line to see clearly.
So walk gently. But walk differently.
---
🔹 SCENE SIX: THE AWAKENING
Savitri:
The real parent is not one who delivers a child to society.
It is the one who returns the child to their own soul.
Raghav (softly):
For the first time…
I feel like I’m allowed to be human.
Not a label.
Not a role.
Just a man… discovering what was stolen.
Madhukar:
And once you see this…
You can never go back to the lie.
---
🔸 EPILOGUE (3 MONTHS LATER)
Raghav quit his job.
He now works part-time at a community seed bank.
He walks with his daughter every morning.
He asks her what she wants, not what society expects.
His parents still struggle — but they’ve stopped advising.
A little silence has entered the family.
And in that silence, life — real life — has begun.
---
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Your Life Was Their Apology to Society
they called it love,
but it was obedience.
they said it was for your future,
but it was for their image.
you were born into a house
already filled with milestones
waiting for your feet.
first step: speak when told.
second: study like your cousin.
third: pass exams, never ask why.
fourth: take a job, even if it kills you slowly.
they clapped for every step you took
as long as it went in their direction.
you never got lost,
but you never arrived either.
your dreams were buried under
words like respectable, safe, practical —
the velvet knives of family pride.
they loved you, yes.
but not enough to risk being judged.
and so they delivered you —
like a parcel —
to marriage,
to job,
to children,
to burnout.
not because they were cruel.
but because they were trained.
trained by a thousand years of
what-will-people-say.
trained by caste, class, and the neighbor’s opinion.
trained to protect reputation, not reality.
you cried in boardrooms.
you clenched fists in bedrooms.
you smiled at weddings while dying inside.
and one day,
your soul broke.
not loudly.
just cracked quietly in a parked car,
while staring at your hands
wondering if they were ever yours.
you walked into a forest,
and told a man with ash on his feet:
i’m tired of living a life everyone else chose for me.
and he didn’t say "be brave" or "keep going."
he said:
"then stop."
stop pretending.
stop performing.
stop completing the checklist of ghosts.
your parents wept.
because they meant well.
but meaning well
is how prisons are built by poets
and dungeons are decorated with devotion.
they didn’t betray you.
they simply obeyed.
they were good citizens.
and that is the tragedy.
and now,
you sit in silence
next to your daughter
who is barefoot in mud,
singing to ants,
unaware of milestones,
free.
and you weep.
not from pain —
but from the miracle
that you broke the chain.
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