Greetings to fellow readers and authors. Relationships are inevitable truth of life unless you have given up every worldly pleasure. There are many beautiful and varying roles to play for both men and women throughout their lives. All of them are fun and amazing but with in order of increasing amount of responsibilities as you age up. Since I am an elder brother, I am gonna share with you all, how it is to be one and my experiences with my younger brother and also about my perspective of playing this role nicely. Just so that you know, my younger brother is one year younger than I am.
Starting from childhood, when we were some 4 or 5 years of age, there was a sense of being elder but no responsibilities. He and I would play together and fight over silly possessions. I used to take advantage of being elder and would beat him if he didn't follow my commands as I always expected him to. We would play pet game together like he is my pet and I am his owner or gun fight with our ammunition made with fingers. There was always a brawl over who will sleep by mum's side or dad's side for whoever the fight would start. Sometimes, while leaving two of us alone, mum would put me in charge for the things and taking care of him, then, I would try to ensure his wellbeing and would do small chores assigned like serving breakfast to both of us and then placing the utensils in the sink, I would lock the main door and would go to check first, in case any stranger came, sometimes I would attack him for violating what mom said to do as I am in power for time being and then he would attack back then a little fight and I always ended up making up to him for hitting him first as he would get angry with me always.
When we grew up to the age of 10-12 years, I was probably in 5th standard and he was in third since I skipped one class back at school. In this age group I noticed a thing. When we visited my maternal grandmother's, I used to team up with my cousin against my brother and we used to tease him and he used to get angry of me. My mom often told me why do you did that and then I used to realize how wrong I was but since I was a child, I used to forget how bad I was to him and again I mostly used to team up with others against him. Talking about other aspects, I used to support him whenever I could. We both would do a lot of fun and he used to sit on my carrier when ever we went out for cycling. There is an incident from my childhood, I had a fear of dark and when I had to go to toilet he would come along and would wait outside. For this help I owed him and had to do something for him for the day to come though I would never do anything lol.
Things were same till I had to go to some other city for college. I started being extra good to him. I missed my family of course but more than anything my brother now would listen to me more than others in family. I used to guide him on call and I developed a tendency to give him as much as I can in every aspect. Whenever I used to go home in holidays, I would spend all money I was left with from my monthly allowance given by parents with him and also while going back, on station, I would give him a little amount of what I was given for the upcoming month. Once he fell ill with dengue and I really felt so bad and this emotion I really never had experienced before. I really wanted to help him somehow and I prayed for his wellbeing with all my heart. He recovered soon since he's athlete. Even now, he listens to me and I have adopted a things or two to maintain the harmony in relation and also the respect on both the ends. I am listing down these points below:
Whenever there is a fight, there is always an scope of sorting it out by stopping arguments and accepting. Even if you are wrong, the other person will learn this from you and eventually, your fights will get to an end with intellectual discussion about it rather than blame game or maybe fights will stop happening at all and I do this all the time with him. I stay quiet, absorb good vibes and who ever of us realizes his mistakes, comes and apologizes.
I always tell him my experiences and when I see him going a wrong way or wasting a lot of time, I lecture him and since he respects me, he willingly listens and tries to implement.
I listen to him making him feel important and he always has a lots of talks from his day at gym. Be it any conversation, giving others the time to speak and being a good listener is very important.
Whenever possible, I try to help him with chores or prioritize him over me in things of advantage.
When I want to make him feel like he isn't productive, I don't talk to him that nicely and show him that I am busy in my study and then he accompanies me also most of the times. You need not to be partner in crime only always, you should partner adventures as well as hard work.
I connect on call with him from hostel on regular basis. Those who are important should know that they are and phone calls from different places always sweeten bonds.
There can be a million advices and at the same time no advices as everyone have their own ways to be good but I want to make a point that blood relationships are the best and to relish their strength, you need to nurture them with all you heart and mind. When you put efforts in each and every domain of your life equally, it strengthens you towards a better tomorrow and family always is your overall strength backup. You can always count on them and your siblings being of your age group and closest to you understand you more than anyone. Being an elder, its your responsibility to water the seed of love and strength in relationships and soon you will be pacified like anything under the shade of the tree having limitless fruits of trust, support, confidence and what not.
