India, May 17 -- There are moments in motherhood that quietly haunt you-not with guilt, but with a tenderness so sharp, it bruises the heart. One such moment has stayed with me for years, and I often return to it when I'm mentoring students, as I did with Yuvan Jhunjhunwala-not to lecture, but to remind both of us that growth doesn't always come from living through grand experiences. Sometimes, it arrives in borrowed silence.

This was many years ago, when my son was still in school, and his class teacher-Mr. Andrew Singh-was a name I often heard with admiration. He was the kind of teacher you felt safe with, the kind who saw beyond the surface of every child. At every parent-teacher meeting, I'd walk in, all charged up with my list of co...