downtown. Lights on everything that makes you wonder. And in that moment I swear we were infinite. Charlie. From Perks of being a wallflower.
“You should try to sit down, under the shower; and imagine the first monsoon rains fall over your body after a hot summer day, trickling down your bareback. The smell of soap takes after the petrichor. the sound of the tipper tapper of the droplets surround you, caressing you; like a hug from a long-lost loved one. utter bliss.” he said.
“What? I don’t Understand you, bro. Anyway, heard about the latest superbike launching next week. god, I cant wait to go test ride it. now That’s Utter bliss, bro”.
“Hey….. but hey guys, arent you forgetting something? what yall came here for? I cant wait to see your faces when you bite into this new flavoured Cheesecake that I invented! ” Go, ahead! I want to see your reaction! Its to die for, I swear guys.”
We, as humans are absolutely brilliant at getting things done. We run, we jump, we crawl and we strive and excel towards achieving something. The motivation usually being to be written down into the books of history as someone to remember.
We want to hear things like “Husain made this charitable hospital for everyone, rich and poor alike, so that healthcare is never a worry among any human being, because good health is a basic need, not a want.” or ” Krishna discovered a gold mine in the outskirts of Pune, and the whole country now knows him for this one in a quintillion scenario.” being recognised, makes you feel elated. it makes you feel something good. like to the whole world, you matter. Like out of the 7.1534 Billion unrecognised faces, you matter.
So it would be safe to assume that it makes us happy. Being recognised makes us happy. being loved like you’re the object of someone’s thoughts all the time makes you and me happy. being under the shower, senses dialled up to 11 makes me ecstatic. speeding across the highway on my bike at 150, on the verge of life and death makes me happy. having my family, and people on my mind most of the time around me; makes me feel wanted. and that’s happiness. for many, happiness would mean smoking a blunt with people who laugh and vibe at 2:32 am on the top of a cliff on a cold winter, talking about how much they are grateful to each other and how beautiful they all are, makes them all euphoric, even if knowing that this is the first and the last time they cross paths talking to each other. for others, it would mean the first bite of Kaju katli after years of not having it. Looking people around you who matter still content, alive and healthy is happiness. Heck, happiness is waking up in the morning, a good 8 hours of sleep, the first good sleep after a few weeks of a tedious internship.
To you the reader, may I ask. Have you sometimes been asked to think, or have contemplated what happiness means to you, or I suspect, are you even human?
And we kept dancing. It was the one time all day that I really wanted the clock to stop and just be there for a long time. Charlie, Perks of being a wallflower.
Now I know what the nihilist in us says. “There is no happiness. Happiness is only the surge of serotonin coursing through your bloodstream as a reward to an achievement, which is the self-decided goal that every sane man has taken upon himself” and also, “This love is bullshit man, it’s all just the minds play to motivate a man to do what he and all other living beings ultimately are born to do. Procreate. It’s all a play by the brain to signal hormones to create lust, and fast heartbeats, and pheromones so that one may attract a mate, pass on resilient genes in the animal heirachy, just like monkeys, and lions, and zebras, and butterflies. Fulfil what he is born to do, and just fuck off then.“
And maybe, yes. that is true. Now that you know it, now what? do you just refuse to do what “regular” (pshh) people do and just quit your life? If it all doesn’t matter anyway, why not play the game of life with a certain sense of ease and relaxation, now that you know that the consequences, on a grand scale of things, do not even matter?
Because I feel, that there is no path to happiness. happiness is the path. the struggling, the failure, and the eventual outcome of it. that’s happiness.
come on now, don’t be a spoilsport. Join the game, the others are waiting for your turn.
With Love,
Husain
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