Pritam's Blog
I Am Emotionally Constipated And I Am Ok With It
“How does it feel like to be 32?” asked a slightly younger colleague.
“I don’t know about others but I feel emotionally constipated. Then again I have been feeling this way for the past few years. I don’t think it has anything to do with being 32,” I replied.
“So, what did you do on your birthday?”
“Nothing. Took leave and got up late. So many calls from you people as if it’s a big deal. It’s not a big deal. I had no role in this entire process. My parents decided to have a kid and that’s how I popped up into this world. It’s not my achievement. In fact, given a chance, I wouldn’t have given consent to this whole thing. It’s so unfair, no? We don’t get to have a say in this, whether or not we want to exist. Second, I feel it’s kind of hypocritical to celebrate your birthday when you truly believe and express your belief that the most noble thing for humans to do is to walk into extinction.”
“And yet you remember our birthdays and send us cakes. Why?” she asked.
“Well, I do not expect everyone to feel the way I do. For all I know, you might be excited about your birthday. I have no right to make you feel otherwise. And most of you people live here all alone, far away from your family. If a simple cake brings a smile to your face, it’s worth it. A smile is always good. It’s just that I cannot bring myself to smile for something like that.”
“To be honest I too feel this way at times but you articulated it so well - both the points. Why are we so fucked up? My parents often say - we had to fight for even our basic needs, you people got everything and still you are not happy.”
“Yeah! Because we didn’t have to fight, we had plenty of time to think about our life. Hence, this existential crisis.”
“Do you really think it’s true?”
“No. I was being sarcastic. I think compared to them, we got a lot of stimuli ever since we were born. And that’s why a part of us has become numb. I don’t know. I am not a psychologist. But I personally feel the Internet, all these competition and peer pressure, for example, have a lot to do with the way we feel and react. Our parents didn’t have all these.”
“You should go to one of those babas, spiritual leaders or motivational speakers,” she said with a chuckle, to irritate me.
“Yes. And the next day the two of us will be fighting on whose baba is better… The competition is here too. I actually heard two youngsters fighting the other day. One liked Sadhguru. The other was a big fan of Double Shri… What is fucking wrong with people?”
“I know… And I do agree that the Internet is a big culprit here. The other day, I was so happy with my productivity at work. I went home. Then I opened LinkedIn and I saw this post - a fit and healthy guy, 36 years old had had a heart attack. The happy feeling vanished. Everything seemed so pointless,” she said.
“I saw that post too. And then I wondered it could be me any day. And I looked around. And I saw the empty packs of cigarettes and chocolate wrappers. And I decided to clean the room. Why? Because I thought if I died tonight, I wouldn’t want my loved ones to think that I died of smoking and eating chocolates. So, I cleaned the entire room. By the time I finished, I was so tired that I didn’t have the energy to think of all these. I just fell asleep. I think you just have to keep yourself busy so that all these thoughts do not occur to you.”
“But that’s not a long-term solution. If you have to keep yourself busy all the time, sooner or later you will be tired. Then what?” she asked.
“Then you take two steps backward and start again.”
“Hummm… Tell me one thing that truly made you smile recently.”
“Someone in my Facebook friend list for whom my birthday along with certain other details aren’t visible, which means they won’t get a reminder of my birthday, texted me and wished me. Even though my birthday doesn’t mean anything to me, it brought a smile to my face…”
“Nice. For inexplicable reasons, I feel happy about it.”
“I know… It’s worth living, no matter how emotionally constipated you are…”