Depressed?

We live in a world that doesn’t allow you to be depressed. To grieve is not allowed! To be sad is a sign of failure against a life which is apparently so filled with opportunities.

I don’t know about others but I personally feel that all happy or trying to be happy folks are more insecure and living in a fear that outbursts in the deepest secrets of their lives. Somehow acknowledging that I am sad or depressed or fantasizing with death, at the least makes me less afraid, less anxious. As if I won the battle by simply giving it up for absolutely no reason. I mean so far I could somehow become whatever I wanted to be, but did I get better, did the human race become better? Probably no.

The obsession for growth, prosperity, great company, and health, at the face of a self that is deeply troubled by the ambiguity around everything, is a meaningless battle. Probably why a section of the human race invented foolish reasons to wage war — in fact I think wars behind the disguise of an national identity or some sort of cause — suddenly gives us human the only collectively certified channel to glorify self sabotage at defense to the unavoidable sadness and grief. Or probably it is in a collective accepted state of war that human intermittently receives a glorious opportunity to put an orgasmic pause to the painful, the fearful, the anxious state of our existence.

Off course, all so because the world is ambiguous; because people simply can’t express themselves to other people, their love, their sentiments, their hatred, their selfish needs; partly because of the cost of breaking well established etiquette are high and partly because language is too short for the ambitious goal of human expression. It simply is impossible to tell another human being how I feel at this moment; and even if a portion of my feelings are transferred to the other side, the other person is no position to acknowledge that because he or she probably busy doing the exact same thing — trying to tell me how he or she is feeling and failing at every attempt, just like me, just like everybody.

So what do you expect me to do? Listen to the next motivational song? Wait for my happy birthday song? Read those cliche quotes on what a wonderful life it is? Share those modern writer’s advice on why the last girl was not right for me and there is all great things for me next door? Come on…

I am surprisingly smiling and grieving and crying at the same time — and what’s wrong with it? Does it look psychopathic? Am I going to scare the shit out of people because they are so accustomed to emotional etiquette? Give me a towel if you are thinking of a tissue paper.

Well, just like I love the idea of war, I like the idea of compassion, too. In fact what most of you guys call love, in theory is supposed to be compassion but in action is just another transaction, like you know shopping, choosing a college, interviewing a candidate, or finding the right shoe that fits — isn’t it? I mean, most of the experts on dating and relationships and marriage, are just speaking that same — putting the individual so high for respect, esteem, and what not — to save the collective goal of a scared, synergistic, sober, romantic couple. I mean where is compassion, because I only smell transaction.

Compassion is not a goal. It is an accidental outcome. Compassion is neither a solution to our anxiety and fears; I believe compassion simply can make the journey a bit sweet, if not all great; sweet; in pain and pleasure, in fear and also in courage, in our anxious attempts to understand and make other others understand. If there is one stupid method of life that Americas has marketed to the rest of the world, it is this — “goal”. So now we have a super market of “career goals”, “couple goals”, “parenting goals”, bla bla bla. Not that all goals are bad, goal setting is great if it’s your career, your processes and systems in your so called value creating businesses, or anything that’s linear. My life is not linear and as far as I have meet people they are not linear too. So are we pretending to be linear? Does all of these goal setting going to solve our lives?

So what is compassion, then?

It’s an accident.

It’s an unexpected curiosity of a wild bear to save a little drowning bird, or probably an unexpected friendship between a lioness and a baby deer. A rare accident that we humans have liked it so much that now it is a goal certified my our central justice department, enforced by peacekeepers, and shared by citizens like us as if it is our default nature against all criminal exceptions. However, these unquestionable chain of logic is only applicable to our special human race and not in a zoo, or a war, or in the wild. Oh sorry, lately even in war we carefully drafted a few grey spots, thanks to the Geneva Convention.

But I was speaking about grief; about depression. I am kind of lost.

Rewind.

We live in a world that doesn’t allow you to be depressed? To grieve is not allowed? To be sad is a sign of failure against a life which is apparently so filled with opportunities.

I, however, is grieving tonight. The trigger is an usual suspect, a girl, but there is lot more reasons to make for the ammunition. It’s personal and since I have no idea who am I writing to, I will skip the details.

First of all, let me tell you why suddenly I am in love with grief.

Once I break the repository of every stupid sentences and idea of life, I suddenly miss the girl I was talking about. Not in thoughts, but some of feeling a void, loneliness, etc. Through grieving I lose myself, and somewhat humiliate that I couldn’t keep it. Through grieving I knowingly and unknowingly shove all my problems in this immediate misery of not having her, right here, right now. I grieve so much so that sometimes looking at the successfully growing colleague or knowing what great people excelled at my age, the FOMO simply short circuits my grief — I even imagined once to simply kill her. Now I know how people go crazy — who do I blame? And which doctor can I consult who is not secretly a patient. Which life is not a disease? The more I share, the more you guys put frameworks to analyze not knowing that we all are the same, anxious and scared. At the least, grief is better — a graceful acceptance of the unavoidable. I don’t think that there is anything more beautiful than to grieve when I have to — why do I want to stop it? Let it. At least in grieving I am with her.

30 years of life, and some 25 years of hers — how in the world could we be the same. The agony is that there is lots of romance, and less truth, less courage, more pride, less work, more beauty, less love, more hypocrisy with our own selves in the name of diplomacy.

But you see? Where else can I go? Where else will she go? If I choose a human, I do not love. If I don’t choose a human and choose another, I still do not love. How can I choose? Those couples goals are not mine. Those romance are rented Netflix. Those words are your Instagram TV. Those high morals are your blogs on great relationship. How do I love a human and not some goal, some outcome, some nonsensical conception of forever, when roads are filled with naked miserable humans unable to gracefully accept this meaningless mess and yet advise me. What good is my language, your language, her language — there is no right choice — each one of us are the same.

So no love? Because it is an accidental outcome and I keep waiting for another accident like some silly teenage girl? But even waiting is a choice. So probably no thinking at all? But to decide to not think is also a choice. Basically stuck for a very very good amount of time. Dear fate, I am trying to gracefully accept you.

But wait a second. The first thing that will occur to me in the morning is staring at an excel filled with random numbers, and I trying to be a guy adding value to an organization that moderately acknowledge me for my so called analysis and bla bla skills — something that gives me value in return at the end of the month — which ensures my survival, helps me get people’s attention, and gets me stuffs I like. The problem is that there are speed breakers in this not so bad journey — except for my dad there is hardly a human being who in blind faith is with me and the inevitable possibility of his death just reassures me that how lonely the war like life is going to be — more reason why sometime I just can’t stand his shear compassion for me, because I just want to stay around but not create more memories for a soon to be dying man. He was quite a short tempered father but now it seems like I am his short tempered father, and he silently accommodates me without saying much. His morning flask of tea in my doorsteps will be missed very soon.

Off course the thriving market of anti-depressant are today’s intelligent solution to our human condition, so much so that it has become a point of glamour to say that one is depressed and is on medication. But does it take so much brains to understand that things are beyond flickering hormones and psychiatric gibberish. It is not an argument between natural solution vs cosmetic solution. It is a question of what we really are and what is the graceful, if not great, end to this ambiguity of our lives.

The graceful end to this ambiguity of our lives, I personally believe these days, is to destroy all structures of thoughts, traditional and modern, and to courageously confront our condition in whatever reality it is, and eventually seek a very personal solution to our misery. If there is doubt, do not share. If there is love, try sharing it with a couple of friends. If there is a pride in your solution, know that there is a high chance your expression and art is futile at the face of a meaningless world.

I for one, deeply believe, that a living creature like us a) can not survive alone b) can not express all through any language or art c) has to navigate the ambiguity of life d) has to work for others to make others work for our survival, needs and desire e) are limited by time, and that the only graceful end is either to wage absolute war just to be killed or kill, OR, have compassion and be blind in faith for at least one fellow prisoner of life, without choosing one over another. As children we should play more. As old animals, I am not sure. However, as young animals trilled with both the prospect of mating and the anticipation for compassion, to meditate in one, to repair with one, is the graceful end; because people are just bunch of attributes and packets of meaningless desires; if you can’t fulfill one’s and be fulfilled by one, you can go to the end of the universe you will find none. There is no choice and there is absolutely nothing romantic about it.