How are you feeling?

We feel how we feel. We sometimes feel happy and sometimes feel sad. Often times, it’s a mix of the two and usually on a spectrum. A lot of our happiness and sadness gets dictated by the environment we live in. Is the weather bright and sunny today? Did I get a lot of traffic to work? Am I going to get that next promotion and make more money? Why hasn’t that person I am attracted to responded to my text?

Some of the happiness and sadness can also depend on how we view the future. Will I be able to buy that house in 5 years? Will I lose my job? Will I get a divorce? Will I get hit by a car tomorrow and die while crossing the road? Same is true when we think too hard about the past that we can’t change. Was I too much for my ex that they decided to leave me? Should I have done a better job at being a parent to my kids? Should I have not said what I said to my friend?

Some of the scenarios that I talked above might be a bit exaggerated and not relevant to everyone. But I think you get the point. We, Homo sapeins, generally have a tendency to get dictated by the environment, our past, and/or our future and become happy or sad accordingly. And to be clear, while I know that I am using the word “we” but that doesn’t mean I am trying to generalize it all. Anyway, the question then becomes that if we know that to be happy, we need to be more focused in the present and not dwell too much on the past or the future or get easily influenced by our environment, why is it so hard to do? There could be a myriad of reasons but one that pops in my head right now is - it’s the society we live in.

Monkey see, monkey do. I see my friends making more money, I wanna make more money. I see my friends getting married, I wanna get married. I see my friends dancing at a night club on their Instagram story, I wanna dance too. I see my friends going on a hike, I would like to hike too. I see my cousins travelling to Paris, I wanna go to Paris too. I see that my friend’s son got married and has kids, I want my son to be married and have kids too. The list goes on. Some of it or none of it might be applicable to you but that’s besides the point I am trying to make. I know that you would know in your heart what things are indeed applicable to you that bother you. And if you don’t then sit down and take a moment to reflect the smallest of the things you do not for you but for the “society”.

Okay, before I go any further, I have a confession. I wasn’t exactly going to write about what I wrote about above. This post was supposed to be about why and how people get too attached to people, and sometimes those people might not even be good for them. Take Rihana and Chris’ relationship, for example. In spite of Rihana being physically abused to the point that her face was swollen and bruised and bleeding, she briefly reunited with Chris a month after the incident. Would you call it love?

I think I got inspired by the above thoughts because I was talking to my dad earlier tonight. Amongst the bunch of things we talked about, one of them was this Urdu couplet that goes like:

Na Itna Toot Ke Miliye Ke Dil Pe Shak Guzre
Khuloos Mein Bhi Zaruri Hai Faasla Rakhna

~Anonymous

The gist of the above couplet is that a little bit of distance can help even in close relationships. I would have written more on this topic but I am kinda sleepy now, so, that’s that.

Good night!

p.s. Sorry about the randomness of this article. I know it doesn’t flow well but well, I just needed to be in the present and capture some of the thoughts in my head before I slept.