Melancholy Sets In

Melancholy. I’m sitting down to write after more than a year. I am nervous and I am uncertain what I shall reproduce. I’ve experienced so much in the past year; fallen and gotten up, beaten myself down over the smallest things, read about as diverse topics as I could lay my hands on but most important of all, I’ve understood myself much more deeply than ever before. This is perhaps what causes me the most anxiety, fear and melancholy.

We all see our lives as a journey towards a goal, anything that gives our lives meaning. I’ve always had a tendency of judging people based on where this meaning lies for them. So the world is always divided into the good and the evil for me. I’ve begun to question this. This scares me!

Buddha said that we all create our own realities. This means we see the world solely based on our opinions and assumptions, hence the perceived world is an artificial creation with a million million versions of it, ever changing and ever evolving only in our heads.  Which version of the world am I carrying? And what makes me right?

Throughout history there have been people who have devoted themselves to their families, tribes, kingdoms, philosophies or nations. I was watching a documentary, before I sat down to materialise this melancholy, of a nation built on the devotion and sacrifice of people such as those. After decades of service all that they were left with were old and faded pictures of young, enthusiastic and committed versions of themselves, people who saw great meaning in what they were doing years ago. But pictures and memories is all they had now.

The ideas I find meaning in are certainly different from theirs, almost polar opposites. They were wrong and I am obviously right! A year ago, I would have been naïve enough to think that that was enough to guarantee a much more contented and celebrated conclusion to my life, but I am older now. I understand that we all find meaning in something or the other and divide the world into the worthy and the unworthy.  In our heads we are all right! We are all right!

Then who is to guarantee that when I am old and withered, I will not be staring at my wall of old pictures of when I was young, enthusiastic and committed and watch myself fade away just as my pictures? I am afraid there is no one who can answer this question for me. I am older now, yet I am not closer to my answer. And perhaps this is what I was afraid of facing when the thought of sitting down and writing crossed my head, that I have found meaning in my life, but am completely unsure whether I am wrong or right. And I shall only know when I am old and withered and look back at my life in retrospect. Wouldn’t it be too late then? Melancholy sets in…  

36 Questions to love... Love?

     Love has been on my mind a lot lately and who better to answer my questions than the internet? It was then that I came across a wonderfully intriguing TED talk by Mandy Len Catron titled "Falling in love is the easy part". Love and Easy in the same sentence? Now this I had to check out!

     Turns out that the speaker Mandy, just like me, wanted to experiment with the ever mysterious phenomenon of falling in love, and realised that the only way to 'figure it out' was to fall in love! So here we were, two single but adventurous women, ready to fall in love. Oh but only if we knew how! Apparently she had figured out a way(borrowed from a psychology experiment) and I too set out to find the ideal guy to try it out with... and I did find him.

    There are a set of 36 questions that you ask each other (where the partner and you are fairly strangers to each other) and most importantly, openly share and actively listen to each other. The original scientist shared that a couple from the original sample group ended up marrying each other, apart from several successful relationships that commenced and Mandy herself had found a long term relationship that she was still in. Now I was getting really excited!

     Fortunately for me, I found the most understanding and mature guy, who was also adventurous and a good listener. Just the guinea pig I needed(Don't worry he knows I'm writing about him). The questions began with the cliche "Who would you invite as a dinner guest, if you could invite anybody?". I obviously has The Buddha over for Biryani and he had his late grandpa over for Butter chicken. The questions deepened gradually towards our most treasured memories and death of loved ones. You get the flow...

     As we answered and listened to each other, it was almost as if all our hesitations and our fears were put aside and we truly wanted to share each other's stories. It was then that I realised I couldn't remember the last time I had done something like this, the last time I had truly shared my life with someone and more importantly listened to someone. This wasn't love, but what we were feeling was the most essential element of human existence that makes life beautiful; Connection.

     We were connecting primarily as human beings sans all the external identities that our societies have given us, in an open and free environment that these 36 questions to love, helped create. How fascinating! I could notice that we were smiling more at each other and were much more at ease in each other's company. Was Cupid flying somewhere close by?

     But a question more interesting that this raises, is whether love can be created? What happens to all our fairytales and fables of that one true love and love at first sight? I think we humans were never made to love just one person. Our hearts are genuinely capable of a love larger than our stories make us believe. We shall only know if we let our hearts love...

     Another interesting aspect of the 36 questions we noticed was a cleverly repeated question where we had to share positive points about our partner and tell them what we liked about them. Though the degrees or intensities varied, the premise was the same - see the good in the person in front of you and appreciate them. You know what I'm going to say next; oh how often do we do this with people around us? (Good! you're catching on)

     We took a few days to finish all the 36 questions, but as promised the 37th question was not "Will you marry me?" for us, so no wedding bells or circles around the fire as of yet. And love? That is a question that we decided to stay on longer with each other to answer(yeay!). So keep checking my blog for updates on whether love happens or no. But this exercise certainly opened a door to a deeper and more meaningful relationship(or a friendship) for us. If you decide to try these 36 questions to love, please do let me know how they turn out, for now I have a romantic movie date with my guinea pig!


Do also check out my other posts and tell me what you think :

• A Friend No More!
• The Big Elephant In My Room - My Parents' Seperation