Indecision

I have never really understood why girls my age dig Taylor Swift’s post breakup songs, or why she wrote them in the first place. I’ve never been able to fathom why we generally associate the word “emotion” with a dispirited sort of feeling. And I don’t get how this dispirited feeling plays a big role in making us who we are.

In my mind I’d made plans of a grand comeback to blogging. I had set myself up for a return to my severely critical alter-ego, equipped with my razor-sharp pen and my acerbic tone (Ha!), when… Let’s just say something happened to dampen my spirits. Thereafter, believe me, it was really quite fascinating to run a psych-eval on myself.

I realized that when it comes to relieving emotional stress, I am a shrink’s dream patient. When it comes to how I relieve my emotional stress, I am a certified nut job.

I never let my emotions build up within myself. I always manage to find efficient outlets. But I end up doing absolutely crazy things in the process.

Let me tell you about the last such crazy thing I did.

Just after I received that “mood-dampening” news I was talking about, my parents noticed that something was wrong. (If I were a case, my parents would wrap me up faster than the Delhi police wraps up robberies.) Being the “mama’s boy” that I am, I told them the truth. Considering everything, they took it very well. I went to console them (or console myself, more like). Half-an-hour later, I returned to my room after having hurled at them the cruelest set of adjectives to have ever come out of my mouth. And I’m never cruel.

Now let me tell you about the crazy thing I did before that.

A few days after my parents’ 25^th marriage anniversary, I’m sitting on my divan, trying to study the hell out of some Advanced Computer Architecture days behind schedule, and I realize that I’ve never given my parents anything on any of their previous marriage anniversaries. (God, I’d have liked to have seen myself giving my parents a tiny devil’s trident on their second anniversary. I’m only 22.)

So I got to work at 12.10 am. At precisely 1.04 am, I stuck this on the refrigerator with a magnet:

My parents said that it was the second-best anniversary gift that they’d ever received. It was the best compliment I’ve ever received.

If this were a CBSE subject guide, I’d conclude like, “Thus, similar emotions can have completely different effects in different situations.” But I don’t think it’d be fair to generalize something so significant. Let’s dedicate a little more time and a few more kilobytes to this… “discussion”, if you may.

Emotions are funny. A couple of minutes ago I was preparing myself to launch into a drawn out narrative about my infamous eccentricities. Now… I’m lost.

So I hit Google looking for inspiration.* (How original.) And the first thing I notice, written under the Google search bar, is:

Skydive with Santa, race with reindeer, and parachute presents in Santa’s Village.

It does seem to put things into perspective, doesn’t it? Christmas is round the corner, and here I am, sitting in front of my laptop, presenting this lugubrious monologue. How sad is that?

So, naturally, I found myself Googling “Christmas Blues”. After getting past a couple of YouTube videos, I found a link to this “All-things-psych” website. The first line said, “The stress of the holidays triggers sadness and depression for many people…” I immediately closed the browser window. (Sigh.) That’s all I needed to read to know that I’m a lost cause. If many people suffer from that, no wonder there’s so much misery and suffering in this world.

But all this digging around into my psyche has been helpful, if not mildly cathartic. And I take solace in the fact that at least I have feelings to talk about. That I am not numb. I am grateful for that.

I read somewhere that creatures that do not have a language cannot “feel” in the technical sense of the word, because they have no way of knowing or expressing what exactly it is that they are feeling. For me, that would equal an indefinite period of imprisonment without light. (I was about to say that I couldn’t imagine how these creatures must feel, but I decided that puns should not be shoved into one’s face.)

So, I feel that one should let their emotions flow, unrestrained and uninhibited. One should not be ashamed of or make excuses for what one is feeling. Since we have speaking mouths and intelligible languages in our arsenal, ignorance doesn’t stand a chance. Our emotions are what are responsible for the most beautiful art and the most important inventions. It’s because people generally find their pressure release valve in what they love to do the most. That is why most people excel at what they love to do.

Conversely, appreciating beautiful art and experiencing technology help us palliate the symptoms of an overwhelmed mind. Aristotle always maintained that tragedy arouses the emotions of pity and fear in order to purge away their excess, to reduce these passions to a healthy, balanced proportion. (I’ve run out of different ways to thank Google.)

And if people don’t like you expressing your feelings, screw ‘em. The world owes us that much.

But emotions are like an unpinned grenade. They make us volatile and vulnerable. Some of us lash out at the slightest provocation. Some of us make gifts for their parents. Makes me sound like such a schizoid.

But I’d rather be that schizoid Indian kid than be forced to live without a tongue, physical or metaphorical.

I don’t know what I’d do without my emotions. Food and water may propel my body, but my mind feeds on emotions for sustenance. I’ve heard of children in war torn countries suffering from PTSD who have refused to speak for years. That is my worst fear. That is my own personal version of hell.

Soumit

15/12/15