I’m sure I’m not the only one who goes through periods of extreme happiness and then, periods of extreme – no, not sadness – inertia. Pensiveness. Like a soft sadness. A constantly recurring thought about ‘Am I doing this right? Is this what I’m really about? Am I being myself? Are the people around me really what I think they are? Should I be someone else, at someplace else, with another kind of people?’ And it keeps coming back. As I said – recurring.
You may go through this as well and are probably amazed as well as grateful that someone is sitting behind a laptop writing about it. Or this may have never happened to you and you may be thinking that I am an utter and complete lunatic. Either way, after much discussion with my flatmate, I am sure that (I’m going to refrain from saying that this is normal, as I don’t have any proof of that!) – this happens. If not to everyone, then at least to many.
I am sat here, listening to Gabrielle Aplin, wondering whether ‘everything is right’ – if you know what I mean. After being stuck at the same point for the last 10 minutes, I decided that there was only one way in which everything could be right. That was if I spent most of the rest of my day writing down a series of articles, overflowing with my seemingly complicated, intrinsically twisted and often unnecessary and quite relative, yet possibly simple thoughts. Wow, that was a long, winding description.
Obviously, the solution to the ‘problem’ mentioned in the first paragraph, the problem of ‘soft sadness’, is to just aggressively be yourself. Be yourself, associate with the people that you want to, do the things that you want to etc. However, it is not always that simple. When we engage with different groups of people in society, we tend to behave differently with each of them. I find that this is because we associate each group of people with a different attitude, a different ‘thing’ that they’re all about. Hence, when we mould ourselves to fit in with that group. We may not change ourselves to the extent that we’re a different person altogether, but it is natural to mould ourselves slightly in order to fit the situation. Hence, we are loud and crazy with people who allow us to be, and practical and serious with some other people. Nobody would walk into a meditation club and scream ‘This is my party!!’ – or at least, I hope not. In doing so, somewhere down the line, we probably get to a point when we’re often with people, in whose company we’re not really ourselves. And that bleeds onto other aspects of our life and we end up living a life that is close to what we’re about but maybe, not quite it.
Also, often, just ‘being yourself’ may not be the solution to soft sadness. Sometimes, it is simply a result of introspection that comes with solitude and I think everybody should have the privilege of going through it. It is a beautiful feeling and when you write about it or think about it, that is as close to yourself as you can possibly get. It gives you a momentous new dimension to look at things from, and a much-needed insight into life. And who needs an insight into their own life? Well, me. And probably, you too.
Cheers!
Ranjini
(Hi, I’m Ranjini and I’m 21. Follow my blog by opening the bar on the right for more..!)
This and That By Ranjini Sircar 