In the Search for Words

 I am probably saying this one last time: Bad things happen, life is unfair. People describe their experiences of suffering from anxiety that make it feel like a collective experience. Just that, they don’t stop a certain section of their life, they aren’t paralysed from shock, unable to comprehend their life. Their hearts race, my heart felt like it’d stop any moment, as if I was physically dying from the inside. Now I tend to not speak about it, all the place-time displacements, and actions based on made-up scenarios in my head. Sometimes I miss the multiple voices having a roundtable conference inside my head, afraid that I lost my ability to express, to write, when I killed them. I often wondered in the year gone by, was it my madness that brought me stories? I spent months in silence, looking for words that used to flow like blood through my veins. I did the only thing I could do then, in my search for words, I read.

What is the point of reading so much?

I don’t read so much.

What will you do by reading?

               What kind of question is this?

You are escaping.

               No, I am not. If fiction does anything, it makes reality more evident.

That’s what you tell yourself.

               That’s what I live.

They don’t get it, they will never do till they form a relationship with stories. It is true that stories sedate me when needed. It is also true that I might not have lived the last few years had I not found parts of my life in stories. There’s no explaining to anyone. I switch from literary fiction to fantasy, Indian literature to world. I close my eyes and hear a book calling me. If I don’t, I try harder to concentrate. There’s always a book calling when the time is right. No, I cannot explain right timing. I can only say, sometimes trying to read is painful, there’s no going beyond a few lines. Yet, in a while, sometimes in years, it becomes effortless.

There were other fears: the inability to grasp a story in one reading, the unstoppable drive to prove an argument if formed inside my head, and it all led to one thing, the absence of words in my system. There was nothing I wanted to say after burning myself out by being my own sounding board. I remember such details of my life, there’s no way that I cannot throw ideas at my brain and not make it work. My mind palace is an empty room, blackboards covering the wall. That’s where my scribbles go now. Fear of losing the 2am ideas has no place. I exhaust myself anyway, brainstorming alone makes me slow, and no amount of patience seems enough. I burn out. 

The questions that were asked win and reign inside my head. What is the point of it all? The questioners do not see the intellectual labour, I don’t think anyone does. The amount of time an idea can stay inside one’s head. I no longer try to shoo them away. I found answers to, why do authors make-up places in fantasy? Why is there always a guardian figure in such stories? These questions first appeared three years ago. I eluded them at the expense of thinking too much. They kept coming back till I gave them a convincing answer. When I had a moral crisis reading The Enchantress of Florence, I wanted to let it go, I didn’t till I found out that calling it a shaggy dog tale helps my moral compass and actually answers all the comments made about male gaze and misogyny in the text. I cannot deny the presence of male gaze but I don’t agree with it being misogynist either. Just look at the words, they are quite literally laughing at us.

Many people suggested many things to do. I asked them one question, why? The answer was, You’re doing nothing anyway. That’s when I stop listening. Imagine doing nothing for a moment, it will drive anyone crazy, make the reality of meaninglessness bang the walls of one’s skull exponentially. How can anyone assume that another person is doing nothing? There might not be an output to showcase, yet to assume there’s no input? I stop listening, my hypocrisy chuckles. I believe I listen to everyone, I don’t.

Why? It is the only question that matters. I look back at things that people consider my achievements.

 My mom will tell you the anecdote of how I scored a hundred in Math just to get TV back at home.

I’ll tell her, I loved TV, I don’t love like that anymore.

My friend tells me not to quit pursuing research because she saw me at my best when I was immersed in Rushdie.

I tell her, I loved plurality, I still do, I just don’t feel the need to prove its existence anymore. It exists everywhere; to say otherwise is living in denial.

They give up, I sigh. Give me a purpose, I will thrive.

Don’t you want to prove yourself?

To whom?

Don’t you want to prove them wrong?

Who are they and why should I be proving them anything? Have I not fought enough? Negative motivation doesn’t work for me. Anger, hatred, ego, holding on to them tires me. I don’t want to be tired anymore.

How can you not want freedom?

               I have it, I don’t like it. It’s a prison. To not belong, to understand you’re free – what do you think I have been doing all this time? Freedom feels good as long as there’s a shore you can return to. To hang out on a boat in the middle of the ocean, survive the storms and demons, and stay afloat while running out of food and water, that’s not a life I want.

There, that’s a purpose.

               It’s not enough. It says what I don’t want, it doesn’t say what I do. It says I want to belong, it doesn’t say where.

Can’t you find out?

               I can. It might take a while.

Time’s running out.

               It always is.

Does that not bother you?

               It does, sometimes.

Then?

               You can’t expect for me to have a conventional life now. If I aspire for that, I will never be able to do anything apart from comparing my life to others. I am making peace with my timeline. I am slow because I don't know what I want to do. I tried a few things, figured out they don’t work for me. It’s like writing many drafts, knowing they are not the story you want to tell but they need to get out of your head so that a story can take shape.

Okay, they say. I let it be. Talking exhausts me. Being excited gives me a headache. It’s my body’s way of telling me that sadness remains at the base. And this is why I read fiction, to understand that no matter how much we aspire to be happy, it is sadness that’s home. Everything else is just a way to sedate ourselves, we like to call it comfort. And, that’s okay, it has to be. This world, society isn't something you can survive without sedation, people and their choices begin to make more sense. Sadness as the basis of life isn’t an odd view of living, it’s peaceful. You stop fighting; you start building on an unshakable foundation.

You don’t understand, but you want to tell me something, give me some advice. I know. Don’t, I’ll not listen if you don’t see the importance of making peace with sadness. I want to tell you that happiness is easier to live this way. I want to but not enough. And words don’t show up for half-hearted efforts.