I've never been (Un)happier

by Shaheen Bhatt

Consciousness makes us human, and there seems to be general agreement that consciousness as we know it is unlikely to exist beyond death, that the curiosity we would satisfy will not exist by the time it is answered.

The world around me is being put into constant, unfiltered perspective, and while others can push it away and forget about it, I can’t. Maybe my only problem is that I’m one of the ones who can’t forget.

I realized that most of our problems in life stem from the quest for permanence. In this age of instant gratification we want everything in our lives to come without an expiry date. We want everything to be permanent—relationships, love, beauty, youth, happiness. But the truth is permanence is an illusion, and like everything else in life happiness also comes and goes.

It has magnified and multiplied the empathy within me and it has fanned the sparks of creativity. It has taught me how to be alone and how to find comfort in myself. It has made me love more fiercely and with abandon. It has not simply made me tolerant of the differences of others, it has shone a light on the beauty of that dissimilarity. It showed me that just because you don’t understand something, it doesn’t mean it’s bad or wrong or that it needs to be feared. It showed me that most of the anger and negativity around us stems from fear, and it showed me kindness is the only way forward.