WHAT THE HELL JUST HAPPENED?!

THE DISAPPOINTED OPTIMIST/ THE SURPRISED PESSIMIST

I had been sitting on this title for almost a month and just could not find the will or the context to start this article. On some days I laze around, completely forgetting about me trying to be a writer. On other days I open my laptop and stare at this screen for two full minutes and then shut it down because no words come out. Procrastinating? Maybe. But they say you can’t force things. So, today, as I was lazing around, procrastinating and watching more of Grey’s Anatomy, it hit me. 

(Well, I do have Shonda Rhimes to thank for a lot of things in life. And also Meredith Grey, for being the dark + twisty character she was)

*SPOILER AHEAD*

So, Alex Karev, was one of the most well-developed characters in this series, and a total sweetheart because he never gave up on his love despite brain tumors, dark pasts, traumas and mental illnesses. He always wanted to be a better person to be able to be there for the one he loves, be it his wife or his best friend. After 16 seasons of this sweetheart-edness, HE JUST LEFT. And that would have been okay, if he hadn’t just remarried his wife after she had been through and recovered from depression, reassuring her that he is never going to leave her (Jo, she was the one with a dark past). He left, because he grabbed the first excuse he got to reconnect with his first wife (the one who had a brain tumor and recovered from it, and then left him, Izzie) and he found out that she had his kids and lives on a farm.

Well, the reaction I had was obviously: What the hell just happened??!!! 

This one sentence, in just five words, describes the gist of what life actually is: A series of events that make us go “what the hell just happened?” every now and then. Whether it’s good or bad depends on whether it makes us what I like to call a  disappointed optimist or a surprised pessimist. Either you are positive that something good will happen and end up being disappointed, or you are not sure about a situation, or yourself or anything and it turns out okay, so you end up being surprised. In both the cases, the reaction is, yes you guessed it right: WHAT THE HELL JUST HAPPENED?.

Of course there is a third kind, the realist, someone who sees a situation as it is and is prepared to deal with it, whether good or bad. Well, that’s not enough melodrama. We like to live on the extremes and romanticize every situation, so we are not going to observe much of this third category. 

From January through October, 2020 had more and more disappointments for us all. Loss, quarantine, masks, anxiety, depression, uncertainty, loneliness, work-from-home, long-distance and worst: hopelessness - these have been the top 10 feelings of 2020. We had never paid heed to these words as much as they are used now. In fact all these have integrated and formed what we know as the “NEW NORMAL”. 2020 was an even more extreme case because, well we expected flying cars and aliens walking among us. So, the graph of expectations basically took a veryyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy deep dive, reached the mariana trench, hit the bottom and flattened. All the optimists faced the biggest disappointment in generations as 2020 happened and all the pessimists also faced a big disappointment because itna toh kisine bhi nahi socha tha. As the entire world moved indoors, animals got on the streets, we got a lot of time to think. Thodi toh overthinking bhi ho gayi and anxiety aur depression cases bhi badh gaye. But, we thought a lot about everything and everyone, including ourselves. We thought about our relationships, our passions, our careers, our strengths and weaknesses. Basically we did a whole SWOT analysis. As a bonus, and I believe this was the most important one, we realised what we DO NOT need in life. Yeah, it is tough knowing what you want from life, but it is even tougher to know what you don’t want. Sometimes when we accept things as they are, we are merely compromising to such an extent that we do not even realise that we are compromising. If you know what I mean, then there is something in your life that you really need to throw out! We can live without a few (non-serving) relationships, we can live without the hustle + bustle that has become such a huge part of our lives and we can certainly live without fear. It is often said that once you hit rock bottom, you can only go up. So, this, THIS is our rock bottom. This is essentially everything we have ever feared - losing someone close to us, missing out on opportunities, breaking some ties, being away from society. This year has thrown everything right at us. The pandemic has basically answered the question - “What would you do if you had nothing to lose?”. What does that leave us with? 

We are now living for the little things that make us happy, the few people who stayed with us when we needed them the most, the hobbies and passions we re-discovered or never discovered before and little by little we realised that we do not really need big things in life. Life then becomes a collection of little things that give us joy.

I agree that anxiety, depression, any other mental illness or any extreme loss like the loss of a closed one are situations that are beyond one's control. These make life difficult for us and for our loved ones. But with extra care and attention and a lot of compassion, we can learn to perceive things in a completely new light. Even though such situations will always be a part of our being, we can, through practice learn to not let them rule our lives.

Of course the experience was different for everyone and I am not trying to sugarcoat anything. It has been tough, very tough. We have borne extreme pain of losses and felt excluded from our own lives. We have had more shocks than ever that have had major consequences on families and our lifestyles. We might not be able to overcome them fully, but we now know our potential to find hope even in the darkest of times. 

This year allowed me to reflect on a lot of things and do this guilt-free kyunki sirf main hi nahi poori duniya hi stand-still pe hai. I have been able to establish a new sense of authority and decided that I will never let anyone have so much control on myself that it becomes self-destructive. I have been able to fight my fear of trying new things and given a shot at so many hobbies (and I am very very very surprised by the result). For someone who has struggled with anxiety for over ten years, this is not an easy achievement. So, kudos to those who accept help when they need it and those who are able to recognise when a loved one needs help. Let’s give ourselves a second chance and show ourselves that we can live without things we thought we could not live without (things - materialistic cheezein).