Eleven Minutes is what it takes to experience pleasure. But what about love? Discover Maria's search for love in Paulo…
“Veronica had everything one could dream for – young and pretty, surrounded by friends, a loving family, a steady job, and enough bank balance to relish her fantasies. Yet one morning, she takes an overdose. That winter morning, she had woken up with a singular objective – to take away her life at her prime.”
Reading Paulo Coelho’s Veronica Decides to Die propelled me into an ocean of contemplation. Why would a girl who has everything that a similar-aged human might desire step away from the same and instead willingly choose death?
Interestingly, I was also going through a similar phase in life sometime back. Moving from a structured teenage living (we always knew the syllabus to succeed in school and colleges, didn’t we?), the vast ocean of dynamic adulthood overwhelmed me. It made me question myself, my existence, and (on an abstract level) my reason to live.
What is life? Why do we live? Why do we breathe the air around us, rise with the sun, run hitherto the entire day to earn our living and finally, curl ourselves to sleep in the twilight?
And adding to that, we sleep with hope, a promise to keep doing the same the next day and the day after.
But why?
From early on, every parent, teacher and elderly well-wisher has ingrained in us a list of goals one should focus on to declare themselves successful. Study well, get a good job and pay package. Earn well and take care of your parents. Plunge yourselves into familial life – get married, pro-create, have kids, and similarly initiate their life cycle. Finish your responsibilities, retire, and seek “peace” until death beckons us.
It is a generalist routine. It’s pretty biased and stereotypical, yet valid for most of us. It almost feels like being part of Orwell’s 1984 – a staged disillusioned life with nowhere to escape. No, I’m not pessimistic. I do not grumble about the negatives in life. But yes, a question does arise – is that all life has to offer?
Life isn’t just about these societal marks of success. Maslow’s hierarchy of needs discusses five levels of motivators and drivers that encourage a human to strive for a goal. Skipping aside the basic safety and societal needs, I believe humans are internally wired to seek self-actualisation.
At one point in life, everyone faces a mid-life crisis. I like to call mine ‘the quarter-life crisis’ – my own ‘Veronika’ moment. No, I didn’t contemplate the extreme, but a general disillusionment cocooned over me, along with a liberal dose of imposter syndrome. I kept wondering why everyone has a goal in life, but for me, the vast ocean is just unbearable.
It is not simple to look ahead of the ingrained boxes, think outside the lines and motivate oneself continually. For me, it became essential to rise above materialistic needs and build an archetypal purpose towards living – my mantra for life.
Greek philosophers always believed that our thoughts could be divided into two broad kinds – archetypal and typal. While typal relates to the material world, focusing on the why, how, when, and where, the archetypal thoughts are all about the fundamentals – the core principle of the idea itself. This leans towards the metaphysical aspect of life, but yes, it resonates with me and my search for the abstract.
More than the notification that announces my salary, the happiness of a laugh with a loved one, the joy of learning a new skill, a new hobby, and the exhilaration of discovering nature’s delights – exploring the world satiates me. Living in the moment fills me.
The desire to learn satiates me. The COVID-era lockdown allowed me to engage in my hobbies – learning a new craft and bringing out my creativity. I did quilling, sketches, canvas painting, poems and stories, and became a published author!
I may not be perfect and do not strive for perfection. But the joy of doing something unique fills a sense of purpose. It provides the peace – a sense of satisfaction that the societal list ultimately asks us to achieve!
Life is all but our path of choice!
Eleven Minutes is what it takes to experience pleasure. But what about love? Discover Maria's search for love in Paulo…
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