The Anger at Loss

What is that makes us angry at a profound loss?

Imagine that you love something or someone very deeply. You feel a sense of unbreakable attachment. Almost a sense of entitlement. An everlasting feeling. There are absolutely no doubts that it belongs to you. Nothing can shake that bond. And then suddenly out of the blue things go haywire. This was not supposed to happen to you. This was supposed to happen to someone else. Someone else's story. Not in this lifetime. You feel that this is just a bad dream and if you pinch yourself hard enough, you will snap out of this hallucination. But it doesn't. It lingers. This sick feeling in your gut. It creeps up your spine. You look outside the window. All you see a distant dreamy landscape, something that you have seen several times before yet looks alien. This is just a bad dream, you reassure yourself... Just a bad dream.

The grief has long passed. A void now takes its place. But the void is only ephemeral. It is being quickly replaced by an unstoppable feeling. A feeling that makes your muscles tighten. You grit your teeth. Your fist is clenched. A lump starts welling up in your throat. And before long you are overcome by an intense anger. This anger is pure and untamed. A reflection of the true animal that you are. Rationality has long left you. You bay for blood. A revenge that will set everything right. A vigilante justice that only you can serve. A vendetta not in vain...

Deadmau5

"The bass is so heavy my rubix cube fell off my desk and completed itsself, neighbors called the police and they got arrested, my windows broke and had to buy a mac, my cat barked, ʇxǝʇ ʎɯ oʇ sıɥʇ pıp doɹp ssɐq ǝɥʇ, I have to change my pants, made --- people miss the like button, mom walked in and I switched to porn, it became my neighbors favorite song, hitler got his gas bill, I pressed F13 for extra bass, my water turned into wine, I clicked 720p, it went B0:00M" - A highly liked comment on a deadmau5 youtube video.

We are Machines

"We are Machines" - This is a profound realization that I have gotten off late. To go into the moral and religious ramifications of this statement would be opening a can of worms, and that tends to attract a lot of flies. I am in no mood for fly-swatting. So not going into any controversy, I will talk about some of the practical aspects of living life as a machine. To appreciate the rest of this post, the reader will first need to agree with me that we are indeed machines. If this somehow seems implausible, I request you to suspend disbelief and agree with me for a short while.

By bringing up machines, I am not referring to Robots or any of those androidy things that science fiction movies would have you believe. But rather think of yourself as a rusty old steam engine. Yes, a steam engine. A good old steam engine with many moving parts. It's a good analogy. Just like a steam engine needs fuel and water, so do we. In many ways, we are exactly that, a steam engine. But never in their life would anyone consider themselves to be a machine. It somehow degrades this thing called life. It degrades this feeling of self. It makes all our emotions and all our hopes and dreams seem frivolous. It discounts our belief that we are somehow capable of much greater feats. But dear readers, since you have read this far, and you have suspended your disbelief so far, bear me a little longer...

So if we are indeed machines, why do we not feel like one? Why are we not made aware in every footstep and every breath that were are mere machines? The answer my friend is that we are too comfortable. Too cozy and too well fed. Every time you push yourself beyond your comfort zone, the machine creaks and groans, and you are Reminded ever so gently, that you are all but a machine. So the next time you go out of breath trying to climb the staircase, don't curse the elevator, but instead remember to smile. Smile with the knowledge that the machine is complaining.

P.S. I do not believe in a mind-body dichotomy.