Should We Really Be All That Happy?

I must confess that I have wished very very few people a Happy New Year this year. I didn't put up anything especially "happy" in my FB status message, I didn't celebrate any new beginnings, new meanings, hope, harmony and humour. Partly because I am not seeing many "new beginnings" in the world around me. There are several kids I know personally who are dragging on with the same shit, the same lack of resources. There are several people who are dragging on with the same bad marriages, many many more suffering from acute lack of opportunities. I can keep on adding to this list, but I don't think that would be necessary. You, my readers, get the point. What I am trying to say is, I am a little suspicious of this popular impulse to evade the negative, the avoidance of conflict and this general denial that "happiness" is a complicated state of being, which if not totally dependent on material resources, can't really thrive without it. And yes, there is a big difference between access to adequate material resources and consumerism. The groucho that I am, I can't help thinking this happi-happi-happiness that is blowing over the blogs, FB status messages, web articles, is ideological. Especially since the country I happen to live in is suffering from one of the worst recessions. The one where I come from is conducting a few genocides of its own citizens. I honestly don't have much hope for humanity at this point. But on a very personal level, I hope to retain enough courage to take up/confront contradictions and conflicts as they appear in my life, and not fall back upon platitudes. I dread the mental state that comes from being a shirker. I am not saying that we all turn into sour-faced little robots overnight, and I do think, sometimes laughter is the best form of subversion human beings can throw at the face of the powers that be. But there is a big difference between laughter that subverts and the "how-may-I-help-you" service-sector smile. I see a whole lot of the latter in my everyday life and not enough of the former. Almost along the same lines, I appreciate those who acknowledge and record the little ways in which human beings resist conformity in their everyday lives. I have enormous respect for those who try to live their lives creatively in their own ways, try to create things and spaces in ways that would speak back to power in all its complicated embodiments. I believe in celebrating the everyday pleasures of life-- good food, good coffee, good chocolate and so so many other things. But all those "good" shouldn't really eclipse/obfuscate the fact that even as I am writing these words, there are so many who will never know what good food looks and tastes like. I think, the anger, the hatred that human beings have collectively shown towards that non-seeing and non-tasting is beautiful. Sometimes even more beautiful than good food or even the bestest of the arts. I hope never to lose the frame of mind which leads me (and several others) the beauty of the anger that tries to transform. And the ability to see that anger, to feel that anger doesn't come to us automatically. It almost invariably follows the ability to see the horror of inequality, systemic forms of oppression, deprivation. Yes, I am talking about balance here. The balance between the ability to see both the beauty and the horror of everyday existence. The balance between the ability to feel both enraged and inordinately happy. For myself, I am naming that balance dialectics.

Now that I have let this rant out my chest, Happy New Year!