Yesterday evening as I browsed through the newspaper the news of a techie couple committing suicide in Goa caught my eye. You can read the article here. I normally just read through and move on……. but it was this very trait of mine that made me pause and think again so much that it disturbed me.

It made me dig deeper and by morning I had read all about it including all the stuff other people had to speak about it. I agree with some questions posed by the speaking tree you can read it here and by the Telegraph who analysed the more psychological and sociological aspects of the story.

Anand and Deepa led a quiet life. I’m sure they would not want to be analysed like this or is it that they wanted and maybe people around did not care enough??? They had achieved all that they wanted to in life materially was this why life held no meaning for them??? Were they disillusioned by family ties and friends??? The circumstances of their death and their note in which they say

“We have lived a very eventful and happy life together, We’ve travelled the world, lived in different countries, made more money than we ever thought possible, and enjoyed spending as much of it as we could on things that brought us joy and satisfaction. We believe in the philosophy that our life belongs to us and only us, and we have the right to choose to die as much as we have the right to live. We leave behind no debts or liabilities.””

Or were they so successful that they wished to control their own deaths as they had their lives??? The fact that they tore up all that they read and threw away all that they saw makes me think that they undoubtedly tried to find meaning in their life and then tore them up because all that they read were nothing but lies and made no sense to them. Eventually they went as they came.

Maslow’s hierarchy of needs states that self realization is the last step in the pyramid of needs. When we reach that we are pretty much old and have lived through so much that though life has a totally new meaning by itself. My Ma for example when I regale her with stories everyday about things that are happening and stuff people do around me….. she just smiles and tells me stuff like this does not even warrant a comment from me…….. it is ridiculous. It is just like the stuff I say to my niece when she tells me that she fought with some friend of hers over some real trivial matter. I guess when Maslow suggested his heirarchy of needs he timed self realisation at a time when people’s experiences made them handle things differently. In Anand and Deepa’s case as with most techies that I have seen…….. people get a lot of money and a lot of success by the time they are in their late twenties so then after that they travel the world to get some zing and when that is even over they try to find something new…… they rely on family and friends for support and when they are disillusioned (not IF….. they always are). They take extreme steps. Trying to finding a purpose for life or finding a new meaning for life loses its charm….. Nothing surprises you……. everything seems same…… you are not shocked or excited by anything new……. and all this when you are in your twenties.

Recently a blog of mine found its place in “judges also liked this” not the first not the second or third but it was the first time that somebody thought something of my blog. Just last week my pic took second place in a flower pic challenge. In both cases I was so happy and wanted to share it with somebody and I realized that I had nobody to do it with…… It was just another thing that I would have to file into memory. Was I looking for gratification when I entered these blogs into contests??? I analysed this fact and realized that blogging and taking pics was getting boring and I wanted to feel I was going somewhere so I put it up. My question is if I don’t have anybody to share my happiness with who will I share my fears, my anxiety, my troubles and my unhappiness with????

Quoting from the article

“With each success, there is a feeling of loss — loss of time and loss of value-based relationships. This is when guilt pangs work and people get depressed despite their achievements,”

It is this desolation something like Hansel and Gretel lost in the woods trying to make some kind of meaning to their situation. The feeling that maybe nothing better can ever happen. I am an average person and this happened to me just a little while ago. Isn’t this happening with everyone else as well???……… isn’t it clear why more and more people are folding in the realms of the god men and spiritual leaders or downright declaring themselves as atheists??? Isn’t our social structure crumbling??? Are we becoming more and more jealous of each other or un-tolerant of each other that we cant support each other??? Or are we so nuclear today that something or anything that does not happen to just our loved ones does not concern us???

I am not justifying their act just trying to find a reason……. something of a closure. We cant judge them because we don’t have their version of the story. Concluding with a saying from OSHO something my friend Dhir put up on his FB status:

‎”Make your life… Find out why you are feeling bored. Change. It is such a small life. Take risks, be a gambler — what can you lose? We come with empty hands, we go with empty hands. There is nothing to lose. Just a little time to be playful, to sing a beautiful song, and the time is gone. Each moment is so precious. If you are silent, if you are creative, if you are loving, if you are sensitive to beauty, if you are grateful to this vast universe… There are millions of stars, which are dead — and you are so small, yet you have the most precious thing in existence… LIFE. And not only life, but the possibility of becoming a consciousness, of becoming enlightened, of coming to a space where death has never entered.” – OSHO