Hey Sach

Reading your post on being twenty and being confused and possibly depressed about it, made me wonder about the metamorphosis from teenager to adult in today’s privilaged Sri Lankan society. In your case, by your own admission, you have understanding and supportive parents, a very secure and satisfactory lifestyle, exposure to most influences of your choice, expertise in music, performing with a group of other musicians, friends and relationships and all sorts of other goodies that a majority of Sri Lankan twenty-somes have very little of – in other words, a pretty good slice of life has gone by with little or no glitches to even hint at austere or unpleasant possibilities. So what’s the problem? Could too much of a good thing be the cause of this feeling of not being fulfilled? Bored with the good life?

If the emotion you expressed could be equated with unhappiness (for surely you don’t come across as ‘not unhappy’ in this post) at your state of mind, then it must follow that the cause for this must have to do with some unfulfilled desire? One of these (if there are more than one) could well be the need to experience living independently of your parents, which you express almost in passing, but also being considerate of your parents’ likelihood of not wanting this right now, puts a damper on that one. You also mention that you are “.. too busy to take a break to enjoy life”, which may just be a cop-out, as your studies are now done – until next January, at least. And even for the next ten days when you say you are “free”, doesn’t bring up the possibilities of that “break” you mentioned you couldn’t take due to being too “busy”. So what gives? Not wanting to look at what’s really going on in your head? If so, the attitude won’t help in solving the problem. All the advice from well-intentioned respondents will not be of use if the crux of the problem is not looked at as dispassionately as possible.

Wanting to “run away” from the life you see “stretching in front” of you is a more than a little sad – a statement reflecting the present state of mind, but now that you have come to terms with it, there is much that could be done to change the mindset. The solution, however, lies with you and your ability to cut through the crap of conditioning and look at life with a fresh perspective. A change of environment, whether physical or in the head, is always one way of catalyzing a shift in perspective and the will to set that in motion must be imperative to get things started in the opposite direction to what is being felt right now.

Actually, come to think of it, age probably doesn’t have all that much to do with this feeling of despair that so many folk experience in the course of their lives. Being ‘twenty’ is probably just an association with all the events that have occurred nearly simultaneously at that particular point in time for you, so that’s another association to label as irrelevant and dump, so as not to clutter the space.

Maybe it’s time for a little adventure to break from the monotony of the times you have been experiencing all your life – your parents will surely understand if they are as cool as you make them out to be. Backpacking with a friend or two can be very trippy and will expose you to all manner of new experiences – you have until January, right? Very often it takes leaving something or someone to actually realise the value of that which wasn’t considered valuable before leaving. There’s other things too that maybe you could consider given your interests, so give it a go and get off the bummer. You’re too valuable to go to waste.