On flourishing, virtue, and the quiet luxury of living on one’s own terms
What is an unmarried man in his 40s doing in a country that is obsessed with marriage and children?
I will never forget the day when I was about to be a father.
My girlfriend rang me to tell me the “good news”. She was pregnant with my child.
I was very happy to hear the news, but we didn’t keep the baby.
No other moment than that one made me realise that I don’t want to get married and raise a family.
Luckily, my then partner had the same opinion and outlook on life.
But people are people, and they ask.
In India, someone’s marriage is everybody’s affair.
But can you operate without marriage and children?
In India, having a wife, children, land, and livestock is considered flourishing. A well-paying job and a salary are added to the list in modern times.
It is unfortunate for an ancient country with such a rich cultural and spiritual background.
India is in tension with its own inheritance.
Being exotic in modern times is very expensive, and people are going bankrupt to flaunt that exoticness.
To wear the most expensive clothes they have ever worn and offer the most expensive food to friends and family on the wedding day.
They live only for that day, and only on that day.
I find myself happy without taking the beaten path.
I am flourishing.
This invites a discussion on human development and what it means to be virtuous.
Moreover, what it truly means to flourish.
***
The general notion of upbringing is such that rising above barely making ends meet is called flourishing.
It includes the accumulation of wealth and safety.
Hence, in modern times, emotional and social safety is sought in marriage and children. It makes a person “one of us” for others.
But at the very core of its definition, flourishing for a being better than an animal is misunderstood.
For a cognitive being, flourishing is the desire to grow and become valuable.
Moreover, it is expected to be pursued by a valuable person even if the goal is uncertain, unpredictable, and unknown.
Making a species flourish is not an intellectual undertaking; it is a biological aspiration.
Even animals are capable of that.
We seek flourishing but often lose track of where it is found more profoundly.
It is not societal pressure or the need to fit into a norm that highlights virtuous living.
The people we find virtuous are not virtuous because they got married and had kids.
That could be part of their life, but it was not their life.
They were busy making breakthroughs and building ideas upon ideas.
This virtue of self-expression is a trait of character that enables a person to flourish.
Then, should everybody completely discard the concept of marriage from the social structure, especially in a country like India?
Firstly, you don’t have to be married to have kids.
Secondly, I am not here to judge anybody for their individual and personal decisions to commit to another person. I personally find it unnatural, and if someone chooses it, I observe that it often comes from a need for safety—emotional or financial.
This puts us in an uneasy spot.
But this is also the very phase that can turn moths like us into butterflies.
Free.
Questioning evokes rational living. If you want someone to act rationally, ask the right questions, and you will receive clearer responses.
What is the question?
***
I would say—don’t trust anything. Not even yourself. Question it.
Our beliefs are lies we are comfortable with.
Everybody has a different set of beliefs; hence, everybody has a different set of lies.
The biggest problem with lies is that we impose them on others for the sake of gratification and justification.
That is the instrument of any institution at large—be it a corporate office, a school, or a religion.
We were taught in school that petrol would become extinct in 15 years. Thirty-five years later, I am still using a vintage petrol bike.
Nobody knows where they are going, and yet they want everybody else to hold their hand and walk with them.
So that if they fall into a pit, they fall together, and no one is left to be judged.
If you truly want to be a leader, inspire people to take their own path.
Leaders not only inspire leadership in others but also inspire them to inspire further.
That is flourishing.
If I get married only because all my friends and siblings are getting married, I would be playing monkey see, monkey do.
A leader is—
Reliable, sincere, humble, honest, creative, passionate yet compassionate, giving, sharing, autonomous, valuable, unconditionally accepting, selfless, for you and pro you.
These are qualities of a virtuous person. Be this person, because people are looking for you.
***
People fear unexpected or unwanted responses to the decisions they want to make and end up living a life they don’t want.
Many of my married friends and family live in stress and quiet regret.
We take conventional decisions because they have been validated for generations.
The ecology of our existence has changed. We no longer live in caves.
We don’t need to cling to the safety of a husband to provide or a wife to carry forward genes.
If people are meant to come together and live together, they will.
Regardless of being married or not.
Like many people in my life, who came and stayed for a while.
Something fragile and tender blossoms in me every time I fall in love.
And if I had married all the people I had fallen in love with, it would have cemented that fragility instead of allowing it to flourish.
There is beauty in the importance of a relationship.
You cannot be calculative about it. It is intangible and can only be shared, not transferred.
And to do so, we need to have better relationships with ourselves.
The better we are with ourselves, the better we are with others.
Because when we are ourselves, we can relate to others with empathy. There is no place for anxiety, jealousy, or judgment.
Flourish.
***
Commit to the process of simply being yourself.
It offers people the opportunity to experience us as we are.
And it all begins with simple questions.
Who are we in our spirit? Who are we in our souls?
What remains of us if we exclude the body and material possessions?
Offer that.
Being in touch with that which is not seen or touched appears like nothing.
And this nothingness is where the quality of thought arises.
This nothingness facilitates emotional experience.
It enables conscious decisions without fear of uncertainty.
It allows us to appreciate life as it is.
To accept people and events as they are.
In this space of appreciation and complementing one another rather than competing, we can accomplish wonders together.
It is not money, marriage, or material possessions that enable living life fully; it is living a virtuous life.
We must be flourishing in our hearts, in our understanding of truth, and in our knowledge of ourselves.
We are creative beings. We are seekers of knowledge. We can reason.
Living otherwise is chasing external stimuli in search of contentment.
A doomed attempt, no matter how hard one tries.