Happiness is Overrated

Happiness is Overrated

   January 31, 2018       Hardik Gandhi

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Here’s what to pursue instead.

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Not too long ago, I was floating in the crystal-clear Pacific Ocean, the water lapping against my back and saltwater seeping into and out of my pores, the hypnotic rush of the waves providing the back-beat for the symphony of seagulls. I didn’t notice. My body was in the water — my mind was somewhere else.

I spent nearly all of 2017 sinking into a black hole of rage and sadness. I spent the year crisscrossing the country hoping my demons wouldn’t follow me. They did. I ran a marathon in Orlando. I spent springtime in New York. I saw the Cubs in Chicago. I saw Kendrick Lamar in Phoenix. I spent a secret weekend in Seattle. I took my mom to New Orleans. I surfed in San Diego. I saw the Lakers, Kings and Chargers in Los Angeles. I climbed the cliffs of Malibu. I drank wine in Napa. I rode scooters around San Francisco. I heard soul in Memphis. I saw old friends and met new ones. And I did SXSW and ACL right here in Austin. It was everything … yet it did nothing to beat back the double-barreled blast of depression of anxiety. And all I could do was wonder why.

I have an incredible job that I love and excel at. I have parents who love me to the moon and back. I have some side-talents I’ve developed that have turned into side-hustles that bring me great joy and the occasional paycheck. I live in one of my favorite cities. I have fun friends who bring smiles to my face. I have a cat who, while prickly and swatty, is kinda cute and keeps me company. I have a nice roof over my head, a comfortable bed to sleep in and a car to get me where I need to go. I haven’t always had all these things.

Still, I find myself chanting: “Happiness is not enough.”

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I have a pathological fear of my life crashing down upon me, ruining everything I’ve worked for, napalming all my relationships, causing me to die young, or kicking me back out onto the street or into jail with the riff-raff. I nearly always feel like I should be doing something else … that I’m not making effective use of my time. I spend many waking moments feeling restless and fearful. I often feel unworthy of love and friendship. And I’ve often wondered why, and have spent a great many years at Medium mining my psyche on this. Not long ago, I finally drilled down deep enough to strike oil. And so I know: The cause of my constant dread and ache is a voice inside my head that’s as verbally abusive as any drill sergeant or SEC football coach. It’s rooted in someone else’s voice that’s been with me all my life, and I’m only now beginning to recognize it and undermine it.

Prior to that epiphany, I’d spent my life trying to outrun it instead. I’d been trying to silence that voice by cramming as much happiness into every waking minute as I possibly can: More accomplishments. Bigger paychecks. New clothes. Trips across the country. Luxurious meals. Long hikes. Longer nights out. Drinks. Sex. Deeper friendships. Viral columns. Even more drinks. Trying to set a high score in the game of life. I believed that if I am perpetually happy, then I will never have time to be sad.

And then I come home. Take off my shoes and my sweater like Mr. Rogers, plop myself into bed, and lay there praying for sleep to come swiftly, while shaking like I’m withdrawing from heroin. The voice remains. You can escape pretty much anything, but you can never leave yourself.

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I always believed that you stockpile happy memories the way you’d deposit money in a 401K — filling your soul’s bucket to the brim with it. After that swim, I realized I could be wrong —in fact, that analogy is a bit backwards.

Our souls do float across the sea of life, taking on water as they go, sinking ever so slightly — perhaps even imperceptibly — into despair. But our souls are not the bucket. Happiness itself is. And it’s the bucket we use to pour water out our souls and keep us afloat. What we really need is peace. Peace patches the holes in our souls and stops the leaking. Once we have peace, we will no longer need to seek happiness.

How do you find peace? You find peace through living your truth, through pursuing your passion. You find peace through meditation or yoga (or god, if that’s your thing). You find peace when you become your best self and when you make the right decisions. You find peace through challenging yourself to do good, to take risks, and by delaying gratification for the sake of setting yourself up for future success. You find peace through connecting with and caring for others. You find peace in the stillness of yourself. You find peace when you recognize the voice inside your head that says you don’t deserve it, and you smirk as you minimize that voice until it no longer has a say. You find peace without looking for it. I’ve touched on this before and failed to realize it. Peace is the ultimate pursuit — it’s miles away from happiness, no matter how far you travel.

Happiness is a cigarette. Peace is a clear lung.

Happiness is sex. Peace is love.

Happiness is a Lexus. Peace is a 401K.

Happiness is a wine buzz. Peace is sobriety.

Happiness is what’s best. Peace is what’s right.

Happiness is temporary. Peace is forever.

Happiness is doing something you know you shouldn’t, because you can. Peace is doing something you think you can’t, because you should.

Happiness is floating in the crystal-clear Pacific Ocean, water lapping against your back, saltwater seeping into and out of your pores, the hypnotic rush of the waves and a symphony of seagulls. Peace is what allows you to notice it all.

The next time I wander out into the water, I want my mind to come with me.

I don’t think that’s wanting too much.

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What Sobriety Taught Me (So Far)

What Sobriety Taught Me (So Far)

   January 29, 2018       Hardik Gandhi

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The nature and the nurture of reality.

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So, if you’re into anniversaries and celebrating and commemorating things, and one could argue that all milestones are worth celebrating because joy should be seized whenever it lays out in the open begging for your attention, here’s an arbitrary one:

It’s been 159 days since this. It’s long enough to reflect and notice a considerable change in who I am. We’ll get to whether that’s good or bad. It was an easy choice, but it’s been a difficult implementation.

As a musician it is hard work to not get plastered: I would spend three-to-five nights each week in bars, often times till close. And people have historically always, always bought me drinks. Friends and strangers seem to get a morbid rise out of pouring gasoline on a liver fire, I guess.

As a substitute, I have consumed vast oceans of Topo Chico, a beverage I had not even heard of until I moved to Austin, and now one I cannot breathe without. I can’t say I ever entertained the idea of drinking mineral water as a recreational activity. And yet I set a new record by pounding eight at a birthday party on a recent evening. Many bartenders, club owners and friends have asked me if I am okay. None thought to ask that when I was slamming eight beers. I wonder when it stops getting awkward.

I also wonder when I start developing healthy habits. I spend the vast majority of my time stuffing my face with pizza, watching football and fretting recklessly over what I’m going to do with the rest of my life now that I have a clear-ish head. I suppose it beats lying on the lawn and holding onto a blade grass to stop myself from falling off the face of the Earth.

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A long time ago, on one breezy, sunny summer afternoon, my dad, his wife and I were sitting on a patio at Gramma Mora’s Mexican Restaurant on Hertel Avenue in my hometown of Buffalo, New York.

In between bites, my step-mama asked us both what our greatest flaw was. My dad went first, and his answer was quick, definitive and shocking. He said, “I wish I cared more about other people.”

My father is one of the most loving, patient, kind, and wise people that’s walked this pebble. I have no idea how, or why, he’d come out firing with what sounds like the ultimate backhanded slap to himself.

Flash forward to this birthday party where I slammed eight Topo Chicos. (Ocho Chicos?) I saw gorgeous young women dancing on bars, and I gasped at fools rolling around on a floor covered in body-paint. Silly-string and balloons pelted me from several yards away. Entrancing, psychedelic music of all kinds tickled my ears. I had signed on to be host and MC, and did a capable, enthusiastic job. And yet, once off-stage, I often retreated to a silent corner and streamed the Sixers game.

I heard a card-carrying member of the outer-ring of my friend circle tell me, “I hate what you write. And then I love what you write. Sometimes in the same sentence. Keep doing what you’re doing. You’re amazing.”

I heard another (somewhat) closer friend tell me, unsolicited and seemingly on the verge of tears, “You’re amazing. And you have no idea how amazing you are. And that makes you even more amazing.”

I heard a (ostensibly) very close friend tell me, slurring, “I love you, man. You’re one of my favorite people of all-time.”

And I would smile, and say “thank you,” and we would all hug. And then I’d wander back off to take a piss I didn’t have to take. I felt like I was living in the third person, like I was a surveillance camera peering upon my own life. An unbiased observer. A watchful eye for someone who needed watching over. I was completely detached. I wish I cared more about other people.

I caught myself ruminating on a lot of things: my health, my job, my bills, my pile of laundry, my lost debit card (again!), my forthcoming European vacation, my failed romances, my current circle of friends that I wish to cull to a more manageable size, my plans for the weekend, my brother I haven’t talked to in over four years, my goals, my ambitions, my career, my philanthropy. I am a pathologically restless soul with a pathological amount of pathetic personality quirks. I need to fix and finalize these things before all my flaws eat me alive , all before everyone notices. At that moment, I finally understood what my father was talking about.

I am so concerned with how I am that I actually forget to just … well … be. I don’t converse well with anyone beyond pithy zingers. I don’t share anything of substance with people in real life beyond music or humor. The National once sang, “When I walk into a room … I do not light it up.” It hits home so hard. So much wattage is being expended gathering, re-gathering and napalming my abusive and destructive inner dialogue, so many inward-facing amps, that the energy directed outward is muted and minimal. My body is here. My mind is not. I’m not present. I’m not really here.

And at that moment … I realized why I used to drink: To silence my inner dialogue and focus my energy outward —I drank to care more about other people.

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Mistakes are a man-made construct. We’re all living, breathing organisms trying to survive — making decisions with imperfect information that precipitate a range of probable outcomes. No action we take has fundamental, intrinsic value beyond eating and sex. If we eat the wrong thing (or fail to eat), we get sick or die. If we do not have sex and/or have sex with the wrong people, a whole litany of sub-optimal outcomes are possible.

Problems are man-made, too. They’re deficits in character that we only deem true when we compare ourselves to an arbitrary standard, or when we compare ourselves to arbitrary people close in proximity to us. Comparisons kill. Expectations are hell.

Someone once told me, “don’t let a mistake become a problem.” In other words, if you fuck up, own it and fix it before your fuck-ups define your character. I’ve always believed this, and yet I am starting to believe I’ve had it backwards this whole time.

I’ve had (and have) problems. Problems I invented. Problems I wanted to get away from. I drank a little much. I still don’t really exercise enough. I shake and sweat uncontrollably. I shut down and avoid dealing with things. I am frayed, frazzled and burnt the fuck out — and have been for as long as I can remember. Right now, as I write this, I look like I’ve been hung in a smokehouse and run over by a truck. I walk with an unsteady gait. I sit hunched like a geriatric Quasimodo. Oh, how many days my alarm’s gone off, I’ve hit snooze, said “Fuck this shit,” and said, “I’ll try again tomorrow,” — all before 9 a.m. Sure, I want those days back. I make no secret about it. I wasted them all. Sometimes while wasted. I let my problems become mistakes. See? Backwards.

What I do not have, however, are problems I cannot fix. In fact, it is my rumination over them, and subsequent self-loathing for spending that much time hashing and rehashing a strategy for assassinating them, that’s more problematic than any black-mark you could tag on me. I live in a constant state of stress, paranoia and a complete lack of presence in the “true” reality.

Reality, or what we think is reality, goes mostly unnoticed. I think back to David Foster Wallace saying, “This is water.” So much of life happens under the surface and under the radar. Even the most delicious cake in the world is mostly flour. Our thoughts, when left to run wild in the silent cacophony of our own heads, can cause unrelenting madness if we let them. Our expectations can defeat us before we even scramble out of the blocks.

Everything you do and, by extension, everything you are, is filtered through everything you think, and everything you feel. When you have no filter, you can let all the light in and it becomes easier to care about other people.

I wake up every morning afraid I’ll fail at this whole “not drinking” experiment, or fail at life and in many other things. I’ve had recurring nightmares that I’ve been dragged away from my desk or thrown off a stage or into jail or prison or a hospital. I’m so convinced I’ll be “outed” as a failure that I’m essentially posting this as a preemptive strike to say “not unless I reveal I am a failure to all of you first.”

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So, what I’ve learned so far is this: I drank to step out of my own head. It’s a secondary problem — a manifestation of my own inability to silence my inner critic and exist in a state of empathetic reality. The primary problem I need to solve is being kind and understanding to myself, so that I may be kind and understanding to others. I need to be able to trust that problems don’t need to turn into mistakes, and that even if they do, mistakes aren’t failures, and they’re nothing to be afraid of. Every day, every new person I meet, is an opportunity to make the most and the best of whatever’s in front of me. That’ll help me chill the hell out and open myself up to more of what’s around. I want to fully inhabit this body and not be the surveillance camera in the corner monitoring my every move. That’s all I’ve got. That and a fridge full of Topo Chico, anyway.

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