I do not know when one draws a line and says ‘No, the happiness you are feeling right now, is not right? Just as your sadness the other day.’ I, once, asked a psychiatrist why he/she mentioned that treating bipolar disorder is the hardest. Her/His response: How can you convince someone that they shouldn’t be this excited, and happy? How can you even identify that their happiness would be self- harming?

He/She was using the term happiness so I could relate to it from my own behavior and we were mainly talking about the early stages. Yet, it was something I never thought. We help people when they are deep in sorrow, this behavior is instinctive , almost. I can guess what to say, what to do, even though is not always the right thing. At times, I can even identify my own sorrow that is harmful to me and remove the sources of it from my life. But happiness?

I have ideas for at least a three full blown art exhibition. It just comes to me… But often ideas, this big, dies without me doing anything about them. It always puzzled me, as to why? I was so excited about them at that moment, I couldn’t possibly make it happen then and there, why can’t I accept that it takes time? I have patience, you see, that is not the issue. I couldn’t find an answer. Thus, I started to question the way I do the small things that gives me joy like reading a book. I had this rule that a book must be finished within three to five days. I didn’t set this rule because I wanted to read fast. But that’s how I was. A relative of mine, asked me once, how could I finish a thick book in that short time? The answer was if it is exciting, I do, literally nothing else but read (and of course, she has kids to look after and I don’t).

The brief exchange with the psychiatrist, I had, was enough to solve my long overdue puzzle. It also explained, why my mom and my sister had a bet whether I would give up my cat. My mom thought that I would simply be bored and give her away. My sister thought otherwise. My sister was right, that I didn’t give her up. But this morning I realized, my mother was also right. She thought I would be bored, because over the years she has observed me doing things with a passion for a short time and giving up soon after.

I need to control my happiness. It is not that I don’t have the patience to see the end of projects, activities but my excitement burns itself too quickly. I should take all those positive thoughts and store it somewhere to use it for an extended period of time. I do not know how of course. But starting with the small things. Finishing a book in a longer time period is one thing I have achieved.

I came up with this idea to combine math with programming so that I could improve in both. I could write a program that would use the polynoms and plot a graph. But I should write such that it would mimic the motions of wings. I could add some other details about the bird later, using the equations. I was so excited when I came up with this project for myself. I even thought things like this could be used in classrooms too. I haven’t started it yet, but I am not letting it die as well. I have stored all that joy and using it little by little.

There are, of course, other reasons too as to why something would be left unfinished. But if it is a project that involves only me this seems to be the reason. If it involves other people, I look into my level of respect towards other people. When there is no respect left, there is little hope for things to be finished for them. Only when I find a reason for me, only then it gets finished.

And why any language would have gender labelled pronouns? Seriously? Why was this so important?