Congrats, you made it another year! But why is it that a sense of celebration would misguidedly take a route to contemplation? While you count the milestones achieved and the road to go, times of celebration are not always as colourful as you expect them to be.
Sometimes, they’re blue. The rest of the year is pretty normal, with the variations and hurdles you expect. You make your attempts to be a part of events for those who hold dear to, yet when it comes to you matters are slightly different.
In a world that grapples with measuring the severity of their existential crisis, societal expectations stand bang in the centre of the storm. When it comes to celebrating your existence, emotions vary. Being a closeted person, these rather outlandish celebrations may not appeal to you. Your quotient of enjoyment is a tad bit different, and by all means yours to call. But what happens when the world is watching you?
Birthdays over the years have developed a certain protocol, those using social media would know. What starts with a countdown often ends with stories of your party. So a party or say stepping out to celebrate your birthday is deemed necessary. Thing with protocols is that it may stem comparison. Whether you adhered to the idea of celebrating or not, there’s always that one question that comes up, ‘‘how did you celebrate?” or ‘‘where are you going tonight?’’ By that logic, some assume that you have to do this. Here’s when the nerves kick in.
Back to the colour blue, Urban Dictionary defines ‘birthday blues’ as a general sadness or feeling down by a person on or around his birthday. This could occur due the idea of aging and is also triggered by expectations.
The expectation of enjoyment and having a celebration with your loved ones isn’t always as authentic as one may like to believe. Social media does play a role in being an exaggerated platform of portrayal. Portraying your life to be a certain way starts as a conscious exercise to display the degree of enjoyment. While some tend to keep it real, some savour it for the better days. It makes you question the idea of whether you’re truly living the moment or just a pixelated version of it.
So while you imagine your birthday a certain way, it now becomes a part of your profile. This accentuates your birthday blues. This is a pressure no one needs, but somehow comes along the path of your expectations. Staying in and celebrating is still a choice, but somehow it needs to be depicted in a way that panders to meeting the expectations of having a good time.
From time to time you come across those who love the idea of great bash in their honour, but one can’t help but wonder whether this is authentic or designed for you.
The anxiety is real. The various groups of friends you have need to gel today, but you want to make sure they have a good time. Planning is the toughest when it comes to living up to your expectations. Birthday blues attribute to the fact how dread takes over the closer your birthday gets. Enthusiasm is an emotion at the bottom of the list. But now, you start forcing yourself possibly out of your normal. To act differently at the behest of a celebration is something, you’re not used to.
But then there’s the occasional idea of a low-key celebration. Neither here, nor there, but let’s make everyone happy. The fact that ‘you don’t always have to celebrate’ makes you question the set benchmark of a birthday or any celebration for that fact. Off course it’s a special day, but set the occasion in a way that’s right for you.
Contemplating the year and how it’s been for you is somewhat natural to do on this day, but pitting it against others and whether you kept your deeds in line with the society becomes troublesome. And maybe that’s why the blues. For all you know them maybe common to all, but channelizing them makes all the difference.
In a whirl wind of emotions, it’s not always this day to figure out the rest of the days, but somehow this becomes your time for contemplation. But hey, as long as that feed of yours is colourful enough, you can hide your traces. Augmenting your reality is a part of the game, virtually or in real life.
Making a day of your existence is a pressure you need not take on because creating authentic experiences bereft societal stakes is maybe what it’s all about. It’s all about you while you want to be spoilt silly, you can’t be too reliant. To tone down this feeling of grief is not to shun it away. Create your own special even if it’s you, reading that book you love over and over again. Yes, there’s a protocol, but while you’re blue, paint it with other colours?