By Dhruv Arora:
I want you to imagine something. I want you to take an image of what you look like right now, and make it perfect in your head. Remove everything that you don’t like about yourself and add everything you want. I want you to picture yourself looking like everything that you want yourself to look like till the point where there is nothing left to change. Now I want you to tell me how confident you feel to walk out of your house and promise me that you will be happy.
Now, picture this. I want you to look down and peek inside your pants. Now I want you to picture the most perfect genitals that you can ever hope to possess. I want you to add or remove size or girth, hair or colour, or even the fragrance. Now I want you to open your eyes, look at me and promise me that possessing these godlike genitals will bring you happiness.
Now, imagine happiness. Chances are, none of what you pictured in the last two scenarios came from you or is your idea of happiness. Make the connection that having the so called “perfect body”, or “perfect gender”, whatever that is, has nothing to do with how happy or satisfied you are. Stop trying to make people think that you’re happy, and be happy.
“I’m just worried about your health“, he said as he breathed in a fresh batch of smoke into his lungs, “It’s not about conforming to anyone’s idea of perfection”.
“You know, it IS your fault that you look like that” she said, as she concealed her dark circles underneath layers of cosmetics, “if you could just make a little effort you wouldn’t have to worry”.
“I don’t judge people for being gay”, they said, “but why do they have to shove it in other peoples’ faces?”
“I don’t buy into the unrealistic standards of beauty set by the media”, she said, “but damn, I’d be Ryan Gosling’s blue valentine any night!”
“You know, people don’t like fat or ugly people. I mean, it is in your hands to change that. You can’t tell people what to like”, he said, as he purchased the new skin moisturizing cream for men.
…and it never ends.
They have creams to make penises larger and vaginas brighter and tighter. They want to increase the size of the so called masculine satisfaction and decorate its apparent docking home with lights and frizzes. They want your masculinity to be defined by the inches in your pants and a woman’s feminity by the brightness in her panties; and they are trying to get you to define your birth with the shades, sizes and shapes of your genitals. They want you to be thinner and curvier, thicker and broader, they want you to increase the length of your penis and the depth of your vagina. They want you to know that you’re never ever going to be perfect so they can keep you coming back and asking for more and more and even more of some liquid drops of what they call perfection, and this cycle will NEVER stop unless you say NO.
…no, I will NOT give in to this self-deprecating circus of exaggerations and complexes. No, I will NOT have you tell me what I can or cannot become based on your flawed assumptions of what my genitals, the colour of my skin, my weight or my gender may imply, I said as I renewed my membership to the gym; because I, too, am a part of this circle, even though I may loathe it. They would like you to know that what you’re saying will have no weight if you have too much of it, that you will only be someone’s walking stick if you don’t have a stick between your legs; that you are not entitled to basic human rights if you are not copulating with someone of the opposite gender.
The beauty of all of this is that none of these people telling you the key to happiness are themselves happy; and none of the people concerned for your health are healthy. In the end, we are all conforming to the idea of non-conformity while donning the newest in fashion and technology, I write with my shiny new laptop. A few more drops of liquid perfection, but of that specific brand, for reasons, and you could be one step closer to giving up your life completely and “perfectly”.
I should renew my gym subscription.