A hungry man thinks of bread

To be without some of the things you want is an indispensable part of happiness.

— Bertrand Russell, The Conquest of Happiness

Last Saturday, I was studying at the Analog Cafe in Vancouver, BC, finishing up a Python assignment for my partial differential equations class. The cafe has a unique, cozy atmosphere. The tables are made of a dark-brownish wood, with a glossy finish. You could probably see parts of your reflection in it. The menu hanging above the register was one of those changeable letter boards. I ordered an americano. My table was a little off balance, which was annoying, so I spent most of the afternoon with my foot pressing down on it to keep it balanced. I admit it was hard to stay focused on such a beautiful day, which is usually unheard of in late October. The sun came through the window, producing a glare on my laptop.

By around 2pm, I had finished what I intended to get done for the day. The sun wasn’t shining as bright as it did at noon, and the cafe had gotten really cozy. I looked around, and the day felt too good to waste. Anyways, I impulsively decided to make a plan to head east to Port Moody to kayak with my friend.

My friend is quiet, yet very well-spoken. He doesn’t say more than he needs to and likes to err on the quieter side of things. Sometimes, I swear I can see him thinking before he answers.

The water was windy at first. While kayaking out of Rocky Point Park, he mentioned that, a few years ago, while camping in Tofino, he was asked, “Would you want to be your optimal self?”

I find this a hard question to answer. We both landed on the same thing: it’s either an incredible, deep, thought-provoking question, or it’s a plain, stupid one.

Who wouldn’t want to be their optimal self? The version of you that can essentially learn and absorb content like a sponge, the version of you that’s charismatic, that gets the girl. But is that optimal? It feels shallow, at least to me it does.

I feel like I struggle to answer a question like this because of the complicated little details. For example, being my optimal self, would I lose ambition? Would I still strive for an optimal state? Or are ambition and striving for optimality only things you feel from the perspective of someone who wants to be better? If you have reached optimality, is there anything else for you? I want my optimal self, but my optimal self wants to become its optimal self, and so on.

This feels like it relates to the world’s wealthiest people continuing to work long after they can essentially buy anything humans have ever made. Why do they still work? What are they aiming for? I think they’ve reached what many people would consider optimal, but for themselves, they believe they haven’t reached that state yet. Maybe they don’t feel fulfilled.

Way below my usual baseline#

This question also seems to relate to happiness, specifically long-term happiness, the type that is achieved after having inner peace, satisfaction, and fulfillment. I feel like my optimal self would have all three, permanently. Is that what it means to truly be happy though? In modern society, I think there’s this perfect picture that your life should consist of mostly happy days throughout the week. Being anything but happy feels like it’s not allowed, why?

Being happy also implies that you are unhappy at times as well. I believe that anyone that tells you to just be happy while you’re unhappy is giving you bad advice. I used to be a firm believer in this, that you can directly influence and alter your mental states through belief. Now, I’m not so sure that altering states of mind is that simple. To a certain degree, yes, that’s possible. It just depends on the magnitude of the emotion and the level of metacognition you have.

I had been happy for so long that I feel like my baseline had shifted. Recently, I felt like I was at one of my lowest lows in a while. Way below my usual baseline. I didn’t want to see people, I was exhausted, and I’d forgotten what that felt like. My judgement was clouded, if I had any at all. The world felt cruel, and nothing felt like it would work out.

I consider myself a pretty pessimistic person. Maybe it helps me keep my expectations low so that I’m not disappointed when something doesn’t work out. So, at times like these, I end up spiralling and trying to rationalize. But how can you rationalize abstract thoughts? Thoughts you don’t fully understand, situations out of your control, what can you do? You can’t do anything.

I recall another close friend recently saying that when it comes to emotions, we should “feel it all.” We should feel these raw emotions to their rawest potential version, because that’s what it means to be human. That isn’t weakness. I believe the one that accepts who they are, knows themselves, and can feel their emotions to their maximum magnitude without shame is admirable, compared to the one that doesn’t show emotion and hides away. Maybe that’s closer to an optimal self than the one that learns like a sponge and gets the girl.

I genuinely don’t know if I’d want my optimal self. I feel like working through my lowest moments and feeling everything is the reward.

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On the way back, we stopped paddling and were just floating, still talking about it. I told him, “I think that question is insanely hard, because what would happen once you get your optimal self? What’s next? I don’t know what that would look like.”

He said pretty much the same thing. By then, it was reaching sunset, and the water had become super calm. We sat there for probably 15 minutes.