What does it mean to be happy?

September 2014. My friends and I went to the Horseshoe Casino in downtown Chicago one day. They occupied tables at Blackjack and Poker while I played Baccarat, a game that fascinated me with a 50% chance. We made decent returns that night and later hung out at Sound, a popular nightclub in Chicago. As they say, the money you earn at a casino never goes accounted for and we spent it all at the club and returned home.

My friends and I at a club in Chicago, 2014.

I went to work the next day and ran through the marathon meetings that made me question the little interest I had at doing something productive with my career. After work, my girlfriend and I went to watch The Entourage. My relationship with my then girlfriend was more about sightseeing and handcuffs (handcuffs are overrated) than it was about comfort and connect. She asked me four times a day about what I am thinking, a question that enraged all the nerves in my body at once. Later that evening, a few friends came over for drinks and everyone wrestled to play the songs they like to show off their taste in music.

Around midnight, Abhisek, with who I have had deeply philosophical tête-à-tête's over the drinking years, wanted to light a cigarette. We sat in the patio sipping Monkey Shoulder and protecting ourselves from the freezing winds of Chicago.

Abhisek and I in the patio, 2014.

I turned to him and said, "There must be something more to life than this monotonous work and partying. It feels like everything is good yet there is something missing". I wondered what Abhisek would say about my privileged lifestyle that I was complaining about. He sipped some of his whiskey and drew in a few drags that burnt his cigarette complete.

"You are not happy, man", he said. What he said made me wonder. I pondered over his words but couldn't make anything of them.

"Lets go listen to some Snow Patrol", he said, gesturing to get inside the apartment.

Three years passed after that night. Most nights were filled with films, drinking, casinos and stories of women in our lives while days were filled with lifeless attempts to make sense of a career that I hardly found stimulating.

October 2017. One evening, I was watching a TV show hosted by one of my favourites, Ellen Degeneres, who has raised millions of dollars for impoverished children in the United States. After many episodes of watching her give away hundreds of thousands of dollars, I wondered how such levels of poverty prevailed in a developed country like the United States. I did some research and to my dismay, the data presented itself to me: a) 15 million children in the US live below the poverty line, that is 1 out of every 5 children b) 43 million children live in low-income households and have no access to healthcare and c) only 4 other OECD countries have a higher child poverty rate than the US (Mexico, Spain, Israel and Turkey). Surprised with the findings, I wanted to do more. My plan was to develop a non-profit app and write an algorithm that would identify schools in 99% poverty and then raise donations for these schools. Instead of burning the donations for temporary relief, I wanted to partner with healthcare providers to get sustained care for these kids.

I reached out to some local and federal government agencies within the country and requested to meet with them for more information. I went to a few local schools around Chicago to understand and see for myself how the school programs worked amidst 99% poverty conditions.

One day, I happened to meet a school superintendent, Ms. Beth Derry, at a public school in Peoria, Illinois. Ms. Derry allowed me to speak with some of the kids during their recess. I wanted to learn more about the circumstances of these kids' lives to understand how poverty affected them. Ms. Derry put me in a room adjacent to her cabin so I could speak to the kids. I spoke to 4 kids that day as one after the other came into the room and shared about their lives with me.

"Heyyy! How are you buddy? What's your name?" I asked the third kid as I rolled the chair for him to sit.

"Justin", said the shy young boy with a confused grin wondering where the candy was. I forgot to take candy for the kids.

Justin is a 11 year old African-American kid who was born and brought up in Peoria county around Chicago for most of his life. He had the African-American accent, which I always thought was very cool but almost impossible to imitate. I could see that Justin was a few pounds shy for his age and he didn't particularly seem healthy either. His facial skin was hardly shielding his skeleton and I could tell that he didn't have a good meal in a long time.

"Hi Justin! So nice to see you. Did you just finish your class?", I asked.

"Yes", said Justin.

"Wonderful. What class was it?", I asked, trying to make small talk before getting to business.

"Science", he said.

"I always loved science when I was growing up. What did you learn about today?", I asked.

There was a long silence that ensued and I noticed Justin's face turn blank. I figured he had not paid any attention to the class.

"Don't worry about it. I could never follow all the classes myself when I was in school and it is okay. But don't neglect the homework, okay?" I said trying to take his guilt away. Its amazing to look back and wonder about the kind of things you feared as a kid.

"Okay", said Justin.

"I am going to ask a few questions about your parents and what you do at home. Is that okay? You can always tell me if you do not want to answer", I asked.

"Okay", he said, maintaining his form of one word answers.

I asked Justin a few questions about where he lived and how his neighbourhood was. I then proceeded to ask him about his parents, living conditions at home and his recreational activities.

"Justin, can you tell me what your father does for a living?", I asked.

"He is not here", said Justin, making me wonder if that is a clue for his father passing away.

"Umm..does he live in a different city?", I asked shamelessly.

"He is in prison", he said, with a straight face that made me wonder how to react.

"I am so sorry to hear that. Do you ever go visit him?", I asked, feeling a suspense that I may break his straight face and make him cry.

"Sometimes", he said.

"Do you know when you went to visit him the last time?", I asked out of curiosity.

"About 3 months ago", said Justin. I watched prison visitations only on TV but I was pretty sure that you can have visitations much more frequently than once in 3 months. I wondered how severe the crime was.

"So, who else lives with you at home, Justin?", I asked trying to get clues to why he was seeing his father so seldom.

The main screen of the app prototype I worked on in 2017.

"My mother", he said.

"Can I ask you what your mother does for a living?"

"She used to work at Burger King", said Justin, making me want to ask him the obvious.

"I see. What does she do now? Do you know how your mother pays the rent?", I asked.

"I don't know", he said

"Okay, no problem. Does your mother cook at home? Does she play with you after school?"

"Sometimes. Mostly her friends come home and they sit in a room and smoke". I understood right away that Justin was referring to drugs but it kind of surprised and numbed me. I began to wonder if I can discuss crime at school, especially when Ms. Derry is right across an open door in her office. I imagined Justin's mother banging on my apartment door later that night for harassing her kid with questions. I felt so sorry and helpless for Justin. It amazed me how Justin maintained a straight face talking about his outrageous circumstances at home, an indication that he unconsciously accepted how his childhood is going to be. At an age when a child's personality should blossom, Justin was seeing and growing around all the negative things this world could offer.

"What do you do when your mom doesn't cook for you?", I probed to understand his alternatives for a daily meal.

"I eat at school", he said.

"Okay, that's nice. I am happy to know that you can eat at school, Justin", I said, trying to bring some solace into the conversation.

I asked Justin a few more questions after that and then proceeded to speak with Ms. Derry. Speaking to Ms. Derry, I had gotten to know that Justin's mom was arrested and put in jail a couple of years ago for shoplifting and drugs. Justin had to live at his grandparents' house at the time. I also learnt that the Obama Administration had introduced the National School Lunch Program (NSLP Act) to provide free lunches for kids in poverty hit schools(the Trump administration in 2018 tried to relax terms of this law, which would reduce the cost for business partners and make the meals less nutritious. A court in 2020 eventually struck down the attempt by the Trump administration). It was eye-opening and overwhelming to learn how unemployment can induce someone into devastating environments such as drugs. It is almost impossible to find a decent job once you are a convicted felon in the United States. It was no surprise to learn through my research of FBI records that neighbourhoods with higher unemployment rates recorded higher poverty levels, which in turn reflected higher crime rates.

I felt bad for Justin. I wondered how it would be for him to go home after school everyday. I imagined an apartment with very dark spaces - both physically and psychologically, with people just laying around and injecting drugs into their bodies, and a poor kid playing games on his phone wondering if there is going to be any dinner. Justin's story moved me because his circumstances meant that he will never be able to focus on his education. How can someone who wants to secure a daily meal focus on learning something? It was a powerful experience meeting Justin, yet a disturbing one. As I thought deeply about his circumstances, it made me retreat to my childhood to introspect on my upbringing.

When I was a kid, my father passed away in a road accident. My mother, who had completed her college 19 years before that, had dedicated her life to raising my brother and I as a homemaker. After my father's passing away, my mother had to quickly realise the new order of life. Without any savings in the bank, she had to learn to ignore everything that didn't matter and focus on putting food at the dinner table. I remember vividly that for two years after my father's death, my brother and I were given 5 rupees a day ($ 0.06) to spend on things we liked. Everyday during those two years, after my classes ended, I would run to the school canteen and buy a vegetable puff (sometimes called a common man's pizza) for 3 rupees and my favourite Rasna fruit drink for 2 rupees. My generous friends and dorm-mates would sometimes chip in and buy me things that I could not afford. At the time, I always wondered why my mother would not give us more money.

Mom and I at the World Trade Center, 2016.

Justin's story helped me understand the sacrifices my mother made for my brother and I. With no warning, my mother had to suddenly deal with figuring out her employment, finding her way up in a male dominated society, and hustle hard to ensure that my brother and I always received quality education. If my mother had had any distractions at that juncture of our lives, things would have been very different for all 3 of us. She had to bear the burden of raising two kids with no help whatsoever from her in-laws and parents. I felt like the universe opened the right doors at the right time for us, but my mother had to constantly keep at trying to push these doors open.

The 48 hours that followed after meeting Justin left me with a lot of thoughts, which proved to be one of the turning points of my life. I kept questioning myself various things that never occurred to me - why is Justin struggling so much when I had a privileged life? I was facing a few hardships in my life before Justin's story happened. What do all those hardships mean and for what? what is the point of our existence? why are we on this planet living the lives that we live? what does our life mean in the face of death? My thoughts kept taking me back to the difference our respective mothers made in our lives. That day, as I sat in my garden and connected my story with that of Justin's, I learned something very powerful - the meaning of our lives is to find our joy(what makes you happy) and the purpose of our living is to give the joy away to create value in others' lives. My mother found great purpose in advancing the lives of her children while Elon Musk found his purpose in taking human civilisation from one planet to the other. I wished someone's purpose also made Justin's life better.

I started to think about what our life meant in the face of death. We live in a universe filled with billions of galaxies, which contain billions more of stars and planets. Those 48 hours made me comprehend the fact that we are nothing but a tiny tiny minuscule part of this vast universe. That powerful realisation humbled me to my core and made me recognise how stunningly short our time in this universe is. I was 26 years old that day and suddenly a very uncomfortable feeling crept into me. A feeling that I had been wasting all my years with friendships that don't matter, with relationships that fuelled unnecessary hate, and with a career that made me feel lifeless. I began to feel silly about the fact that I was taking myself so seriously all those years. In the bigger scheme of things, I felt all the negativity would only cheapen our biggest asset - time.

Throughout the next few days, I felt a sudden rush to change how I was living my life. I imagined myself being 60 years old and it terrified me that I have not had experiences that would have made me feel content with my life. That was it. I wanted every decision in my life from that day on to be one that helps me live a happy and content life. I looked forward to my future and acknowledged the few years that I had left to live. I sensed that I was not truly happy - and content - but how do I find my gift that makes me happy? I wanted to search for what that was and try to live a life that fulfilled my existence. I looked back to understand how I reached that day and that hour when I was having all these thoughts - I was watching a TV show about impoverished kids and wanted to do something about it. And by doing something I connected with, I was able to experience something very powerful.

A scene from Unbroken, an exceptional true story directed by Angelina Jolie. Three soldiers find themselves stranded in sea after a fatal plane crash. They wonder why they are alive while others died.

As I write this blog, it has been 3 years since I began the process of finding happiness. The journey has not been easy but very rewarding. I looked back at the jobs I worked on and questioned myself - there are a billion jobs in this world, why am I doing what I am doing if that does not fulfil my heart? I felt like a small kid with wonder when I started to discover how many different kinds of careers people had and how vast the world truly is to explore in our lifetime. I moved from one continent to the other in the process of finding something that I can connect with on a daily basis.

I looked back at all things in my life that helped me build toxic relationships and decided to pay little attention to friendships that did not carry value beyond money and beer. I began to value more the people I believed were being constructive to my life. I started being grateful for the women I dated, who helped me understand the value of pain, grief and sorrow in finding myself. No matter how troubled my past experiences were with people, I started with a clean slate with every new person in my life. Because I believe people are inherently good, until circumstances change them. Now, the world seems so beautiful to me and I appreciate the differences much more. I hate taking myself seriously and understand the importance of being compassionate and kind.

Today, I don't know if I am truly happy. But I wake up everyday looking forward to meeting someone and doing something that will help me understand myself little more. I met a couple in Thailand that made me envious of the fact that they were truly happy and content without much money and all they wanted to do in life was travel across the world and teach kids. I met a very successful Investment Banker in France who helped fuel the ambition within me to dream big and test my professional abilities for at least once in my life. I met a kind filmmaker in India who helped me understand that I am passionate about listening to people's stories and letting the world know about these stories. I still go to the casino and invite people over for drinks but I look at experiences and people differently.

Today, I believe that life is very short but very beautiful if you appreciate all the little things that go into making it worthy. I am learning to live with optimism and change rather than with caution. I learnt that happiness is something that you cannot search for but it is something that can only be met through life experiences. Nothing makes me more happy in this world now than to look forward to life itself, in all its unpredictability and glory. I look forward to watching a film with all my heart as much as I look forward to understanding the depths of people I meet. I believe that every person in this world has a different meaning and purpose to their life and finding that purpose changes every perspective they have had about this world. I finally understand what Abhisek told me over drinks in 2014 and I look forward to understanding it even more.