Things should end on their own accord - Part III

Which is preferred - death of a relationship or death of a person? By very definition, if a relationship dies, then the death of a person is moot - because you would not even know about it!

So, death of a relationship is the preferred method. (I am going to make a Hindi movie to showcase this very fact. There will be three hero - heroines. All three heroes receive the news that they are going to die soon together and discuss their methods of dealing with it. They seal their methods in an envelope and send it to a writer. They all die their own way and many many years later, all their significant others receive this news. They are asked to comment on which was the best method, based on their own lives.)

Sooner or later, all relationships die. I was tempted to say - except ... - but could think of no exception. One might ask, what about the marriages that last years and years - and the answer would be that to continue to remain in a marriage or not is a practical decision - not one made out of love or affection. Perhaps the decision to enter marriage was made out of love/passion. But to continue to be in it, say after 10 years, is definitely NOT due to passion. All chemistry has died by then (see the thesis in A Certain Chemistry).

OK, so all relationships die. Why then, does untimely death of someone you love generally cause so much pain? Even if one is made aware of the inevitability of physical death and inevitability of relationships breaking, why does one feel pain? Again, A Certain Chemistry explains that it is just your addiction that is feeling the pain. It is akin to a man who decides on savoring a hundred different drugs, but only to a small extent. He chooses marijuana for a few weeks. Then stops smoking it forever! Then he takes up heroin for a month. And then stops heroin forever. He remains clean for two more months. Then he embarks on Cocaine. And so on. He tries out a hundred different drugs. What happens is he feels the joy for a few weeks and suffers the pain of addiction when he does not get it any more. Finally, he moves on. Then he is OK. He voluntarily chooses another drug.

In case of people, it appears that the people are PROGRAMMED to fall into relationships - programmed to savor a hundred different drugs compulsively. I do not know this for sure, but I would imagine, that while you are addicted mildly to one drug, if you were to taste another one, your craving for the first one would not become very bad. Suppose your job changes and you suddenly find yourself not having anyone to share your lunch, you feel very very bad. A few days later, you make friends and all is well again. It is so much better if there was someone to share your lunch for the first few days. Somehow with people, sooner or later, new relationships keep happening and pain over forgetting someone is minimized.

But when a person dies - there is NO ONE to replace that person. Every one is unique. A sudden death is necessarily painful on the survivors.

My first reaction to death is that of anger. I am angry that so many people are subjected to the needless pain - given a chance, people would have screwed up their relationships completely anyway! But they were not given a chance, and now we have So much pain - it is a physical emotion - a biochemical response - something that cannot be avoided but only phrased and paraphrased in a lot of words.

Also, this ends my series of blogs on things ending on their own accord.