Forsaken Mirage - Part 2

Maya has yet another pitfall. The line between my life and my imagination is very thin as a result of my belief in Maya. I have made a habit out of conjuring alternate realities in my head whenever I don’t like my physical reality. I delve into the “what if”s only to get me through tough times, but I am on thin ice. It usually takes me a lot of effort to will myself back to reality. In my mind, the only difference between fantasy and reality is that my fantasies are my personal Maya and reality is merely the Maya I share with other people. The only thing that drives me to maintain the physical reality is my belief in Karma. I feel like I have a moral responsibility to feature in other people’s Maya. As ambiguous this logic is, it has been effective in keeping me rooted in reality.

There were times when I thought there might be something wrong with me. After watching Girl, Interrupted, I wondered if I was a pathological liar. After watching A Beautiful Mind, I started wondering if I was a borderline schizophrenic. I have also thought about bipolar disorder. By no means am I qualified to draw the line between some indulgence in dreamland and a mental disease, but that doesn’t stop me from wondering if in my mind something is really twisted. However, I realize that if I try to justify every one of my quirks by finding conditions that force me to act the way I did, I would be creating another alternate reality in which I was psychotic. Fear of this Catch-22 situation has kept me from spiraling into this delusion of mental illness thus far.

Maya is one of my few “quick fixes” for anger, depression and anxiety. Just like telling myself “this was my choice” uplifts me after setbacks, I feel better about losses once I tell myself that “it wasn’t mine to begin with”, and that “it was just an illusion.” I will never truly know how to weave the concept of Maya into my life without being a stone wall devoid of emotions, or a nutcase. All I know is that my belief in Maya is an integral part of my character.