“Bro, did you see what he posted? Two million in six months. We’re doing something wrong,” my friend said, scrolling through his phone at dinner, not looking up once.
“Maybe he’s lying,” I said, feeling the discomfort in myself.
“Or maybe we’re just slow,” he said, still scrolling. “Everyone’s doing something. Starting something. Buying something.” He turned his phone to show me a car, a house, a vacation, all belonging to people neither of us had met. “Look at this guy’s life. He looks so happy.”
I looked at the guy, smiling while showing off his Ferrari and his big house. Then I looked at my friend, then at the plate of food going cold in front of both of us. Neither of us said anything for a while. We just sat there, two men comparing our lives to a stranger’s highlight reel, forgetting to eat the meal in front of us.
It made me uncomfortable. I was nowhere near that level of success. I kept thinking how I could earn that kind of money, how I could become equally successful, if not more. The internet guy had figured out the one thing I hadn’t. Maybe that car, that house, that smile. Maybe that was what being happy actually looked like. And I didn’t have it.
* * *
That night, I opened my phone and saw the number: 4.5 hours. Screen time that day alone.
I felt a strange frustration rise in me, aimed at myself, for not knowing where those hours had gone, or whose life I’d spent them chasing. How would I achieve any success if I kept wasting time like this?
But the bigger question in my head was this: how do I even get there?
* * *
The next morning, I left the phone at home and went for a walk.
Within minutes, I noticed something odd in my left palm. An itch. An urge. My hand was searching for something to hold, something to scroll, something that wasn’t there.
I kept walking, watching people pass, most of them half-present, eyes down, thumbs moving, chasing someone else’s millions, someone else’s car, someone else’s smile.
I felt the urge again, sharper this time. My mind was missing something it had no business missing.
I was addicted, and somewhere underneath that addiction, my body was asking for something real. I didn’t yet know what that was.
My mind kept returning to writing, the one thing I loved most, the thing that had never once made me feel behind. But the internet had taught me that love alone wouldn’t make me rich. That frustrated me more than anything else that day.
* * *
The next day, a friend dragged me to an astrologer. He wanted to know his future. I wanted to leave.
“Do you remember the best moments of your life?” the astrologer asked him.
“The time I spent with my family,” he said, smiling as if it were obvious.
“That’s true for everyone,” she said. “Tell me something else. A time you achieved something. A time you felt truly alive.”
He closed his eyes to think. I sat behind him and closed my eyes too, my mind wandering to search for the best moments of my life. It kept flashing images of the time I was happiest, when I did the thing I loved most.
When I opened my eyes, the astrologer was looking at me. “So? What’s the best moment of your life?”
I shook my head and tried to stand. My friend pulled me back down, out of respect for her.
“Come on. Tell me,” she smiled. “I’ll tell you when such moments will come again. Your successes, your failures, whether you’ll reach your dreams.”
I smiled back. “Once, I had everything people call success. A good job. Enough money. A happy family. But every day looked like the one before it. No surprise. No edge. I knew exactly what tomorrow held before I woke up.” I paused. “I’m not interested in ruining what’s left of my life by knowing what’s coming next.”
She leaned back, her eyebrows lifting. I stood up.
“Where are you going?” my friend asked.
“To relive the best moment of my life,” I said, and walked out.
It was raining outside. I didn’t reach for an umbrella. I just walked, letting it soak through my shirt, my hair, my shoes, the way I used to as a child, when rain meant nothing but rain, and tomorrow was too far away to worry about. I’d forgotten that feeling existed. I’d forgotten I could still have it.
* * *
The next day, I packed a bag and drove to the forest, phone switched off, mind switched on. I parked on a hillside where the road simply ended. No signal, and no sound but my own footsteps.
I sat on a rock and listened. The wind moved through the trees before I saw it. I heard the leaves turn, a low rush building and fading, like the forest was breathing. A bird called out somewhere close, then another answered from further away, and I realized I was tracking the conversation without meaning to. Nothing here was performing for anyone.
The trees didn’t grow to be noticed. The birds didn’t call out for an audience. Everything simply was what it was, and somehow, that made all of it beautiful.
I didn’t need to close my eyes again to know what made me feel alive. I’d always known. I was just too lost in the cacophony of the outside world to hear what I truly wanted.
I opened my laptop and wrote for hours. It wasn’t for an audience or a number on a screen. It was because it made me feel alive and connected.
* * *
Quiet Clarity:You don’t need more of the world to feel alive. You need less of it, and more of yourself.
Reflection: When did you last do something purely because it made you feel alive, with no one watching and nothing to show for it? What is stopping you from doing it again this week?
Short Story Smorgasbord
Genres: General Fiction / Short Stories & Novellas, Mystery & Suspense, and Sci-Fi & Fantasy
Escape Into Clean Fiction
Genres: General Fiction / Contemporary Fiction, General Fiction / Contemporary Women, and General Fiction / Literary Fiction
Later-in-life romances
Genres: Romance, Romance / Comedy & Humor, and Romance / Contemporary