"Babuji ne kaha gaon chhod do... sabne kaha Paro ko chhod do... Paro ne kaha sharaab chhod do... aaj tumne keh diya haveli chhod do... ek din aayega jab wo kahenge, duniya hi chhod do..."
I think Devdas was never about alcohol. Neither was it about Paro. Devdas was a story about a man who was slowly being asked to leave everything he had ever loved... piece by piece... until there was nothing left to leave except himself.
And sometimes... I wonder whether all of us become Devdas someday.
Life has a strange habit of asking us to let go of things we never wanted to lose. First, it takes away our childhood. Then our innocence. Then the people we thought would stay forever. Slowly... very slowly... it keeps negotiating with our heart. It never asks for everything together. It would be too cruel if it did. So it takes one thing at a time.
And the worst part is... after a certain point, we stop fighting.
I remember someone once asking me, "Kabir, tum life me kya chahte ho?"
I smiled and replied, "Bas sukoon..."
Funny isn't it? The one thing I wanted the most was also the one thing I lost first.
There was a time when I believed happiness was waiting for me somewhere. Maybe in a person. Maybe in a place. Maybe in a future version of myself that had finally figured life out. I was stupid enough to believe that if I loved honestly enough, life would eventually become kind to me. That God keeps a separate notebook for people who try their best and someday... somehow... He rewards them for surviving.
I don't believe that anymore.
And no... this isn't one of those blog posts where I tell you that life gets better and you should keep smiling because the best is yet to come. Sometimes life doesn't get better. Sometimes people don't come back. Sometimes prayers remain unanswered for years. And sometimes... the story simply remains incomplete.
That happens too.
We don't talk enough about those stories.
Kabir was never afraid of losing people. I think he was afraid of losing his ability to feel things. The day Caify left, he didn't lose a person. He lost an entire universe that existed only inside his heart. Nobody noticed it, ofcourse. That's the beautiful thing about emotional deaths. They don't require funerals. The world continues exactly as it was yesterday while somewhere inside you, an entire civilization has collapsed.
People still ask you whether you've had your dinner.
Nobody asks whether your heart survived another night.
Months have passed now.
Kabir laughs. He works. He writes. He listens to songs. He meets new people. He drinks tea. He scrolls through Instagram. He lives like every other person around him.
And yet...
January never ended.
There are people who live in 2026. Kabir still lives somewhere between memories and midnight conversations.
The world tells us that time heals everything. I think the world lies beautifully. Time doesn't heal everything. Time simply teaches us how to carry things that never healed.
There is a difference.
Do you know what I fear the most these days?
Not death.
Not loneliness.
Not failure.
I fear becoming happy again.
Because happiness has become terrifying.
Everytime I have ever loved something deeply... life has eventually asked me to leave it behind.
So now I don't ask life for forever anymore. Forever is an expensive word. I cannot afford it anymore.
I ask for moments.
And sometimes not even that.
The saddest thing that has happened to Kabir wasn't losing Caify. It was losing hope after losing Caify. There was a time when he would look at couples sitting together and smile. Now he silently looks away. There was a time when he wanted to become someone's home. Today... he struggles to live inside himself.
And I know some of you reading this will immediately write to me saying,
"Everything happens for a reason."
No.
Sometimes it doesn't.
Sometimes bad things simply happen to good people.
Sometimes there is no lesson.
No reason.
No poetic ending.
There is only loss.
And that's okay too.
Human beings should be allowed to admit that they are unhappy without immediately being asked to become positive.
Perhaps that's why Devdas feels so personal. Because everyone notices his alcohol. Nobody notices how much he was asked to leave behind before picking up that glass.
Babuji ne kaha gaon chhod do...
Leave your home.
Sabne kaha Paro ko chhod do...
Leave your love.
Paro ne kaha sharaab chhod do...
Leave the only thing helping you survive.
Aaj tumne keh diya haveli chhod do...
Leave the only place left that still feels familiar.
And finally...
Ek din aayega jab wo kahenge, duniya hi chhod do...
Leave yourself too.
Isn't that exactly what life does?
It never asks us to leave everything together. It patiently waits until we are emotionally exhausted enough to stop resisting.
I sometimes feel that Kabir has spent his entire life leaving things behind.
Leaving expectations.
Leaving dreams.
Leaving people.
Leaving faith.
Leaving versions of himself that deserved better endings.
And perhaps one day he'll leave his sadness behind too.
Or perhaps he won't.
I don't know.
For the first time in my life, I don't have answers anymore.
People often ask me whether I still believe I'll ever become happy again.
The truth?
I don't know.
And I think I have finally made peace with not knowing.
There was a time when Kabir wanted a beautiful love story.
Today, he simply wants peaceful sleep.
There was a time when he wanted forever.
Today, he wants tomorrow to hurt a little less than yesterday.
And maybe that is enough for now.
If you have reached this part of the blog and you feel uncomfortable reading it because it isn't positive enough... then perhaps this post wasn't written for you.
It was written for that one person reading this at 3:17 in the morning wondering whether they are the only one who has lost all hope of ever becoming happy again.
You are not.
There are many of us.
Some of us are reading.
Some of us are writing.
And some of us are silently surviving.
So if life has asked you to leave too many things behind lately... if you've become tired of beginning again and again and again...
Please know this...
You don't have to become positive tonight.
You don't have to become stronger tonight.
And you certainly don't have to pretend that you're okay.
Surviving is enough.
Breathing is enough.
Existing is enough.
And if nobody has told you this lately...
I'm glad you're still here.
Because sometimes...
that's all we can ask of each other.