I don't know if it's because I've found myself enveloped within the shadow of cynicism or its siblings, but I've found, or at least my dominant voice speaks as such, that happiness or its pursuit of or contentment or its pursuit of seems to be fool's errands. Unrealistic, romantic idealizations. It seems that practicality and pragmatism demand that stepping forth on a journey for happiness be asinine and nonsensical.

What does being alive mean? Is it simply functioning biologically such that there is a verisimilitude of consciousness? There's breath; heart beats; and an ersatz cognizance. Does that constitute being alive? I suppose that "life" is the right granted by birth. But, those shades of happiness and idealizations are privileges of some sort. I suppose, really, happiness is a subjective quality. One should be happy being able to simply breathe...even if inhaling ash.

I wonder if it would be nice to switch off, psychically speaking, and be some kind of consciously empty organic machine; an unconscious, mindlessly functioning automaton.