Alright, I’ll share my plan to end all human suffering

Human life is difficult, and it gets progressively shittier as we grow old. This is a scientific fact.

The biggest problem we face as we approach middle age can be summarized by the statement, “It feels like, there is nothing to look forward to.”

I feel the answer to the human condition lies in ‘anticipation.’

Human beings can survive astonishing levels of misery, provided they have something awaiting them in the future.

Which brings us to the subject of (you guessed it right):

Drugs!

I think we should all be permitted to do drugs.

No?

Well, allow me to change your mind.

I am not proposing a novel idea. We do give access to various drugs but limit it to a certain age groups.

We avoid giving tea/coffee to kids until they turn teenagers. There is a legal drinking and smoking age. The problem is that this stops at the age of 21.

It is a terrible design. So, here is my proposal.

Firstly, we should change the legal drinking age to 30. I know this sounds insane, but hear me out.

People in their twenties already have access to the greatest recreational drug ever discovered.

Sex.

It occupies much of their mental real estate. Their brains are already running a powerful cocktail of hormones and poor judgment. Introducing whiskey to the ecosystem doesn’t really help.

As soon as you turn thirty, you should be able to have alcohol.

Your thirties are when regret begins entering your life. This is when alcohol becomes useful.

So you can sit in a pub and watch twenty-two-year-olds having all the fun and still feel a sense of gratitude. Because they may have youth, beauty, and make-out sessions, but you have alcohol.

You’re in your forties, the age of the midlife crisis and teenage children.

The age when you begin questioning every major decision you’ve ever made, is also when your teenage child starts questioning every decision you make.

This is the point at which the relationship between parents and children is often at its weakest. And sometimes, it never recovers from the fallout that happens during this phase of life.

It’s nobody’s fault.

The teenager encounters changes in their body, and they are trying to figure out who they are. They are searching for a voice and a place in the world.

Meanwhile, the parent, at forty, begins conducting a detailed audit of their own life.

What exactly have I accomplished? Is this it? Am I a loser? I was supposed to be mysterious and attractive. When did I become responsible for another human being?

And just as you’re asking these questions, you notice your teenager making decisions that appear spectacularly unwise.

You want to protect them for the sake of the forty-year-old version of themselves. So you interfere, and they push back. Now they, too, think you are a loser.

It’s just a big, ugly mess.

Unless, on your fortieth birthday, you are handed a legally sanctioned bag of marijuana?

You watch all those existential questions drift away.

What exactly have I accomplished?

Who cares!

Is this it?

Oh yeah! And it’s goooood.

Am I a loser?

Huh? Have you ever stared at a ceiling fan for a really long time?

The entire decade passes in a pleasant haze. Your teenager sails through adolescence largely unnoticed.

Years later, your children tell their friends, “My parents are the chillest people I know.”

And you don’t even remember earning that reputation.

When a person turns fifty, they are now allowed to take MDMA/ecstasy. And the government should subsidize it for men.

Now, ladies, calm down. Get those thumbs away from your phones. The only reason I propose providing the discount to men is because I am sexist.

Allow me to convince you.

Take a look at all the major wars of the last hundred years. Almost all of these wars were started by men above the age of 50.

Men over 50 have an angst. Sometimes of an unlived life. Sometimes, a bravado hiding childhood trauma. Sometimes, it is something as simple as they can’t get it up. Society has to pay a price for this angst. It comes out in the worst form of carnage known to mankind. Wars.

These men need help. And that help should be affordable.

Imagine a world where powerful leaders spend an hour every morning taking MDMA and discussing their feelings.

Imagine Donald Trump, Vladimir Putin, and Benjamin Netanyahu sitting in a room, complimenting each other, sharing childhood memories, and sometimes bursting into tears while talking about their relationship with their fathers.

Now, ladies, I understand that your bodies are going through some brutal changes during this period as well. But unless you start invading other countries over it, as a matter of public policy, the discount should go to men.

Once you turn 60, the age of back pain and biopsy results, you get access to LSD.

Your entire life has been organized around work, but you are now retired.

Your professional identity is taken away, and you start wondering what else you have. What are you, if not your job or your role as a partner or parent?

This is where the spiritual experiences associated with LSD come to your rescue. The feeling of connectedness. The dissolution of ego.

And the visual hallucinations are there to give you company.

You will never be alone.

In your seventies, you cross the average life expectancy of a human being. If you made it this far, you’ve beaten the game. Anything further are bonus years.

So once you cross 70, it is open season. All known drugs to mankind.

It’s like when a batsman scores 100 and then starts charging down the pitch, taking crazy risks to get the most out of the remaining balls.

So imagine your grandma on cocaine.

What arthritis pain? What mobility issues? What fall risk?

The beautiful thing is that society’s relationship with old age completely changes.

Younger people will look at seventy-year-olds and start thinking, “Man, I can’t wait to be 70.” People will start counting down to their seventieth birthdays.

Is it harmful to your body and internal organs? Of course it is, but what are you saving them for?

Like a new T-shirt, you first wear it outside, then at home, then as a sleeping T-shirt, then at Holi, then use it as a pocha, and finally as a cloth to wipe your scooter. You get the most out of it.

The goal for your body should not be to arrive at the finish line in pristine condition.

Imagine a world where everybody squeezes every last drop from their allotted years. You get the biggest bang for the buck from this body.

You have lived a fulfilled life.

That, ladies and gentlemen, is world peace. And a recipe to end all human suffering.

You are welcome!

PS:

Alert readers would have noticed that there is one extremely harmful drug left out of the essay. It was deliberate.

I guess once you cross 80, and your teeth are damaged from meth, cocaine has messed up your heart, and LSD has fried your brain, you should be allowed access to the most dangerous drug known to mankind.

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