Certainty

There's this show, Master of None. It's a great little series on Netflix featuring Aziz Ansari as a 30-yr-old in NYC struggling with decisions in his career and relationship, all while staring down the barrel of his future fraught with vagueness and uncertainty. The first time I watched the show about a year ago (when it first came out), I walked away from it with a bad taste in my mouth. At the time, I wasn't able to put it into words, what bothered me so much about the show that on paper should have been enjoyable yet thoughtful entertainment. 

I have recently rewatched the finale of the first/presently only season. I think I have some words now.

For those who have not watched and plan to, I'll speak with enough vagueness so as to not spoil, but keep details that will maintain clarity. For those who have already watched, we're all on the same page. For those who will never watch, please refer to the earlier statement of vagueness and clarity. Guess you're along for the ride!

Dev, the protagonist portrayed by Aziz Ansari, is at a crossroads in his life. He doesn't know exactly what he wants to do with his professional pursuits. He worries about the state of his romantic relationship. He feels like he is being steered onto a path with no surprises or excitement - marriage, kids, mortgage, retirement, death. When he speaks to his father about his misgivings, his father quotes Sylvia Plath's The Bell Jar, referencing the woman standing before a fig tree. The tree branches off in many directions, each direction with a juicy fig at the end. But while standing before the tree and wallowing in indecision, the figs begin to wrinkle and fall off the tree. Options were lost, opportunities withered up. 

A key issue I take with Dev's bleak view of the rut he feels stuck in is that said rut clearly isn't what he wants. Otherwise, it would not produce such a bleak outlook. While married life is definitely not for everyone, people who lean towards it should never do so out of obligation or societal pressure. He imagines wedding vows as these impossible promises, shackles binding him into a future he would be taking because otherwise, he might miss out on it later. The resignation to the assumed order of things keeps Dev on this path. The fear of lost opportunity is what drives Dev in the actions he takes with his relationship. 

Most importantly, the fear that Dev nurtures hurts his own judgement. It makes him feel like he needs to go through life with 100% certainty on anything he is committing to. He looks at his relationship and worries when he's not certain it will last. He looks at the jobs he's had and the failures and successes he's met and doesn't feel certain all of his efforts have been properly allocated. All at the same time he's not certain he wants to move onto something else, something new. What Dev fails to realize (and the missing message of the show) is that he doesn't need to be 100% certain on anything in life. In fact, certainty is such a difficult thing to come by in any aspect of living. He looks at other people and mistakes their determination to make something work as certainty that it will work. 

The specific words I didn't have before that I've found now are that, doubt is everywhere. Tough, life-altering choices can be easily found in the day to day. Being uncertain is part of it. But taking risks and chances can be worth it, and making one choice does not necessarily mean cutting off all others. It's the norm to have fear of the unknown. It should not be the norm to be complacent with the known.