Johar Karan - An Unsuitable Boy

T oday I finally feel liberated. I feel like I can take on anyone or anything. I dont want to be this person who is bound by principles, morality or reality, someone who has to conform to any kind of societal rules. The only time Im tight-lipped is when Im asked about my sexuality because its my personal business and I dont want to talk about it. When Im ready, I will. Right now I dont wish to. Its the only part of me I feel Ive caged. But otherwise I feel alive. Im forty-four and Im ready for new challenges, new people. Im ready to remove a lot of clutter from my life. When I walk into my office, I am so energized to do new things on a non-stop basis. Im on the treadmill of life, running constantly. And the gears are in my hand, the levers are in my hand. I can go from one to ten, depending on what I wish. But I havent reached this stage overnight. It is the result of all that Ive been through over the years. I was asked the other day about my latest film, Ae Dil Hai Mushkil, and for some reason I felt the need to tell the truth. Actually it is a personal story. Ive had two unrequited love situations in my life. One in my twenties and one in my thirties where Id loved and not received that love back, and I remember how hurtful that was. Its worse than a toothache. Its worse than having a tumour in your brain. Its worse than having a wisdom tooth extracted. Your heart hurts. Some call it anxiety, some call it breathlessness. The second time it happened to me I was much older and I had to visit a psychologist and be on medication for several months. I kept getting these bouts of anxiety. My doctor felt that the anxiety was a product of that depression which I hadnt acknowledged. My second love situation had really overstayed. There was the sense of being at the midpoint of your life with nothing happening in your personal life. There was professional growth, yes, but that comes with its own stresses and insecurities. And there was a general feeling of loneliness, emptiness, of being vacant, being burdened by the lack of love. Or the lack of companionship perhapsdespite being surrounded by people. I felt like I was going through something that required medication. Mere conversation was not going to help. My doctor put me on medication, monitored it, then slowly weaned me off it. Im totally off it now.

It was the acknowledgement that was important. Sometimes we feel its just a phase. We dont realize that in our times, this has now become part and parcel of our livesdepression, anxiety. I call it medical sadness. It needs to be addressed, either through therapy or a psychologist, and its important to know the difference. I just knew that I needed a psychologist. Im quite self-aware. I didnt feel I needed somebody to walk me through the beats of my life. I felt I needed a diagnosis, not a discussion.

Now I dont go for the sessions but Im still in touch with my doctor. Once every few months, I touch base with her. Were WhatsApp buddies. Not that I badger her with messages. She walked me through the writing of Ae Dil Hai Mushkil when I was feeling the burden of my unrequited love. She messaged me the other day, saying, Saw the promos. Feels really surreal, I feel a part of that. Which she was.

With Ae Dil Hai Mushkil, I feel Ive put out my first personal piece of work. I dont want to say its an autobiography because theres a lot of fiction in it but there are scenes and conversations that are very true to what happened in my life. Im pretty much Ranbir Kapoor in the film, and the film is all about him and his broken heart. Theres a dialogue that goes: Rishtey jab jismani ho jaate hain toh kahin na kahin dosti mit jaati hai. Pyaar mein junoon hai par dosti mein sukoon hai aur main nahin chahti ki hamare beech ka sukoon kabhi chala jaaye. The person I was in love with told me, Im glad were not having sex. But I was also told, youre the most important person in my life, youre my family, youre my everything, youre just not my lover. This happened when I was thirty-five. Its taken me so many years to get over it. I realize that sometimes heartbreak is a luxury. You just lie in that spa of heartbreak for months.

Love is such an indulgent emotion. But I tried everything to get over it. I tried rationalizing it internally, I tried sitting with friends and discussing it (they told me I was being stupid, idiotic, nonsensical). But only you know what you go through. The only thing it did to me was that it made me feel alive. I never regret those years. (They gave me a feature film too!) Theres a dialogue in the film: Ek tarfa pyaar ki taaqat hi kuch aur hoti hai. Aur rishton ki tarah yeh do logon mein nahin bant ti. I believe in that very strongly. That power of love is mine. To love someone is such a feeling of power, because even if you dont get that love back, you still have it. It could be a weakness, it could be a strength. Its how you look at it. I look at the love I had as a source of great strength. I built my company to the optimum fuelled by that emotion. It gave me some kind of energy. It hurt me, it broke my heart, but it also gave me power, made me feel alive. I dont regret it. It hurt only because what was said to me at that point was that this would be a relationship for ever, nobody could come in its way, but somebody did. A third person changed the dynamic. Theres always separation because of a third person. Sometimes siblings change because one of them gets married.

But Im finally over it because I put it out there. I wrote about it, I lived it, I shot it, I executed it. There are scenes, moments in the film that are completely me. The film is based on love and friendship. Its about how sometimes you can be in a situation where you can never translate friendship into love. Sex can change the dynamics. I never had sex with either of the two people I was in love with. The second person got married, moved country and now Im not in touch with that person any more. The only thing that hurt me was that I was promised so much, but I never even got that friendship. Because of the third person who entered the picture. But the first person I was in love with is still very much a part of my life.

I feel a lot more internal today. Its strangeI used to be the most peoples person, today I feel far more introverted. I dont feel the need for noise around me any more. I dont feel like going to a crowded party. I go because I have to; Ive become less people-friendly. Id rather sit on my terrace with a couple of friends and drink a bottle of wine and talk about my life and their life. I dont want to be the life of a party no more. I feel bored. Ive done it excessively for the last fifteen years. From the age of twenty to the age of forty-four, all Ive done is surround myself with people. Now I dont feel the need to be over-reverential to seniority or to overly bond with younger people just to make myself feel that Im relevant. You could call it disdain, detachment or just liberation. It depends on how you look at life. Im happy in the confines of my own professional environment and the work I need to do.