I don’t normally write about Tottenham or football, but I feel as though my feelings towards the club are changing again. There’s a lot of Jose-in and Jose-out conversations. Will we win the cup, or how badly will City thrash us? More importantly, it’s making me reconsider what is happiness and how I experience it. Here are some musings on what’s going on right now.
I have written elsewhere on the web about how I started supporting Spurs, my thoughts back then and the-what-not.
While I did end up “settling down” for a season and went to all but one game in the season. I loved every moment. Now it all seems light-years away. This year and most of last year… the feelings are just negative. I would say that what is missing from Tottenham right now, is not what we call a lack of identity. It is a lack of plan going forward in the future.
The joy that Tottenham brings me, is only important to me and can only be judged by myself.
Spurs as a club has an identity. Always has. We are the best club in North London. The nearly men, who are the precipice of eternal success. From when I first pledged my soul to the club, we were all about pretend rather than contend. Recently we did contend, and we became the pretenders to the throne. Inches away with what ifs and maybes. It has been a hell of a ride. Previously I wrote that Spurs were a pseudo-religion for me. That’s probably why I feel distraught these days. The pain now, just means that when success comes, it will taste so much sweeter.
I never really watch that much football. It’s an okay sport. I follow cricket, especially with the IPL back on, as though there is no greater purpose in life. I’m more interested in Rainbow Cup which might not even start than any football. And yet, when Spurs play, I must turn on. I need to know. And it hurts to see them lose because I associate them with me. Can’t live with them, can’t live without them. It’s not healthy but that’s okay. Better to love than not love at all? Well, I’ll never be able to find out the later and thankfully I do know what joy and ecstasy feel like. That’s the beauty of supporting Spurs, it’s a love affair. It has its up and downs. The higher the highs, the lower the lows.
Friends will continue to send memes, talking about Kane leaving or what not, but that’s not important. I’m not suddenly going to stop supporting Spurs. It’s the hopes that killing me and long may it last. I asked myself back then: Will the magic disappear? And more to the point, will I ever get tired of supporting Spurs, because honestly it feels like it could happen.
I’ve been thinking about this for a bit. The question requires me to contemplate what happiness is. Is happiness just a state of mind in a moment, or is it a mental state [longer term]? Pleasure can be a seen a type of happiness and so can life satisfaction. The commonality is the psychological state of the mind, with a value judgement. I’m going to assume it’s valuable, as this a blog post and not an essay from my undergrad days. Simply, happiness is the value of happiness is something that benefits the person, a net positive.
When I see people on twitter or the WhatsApp group unhappy about Spurs’s performance after a loss, then it does provide that connection A grounding on what reality is, rather than just my perception
With hedonism, we can see that individuals strive for happiness, regardless of what others think. There is a sense that hedonistic people can experience pure happiness, but can we measure that? How happy is my 9/10 compared to Moussa’s? Or how can one even judge one’s happiness? Me riding around on my tricycle as a 4 year old may not give me the same joy today. Will I ever experience the pure joy that night in Amsterdam? Can I even find an experience that will match that happiness? I don’t know. However, I would stake my pole into the notion that happiness is not absolute. The economist in me says that there are marginal returns to repeated actions, hence we require more and more success to satisfy our needs each time.
So, in short happiness is a private relative value judgement. I am not going to try and answer about reality, but this little bit thinking that we don’t need others to make it real. The joy that Tottenham brings me, is only important to me and can only be judged by myself. To share our happiness with others, we must construct it such a way that others can understand it. Thankfully, we do have language to do that.
When Tottenham win a game, other fans and I are experiencing happiness. Is it the exact same happiness? I don’t think we can know. We may use the same words, but that may be because of a limitation of language. If we were able to use a language that fully expressed our feelings of happiness, then yes, we could have the same exact happiness. However, even if they were different, to the individual one’s own experiences are real. One’s own happiness, must be privately true. Sharing it doesn’t make it more real. This isn’t to deny group happiness or others. It’s just that in this pandemic, alone for most of the time. I’m thinking about myself and Spurs are one of the few conduits of emotional expressions that come up regularly. When I see people on twitter or the WhatsApp group unhappy about Spurs’s performance after a loss, then it does provide that connection A grounding on what reality is, rather than just my perception.
From when I first pledged my soul to the club, we were all about pretend rather than contend. Recently we did contend, and we became the pretenders to the throne
However, I also want to deal with the idea of happiness as individual in a vacuum. Did Tom Hanks character on the island in castaway experience happiness? Yes? Sort of. In short, he was able to make moments of happiness by himself by creating others, sorry but Wilson isn’t real. The idea of being alone forever is terrifying for me, but I’m sure I’m not alone nor the minority. I don’t think that happiness can be experienced without others. Others are required, as being alone creates a situation where your mind is left reeling without a check or grounding. There are accounts of people surviving in the wildernesses alone and experience happiness? Fleetingly in the moment. Which is happiness, but as my earlier point stated, it would be corrected to the relative situation.
Will I ever experience the pure joy that night in Amsterdam? Can I even find an experience that will match that happiness? I don’t know.
Will the magic disappear? I would say it’s stronger than ever. What about happiness? You don’t need to share with others to experience real happiness, but I wouldn’t recommended it. Nor do I need Tottenham to win to experience happiness. But god, it would simpler if they did.
HP KOTECHA 