The Art of Pretending:
Acting foolish and dumb,
playing the fool, not correcting, not interfering, not reacting, not remembering, not minding,
but predicting, analysing, making silent assumptions, and simply listening,
all at once, while remaining inside the conversation with someone: perhaps that is the finest kind of intimacy and tension an aware person can hold.
~ Arsalan Zaid
She wants to erase every memory of him, every moment they shared, every memory she had of him.
He is confused.
Why?
So, he decides to erase his memories of her too, the memories they made together. But somewhere in the process, he realises that erasing the memories because of the bad things that happened would also mean erasing the sweetest and most joyful moments they shared.
So he changes his mind.
Instead, he tries to hide her somewhere deep within his subconscious, hoping that perhaps he can forget her without having to erase everything they once were.
He fails.
*Refreshed*
He: “I can’t see anything I don’t like about you.”
She: “But you will. But you will.”
He: “Okay. Okay”
She: “Okay.”
“How happy is the blameless vestal’s lot! The world forgetting, by the world forgot
Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind!” ~ Alexander Pope poem “Eloisa to Abelard” (1717)
“Blessed are the forgetful, for they get the better even of their blunders.” ~ Friedrich Nietzsche (from Beyond Good and Evil).
- Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind(2004)
A person who lies in such a dumb, clumsy, almost amusing way and somehow makes everyone believe those lies, including him, is to him, one of the funniest and most playful things about her.
There is something mischievous about it.
Something alive. Something that keeps him curious. And that mischievousness is what keeps igniting the flame of hope in his mind.
So perhaps it is not easy to dislike her.
But it is not easy to like her either.
And maybe that is the beauty of it. That strange space between liking someone and wanting to stop liking them.
Between affection and ego.
Between knowing and believing.
Between truth and the lies you willingly accept.
Between hope and reality.
It is something in between, something that is simultaneously difficult to like and impossible to unlike. And perhaps that is one of the most beautiful feelings a person can ever experience.
Not because it is healthy.
Not because it is rational.
But because, for once, even his ego has found something it cannot completely control.
And that is just so beautiful.
Hard to Like, Harder to Unlike.
~ Arsalan Zaid
The Beautiful Contradiction of Her:
One of the strangest feelings for a narcissistic man is when she deliberately ignores him while having her phone by her side 24x7 active everywhere, posting stories, watching stories and posts, yet choosing not to open his messages or respond to his replies.
And he knows what is going on. He knows the game. He knows what she is up to. He knows whether she is genuinely busy and simply does not have the time to open his texts, or whether she is deliberately avoiding him.
He knows. He just knows. But because he likes her, his pride has completely surrendered to her. He has already imagined things in his mind. He has analysed every pattern, every cognitive bias, every possibility, every word, every dialogue, every reply to every reply. He has thought through everything. Just everything.
And yet, his liking has somehow overcome his narcissism.
He becomes humble.
Perhaps even beautiful.
This suffering, this yearning, this desperation for someone can become unbearable and painful. And for a narcissistic man, perhaps that is the greatest loss of all, the kind of loss he believes he cannot afford.
So what does he do to win?
He lets his pride temporarily surrender to the affection he has for her.
Does that mean he loses?
I guess not. He wins or at least, that is what he tells himself.
Because he waits patiently. Silently. He watches. He analyses. He prepares himself for every possible outcome, including the ones that will hurt him. He is already suffering from being ghosted, so perhaps there is little left to fear. Except losing hope. And hope is what keeps him alive.
Even if the flame is barely burning, it is still there. That is why he waits.
Patiently.
Silently.
But if he wins, the other person must lose, shouldn’t she?
Yet she isn’t losing either. She is doing this deliberately. In her story, she is winning too.
So when does she lose? Does she ever lose, even for once?
Yes, the one moment she loses is when She replies softly. Warmly. Kindly. She explains herself with a confident, composed, unambiguous tone, perhaps even with explanations that he knows are fabricated.
And still, he believes her.
Why? Because he likes her.
And when you like someone deeply enough, sometimes you don’t merely believe their truth, you become willing to believe their lies too.
Even when you know they are lies. Hope makes them believable. And perhaps that is how she loses. And he wins.
A single text. A single reply. That is all it takes to ignite the flame of hope again.
But why is it so difficult for him to stop liking her when he knows everything?
Perhaps because confidence, pride, and faith in himself are precisely what prevent him from abandoning what he feels.
If he begins to convince himself that he should not like her, then it becomes a question of his own values and principles.
He believes his taste has meaning.
He believes that whatever he saw in her, he saw at a depth that nobody else ever has. And therefore, he believes his own taste would never betray him.
His affection for her is winning against his ego.
It is the little things she does that attract him.
And he cannot simply stop liking someone because those little things are difficult to forget.
Perhaps that is what makes it so hard for him to like her in the first place. The very things that attract him are also the things that confuse him. They are beautiful, humorous, funny, satirical, exciting, expressive, playful, alive and mysterious yet fake.
Lies.
Deception.
Made-up stories.
Hasty words.
Random explanations.
Confusion.
Contradictions.
And somehow, that contradiction is exactly what fascinates him.
That is why he merely likes her.
He does not adore her.
He does not admire her.
Because what if you actually see me?
What if you see all of it - the madness, the tenderness, the contradictions, the insecurity, the generosity, the selfishness, the joy, the grief, the affection, the fear and you still choose to stay?
Perhaps that is what I have been running from all along.
Not rejection.
But acceptance.
Because rejection tells me I was never enough.
But being loved means I have to believe that I am.
And somehow, I find it easier to keep chasing you than to stand still long enough to discover whether you would ever choose me.
~ Arsalan Zaid
Everyone but You :
It is easy for me to attract someone, to make someone fall in love with me, or at the very least, to make someone like me.
It is easy for me to repeat the same words, the same gestures, the same thoughts, the same feelings, the same emotions; to offer the same acts of service, the same affection, the same kindness, the same generosity. The same patterns, the same jokes, the same stories, the same laughter, the same grief, the same empathy.
Everything remains the same, only the faces change. Different names. Different personalities. Different lives.
And yet, somehow, I keep searching for you in every face.
It is almost cruel. The more I move from one person to another, the more clearly I realise how far I am from you or perhaps, how far you are from me.
Wherever I go, I look for traces of you. In someone’s laughter. In the way they speak. In the warmth of their kindness. In the little gestures that make me feel understood. I keep searching for something that resembles you, knowing very well that resemblance will never be enough.
And sometimes I wonder,
Do you ever search for me too?
Why is it so easy to be loved by someone, yet so impossibly difficult to love you?
Perhaps because the person we desire most has already given their desire to someone else. And that someone desires somebody else. And so it continues a quiet, endless chain of wanting, longing, pursuing, losing.
Maybe that is why, for some people, chasing becomes more important than arriving.
The desire to love someone becomes more intoxicating than the comfort of being loved.
Perhaps it is love.
Perhaps it is obsession.
Perhaps it is simply madness disguised as devotion, a desperate attempt to prove to ourselves that we are capable of feeling something so deeply that it hurts.
She says,
“I want someone who will love me.”
And inside my mind, something immediately screams:
I wish I could say it out loud. I wish I could look at you, face to face, and tell you that I will love you.
For now, I can only say that I like you.
And even those words feel unbearably heavy coming from me.
They are not casual words. They carry history. They carry hesitation. They carry fear. They carry everything I cannot bring myself to say.
So what do I do in real life?
I stay silent.
I listen to you.
I watch the conversation pass between us while an entire universe inside my head is desperately trying to find the courage to speak.
If you could ever see inside my mind, you would probably realise how insane I can be, how obsessive, delusional, irrational, sentimental, narcissistic, neurodivergent, and hopelessly lost inside my own thoughts.
And somehow, beneath all that chaos, you would also find something painfully simple:
How much I like you.
Perhaps that is the part that frightens me the most.
I am not afraid of confronting you.
I am afraid of confronting myself.
Because the moment I begin opening myself to you, I become vulnerable. And vulnerability means being seen. Truly seen.
And I don’t think I am comfortable with that.
The more I reveal, the more of me you get to see, the parts I have spent years hiding, the tenderness I disguise as indifference, the affection I bury beneath silence, the grief I turn into humour, the longing I pretend is merely curiosity.
I would rather chase you than be chosen by you.
Because chasing feels safer.
When I chase, I remain in control of the distance between us. I can admire you without having to completely reveal myself. I can love you from somewhere just beyond the reach of rejection, beyond the terrifying possibility of intimacy.
But being chosen is different.
Being chosen means someone has looked at you, not the version you carefully constructed, not the charming version, not the generous version, not the composed version and still said,
I choose you.
And that terrifies me.
The Way Your Laughter Finds Me:
When I make you laugh,
it is never because I wish to hear my own jokes.
It is because I wish to witness your smile,
to hear your laughter,
and to borrow, for a fleeting moment,
the happiness it awakens within me.
And every time you laugh,
my heart becomes greedier than before.
It asks for one more smile,
one more laugh,
one more moment
again… and again… and again.
If I could spend an entire lifetime
making you laugh,
watching your smile bloom,
and listening to the melody of your laughter,
I know I would never grow weary,
never grow tired,
never ask for anything more.
Some people count the years they live.
I would count the times I made you laugh.
When you laugh at my silliest jokes,
my heart laughs with you.
It finds its rhythm in your laughter,
its joy in your happiness,
its heartbeat in your voice.
It feels like the drums of liberation
echoing through the chambers of my soul,
awakening a forgotten version of me
the younger one,
the lighter one,
the one who still believed
that happiness could be this effortless.
And for a little while,
I become him again.
When you laugh,
every other sound surrenders.
The world grows quiet.
The noise fades.
The distractions disappear.
There is only your laughter,
and somewhere within its melody,
I lose myself without ever wishing to be found.
I could spend forever listening to it,
and forever would still feel too short.
When you laugh,
there is mischief hidden within it.
You know how to tease,
and somehow,
you also know that your teasing has a quiet way
of undoing me.
Yet I never resist it.
I love being caught in that playful surrender,
drawn in by the charm of your laughter,
willingly losing every battle
to a smile that never even tried to win.
When you laugh, something within me begins to glow again.
Your laughter carries the spark
of a youth I thought I had misplaced somewhere along life’s endless roads.
And every time it reaches me,
time forgets to move,
the world forgets to exist,
and I forget everything
except the sound
that taught my heart
how to smile.
Perhaps, for everyone else,
laughter is only a sound.
But for me,
your laughter is a home
my heart never wishes to leave.
~ Arsalan Zaid
The Dream That Wasn’t Mine :
Once again, you visited my dreams.
This time, you did not come alone. You came with my friends and with unfamiliar faces that somehow still belong to my memories.
Why do you do this?
Why do you place yourself in such a scene, surrounded by people, yet leave me seeing only you?
The strangest part is this: I cannot remember the faces of my friends who were there. Yet I remember yours with perfect clarity.
Perhaps I was looking only at you.
Perhaps my eyes were locked onto yours.
Perhaps they lingered only on your hair.
Perhaps they noticed only your smile.
Perhaps every part of my attention belonged only to you.
My awareness tells me there were others. I have seen them somewhere. I have crossed paths with them before. They exist in my memories, but only as blurred faces. I know they were there in my dream, yet when I wake, I cannot remember them.
I remember only you.
What power do you possess that reaches beyond my control?
Once again, you chose the deceitful path. Instead of coming to me in reality, you entered my dreams without permission, without warning, without telling me what it is you want from me.
Do you not know how much this bothers me?
The next morning, I wake dissatisfied, confused, worried, restless, sad, disturbed, disappointed, frustrated, and angry.
All because of you.
First, you appear without reason, so unexpectedly.
Second, every dream ends unfinished. Even though it is technically my dream, I have no power to decide how it ends.
That is what frustrates me the most.
Your presence fills me with a false hope. For a brief moment, I feel complete. I feel euphoric. Then I wake up and realize it was nothing more than a dream.
How could you do this to me?
Do you have no empathy?
No compassion?
You deceive me in my dreams, perhaps believing I enjoy it.
For a while, I do.
Until I wake.
Until reality reminds me that none of it was ever true.
Then why do I still wish it had continued?
Am I betraying myself by believing in you, even for a moment?
Perhaps.
Because it is you, I become selfless.
Otherwise, there is no chance I would ever allow myself to feel this way.
I told you before, on 17/01/2026:
“My Dreams Are Not Yours :”
Today, I am telling you again.
Stop visiting my dreams.
They are my dreams.
Not yours.
~ Arsalan Zaid
A Symphony :
She: A man who can’t even take his own life seriously, how would he ever take me seriously?
Surrendered Me: Okay.
——————————————————
She: I wanted you to say, “Name, I want to make you mine.”
You never did. Instead, you kept talking about how love could be a gamble.
Surrendered Me: Okay.
——————————————————
Surrendered Me: I miss you.
She: That’s what happens when you truly feel for someone.
Surrendered Me: Okay.
——————————————————
She: I have changed. I have become more pious and closer to God. Will you accept this version of me?
Surrendered Me: Absolutely. I will accept you in every version, “Name.”
——————————————————
She: You drink. You go clubbing. You’re not pious. I don’t like any of it.
Surrendered Me: Okay.
——————————————————
She: You judged me.
Surrendered Me: No… I never did.
She: You judged me. Leave me alone.
——————————————————
Narcissistic Me: I am jealous of all the men who had you so easily. No… envy. Jealousy isn’t the right word. I envy every one of your exes who had you.
She: You’re going crazy. I’m calling you rn.
Narcissistic Me: No… please don’t.
~ Arsalan Zaid
@StevenButl12539 That’s a powerful observation. Perhaps that’s why so many people end up feeling lost. We learn how we’re measured, but not always how we’re meant to grow.
The Road Without a Signboard :
Six months of silence, and tonight the words finally found their way back to me.
There is so much crowding my head right now, too much to hold, too many feelings tangled into each other until I can’t tell where one ends and the next begins. I don’t know if I can explain any of it. That’s why, after six months, I finally feel the urge to write again.
It’s pouring heavily outside. The thunder roars as the clouds collide with one another. The power is out, leaving everything wrapped in darkness. This feels like the perfect time for me to write. I know my art comes alive when my mind is in chaos.
I keep circling back to the same realisation I haven’t lived yet. Not really. There’s a dream I set for myself a long time ago, something I promised I’d become, and I still haven’t moved close enough to touch it. The only thing standing in the way is me. My overthinking always gets there first, painting the ending before I’ve even started, until I convince myself I already know how it goes. I know anything worth having asks for effort, for sacrifice, for a kind of discomfort I’m not always ready to sit with. What I don’t have is the path. Some nights I feel like I’ve already lost, like maybe I should stop reaching and just live the way everyone else seems to. I don’t mean that as an insult to anyone who lives that way. I mean that wanting something different takes a different mind than the one I currently carry. And most days, I’m just tired. Tired of trying, tired of the effort, tired of the quiet performance of being fine while I push toward something I still can’t see the shape of.
Is this guilt talking, or am I actually grieving something I lost to my own hands? I never wanted to lose. So why does it already feel like I have? Maybe it’s because there’s no one standing beside me, pointing the way.
I know I could do this, if someone who sees the world the way I do noticed what I’m capable of and stood beside me while I figured it out. Minds like that are rare. Some nights I believe they exist, and other nights I don’t, both thoughts running at once, loud enough to drown out almost everything else. Some part of me wants to take the risk. Another part keeps reminding me what it could cost: money, people, comfort, health, the small quiet freedoms I’ve gotten used to. I know great things ask for great sacrifice. I just don’t know yet if I’m ready to find out whether it’s worth it.
If I’m honest, it was never really about the money or the people. It was always about time. Am I already late? Is there a clock somewhere counting down without me? Every day that passes, I feel my grip on my own timeline slipping a little further. I wish I could rewind and choose differently, even knowing that’s not how any of this works. That wish is just guilt wearing a different face, and I refuse to let it win. I haven’t even lost yet. So why does it already feel like grief? Maybe it’s the voice of everyone who raised me. Parents, siblings, the shape of adulthood I was handed before I ever got to choose one for myself: get the job, find the partner, the wedding, the child, the stability, the whole picture of a life that looks good from the outside. I’ve done pieces of it. And still I’ve arrived here with nothing to show but some knowledge, a little experience, and a long list of things I haven’t done yet.
Maybe this is just what it means to be human, to measure your life against every other life you’ve watched closely: parents, friends, the people who seem to have found their footing. I keep asking what I’m missing, whether I’m behind, or whether something bigger is still waiting for its turn. Everyone I talk to carries something in their aura, in their ki, some quiet hope aimed at me, their own expectations or unfinished dreams resting on my shoulders like it’s already decided. But what about what I want? My feelings, my thoughts, my own dreams?
What is your “Why,” Oda-sensei? @Eiichiro_Staff 🏴☠️
What has kept you writing one of the greatest stories of all time, #OnePiece for over 27 years?
I’ve always been so curious to know- Sensei, what is your “why”? 🤔
what is the ultimate spark behind your journey? I need to know, Sensei.
@Eiichiro_Staff@onepiecenetflix@ToeiAnimation@OnePieceAnime
Imagine I am an actor. I want to perform so authentically, so completely, that the audience forgets it is fiction. I want to sign autographs and take photographs and be so famous that my fans love me the way people love the sun, without fully understanding why, but being unable to imagine life without it. I want to be the greatest superstar this entire universe has ever witnessed, adored by all.
Imagine I become rich. I want to be so rich that no comparison even comes close. And yet, I would love to share. With everyone who has the dream but lacks the means. Because what is wealth, if it doesn’t move?
Imagine I walk into a party, into any room, and I am simply the best one there. Not arrogantly. Just truthfully. I do everything better, brighter, more memorably than anyone else present, and I still want every ounce of their adoration. Not because I need it. But because I deserve it, and I know it.
Imagine I helped someone once. And one day, randomly, we cross paths again. He remembers. He sees I need help, and he helps me, and his help outweighs mine by a long measure. I would still be happy. Because I’d know: someday, somehow, a moment will come where I can help him again, and this time, I will pour so much into it, give so much, that the debt becomes impossible to repay. And if he still manages to repay it, wonderful. Because now I have another reason to push myself further.
Imagine I am a writer, and I write something and publish it. It becomes famous, goes viral, something unforgettable. My name becomes known, and people are moved by my words. I would still be smiling, quietly, thinking:
“You are reading this right now, while my delusional version is the one who wrote it.”
And that is enough. That has always been enough. And maybe that’s the real secret. Maybe in some verse, this isn’t delusion at all.
Perhaps it’s prophecy. Or perhaps not.
~ Arsalan Zaid
‘The Delusion I Choose to Live In or I Choose the Delusion’
I want everything this world has to offer. I don’t want to miss anything, and I don’t want anything to miss me. I want to experience it all.
I want to grow so much that the sky feels small. I want to walk among the clouds. I want to step into the sea and let the water claim me for a moment.
I want to speak to the animals, to the trees, to the mountains, to the cold breezes that pass without anyone ever thanking them.
I want the attention of everything and everyone around me, living or non-living, because I believe, deeply and without shame, that I deserve to be felt by this world just as much as I want to feel it.
I want to feel every emotion that exists, every thought, every sensation, every possible version of consciousness. If something can be felt, I want to feel it.
Imagine I die. Then I’m reborn. I live again, and die again. Then reborn once more, with a new body, new features, new form. Maybe human. Maybe not. Maybe something living. Maybe something still. But always here, in this world. Never far beyond. Just here, repeating, returning, continuing. Just here. Always here. Cycling through death and rebirth, over and over, in a loop that exists for one singular purpose, just to ensure that every promise I made to myself in each lifetime is either fulfilled within its time, or lovingly passed down to the next version of me, so that another me, from a different verse, can carry it forward and complete what was left unfinished.
Imagine that in one of those verses, I finally live exactly the life I always wanted. Every dream fulfilled. Every wish met. Nothing left undone. Even then, that version of me would still be radiant with happiness, knowing that everything this world had to offer was received, lived, and loved without a single regret of missing out on a new adventure. Because there are no new adventures left. They were all mine.
Imagine I am a tree. I want to be nourished, deeply, tenderly, so that I may give back everything a tree could possibly offer this world. I want to be the tree. A famous tree. The one people travel to see.
Imagine I am a dog. I want to be the most beautiful, clever, loyal, and loving dog any human soul has ever had the privilege of witnessing. The kind of dog that makes people believe in something greater.
And for every other form, every creature, every non-living thing, that is how highly I think of my own consciousness. High enough to want it poured into everything.
Imagine, in any verse, I find my love. Even if she rejects me, I would still feel chosen. Even if she ignores me, I would still feel chosen. Because I found her. And the fact that I found her is enough to adore myself in this verse. That alone is enough.
Imagine if she tells me I would be the last person she’d ever want in her life, I would smile, quietly, and think: at least I’m on the list. And I would wait, patiently, for my turn to come.
The only resolution I set for myself, across every verse, every body, every birth, is to remain in a good mood. Even when there are a hundred reasons not to.
I want to give the best of myself from each body, in each birth, until the entire world, across every verse, knows exactly what I am, and who I am.
Imagine I have an enemy in one of these universes. Someone who carries so much hatred for me in his chest that it physically weighs him down. Someone who despises me enough to want me dead. I would love to face him. And even if I lose, even if he kills me, I would die happy, thinking: I fulfilled his dream. I gave him his moment. I died at the hands of my greatest enemy, and that, in itself, is legendary.
A Life Asking for Its Spark :
I wonder what my spark is or what gives me that spark.
I wonder why everything I’ve come across throughout my life never lasts long enough to keep it alive.
I often question myself, just as I am doing right now, if nothing I’ve found so far has carried that spark, then what could it be? What is the thing waiting for me? Why can’t I see you? Where are you, my spark?
What is that one thing that will become my forever spark, the reason I could live for, and even die for happily?
I am running out of time. Come find me, my spark. I am waiting for you.
~ Arsalan Zaid
My Dreams Are Not Yours :
Why do you come into my dreams without my permission?
Don’t you know you have no right to be there?
How dare you visit me, knowing I would never allow it.
I will not let you stay in my mind.
This is my space, and only I decide what enters and what does not.
I will never entertain your presence in my dreams. Never.
Stop showing me euphoric illusions.
I know what you are trying to do.
You come only because there is no other way.
You chose the moment when my mind is most unguarded, when sleep makes me soft enough for you to slip through.
But no form of you will work.
Not sweet memories.
Not borrowed goodness.
Not that beautiful, kind face,
the humble expressions, the glowing presence, that smile, those eyes.
All of it is treachery.
Stop visiting me in my dreams.
Let me sleep peacefully,
or at least let me sleep.
Do not come without my permission.
Even if you asked, I would deny you.
Dreams are meant to give rest, not rupture.
When you appear, you disturb my sleep,
you break my rhythm, you steal my peace.
That is not a beautiful dream to me,
and I do not like you there at all.
Do not write stories with me in my sleep.
Do not hold my hand without asking.
Do not look at me with those eyes.
Do not laugh at my jokes.
Even knowing it is only a dream,
even knowing it is you creating it,
I will not allow it.
If I do not like it,
do not return.
You chose a naive, foolish, selfish way to reach me.
When you could not enter my reality,
when you could not come in person,
you chose my dreams instead.
You knew I would be vulnerable,
off guard, unable to stop you.
So you waited for sleep,
and called it courage.
I will not allow this.
I will never allow this.
I will never accept this.
Go away, you fool.
I want peace.
Do you even listen?
~ Arsalan Zaid
Goals for 2026:
Health, Wealth, Wisdom, Morals, Ideas, and Purpose.
This year will be very special and important to me, as it marks the first step toward becoming who I have always wanted to be.
Things to focus on and prioritize this year:
•Health: I will achieve the best physique possible this year and discover the full potential of my body.
•I will eat clean and healthy, ensuring I get all the necessary micronutrients.
•Mental health: I will become a better version of myself than I was in the past.
•I will learn as many skills as possible to bring my ideas to life, learning and growth are my primary focus this year.
•I will explore more ideas, travel more, and develop the skills that are relevant to my goals.
•I will increase social interactions and networking to gain the information and ideas needed to achieve my goals.
•I will learn to build passive income, make strong investments, and achieve financial stability.
•I will become more humble, kind, generous, intelligent, wise, charming, charismatic, confident, and loving.
Happy New Year 2026 ✨
~ Arsalan Zaid