2025 has been a strange year. For one, I got axed from Forbes ’ contributor list after writing for their lifestyle section, Forbes Life, for a decade. At first, I threw on that dark, heavy cloak of shame and felt rather sorry for myself. After a few days of self-pity, I chucked the crappy cloak and replaced it with my investigative journalist’s hat and got down to combing the section I used to intermittently write for from 2015 to 2025. I felt like Keanu Reeves in The Matrix, before his badass (and black leather) Neo christening. Aha! In a few minutes, I came across five more journalists – some award-winning ones – who were also let go of. There were apparently tons more, as per a New York Post article which began doing the circuit in early December. Getting let go from Forbes , I soon realized, was a blessing in disguise. I felt it in every bone of my non-AI, purist journalist’s body. For one, the contributor rate per article was incredibly low and two, I knew in my heart of hearts, that I needed to begin pitching to other publications. Is this what life is? To become softened against a hardened world, to be hopeful even when social media and the news are telling you how much you’re lacking and how doomed all of us are. During Isha namaaz, while standing on my janamaz, I cried. I felt so silly. But it hurt terribly. It was the breakup I never asked for. And then it hit me, as I went down in sajda …kid, you survived brutal cancer treatment all of last year, are you really going to let this rattle you? Get yourself together. I’ve been very careful not to speak about ‘going through cancer’ (the dreaded, horrifying ‘C’ word), because I know the more I do it, the more this wounded healer (or hero) archetype will get imprinted on my psyche. Besides, I don’t want to re-live it. Health battles throw you into the depths of hell, strip every cute, safe illusion you had neatly dressed up your life and mind up with. And now, buss, bohat hogaya hay boss . I just want to stand up and live. No thinking. Just living. No chasing. Just self-honouring. No regrets. Just present-day joy and gratitude for a heart that continues to pump, a liver that detoxes, and and….okay you get the drift. Next month, I turn 43. With the way the powers that be have unleashed such colossal evil on this planet, I deeply realize how privileged I am to move into mid-life…to still be here, a little broken up (and on the mend), but here nonetheless. There’s immense survivor’s guilt at times, but I stifle it by engaging in hobbies that I used to love as a child: sketching and collecting stickers (I recently got my hands on a 1500+ Care Bear sticker book from my bestie in New York). Is this what life is? To become softened against a hardened world, to be hopeful even when social media and the news are telling you how much you’re lacking and how doomed all of us are. Perhaps, perhaps we are. But in Plato’s Cave – there is a way out of these assumptions, the conditionings and the entrapments of the Great Illusion. There is truth, beauty, joy and freedom once we climb out of the ‘cave,’ so to speak. Last week, I lost a dear friend, Sakhawat, who put up a valiant, graceful fight during his cancer treatment. He was only 26 and had left Pakistan on the Chevening Scholarship. That young fellow defied the odds. The brightest star I ever, ever knew. He loved traveling and being in the outdoors so much, that barely a handful of months after his first round of treatment (and surgery) he caught a bus and backpacked up north for two weeks. Sakhawat lived in the moment. And that’s what each of us must do as we move into the new year. But first, we must take those first few steps out of the cave. Are you prepared? *Note: This article was written entirely by me, me, me. By my brain, my heart, my hands. No AI. No ChatGPT. The article does not necessarily reflect the opinion of Business Recorder or its owners.