When was the last time you were truly happy?
Happy without a checklist of “if only I had this”?
Happy like a child — right here, right now, completely present, not hiding in the past, not waiting for the future?
Probably a long time ago.

It’s strange — we are all born holding the keys to Eden.
Children see the world perfectly: they marvel at everything, believe in magic, accept themselves entirely —
every finger, every hair, every naive drawing, every silly joke.
Children remember. They know how to live, not just exist.
They don’t need a promised paradise — they live in one.

Then adults and society take away those keys, break them, and replace them with distorted lenses.
Through them, the new person sees a glitched, cruel, broken world.
Real joy fades, replaced with synthetic pleasures — tiny highs full of bitterness and emptiness.

Why do we do this to ourselves?
Why cripple generation after generation?
Why settle for a counterfeit paradise,
this glitched Eden, when once we held the real one?
Can we still remember it… and find our way back?

Digital drawing, 2025