The Fish Bowl

In the room where I work every day. One fighter fish residing in a fishbowl which is kept on the table. Sometimes, I would just look at the fish moving inside the bowl. What do they see when they look towards the world outside their bowl? A blur of large shapes of various sizes. Some stationary and some not. Are they even aware of a world beyond their own? A world where creatures breathe out of water. Where some walk on land and some fly in the sky. Are they aware of onlookers outside their bowl? Who looks from the outside curious about them.

The fish was not doing anything. It was just floating around the bowl. It seems like living like a king or queen. I cleaned their water two times in a week so they get to swim in clean water. It was like bathing them. They would give an extra jump for changing the water, so I had to. I thought of the fish and how relaxed it was. The fish did not have any books or music. It did not have a smartphone. But again happily living.

The person lifestyle is like a fishbowl — an enclosed space, a place of their own. Except, no-one can truly see inside, or understand until they’ve entered the bowl. No glass or plastic, no windows or a looking-glass. An isolating world made bricks and mortar — trapped inside a concrete prison. Like the mind of someone with autism: words with no exit, a life with no escape.

One lesson we can learn from fish bowl about loneliness and solitude. Loneliness is what happens when we feel disconnected from ourselves and those around us. As a result, we feel very alone. We can experience loneliness even when we are with family and friends. We can experience loneliness when we are alone. It is a state of disconnection. Solitude is a state of connection which is not dependent upon the presence or absence of other people. A person can feel very connected especially when alone.

The fish in the fishbowl exists in a state of solitude. It is connected to everything and through the fishbowl, it observes us as the lonely and disconnected people that we are. I assume the fish feels bad for us even though the irony is that we often feel bad for it.