Okay, so if happiness isn’t the next achievement or perfect Instagram moment, what is it? Enter Aristotle, who’s honestly the GOAT when it comes to this stuff. He had this word—eudaimonia—that gets translated as “happiness” but really means something closer to “flourishing” or “living well.”
I’m sitting here three days later, and I still can’t get it out of my head. The movie, I mean. Wicked. I went because everyone was going and I needed a break from studying for finals and maybe because I was curious about all the hype but I wasn’t expecting… this. I wasn’t expecting to leave the theater feeling like someone had reached into my chest and rearranged everything.
There will always be that strange feeling—the fear of not belonging, the sense that everything I do is so tiny, so fragile and transient that nothing will remain.
The November air was 50 degrees when we lined up outside the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion. I adjusted my layers—comfortable but warm, as the email instructed—and felt my heart racing. It had been so long since I’d heard Italian sung like this.
I know you’re probably sitting in your dorm room right now, stressed about midterms, wondering if you picked the right major, scrolling through Instagram and feeling like everyone else is happy and has their life figured out except you. Spoiler alert: they don’t.
I sat in Beckman Auditorium last night, November 3rd, my iPad open, my pen ready. Around me, students whispered excitedly. Faculty members settled into their seats. The air felt heavy with anticipation—that particular Caltech energy when something important is about to happen.
The second floor of Kerckhoff had an unusual stillness that evening. People trickled into the small library room for the Science and Faith Examined (SAFE) talk, uncertain yet curious. I sat near the back, notebook open, listening to Tara—a physics PhD student and president of GCF—unfold her reflections on quantum field theory and the Bible.
One of the articles I have been featured in stated that the future Dulbecco is Camilla Fezzi, who is flying to Caltech, where he was. At that time, I did not know precisely who he was…I am honest, but today, after a year and numerous books, I really want to dedicate this article to one of my fonts of inspiration.
