If Only There Were A Cure: Limitless

We often see miracles happening in movies. It could be a plane on a deserted island, the superhero magically appearing at the right time, or sometimes a little pill that opens all the doors in life.

Becoming a genius overnight after taking some sort of drug has been a frequently used phenomenon in cinema. And the reason why these stories keep the audience interested is because we humans are curious about our limits. But, what if there was no limit?

This phenomenon was the subject of the movie Limitless (2011) starring Bradley Cooper, playing Eddie. Eddie is a dowdy-looking writer who struggles to write for his only secured project while dealing with a fresh breakup due to his non-promising life. Right after being dumped, he runs into his ex-brother-in-law Vernon who is a drug dealer. Offering to have a little drink with Eddie, Vernon quickly introduces him to a new drug he is selling: NZT-48. Lying about its reliability, Vernon gives Eddie a single pill on the house which Eddie takes hesitantly.

Thinking that nothing worse could happen in his life, Eddie gives a shot to the pill and as soon as he swallows it, he becomes limitless.

His senses sharpen, long-lost memories and facts start coming back to him, he is energized and has uninterrupted focus. Suddenly his idleness is gone and he is getting his life back together. He can speak a new language fluently in a short time, win in poker, write 40 pages of his book in a day, and invest as a finance genius. He builds a strong network with his skills, gets to meet the richest and most important people in finance, and has them envy him while receiving prestigious job offers. In the meantime, his relationship recovers and he feels more confident than ever.

Although the pill provides Eddie with all he wants in life, after it wears off, he is back to square one. And now, he is left with an addiction, hallucinations from time to time, and symptoms of drug withdrawal.

Now, the question is: Would you take it?

Many people believe that life is a struggle. In life, we all endlessly strive for things, one after another, and for everything we want to achieve, we put in lots of effort. To learn a language, we study, listen, write, read, and practice speaking for years. To get a good job, we study for 4+ years, get an internship, and receive training. To travel the world or buy a house, we work different jobs or retrench to save money. But, there is a good side as well: When we achieve our goals after such hard work, we feel a deep joy and get a taste of success. These feelings, make us want more and set more goals since we want to feel the success and joy of having done our best, of forcing the limits. But, what if there was no effort and no limit, what if we could achieve anything and everything without the slightest effort? What if we were offered the pill?

After taking the pill, we wouldn't need to study for years to speak a language or work hard day and night to save money. Everything we had to do, we could do in minutes, without worries, struggles, or disappointments. But then, would life lose its meaning or would it become much easier, supposing that we never get bored of how easy it is? Wouldn't having nothing to chase and not feeling rewarded in the end spoil all our experiences? In the end, what makes success so valuable is the struggles we go through to achieve it. However, one might also argue that if things were easier to achieve, we could set new goals every time without running out of options as we would be able to do anything, including things beyond our normal abilities. But then another question would arise: If we achieve something by chance, like a miracle pill, would we call it a success?

In the end, "There are moments in life: Moments when you know you crossed the bridge."* The bridges being our goals, crossing them after a long and hard walk or with a taxi is the choice.

Images
letterboxd.com
Limitless (2011), the movie
pluggedin.com

*The quote is from the Limitless movie, 2011.