Epiphany #267 - The big one?
I've had another one of those deep personal insights i've been getting lately. This one happened on Jesus green, near a juggler, a mother & child practicing hand-stands and a couple of students discussing how much they need their own space. It was a nice moment, made me feel part of the world again in a way I haven't since I was very young.
I've known for a long time that I'm always focused on failure, analyse any situation until I find a way it could have been, should have been better. I drag other people down and insult their capability because I apply the same thinking to them that I do to myself.
But this morning, I decided that it's not because I'm afraid of success, unsure of myself, or not sure how to be happy. It's because I *like* it this way. Or I did. Working from the way I viewed the world in the past, Failure was actually more *interesting* than success. Success just meant I was working on something different than everyone else, ahead of them academically and getting involved or excited over something that no-one else could share with me. It never gave me any happiness, and If I'd done something well enough to feel comfortable with it, it meant there was nothing more to apply myself to in order to improve.
But failure, well failure was interesting. Failure was an opportunity to think, consider, try something hard and difficult. It was also a chance to wallow, focus on myself (my favourite subject) and generally think about how amazing I ought to be without ever having to put in any real effort to get much done.
Any situation where you can't get a perfect right answer, and there's a real opportunity to try and sort out the mess and develop a logical understanding of something that was vague before... well those are the best things in life. Yet something about my psyche and my upbringing means i always saw those things as failures, I couldn't help but feel bad about them, even though they're what I wanted. You can fill in for yourself all the shrink-talk about conflicting drives and confusin mental states.
When I look out at the world, sometimes all I see is a giant list of opportunities to fail. My motivation, as much as I've had any, has been to limit the number of times that I do. I'm hunting for a job, trying to find ways of saving money, live my life with my boyfriend, and learn to program computers, all of this as much because i "ought" to as because I really care. If I take away this idea of 'ought' then I take away a lot of pressure. Naturally this makes me feel so much better. Now I know why I was holding on, I think I can let go.
But... then what? how does a person live their life when they're not obsessed with failure all the time? what motivation *can* I find to do the things I might not want to do? Right now I'm on the careers service computers in the basement on Mill Lane, because I want to have enough income to go punting when I want to. I seems as good a reason as any.
I've known for a long time that I'm always focused on failure, analyse any situation until I find a way it could have been, should have been better. I drag other people down and insult their capability because I apply the same thinking to them that I do to myself.
But this morning, I decided that it's not because I'm afraid of success, unsure of myself, or not sure how to be happy. It's because I *like* it this way. Or I did. Working from the way I viewed the world in the past, Failure was actually more *interesting* than success. Success just meant I was working on something different than everyone else, ahead of them academically and getting involved or excited over something that no-one else could share with me. It never gave me any happiness, and If I'd done something well enough to feel comfortable with it, it meant there was nothing more to apply myself to in order to improve.
But failure, well failure was interesting. Failure was an opportunity to think, consider, try something hard and difficult. It was also a chance to wallow, focus on myself (my favourite subject) and generally think about how amazing I ought to be without ever having to put in any real effort to get much done.
Any situation where you can't get a perfect right answer, and there's a real opportunity to try and sort out the mess and develop a logical understanding of something that was vague before... well those are the best things in life. Yet something about my psyche and my upbringing means i always saw those things as failures, I couldn't help but feel bad about them, even though they're what I wanted. You can fill in for yourself all the shrink-talk about conflicting drives and confusin mental states.
When I look out at the world, sometimes all I see is a giant list of opportunities to fail. My motivation, as much as I've had any, has been to limit the number of times that I do. I'm hunting for a job, trying to find ways of saving money, live my life with my boyfriend, and learn to program computers, all of this as much because i "ought" to as because I really care. If I take away this idea of 'ought' then I take away a lot of pressure. Naturally this makes me feel so much better. Now I know why I was holding on, I think I can let go.
But... then what? how does a person live their life when they're not obsessed with failure all the time? what motivation *can* I find to do the things I might not want to do? Right now I'm on the careers service computers in the basement on Mill Lane, because I want to have enough income to go punting when I want to. I seems as good a reason as any.