Hooking up, working, and real emotional truth. (massive post incoming) Plus: a baker's dozen of MP3s
The first 2/3rds of the title of this entry describes the lives of a lot of people, doesn't it? I just realized.
Been hanging out with some pretty normal 20-somethings- that is to say, fairly crazy people- and I've some meditations.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I suppose I should address the last of those 3 things in the topic: real emotional truth. The book that I was reading some weeks ago, The Drama of the Gifted Child used this term, and I've become enamored with it.
The idea is based on the fact that people deny their own emotions. How many times do we pretend like nothing is wrong when we're pissed off, how many people are we pissed at (friends, family, strangers, coworkers) that we will never actually say anything about, or maybe just not to?
There's this thing that happens when parents are abusive towards their children- the kids grow up and are thankful for it. In their mind they remember it as the parents correcting them, because they were bad kids, or they were out of line, etc. "I wouldn't be the person I am today without..." One of several problems with this, is that it is true at all levels of abuse- I've heard horror stories people tell about how they were "disciplined" by their parents, immediately followed by making of excuses or abject praise. The same way a battered wife is sure at certain phases of the relationship that she got what was coming to her, or she started something, etc.
This is a fucking problem.
Here is the deal, though: in situations like these, we are talking about an emotional or psychological injury. Just because they have "forgiven" the parent or abusive party for what has happened in the past, does nothing to change it, just like a physical injury would still exist. The denial serves to not only keep people from clarity as it relates to their past and present feelings about people, the sheltering of the love object from criticism keeps people from ever being in touch with how they felt (ie. "real emotional truth"), and to some degree probably still feel.
Let me abandon any ambiguity: a lot of people remember their childhoods wrong. Period. There are a great many events, large and small, that were you able to view as an adult, you would see completely differently. True story. So, as people continue to focus on the ends and not the means (everything worked out okay, so...), the more they distract themselves from their pain, the real emotional truth. They have not mourned those feelings that they had. They view themselves, as victims, as being wrong, as being the enemy. It is a sectioning off of oneself, a denialism, instead of an integration and accepting of one's own pain and feelings into the whole of oneself.
This is a bad thing.
[edit: I use the example of a questionable parent (ironically unquestioned in this case) because this sort of relationship that serves as a template for later human interactions, or even how people relate to themselves. Even if the present is OK, the past is still with you (and sometimes ONLY you), until you actually go swimming in it and explore your feelings uncritically, without making excuses for others.]
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
And as it relates to the first part of the title, hooking up- as I mentioned, I was hanging around some twenty-somethings, mostly, over the past few nights. An old coworker and her friends/brothers etc.
Hooking up makes me sad. People in their 20s kinda treat each other like shit, and that is incredibly sad to me, also. But there's something terribly wrong with it. Funny story, by the way, as it relates to that term: a guy asked his wife about what she was like when she was younger, and she mentioned she used to got a lot of parties and had "hooked up" with dozens of guys over the years. The guy, of course, is greatly disturbed by this and never asks her much about it. He finds out, years later, that she only meant kissing and things like that. He had thought the whole time that she'd had sex with tens of random guys, and it was no big deal to her. I can't decide if that story is more awful, or hilarious.
But, back to why hooking up is bad. The sex part is actually...kind of okay. The problem is that for many people, if not most, it's frustration. "Inside every cynic is a frustrated romantic," an old coworker once said to me. There is truth to that statement. The problem with hooking up is that a lot of people would, all things being equal, rather be in love with somebody, but they're scared and/or hurt, and don't really have the balls or ovaries to admit this, either to themselves or someone else. As a product of getting burned too many times, many people decide, sorta faux-logically, that it's a better idea to just go for gratification with like-minded people. There is something very disturbed about this, chiefly because people lack an awareness about it.
More troubling is the fact that people don't really like the people they hook up with- it's not really a requisite for a lot of people, and sometimes serious feelings are a signal of another big problem- that one person has become emotionally involved and the other person has not. Though I guess that's a different LJ entry. But the fact is that people have sex with people they don't like or respect, at all, all the time. That bothers me. First of all, there's just a lack of humanity about the whole thing- you're actually inside someone's body, literally, and you don't give a shit about this person? Or the reverse, you're letting someone be inside of you, and you have no feelings about them?
I don't think I'm being too much of a romantic when I say that's fucking bizarre to me. Honestly.
I suppose the fact that it's sort of a mutual exploitation is supposed to make it better, but it really fucking doesn't, at all.
And all this isn't to even say that people shouldn't have sex without being in a relationship. Many/most people go through a phase where they have/would have done this. But the lack of emotional truth, the lack of insight into one's own feelings and empathy and understanding of other people's feelings, it... I don't know. My Spidey Sense goes off.
I suppose it's ironic that I've been listening to this song on a loop for the past hour. "The only rings I want buried with me are the ones around my eyes..."
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
On work.
I had the most brilliant idea the other night. And I'm totally being an ass by calling my own idea brilliant, but I was very amused by the thought.
This former coworker I was hanging out with, when I asked her what was new after having not seen her for 3 months, said nothing much. That she pretty much just goes to work, and that's it. And this was my life when I worked there, I pretty much just worked, and that was it. It wasn't too bad, I didn't hate my job, but I started musing to myself while on the top of the parking garage downtown the next night (it's 6 stories high, and nobody ever parks up there- so the view is nice, and I can be alone with my thoughts, music, a book, whatever)... I was the same way, a lot of people are that way, but why? Going to a job they don't hate, but aren't really in love with, either, more or less for money and stability as opposed to doing something they actually want to do. So why don't we do what we want to do? What is that block that prevents us from doing it?
And then it hit me. And I laughed out loud.
Because we don't fucking know.
Well, I'm sure some of us do, and I've always been envious of those people (in a good way). But the fact that so many people are in my shoes....that they have no idea what they want to do with their lives, either, tickled me to no end. That's fucking amazing. I'm completely serious about that.
I don't even know if it's true- it's just that I've felt that for more or less my entire life, certainly my entire adult life- so the idea that other people feel the same...warmed me? I felt connected, I think. It was a great moment, I had, with myself.
It is sort of an impossibly lofty question, isn't it? I think most of us know what we're into, and just don't chase it. But on it's face, "what do you want to do with your life" seems insurmountably vague, impossible to answer. The solution, of course, is to break it down into bite-sized chunks, instead of trying to jam a whole orange into your mouth. That's a bizarre analogy, but you get what I mean.
And the thing is, speaking of emotional truth...we ignore that question, even when we are stuck in our routine and "secure," as it were. Really, we should be thinking about what we like to do, every day. Putting it out of our mind serves no function.
That's not true, actually- it serves out denial, and so it helps us ignore our situation. That is exactly why we do it.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
TWELVE MORE SONGS
You know what's fucked up? Every time I see something underlined now, I wonder if I'm supposed to click on it. Stupid internet.
On working, and life trajectories:
9-5ers Anthem (Aesop Rock) "Fumble out of bed and stumble to to kitchen, pour myself a cup of ambition..."
Lounge in Formation (the Action Design) "Is it human nature to make new rules, or is it human nature to play the game?"
Young Adrenaline (Del the Funky Homosapien) A get-up-and-go song...
Career Opportunities (The Clash) "Career opportunities, the ones that never knocked..."
Under Construction (No Doubt) I've been feeling a lot like this lately. The title basically says it all.
Privilege (Incubus) "The day you were born, you were born free- that is your privilege!"
Sticks and Stones (Jamie T) UK rapper I'd never heard of, but I stumbled across this song as Spinner.com's MP3 of the day...I dig it a lot. Speaking of emotional truth, something which is certainly lacking in mainstream hip hop, and hip hop in general...
Poised and Ready (Brendan Benson) You know, I neglected to mention that I picked up Brendan Benson's new CD, "My Old Familiar Friend." It's pretty great.
On love and emotional truth:
Open Your Heart ~reprise (Yuki Kajiura, .hack//SIGN OST#2) I love the line "Open your heart to eternal dimension, open your heart for love and affection, open your heart for every emotion, open your heart for tears and rejection." It is stated without any bitterness and sarcasm, but with a kind of warmth. I dig that tons.
Everyone is the Same (Innerpartysystem) On hooking up, sort of...
Broken Hearts, Torn Up Letters and the Story of a Lonely Girl (lostprophets) It doesn't get much more straightforward...
Between Us (Brendan Benson) "Okay, I've been known to cry in my sleep... But dreams often show what you don't want to know; when you're awake you're not so deep."
Plus, the FOB song above. Some of the songs cover multiple subjects, etc...
If you don't feel like downloading songs- my radio thing will be shuffling these songs for the rest of the day:
http://www.jetaudio.com/jetcast_directory/list_english.asp?selectlanguage=English&selectgenre=0&sort=title&sortorder=1&page=&pagesize=20 (~~TS)
Downloads will be up for about a week.
This entire entry, abridged: it is important to be able to feel your feelings.
Also, I love Teresa Strasser. And not just because we share initials.
One last bit about emotional truth- it played a part in why the movie The Invention of Lying was such a disappointment. The idea of people constantly telling the truth, saying their actual thoughts and feelings, was fucking fascinating, even if only in the form of a movie. It didn't quite live up to the premise.
It's entirely likely that I'm socially maladjusted and as part of that I never learned to lie or obfuscate properly, but the truth is so...so much simpler, right? I wouldn't mind living in that world where people tell the truth, and I think I'd like it slightly more so than some of my peers.
Been hanging out with some pretty normal 20-somethings- that is to say, fairly crazy people- and I've some meditations.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I suppose I should address the last of those 3 things in the topic: real emotional truth. The book that I was reading some weeks ago, The Drama of the Gifted Child used this term, and I've become enamored with it.
The idea is based on the fact that people deny their own emotions. How many times do we pretend like nothing is wrong when we're pissed off, how many people are we pissed at (friends, family, strangers, coworkers) that we will never actually say anything about, or maybe just not to?
There's this thing that happens when parents are abusive towards their children- the kids grow up and are thankful for it. In their mind they remember it as the parents correcting them, because they were bad kids, or they were out of line, etc. "I wouldn't be the person I am today without..." One of several problems with this, is that it is true at all levels of abuse- I've heard horror stories people tell about how they were "disciplined" by their parents, immediately followed by making of excuses or abject praise. The same way a battered wife is sure at certain phases of the relationship that she got what was coming to her, or she started something, etc.
This is a fucking problem.
Here is the deal, though: in situations like these, we are talking about an emotional or psychological injury. Just because they have "forgiven" the parent or abusive party for what has happened in the past, does nothing to change it, just like a physical injury would still exist. The denial serves to not only keep people from clarity as it relates to their past and present feelings about people, the sheltering of the love object from criticism keeps people from ever being in touch with how they felt (ie. "real emotional truth"), and to some degree probably still feel.
Let me abandon any ambiguity: a lot of people remember their childhoods wrong. Period. There are a great many events, large and small, that were you able to view as an adult, you would see completely differently. True story. So, as people continue to focus on the ends and not the means (everything worked out okay, so...), the more they distract themselves from their pain, the real emotional truth. They have not mourned those feelings that they had. They view themselves, as victims, as being wrong, as being the enemy. It is a sectioning off of oneself, a denialism, instead of an integration and accepting of one's own pain and feelings into the whole of oneself.
This is a bad thing.
[edit: I use the example of a questionable parent (ironically unquestioned in this case) because this sort of relationship that serves as a template for later human interactions, or even how people relate to themselves. Even if the present is OK, the past is still with you (and sometimes ONLY you), until you actually go swimming in it and explore your feelings uncritically, without making excuses for others.]
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
And as it relates to the first part of the title, hooking up- as I mentioned, I was hanging around some twenty-somethings, mostly, over the past few nights. An old coworker and her friends/brothers etc.
Hooking up makes me sad. People in their 20s kinda treat each other like shit, and that is incredibly sad to me, also. But there's something terribly wrong with it. Funny story, by the way, as it relates to that term: a guy asked his wife about what she was like when she was younger, and she mentioned she used to got a lot of parties and had "hooked up" with dozens of guys over the years. The guy, of course, is greatly disturbed by this and never asks her much about it. He finds out, years later, that she only meant kissing and things like that. He had thought the whole time that she'd had sex with tens of random guys, and it was no big deal to her. I can't decide if that story is more awful, or hilarious.
But, back to why hooking up is bad. The sex part is actually...kind of okay. The problem is that for many people, if not most, it's frustration. "Inside every cynic is a frustrated romantic," an old coworker once said to me. There is truth to that statement. The problem with hooking up is that a lot of people would, all things being equal, rather be in love with somebody, but they're scared and/or hurt, and don't really have the balls or ovaries to admit this, either to themselves or someone else. As a product of getting burned too many times, many people decide, sorta faux-logically, that it's a better idea to just go for gratification with like-minded people. There is something very disturbed about this, chiefly because people lack an awareness about it.
More troubling is the fact that people don't really like the people they hook up with- it's not really a requisite for a lot of people, and sometimes serious feelings are a signal of another big problem- that one person has become emotionally involved and the other person has not. Though I guess that's a different LJ entry. But the fact is that people have sex with people they don't like or respect, at all, all the time. That bothers me. First of all, there's just a lack of humanity about the whole thing- you're actually inside someone's body, literally, and you don't give a shit about this person? Or the reverse, you're letting someone be inside of you, and you have no feelings about them?
I don't think I'm being too much of a romantic when I say that's fucking bizarre to me. Honestly.
I suppose the fact that it's sort of a mutual exploitation is supposed to make it better, but it really fucking doesn't, at all.
And all this isn't to even say that people shouldn't have sex without being in a relationship. Many/most people go through a phase where they have/would have done this. But the lack of emotional truth, the lack of insight into one's own feelings and empathy and understanding of other people's feelings, it... I don't know. My Spidey Sense goes off.
I suppose it's ironic that I've been listening to this song on a loop for the past hour. "The only rings I want buried with me are the ones around my eyes..."
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
On work.
I had the most brilliant idea the other night. And I'm totally being an ass by calling my own idea brilliant, but I was very amused by the thought.
This former coworker I was hanging out with, when I asked her what was new after having not seen her for 3 months, said nothing much. That she pretty much just goes to work, and that's it. And this was my life when I worked there, I pretty much just worked, and that was it. It wasn't too bad, I didn't hate my job, but I started musing to myself while on the top of the parking garage downtown the next night (it's 6 stories high, and nobody ever parks up there- so the view is nice, and I can be alone with my thoughts, music, a book, whatever)... I was the same way, a lot of people are that way, but why? Going to a job they don't hate, but aren't really in love with, either, more or less for money and stability as opposed to doing something they actually want to do. So why don't we do what we want to do? What is that block that prevents us from doing it?
And then it hit me. And I laughed out loud.
Because we don't fucking know.
Well, I'm sure some of us do, and I've always been envious of those people (in a good way). But the fact that so many people are in my shoes....that they have no idea what they want to do with their lives, either, tickled me to no end. That's fucking amazing. I'm completely serious about that.
I don't even know if it's true- it's just that I've felt that for more or less my entire life, certainly my entire adult life- so the idea that other people feel the same...warmed me? I felt connected, I think. It was a great moment, I had, with myself.
It is sort of an impossibly lofty question, isn't it? I think most of us know what we're into, and just don't chase it. But on it's face, "what do you want to do with your life" seems insurmountably vague, impossible to answer. The solution, of course, is to break it down into bite-sized chunks, instead of trying to jam a whole orange into your mouth. That's a bizarre analogy, but you get what I mean.
And the thing is, speaking of emotional truth...we ignore that question, even when we are stuck in our routine and "secure," as it were. Really, we should be thinking about what we like to do, every day. Putting it out of our mind serves no function.
That's not true, actually- it serves out denial, and so it helps us ignore our situation. That is exactly why we do it.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
TWELVE MORE SONGS
You know what's fucked up? Every time I see something underlined now, I wonder if I'm supposed to click on it. Stupid internet.
On working, and life trajectories:
9-5ers Anthem (Aesop Rock) "Fumble out of bed and stumble to to kitchen, pour myself a cup of ambition..."
Lounge in Formation (the Action Design) "Is it human nature to make new rules, or is it human nature to play the game?"
Young Adrenaline (Del the Funky Homosapien) A get-up-and-go song...
Career Opportunities (The Clash) "Career opportunities, the ones that never knocked..."
Under Construction (No Doubt) I've been feeling a lot like this lately. The title basically says it all.
Privilege (Incubus) "The day you were born, you were born free- that is your privilege!"
Sticks and Stones (Jamie T) UK rapper I'd never heard of, but I stumbled across this song as Spinner.com's MP3 of the day...I dig it a lot. Speaking of emotional truth, something which is certainly lacking in mainstream hip hop, and hip hop in general...
Poised and Ready (Brendan Benson) You know, I neglected to mention that I picked up Brendan Benson's new CD, "My Old Familiar Friend." It's pretty great.
On love and emotional truth:
Open Your Heart ~reprise (Yuki Kajiura, .hack//SIGN OST#2) I love the line "Open your heart to eternal dimension, open your heart for love and affection, open your heart for every emotion, open your heart for tears and rejection." It is stated without any bitterness and sarcasm, but with a kind of warmth. I dig that tons.
Everyone is the Same (Innerpartysystem) On hooking up, sort of...
Broken Hearts, Torn Up Letters and the Story of a Lonely Girl (lostprophets) It doesn't get much more straightforward...
Between Us (Brendan Benson) "Okay, I've been known to cry in my sleep... But dreams often show what you don't want to know; when you're awake you're not so deep."
Plus, the FOB song above. Some of the songs cover multiple subjects, etc...
If you don't feel like downloading songs- my radio thing will be shuffling these songs for the rest of the day:
http://www.jetaudio.com/jetcast_directory/list_english.asp?selectlanguage=English&selectgenre=0&sort=title&sortorder=1&page=&pagesize=20 (~~TS)
Downloads will be up for about a week.
This entire entry, abridged: it is important to be able to feel your feelings.
Also, I love Teresa Strasser. And not just because we share initials.
One last bit about emotional truth- it played a part in why the movie The Invention of Lying was such a disappointment. The idea of people constantly telling the truth, saying their actual thoughts and feelings, was fucking fascinating, even if only in the form of a movie. It didn't quite live up to the premise.
It's entirely likely that I'm socially maladjusted and as part of that I never learned to lie or obfuscate properly, but the truth is so...so much simpler, right? I wouldn't mind living in that world where people tell the truth, and I think I'd like it slightly more so than some of my peers.