State of the Union
What do you do after you've made a mistake?
Say you're sorry? But what good can that do? What can that change? When do you stop saying sorry? When you do start saying sorry for being sorry? When does grief end and regret begin?
I very nearly got into a fight last night. I drank way too much and I was belligerent on the train ride back home. I made some phone calls to a bunch of people and some things were said. My timing could not have been more inappropriate.
But that's not what I'm going to talk about. In all honesty, none of that really matters. But at the same time, it's all that matters. It's the only thing that matters. Everything matters.
I'm not trying to speak in riddles, even if I do do that from time to time. I know I should just lay it out, which is what I'm attempting to do here with little progress. Can nihilism be both wrong and right at the same time? Where does meaning come from? These are pertinent questions. But where is the value in them? What is the point of asking whether or not life has meaning? Don't most people go ignoring this issue their entire life? Don't most people stick to one certified answer and defend it to their last breath? Honestly, how many people lay in bed until 3pm and wonder what it is to feel? When does what I'm saying and what I'm feeling cross the line from being inquisitive to being melodramatic? Is this merely an act of sensationalizing everything that happens?
I don't think there's a right answer to this. Every answer is wrong. If I say no, I will keep talking in misconstrued prose and be labeled as flaming ball of emotional effigy. If I say yes, well...there you go, right? Another easy way out. Another prejudgment justified.
Why am I so angry? I ask all these questions. I wonder if I ever really give out any answers. I am angry because I fear. I fear being misunderstood. I've talked about this before on numerous occasions. If you read my journal, you should know how self conscious I am. But if I'm being labeled as self conscious, whether it is by myself or by others, isn't that too merely a prejudgment? I've talked about the failure of words. And they are a failure. They fail to accomplish anything other than eliciting preconceived labels. How difficult it is to learn! How do people learn new words? Who tells a child what hate is? Who explains what love is? When I tell you I hate you, do you understand what I'm trying to say? I don't think even the speaker truly knows what he's saying. It's all unintelligible babble. Why speak? Why talk? Why try? Why love, why hate, when not even you will realize the full capacity of those emotions?
I am NOT full of emotions. I do NOT condescend to be over run by base emotion. There is something deeper than that. Is it so bad that all I want to do is understand myself? Is that so selfish? Is it unhealthy to spend uncountable hours pondering your own being, your own meaning, the ramifications of your own actions, your thoughts, your body, your life? Is that selfish? I don't know. TELL ME. Is that selfish? What if I don't care about you. What if you don't matter to me. What if the only thing in this existence that matters is me? Isn't that the truth? Isn't that the truth for you as much as it is for me? What else can you be sure of other than the fact that you exist? I have this motto that I love to say: The purpose of life is death. I say this because it is true. All life dies. Everybody dies. Everything dies. But at the same time, nobody dies but you. Because tens of thousands of people die every day from starvation, from repression, from anger, from hate, from loneliness, from life. But after they die, you're still there. Death is only an idea until you experience it for yourself. Death is not real. Death is an illusion because to fathom death is impossible. What is it to die? It is to fulfill your life. It is this singularity, the fact that the only death you will ever experience is your own, that draws everything down to this quintessential existential point. You are alone and you are the only one that matters. Everything else is merely a byproduct of your own existence. And if I'm the only one that exists, why should I bother myself with external things? With this in mind, isn't it only logical that I would focus on myself?
But this leads me to another conundrum. What if I don't like what I find. What if those events from last night continue to haunt me, what if they keep repeating like they always have for so long. What if I hate what I do, hate what I say, hate who I am? What if you wake up one day and realize that you're not the person you want to be. That you've never been that person. That you can't be that person. But this is a mistake. The only person I should ever want to be is myself. The only person I can only ever be is myself. The only person that can ever be happy is me. But does this work? Does it make sense that if the only person you possibly can be is yourself that you should be content with what you are? No! That is only the surface level of this argument. It is ok to be discontent with yourself. It is ok to try to improve. I'm not saying it isn't. That's not the point here. That's something different altogether. The idea I'm trying to posit is that this is one wild and precious life. This is MY life. This life is what I make of it. I'm what I make of myself. I'll always do stupid things. That's who I am. I can't escape that. But who I am isn't what matters most. Ultimately, it doesn't matter one bit who I "make of myself." It begins with the fact that I am at all. I am that I am. No, I'm not claiming to be God. But God has given me this life. Everything ties back to the fact that life is a gift. And my search for myself is in essence a search for God.
I have a very bad headache. This is all I can write for now.
Say you're sorry? But what good can that do? What can that change? When do you stop saying sorry? When you do start saying sorry for being sorry? When does grief end and regret begin?
I very nearly got into a fight last night. I drank way too much and I was belligerent on the train ride back home. I made some phone calls to a bunch of people and some things were said. My timing could not have been more inappropriate.
But that's not what I'm going to talk about. In all honesty, none of that really matters. But at the same time, it's all that matters. It's the only thing that matters. Everything matters.
I'm not trying to speak in riddles, even if I do do that from time to time. I know I should just lay it out, which is what I'm attempting to do here with little progress. Can nihilism be both wrong and right at the same time? Where does meaning come from? These are pertinent questions. But where is the value in them? What is the point of asking whether or not life has meaning? Don't most people go ignoring this issue their entire life? Don't most people stick to one certified answer and defend it to their last breath? Honestly, how many people lay in bed until 3pm and wonder what it is to feel? When does what I'm saying and what I'm feeling cross the line from being inquisitive to being melodramatic? Is this merely an act of sensationalizing everything that happens?
I don't think there's a right answer to this. Every answer is wrong. If I say no, I will keep talking in misconstrued prose and be labeled as flaming ball of emotional effigy. If I say yes, well...there you go, right? Another easy way out. Another prejudgment justified.
Why am I so angry? I ask all these questions. I wonder if I ever really give out any answers. I am angry because I fear. I fear being misunderstood. I've talked about this before on numerous occasions. If you read my journal, you should know how self conscious I am. But if I'm being labeled as self conscious, whether it is by myself or by others, isn't that too merely a prejudgment? I've talked about the failure of words. And they are a failure. They fail to accomplish anything other than eliciting preconceived labels. How difficult it is to learn! How do people learn new words? Who tells a child what hate is? Who explains what love is? When I tell you I hate you, do you understand what I'm trying to say? I don't think even the speaker truly knows what he's saying. It's all unintelligible babble. Why speak? Why talk? Why try? Why love, why hate, when not even you will realize the full capacity of those emotions?
I am NOT full of emotions. I do NOT condescend to be over run by base emotion. There is something deeper than that. Is it so bad that all I want to do is understand myself? Is that so selfish? Is it unhealthy to spend uncountable hours pondering your own being, your own meaning, the ramifications of your own actions, your thoughts, your body, your life? Is that selfish? I don't know. TELL ME. Is that selfish? What if I don't care about you. What if you don't matter to me. What if the only thing in this existence that matters is me? Isn't that the truth? Isn't that the truth for you as much as it is for me? What else can you be sure of other than the fact that you exist? I have this motto that I love to say: The purpose of life is death. I say this because it is true. All life dies. Everybody dies. Everything dies. But at the same time, nobody dies but you. Because tens of thousands of people die every day from starvation, from repression, from anger, from hate, from loneliness, from life. But after they die, you're still there. Death is only an idea until you experience it for yourself. Death is not real. Death is an illusion because to fathom death is impossible. What is it to die? It is to fulfill your life. It is this singularity, the fact that the only death you will ever experience is your own, that draws everything down to this quintessential existential point. You are alone and you are the only one that matters. Everything else is merely a byproduct of your own existence. And if I'm the only one that exists, why should I bother myself with external things? With this in mind, isn't it only logical that I would focus on myself?
But this leads me to another conundrum. What if I don't like what I find. What if those events from last night continue to haunt me, what if they keep repeating like they always have for so long. What if I hate what I do, hate what I say, hate who I am? What if you wake up one day and realize that you're not the person you want to be. That you've never been that person. That you can't be that person. But this is a mistake. The only person I should ever want to be is myself. The only person I can only ever be is myself. The only person that can ever be happy is me. But does this work? Does it make sense that if the only person you possibly can be is yourself that you should be content with what you are? No! That is only the surface level of this argument. It is ok to be discontent with yourself. It is ok to try to improve. I'm not saying it isn't. That's not the point here. That's something different altogether. The idea I'm trying to posit is that this is one wild and precious life. This is MY life. This life is what I make of it. I'm what I make of myself. I'll always do stupid things. That's who I am. I can't escape that. But who I am isn't what matters most. Ultimately, it doesn't matter one bit who I "make of myself." It begins with the fact that I am at all. I am that I am. No, I'm not claiming to be God. But God has given me this life. Everything ties back to the fact that life is a gift. And my search for myself is in essence a search for God.
I have a very bad headache. This is all I can write for now.