A Review of the Past
I don't know what to say or do, so instead I'm just going to start typing something out and see what happens. A lot has happened in the past year or so, couple years, or however long it has been since I seriously sat down and tried to type something like this out. One girl I loved left me, though I expect that was the only thing that could have happened in that circumstance. She could not see that those that she called "friends" were not looking out for her best interests. I'm not sure if that is the right place to start, but it was the point where a lot of things were put into place so that they could fall apart. She was a strong and giving person, but without God as the one who sustained her. So she had to get her strength from elsewhere and learned to somehow retain her virtue despite that handicap. You become like those you hang around and grow to be more like those who give you the strength to move forward. Not all her virtue was preserved, of course. She was an alcoholic, perpetual liar, sex-starved, blood-mage, sorceress, and I could never completely relax around her in any of those areas; but she was truly a beautiful person despite her brokenness. The good that she was and that she could be made the rest pale in comparison. But I could not move forward, I was too afraid that her "friends" (both human and not human) would hurt her and then there was the greater issue that her life's direction and mine were not the same and never could be under the circumstances. I follow God who cares for us humans enough to give us a choice and to desire that we grow; she followed those spiritual beings who trade power and perceived privilege for the influence needed to try to destroy or discredit us. Yes, it is a bit more complicated than that, but the end result was the same. The end result was about the only thing it could be. I was betrayed by some and pulled away from her by others. Her sister (betrayed), housemate (betrayed), her mother (pulled), her familiars (pulled), her father (betrayed), her boyfriend (betrayed/pulled, I don't know), her old boyfriend (betrayed), and other spiritual forces that I never took the time to pick apart. And why not? She got a "nice guy" who was willing to give her everything that she could have wanted; escape and structure. I can hardly blame her for cutting off contact with me when that was her choice. I couldn't give her those things, nor would I ask or demand that from her.
But the end result of that was mostly just pain and instability. I had never really trusted that she wouldn't leave, though I had let myself hope, and so it was mainly a dull impact when it happened. The other lies and betrayals that happened around the same time, so many that I could only pull them apart later, left me mostly alone and isolated from all of the connections that I had made during that time. But I made it through, reaching out to whomever else was around and loosing what little hold I had on "hope". Honestly, if the ideal of "elimination of desire" can be properly understood and applied than life isn't so bad. It can actually be fun, so long as you never focus on anything better. Everything in the world is either a pleasure or a stimulus for growth and sometimes things can be both. But that only works so long as you accept things as never changing and/or never needing change beyond natural growth. I've seen, and been, too many transformations of character to believe this to be true. So I continued to be and grow with a morbid determination of one without hope but who still had desire.
The one who changed all of that was someone who was, quite probably, a lot worse off than I was in terms of outside interference. I have bad luck, I know this. I also know that most of my "bad luck" is caused by different types of spiritual influence (and not always on others). It is amazing how big a change a little prodding can do, even if it isn't something that seems bad at the time. Most often the things are completely outside my control or foresight. That said, I am in excellent health and retain a somewhat relatively clear head despite all of this. She is not nearly so fortunate. She sees demons like others see stray dogs and cats, something that is ever-present and needs to be acknowledged on some level but usually not on the same level as everything and everyone else. She also knows God and was taught much on how to use her abilities. This was someone who I believed that, if anyone, this one would be able to accept me and understand. With the lack of discipline and a much higher "starting point" of her abilities came pride and a much smaller capability to integrate things effectively. Her pride is what kept her from going crazy but her much higher ability to interact with the spiritual world without training meant that it could interact with her. She was medically a mess, would become annoyed and very angry at people with little reason, and constantly had to deal with prodding from spiritual forces (most of whom were either hostile or had other jobs to do that did not necessarily include her as a relevant part of that job). And yet, for everything else that could be said about her, she was someone who could truly understand. The difference between someone who understands the spiritual world, and sees it outside the narrow context of the struggle, and goes to God for strength (as opposed to spiritual creatures/the human spirit/nature/others (either through consensual on non-consensual means)/etc.); that is a really REALLY big deal. Most of those who understand the spiritual realm don't understand just what it means to not be friendly with the side that has domain over the world nor do they understand why it matters such that they would have any real reason to not want to be on that side, and the few who don't fall into that category tend to see nothing more than a complete black-and-white view of it where you either ask God to do one or try to call down hell-fire upon the other. She was neither of these, and so was the first and only person who I could talk to and feel like I might be truly understood.
Even so, I never brought myself to believe her when she said that she wouldn't abandon me. When she saw my sealed box of "hope", she cried; and for that reason I tried to change. I was open and honest with her about so many things that I could speak with no one else about. When I lost my job I told her how depressed that made me, especially to not be able to find another right away, and how useless I felt because of that and a number of other things. Seeing people leave and being left with even less support did not help me feel better in the least. But rather than remind herself of this, she instead chose to focus on her own desires; specifically to become pregnant before her ovaries were scheduled to be removed (one of those medical problems that I mentioned before). When she asked if I wanted to sleep with her the only thing I could answer in that state of mind was "whatever you want". I could not say "yes", because I did not want to do it; but I could not say "no", because I was too bad off to have the strength to deny her. A quick inquiry on her part showed her the truth and she left quickly and quite embarrassed (nothing had happened, we were both dressed). I tried to give her some time, I'm not sure if that was a good thing or if it was a problem. During that time I got a chance to see God in a way that few people do. It was an experience that I will never forget. And then later that night I got a text message saying that she never wanted to see me or speak with me again. Even though she had broken her word that she had given on not abandoning me, I was determined to not do the same to her. She had said that the only way she would abandon me was if she did it out of fear that she might hurt me, but it instead appeared that she blamed the incident and had told her family that as well. I tried to be there for her as I could without making her interact with me, but she made it clear that she didn't want to deal with me at all. How much of this was just her personal problem, and how much was externally influenced, I don't know. She talked about the earlier girl as though they had had more than the two conversations that I knew about. They were not RL conversations, the first girl broke into this one's dreams on at least a couple of occasions not realizing her innate abilities (though I would still bet on the first girl over this one in anything other than a direct application of brute force), but the interaction was there and such that she apparently got some very wrong ideas about the nature of my relationship with that girl. So after doing what what I could to salvage the friendship I did the only thing I could do, I let her go as she pleased.
This affected me in ways that are hard to describe. Not because they are incredibly hard to understand or hard to find words to be understood, but because focusing on it to write it out is difficult. The little hope I had tried to open myself to was lost, and I cried for that loss though I had never seriously cared before. I had become friends with her family, but now they hated me, and going to see our mutual friends would cause her to run away, making me feel bad about denying her that time with others even though I knew that it wasn't my fault. My low self confidence got even worse as this seemed to indicate that even someone in the most screwed up type of situation who should know better and be a different type of person would abandon me. Why should I try? I couldn't ignore my personal needs and desires as though they were non-issues, but I had every reason no believe that every effort I might make would ultimately end in failure. The only reason that I didn't think about suicide is that having such a clear understanding of what there is after death doesn't allow for the belief that killing oneself will fix anything. It was hard, but I kept going. I don't know how or why, but I kept trying to not fall apart. So much of it, though, was just going through the motions. I had lost so much that trying for more or better was nearly impossible to do. Once I found out the reason why I could not find a job (one of my references was badmouthing me) I found a job within two weeks and immediately took it rather than hold off on taking it or continuing looking for something that was more to what I needed. My mood was better in having a job, but it wasn't "good" by any measure. The first person I worked with was a mild schizophrenic with low IQ (about 14-16y) who only avoided work because of laziness and because he expected others to take care of him. I kept him from being kicked out of his house and got him motivated to work before he didn't want to see me again (though it was obvious from the cleaning that he had been abusing charity organizations). The second position I got was a night job with a guy who frequently became disoriented over the fact that there was someone in "his house" and would occasionally either run away or become violent. And all the while the one who had been my friend continued to try to separate me from everyone else who was my friend.
Ironically it was that very meddling that helped lead to my first real girlfriend. That is a sad thing to only accomplish at the age of 26. The second female friend in this story told my soon-to-be-girlfriend that I might be interested in her and to avoid me at all costs. The girlfriend girl, upon not receiving sufficient explanation about why to run away and when considering the source, instead only took to heart the idea that I might be interested in her. Though, ironically, I didn't even think to be seriously interested in her until she started showing interest in me. After that everything fell together. We both liked the other and respected the other, so after some difficulty with her family was sufficiently resolved, we started dating. She was cute and could be very fun, but we never connected the way that I had with others in the past. The biggest problem was that she would argue for hours and never seek to change when there was a difficulty until a clear consequence was set down. She never wanted to end a conversation until she thought to her satisfaction that whatever issue was resolved and she felt better about it; so conversations would literally take 4 hours at times, and sometimes longer. I personally could not take the stress of these conversations that happened so frequently as a minimum of twice a week. Then there was the fact that I could not allow myself to continue in the relationship pattern that allowed her to not choose to change or to only choose change as a result of the fear of whatever action I had decided to take. Usually it was to avoid whatever thing was causing the problem or to hang up the phone after she had circled around the issue for hours without making any decision, since I wasn't about to try to punish her, but I did have to break up with her once to get her to realize that trying to tell me that I had to be happy to talk to her for as long as it might take for her to feel better as often as she might desire it. Honestly, it was not her neediness that was the problem, it was her lack of a desire to take personal responsibility for growth.
Over time she began to grow and the previous problems were diminished, though not completely eliminated. And there were a number of good things that I probably should say while I am trying to get my head in order. She always wanted to do stuff and would constantly dream about one thing or another. She was interested in the spiritual world and wanted to learn, despite not knowing anything or having any particular ability in the area. She also did try to make things work as well as she could in the best way that she knew how (TV shows and a lot of books lie horribly about what a functioning relationship looks like). But even as some things got better, other problems began to emerge within the relationship. I was traditionally very active in trying to grow and move forward, but being around her seemed to rob me of a lot of that motivation (though, I admit, I didn't have a lot of strength left to make the effort even if the motivation was there). I was also much too boisterous and outgoing for her in a lot of circumstances. I was also very direct about dealing with things which was in a very direct opposition with her desire to work through circumstances slowly and deliberately. I may think too much, but I do it deliberately and do not do not rehash old information unless I see that there is new information or some reason to change my previous thought process on it; she would go over things dozens of times and was most helped by someone willing to listen to and help organize her thoughts, which frustrated me to no end since the constant focus on problems and issues made me feel even worse than I already did. It later became obvious that our basic ways of viewing the world, as it related to growth and giving of ourselves to others, were fundamentally different. I tried to remind myself that, objectively speaking, her way was probably the better way and tried to live with that beside her. But it started to become clear that I enjoyed her company as a friend and not so much as a girlfriend. I started trying to make the relationship work by reaching out more, by giving more, by doing whatever I could to make things work as "more than friends"; but that didn't work either.
The final straw came when I realized that she didn't love me the way that I loved her. I had always believed that you should love with everything you had without worrying about getting in return, knowing that if both people were focused primarily upon the other person than both would always be covered in the others love. Logically my mind told me that one needed to be more selfish or else the relationship would suffer whenever the other person decided to take a more selfish approach to things, but another part of my mind could never let go knowing that if two people were mutually dedicated to that type of love than the other person's strength would cover over the weakness that one might have and would draw them back into the relationship. This type of relationship could last forever, as both partners would constantly grow closer and stronger even as life's difficulties would give more room for growth together and increasing strength. But the other way was also very attractive because it had much more allowance for the broken nature of mankind and was, in the end, much less taxing than throwing oneself so completely into the relationship. My choice seemed to come down to, "be with her despite knowing that you don't fit well together simply because you would greatly miss having someone to hold and because you know that she won't abandon you so long as you are together" or "end the relationship and hope and pray that she finds someone better suited for her so that you can have some semblance of peace over the fact that you can no longer be there for her the way that you had been". And so, despite her protests, I broke up with her. Thankfully there was another guy who showed up in her life within a couple months who was a much better fit for her and helped her in ways that I simply couldn't till they eventually started dating. I was somewhat surprised that my X-girlfriend wanted to remain friends, especially since she had tried to pull away from me during one of our break-ups. This is probably the one reason that I am still around despite everything else. The anger and hatred that some people have toward me can sometimes be too much to bear, especially since I didn't do anything to cause it and I don't know of anything to fix it either. I did not tell her how hard this is affecting me or how completely and utterly lonely I feel so much of the time. She is with someone who is better for her and is happy, so if I can give her one last gift as part of the relationship it will be to not give her second thoughts about that thing that never worked totally right in the first place.
My current state is pretty much at the end of my rope. I don't have a job and my unemployment runs out in about a week. My stress level is so high that I have gotten sick over it a couple times (I keep a bottle of antacid handy now). I feel so lonely that I wake up every morning incapable of movement and often with tears involuntarily running from the corners of my eyes. In essence I have found that nobody, either normal or freak, can put up with me or fit with me; that is how it feels anyway. I really did put everything I had into the relationship and having made the choice to leave rather than being left only makes it harder by making it clear that I chose this. That may be a big part of the biggest downside of my current condition: I have been having a really hard time reaching out to do anything that might truly matter. Every time I try I am overcome by waves of pain and fatigue. Yesterday, before I started writing this and after wasting most of my waking hours with web-comics, I spent around 14 hours sleeping or napping because of the exhaustion that I felt every time I tried to do something productive.
This has been growing for a long time, I know, but only reached this type of level recently. As a young child I learned that being too smart got you ignored by the other kids and wouldn't make the adults take you seriously anyway. As a school aged child I learned that doing well meant that doing average was bad and that there was no room to be appreciated. As an adolescent I labored for years to get privileges and to open doors that my siblings would get automatically when they reached the same age as what I had been when I got them. The more I learned and grew, the weirder life became for me and the less I fit in with others. As a teen I struggled for years only to see others achieve the same without work or to have what I labored for snatched away over and over again. In community college I learned that hard work was no substitute for having connections or a position and I learned that no understanding or accomplishment would be able to overcome people's personal ideas of what constituted truth. I tried to have a new type of life when I left for university and made a lot of friends, but most of those were either freshmen with no idea about the realities of the real world or seniors who promptly graduated and moved away at the end of my first year. I tried to continue reaching out and find those who could understand me, but every great stride I made forward was soon after met with crushing defeat. When I graduated and found a job it became clear that doing a good job helping my clients only meant that I would not see them anymore and would have a hard time fulfilling my work duties. And then there was the situations that I have spoken about here already, my lack of being able to find a job after my first period of unemployment (the woman whom I worked most closely with had been badmouthing me to potential employers) and my lack of being able to find a job during my recent unemployment (I think my old boss has been badmouthing me to potential employers). I don't know how to convince myself that working hard for something better doesn't bring pain and disappointment.
I am supposed to be writing a book, helping out on one online game, and volunteering at one or two places more than I am. There is physical training that I could/should be doing, and a number of other things as well. I am not lacking in things that I could be doing, only in the drive and personal justification to do them. I have limits and I can't seem to get past them. I know that working as hard as other people and doing the same as others doesn't work for me, I just don't get the same results, but if hard work is similarly doomed than what can I do? The term is "learned helplessness" and it refers to a circumstance where one learns that no action that can be taken has a meaningful impact on the outcome. Most people will choose anything to get away from this circumstance, usually acting out and causing their life to self-destruct before admitting that their actions don't matter. I know that I can help and hurt others, I even know that I can slightly help and hurt myself through my actions; I don't know that there is any real good for myself down the line no matter what I do. I know, that is a horrible horrible thing to say and probably not true, but I really don't know that my life will be anything other than one hope tasted only to be crushed followed by another similar situation. And I don't know what I can or could possibly do to have things be any different. All I know to do is to try my best at doing the most mediocre job I can and wait for something to change. Maybe the only way I matter is in how I affect others, maybe the effect on myself isn't important at all. I don't know. I really don't know. I will survive, that much I know, but I don't know that I can say much more than that.
But the end result of that was mostly just pain and instability. I had never really trusted that she wouldn't leave, though I had let myself hope, and so it was mainly a dull impact when it happened. The other lies and betrayals that happened around the same time, so many that I could only pull them apart later, left me mostly alone and isolated from all of the connections that I had made during that time. But I made it through, reaching out to whomever else was around and loosing what little hold I had on "hope". Honestly, if the ideal of "elimination of desire" can be properly understood and applied than life isn't so bad. It can actually be fun, so long as you never focus on anything better. Everything in the world is either a pleasure or a stimulus for growth and sometimes things can be both. But that only works so long as you accept things as never changing and/or never needing change beyond natural growth. I've seen, and been, too many transformations of character to believe this to be true. So I continued to be and grow with a morbid determination of one without hope but who still had desire.
The one who changed all of that was someone who was, quite probably, a lot worse off than I was in terms of outside interference. I have bad luck, I know this. I also know that most of my "bad luck" is caused by different types of spiritual influence (and not always on others). It is amazing how big a change a little prodding can do, even if it isn't something that seems bad at the time. Most often the things are completely outside my control or foresight. That said, I am in excellent health and retain a somewhat relatively clear head despite all of this. She is not nearly so fortunate. She sees demons like others see stray dogs and cats, something that is ever-present and needs to be acknowledged on some level but usually not on the same level as everything and everyone else. She also knows God and was taught much on how to use her abilities. This was someone who I believed that, if anyone, this one would be able to accept me and understand. With the lack of discipline and a much higher "starting point" of her abilities came pride and a much smaller capability to integrate things effectively. Her pride is what kept her from going crazy but her much higher ability to interact with the spiritual world without training meant that it could interact with her. She was medically a mess, would become annoyed and very angry at people with little reason, and constantly had to deal with prodding from spiritual forces (most of whom were either hostile or had other jobs to do that did not necessarily include her as a relevant part of that job). And yet, for everything else that could be said about her, she was someone who could truly understand. The difference between someone who understands the spiritual world, and sees it outside the narrow context of the struggle, and goes to God for strength (as opposed to spiritual creatures/the human spirit/nature/others (either through consensual on non-consensual means)/etc.); that is a really REALLY big deal. Most of those who understand the spiritual realm don't understand just what it means to not be friendly with the side that has domain over the world nor do they understand why it matters such that they would have any real reason to not want to be on that side, and the few who don't fall into that category tend to see nothing more than a complete black-and-white view of it where you either ask God to do one or try to call down hell-fire upon the other. She was neither of these, and so was the first and only person who I could talk to and feel like I might be truly understood.
Even so, I never brought myself to believe her when she said that she wouldn't abandon me. When she saw my sealed box of "hope", she cried; and for that reason I tried to change. I was open and honest with her about so many things that I could speak with no one else about. When I lost my job I told her how depressed that made me, especially to not be able to find another right away, and how useless I felt because of that and a number of other things. Seeing people leave and being left with even less support did not help me feel better in the least. But rather than remind herself of this, she instead chose to focus on her own desires; specifically to become pregnant before her ovaries were scheduled to be removed (one of those medical problems that I mentioned before). When she asked if I wanted to sleep with her the only thing I could answer in that state of mind was "whatever you want". I could not say "yes", because I did not want to do it; but I could not say "no", because I was too bad off to have the strength to deny her. A quick inquiry on her part showed her the truth and she left quickly and quite embarrassed (nothing had happened, we were both dressed). I tried to give her some time, I'm not sure if that was a good thing or if it was a problem. During that time I got a chance to see God in a way that few people do. It was an experience that I will never forget. And then later that night I got a text message saying that she never wanted to see me or speak with me again. Even though she had broken her word that she had given on not abandoning me, I was determined to not do the same to her. She had said that the only way she would abandon me was if she did it out of fear that she might hurt me, but it instead appeared that she blamed the incident and had told her family that as well. I tried to be there for her as I could without making her interact with me, but she made it clear that she didn't want to deal with me at all. How much of this was just her personal problem, and how much was externally influenced, I don't know. She talked about the earlier girl as though they had had more than the two conversations that I knew about. They were not RL conversations, the first girl broke into this one's dreams on at least a couple of occasions not realizing her innate abilities (though I would still bet on the first girl over this one in anything other than a direct application of brute force), but the interaction was there and such that she apparently got some very wrong ideas about the nature of my relationship with that girl. So after doing what what I could to salvage the friendship I did the only thing I could do, I let her go as she pleased.
This affected me in ways that are hard to describe. Not because they are incredibly hard to understand or hard to find words to be understood, but because focusing on it to write it out is difficult. The little hope I had tried to open myself to was lost, and I cried for that loss though I had never seriously cared before. I had become friends with her family, but now they hated me, and going to see our mutual friends would cause her to run away, making me feel bad about denying her that time with others even though I knew that it wasn't my fault. My low self confidence got even worse as this seemed to indicate that even someone in the most screwed up type of situation who should know better and be a different type of person would abandon me. Why should I try? I couldn't ignore my personal needs and desires as though they were non-issues, but I had every reason no believe that every effort I might make would ultimately end in failure. The only reason that I didn't think about suicide is that having such a clear understanding of what there is after death doesn't allow for the belief that killing oneself will fix anything. It was hard, but I kept going. I don't know how or why, but I kept trying to not fall apart. So much of it, though, was just going through the motions. I had lost so much that trying for more or better was nearly impossible to do. Once I found out the reason why I could not find a job (one of my references was badmouthing me) I found a job within two weeks and immediately took it rather than hold off on taking it or continuing looking for something that was more to what I needed. My mood was better in having a job, but it wasn't "good" by any measure. The first person I worked with was a mild schizophrenic with low IQ (about 14-16y) who only avoided work because of laziness and because he expected others to take care of him. I kept him from being kicked out of his house and got him motivated to work before he didn't want to see me again (though it was obvious from the cleaning that he had been abusing charity organizations). The second position I got was a night job with a guy who frequently became disoriented over the fact that there was someone in "his house" and would occasionally either run away or become violent. And all the while the one who had been my friend continued to try to separate me from everyone else who was my friend.
Ironically it was that very meddling that helped lead to my first real girlfriend. That is a sad thing to only accomplish at the age of 26. The second female friend in this story told my soon-to-be-girlfriend that I might be interested in her and to avoid me at all costs. The girlfriend girl, upon not receiving sufficient explanation about why to run away and when considering the source, instead only took to heart the idea that I might be interested in her. Though, ironically, I didn't even think to be seriously interested in her until she started showing interest in me. After that everything fell together. We both liked the other and respected the other, so after some difficulty with her family was sufficiently resolved, we started dating. She was cute and could be very fun, but we never connected the way that I had with others in the past. The biggest problem was that she would argue for hours and never seek to change when there was a difficulty until a clear consequence was set down. She never wanted to end a conversation until she thought to her satisfaction that whatever issue was resolved and she felt better about it; so conversations would literally take 4 hours at times, and sometimes longer. I personally could not take the stress of these conversations that happened so frequently as a minimum of twice a week. Then there was the fact that I could not allow myself to continue in the relationship pattern that allowed her to not choose to change or to only choose change as a result of the fear of whatever action I had decided to take. Usually it was to avoid whatever thing was causing the problem or to hang up the phone after she had circled around the issue for hours without making any decision, since I wasn't about to try to punish her, but I did have to break up with her once to get her to realize that trying to tell me that I had to be happy to talk to her for as long as it might take for her to feel better as often as she might desire it. Honestly, it was not her neediness that was the problem, it was her lack of a desire to take personal responsibility for growth.
Over time she began to grow and the previous problems were diminished, though not completely eliminated. And there were a number of good things that I probably should say while I am trying to get my head in order. She always wanted to do stuff and would constantly dream about one thing or another. She was interested in the spiritual world and wanted to learn, despite not knowing anything or having any particular ability in the area. She also did try to make things work as well as she could in the best way that she knew how (TV shows and a lot of books lie horribly about what a functioning relationship looks like). But even as some things got better, other problems began to emerge within the relationship. I was traditionally very active in trying to grow and move forward, but being around her seemed to rob me of a lot of that motivation (though, I admit, I didn't have a lot of strength left to make the effort even if the motivation was there). I was also much too boisterous and outgoing for her in a lot of circumstances. I was also very direct about dealing with things which was in a very direct opposition with her desire to work through circumstances slowly and deliberately. I may think too much, but I do it deliberately and do not do not rehash old information unless I see that there is new information or some reason to change my previous thought process on it; she would go over things dozens of times and was most helped by someone willing to listen to and help organize her thoughts, which frustrated me to no end since the constant focus on problems and issues made me feel even worse than I already did. It later became obvious that our basic ways of viewing the world, as it related to growth and giving of ourselves to others, were fundamentally different. I tried to remind myself that, objectively speaking, her way was probably the better way and tried to live with that beside her. But it started to become clear that I enjoyed her company as a friend and not so much as a girlfriend. I started trying to make the relationship work by reaching out more, by giving more, by doing whatever I could to make things work as "more than friends"; but that didn't work either.
The final straw came when I realized that she didn't love me the way that I loved her. I had always believed that you should love with everything you had without worrying about getting in return, knowing that if both people were focused primarily upon the other person than both would always be covered in the others love. Logically my mind told me that one needed to be more selfish or else the relationship would suffer whenever the other person decided to take a more selfish approach to things, but another part of my mind could never let go knowing that if two people were mutually dedicated to that type of love than the other person's strength would cover over the weakness that one might have and would draw them back into the relationship. This type of relationship could last forever, as both partners would constantly grow closer and stronger even as life's difficulties would give more room for growth together and increasing strength. But the other way was also very attractive because it had much more allowance for the broken nature of mankind and was, in the end, much less taxing than throwing oneself so completely into the relationship. My choice seemed to come down to, "be with her despite knowing that you don't fit well together simply because you would greatly miss having someone to hold and because you know that she won't abandon you so long as you are together" or "end the relationship and hope and pray that she finds someone better suited for her so that you can have some semblance of peace over the fact that you can no longer be there for her the way that you had been". And so, despite her protests, I broke up with her. Thankfully there was another guy who showed up in her life within a couple months who was a much better fit for her and helped her in ways that I simply couldn't till they eventually started dating. I was somewhat surprised that my X-girlfriend wanted to remain friends, especially since she had tried to pull away from me during one of our break-ups. This is probably the one reason that I am still around despite everything else. The anger and hatred that some people have toward me can sometimes be too much to bear, especially since I didn't do anything to cause it and I don't know of anything to fix it either. I did not tell her how hard this is affecting me or how completely and utterly lonely I feel so much of the time. She is with someone who is better for her and is happy, so if I can give her one last gift as part of the relationship it will be to not give her second thoughts about that thing that never worked totally right in the first place.
My current state is pretty much at the end of my rope. I don't have a job and my unemployment runs out in about a week. My stress level is so high that I have gotten sick over it a couple times (I keep a bottle of antacid handy now). I feel so lonely that I wake up every morning incapable of movement and often with tears involuntarily running from the corners of my eyes. In essence I have found that nobody, either normal or freak, can put up with me or fit with me; that is how it feels anyway. I really did put everything I had into the relationship and having made the choice to leave rather than being left only makes it harder by making it clear that I chose this. That may be a big part of the biggest downside of my current condition: I have been having a really hard time reaching out to do anything that might truly matter. Every time I try I am overcome by waves of pain and fatigue. Yesterday, before I started writing this and after wasting most of my waking hours with web-comics, I spent around 14 hours sleeping or napping because of the exhaustion that I felt every time I tried to do something productive.
This has been growing for a long time, I know, but only reached this type of level recently. As a young child I learned that being too smart got you ignored by the other kids and wouldn't make the adults take you seriously anyway. As a school aged child I learned that doing well meant that doing average was bad and that there was no room to be appreciated. As an adolescent I labored for years to get privileges and to open doors that my siblings would get automatically when they reached the same age as what I had been when I got them. The more I learned and grew, the weirder life became for me and the less I fit in with others. As a teen I struggled for years only to see others achieve the same without work or to have what I labored for snatched away over and over again. In community college I learned that hard work was no substitute for having connections or a position and I learned that no understanding or accomplishment would be able to overcome people's personal ideas of what constituted truth. I tried to have a new type of life when I left for university and made a lot of friends, but most of those were either freshmen with no idea about the realities of the real world or seniors who promptly graduated and moved away at the end of my first year. I tried to continue reaching out and find those who could understand me, but every great stride I made forward was soon after met with crushing defeat. When I graduated and found a job it became clear that doing a good job helping my clients only meant that I would not see them anymore and would have a hard time fulfilling my work duties. And then there was the situations that I have spoken about here already, my lack of being able to find a job after my first period of unemployment (the woman whom I worked most closely with had been badmouthing me to potential employers) and my lack of being able to find a job during my recent unemployment (I think my old boss has been badmouthing me to potential employers). I don't know how to convince myself that working hard for something better doesn't bring pain and disappointment.
I am supposed to be writing a book, helping out on one online game, and volunteering at one or two places more than I am. There is physical training that I could/should be doing, and a number of other things as well. I am not lacking in things that I could be doing, only in the drive and personal justification to do them. I have limits and I can't seem to get past them. I know that working as hard as other people and doing the same as others doesn't work for me, I just don't get the same results, but if hard work is similarly doomed than what can I do? The term is "learned helplessness" and it refers to a circumstance where one learns that no action that can be taken has a meaningful impact on the outcome. Most people will choose anything to get away from this circumstance, usually acting out and causing their life to self-destruct before admitting that their actions don't matter. I know that I can help and hurt others, I even know that I can slightly help and hurt myself through my actions; I don't know that there is any real good for myself down the line no matter what I do. I know, that is a horrible horrible thing to say and probably not true, but I really don't know that my life will be anything other than one hope tasted only to be crushed followed by another similar situation. And I don't know what I can or could possibly do to have things be any different. All I know to do is to try my best at doing the most mediocre job I can and wait for something to change. Maybe the only way I matter is in how I affect others, maybe the effect on myself isn't important at all. I don't know. I really don't know. I will survive, that much I know, but I don't know that I can say much more than that.