Poison
It happens to the best of us, to all of us at least once, that some idea gets into our head, or some person comes into our life, that everyone who cares about us tells us is a mistake. This mistake will isolate us from our loved ones, destroy everything we hold dear, crush our carefully laid empires into rubble. Our defenses are gone, our values are gone, our life has become completely poisoned by this mistake. And we, dutiful masochists that we are, crave the destruction this mistake wreaks upon us and everything around us. We get ground into the dirt, get up, and ask for more. Picture Superman flying around saving the world with a hunk of kryptonite around his neck. Doesn't add up, right?
Wrong.
We crave the decimation of our very lives not because of some overwhelming masochistic tendency, but because destruction is how we grow. When our defenses are gone, we are suddenly open to new ideas. With the people we care about alienated, we are forced to stand on our own two feet. With our very empires in ashes all around us, we are forced to identify ourselves not by our accomplishments, but by who we are. And of course we appear as great fucking fools, throwing our lives away for something that makes no sense. But what good are friends and empires? What good are values and rules? What good is this silly menagerie of shenanigans we call "reality" if we don't know ourselves? And how can we know ourselves if we keep doing the same shit over and over again? So we seek salvation in our own destruction, clear away the cacophony of sensible voices and reasonable choices and get to the meat of life.
The truth is, we're only alive when we're an inch from death. So we skate the edge of a poison blade to see what we're really made of. We look death in the eye, and we find out who we really are.
Wrong.
We crave the decimation of our very lives not because of some overwhelming masochistic tendency, but because destruction is how we grow. When our defenses are gone, we are suddenly open to new ideas. With the people we care about alienated, we are forced to stand on our own two feet. With our very empires in ashes all around us, we are forced to identify ourselves not by our accomplishments, but by who we are. And of course we appear as great fucking fools, throwing our lives away for something that makes no sense. But what good are friends and empires? What good are values and rules? What good is this silly menagerie of shenanigans we call "reality" if we don't know ourselves? And how can we know ourselves if we keep doing the same shit over and over again? So we seek salvation in our own destruction, clear away the cacophony of sensible voices and reasonable choices and get to the meat of life.
The truth is, we're only alive when we're an inch from death. So we skate the edge of a poison blade to see what we're really made of. We look death in the eye, and we find out who we really are.