My life is like a podcast episode. You hit play and tuck yourslef in bed, but miss the beginning because your mind wanders off. You then untuck yourself, rewind the episode to its beginning, and tuck yourself back in, just to find your mind wander off again. My life is exactly the same with two major differences. With a podcast episode, you can rewind it as many times as you want. The worst that can happen is you loosing a few minutes of your sleep. With my life, it's not that simple. What I miss is often an amazing chance at romance, an opportunity to kick start a wonderful career, or the possibility to settle somewhere with a lot of potential for a good life. You can't rewind these, and even if you somehow manage, your options will almost certainly be different. I did it once. And although the new options were as great, I missed them for the second time, and dived into my deepest depression to date.
The second difference is that, with you being you, you may be able to let go of what you missed for the second or third time, and focus on the rest of the podcast, with a "fuck it" mentality. With me being me, that is almost certainly not an option. If that happens, I am unlikely to be able to focus on the rest of the podcast, unless I rewind it as many times as necessary, and until I get what I missed. Horrible, I know.
I also know that I repeat myself all the time. Not only in my life, but also in talking about it. If you browse through my writings, you will soon realize I nag about the same things over and over again. In my defense, I am in pain, and by writing about them, I am trying to get rid of the pain; often in vain.
I can't help but imagine the kind of thoughts that pass through your mind when reading my rubbish too. This is another malfunction I have that is meant to have two functions. Not being good at reading people, I have spent a substantial chunk of my time figuring out how they think. It has been helping me interpret their messages and intentions with mild success. The second function of my malfunction, is to compensate for my lack of foresight. Not being able to see the consequences of my decisions, I have been internalizing voices in my head. Every time a decision comes to my mind, I imagine sharing it with people I normally talk to, and listen to their comments modelled by my mind. Why not actually talk to them, you ask? Because I would need to be on the phone with them pretty much every day, which is not possible. Most often, I predict their answers accurately though, which is neat. It's like having free counsellors 24/7. But their voices have rarely saved me from creating a new crisis, or sabotaging my chances of success. Perhaps one can only succeed following other people's ideas, if one follows them fully and to the end. My failure has often been due to mixing their ideas with those of mine, thus creating a mixed path that is neither theirs nor mine. For the fun of it, let me give you three groups I am imagining to respond to my rants above.
The first group are my self-made friends who take pride in giving me tough love, by being honest with me. They would say: "Why are all your stories about you, you, you. Maybe you should let go of your ego for a change, and focus on what's real around you." I usually find this difficult to understand. If it means "consider other people when making decisions", I have tried and failed; sometimes because I misinterpreted their preferences, and other times because I couldn't complete the task that I had little role in choosing. If on the other hand, they mean "consider the financial and career-related ramifications of your decisions", I have also tried and failed. I often fail at this for two reasons; one is because I engage in activities I do not enjoy, and othe other is because the conditions for success is beyond my faculties. The first one is obvious and happens to eveyone. Apparently societies are tolerant for people in their 20s to find their interest through trial and error, as long as they don't take too long. I did the same and found a couple of things I am, or at least I think I am, interested in. But by pursuing them, I learned that success in our time has more to do with pushing yourself to the limits, than it does with enjoying what you do. I learnt that success invariably means you have to be ready to tear yourself up in order to compete and stand out. It seems it befalls you to create a demand for your skills through perseverence and excellence. My problem is that I hate competitions with a passion, and there is nothing I enjoy enough to be ready to tear myself up for it.
The second group who do not know me well, are also self-made, and often through sacrificing their own passions. This group, who are hated by my family, would encourage me to pursue my passion for life is short. What they don't realise, and my family does, is that I have been doing this all my life with no light at the end of the tunnel. These people often know what they wanted, but could not get it due to circumstances; and they project their capacities onto me. They think if I look for my passion, it will soon be clear to me, just as their passion was and is clear to them. Having found my passion, they think I can make a career out of it. But they do not know I have problems with both stages of finding my passion, and having consistency pursuing it. That said, this group is the most fun to listen to, now that I know I should not take their words seriously. I used to take them seriously though.
The third group, which involves my family, would try to guide me in the right direction with more gentle words. They would say, "Why don't you start now? It is never late. The fact that you know your mistakes, is wonderful. Learn from the past, and move forward with a fresh start." But what this group don't take note of is that I cannot continue when I have missed the beginning of the podcast episode. When I tell them this, they often remain gentle for some time; but in face of my resistance, they quickly become accusatory that I block every path they lay ahead of me. They then loose their tempor and say, "You find a problem with every solution we lay before you. Perhaps you do not want to solve your problems after all. Do whatever you want." That is why, I keep untucking myself, rewinding the podcast to its beginning, and missing it again, and again, and again. And in doing so, I loose my friends and family, drain my resources, and end up being a nobody; alone and dreamy. And dreams are the biggest distractions when you are trying to focus on a podcast.
I can also imagine you ask "How come you can't figure a solution considering you have given it much thought?" This is precisely what I am trying to do with this website. I will unwillingly continue doing things expected of me by my community, and simultaneously try to fill this website with my thoughts. And I hope one day, the writing becomes all I do for myself and my community.
The second difference is that, with you being you, you may be able to let go of what you missed for the second or third time, and focus on the rest of the podcast, with a "fuck it" mentality. With me being me, that is almost certainly not an option. If that happens, I am unlikely to be able to focus on the rest of the podcast, unless I rewind it as many times as necessary, and until I get what I missed. Horrible, I know.
I also know that I repeat myself all the time. Not only in my life, but also in talking about it. If you browse through my writings, you will soon realize I nag about the same things over and over again. In my defense, I am in pain, and by writing about them, I am trying to get rid of the pain; often in vain.
I can't help but imagine the kind of thoughts that pass through your mind when reading my rubbish too. This is another malfunction I have that is meant to have two functions. Not being good at reading people, I have spent a substantial chunk of my time figuring out how they think. It has been helping me interpret their messages and intentions with mild success. The second function of my malfunction, is to compensate for my lack of foresight. Not being able to see the consequences of my decisions, I have been internalizing voices in my head. Every time a decision comes to my mind, I imagine sharing it with people I normally talk to, and listen to their comments modelled by my mind. Why not actually talk to them, you ask? Because I would need to be on the phone with them pretty much every day, which is not possible. Most often, I predict their answers accurately though, which is neat. It's like having free counsellors 24/7. But their voices have rarely saved me from creating a new crisis, or sabotaging my chances of success. Perhaps one can only succeed following other people's ideas, if one follows them fully and to the end. My failure has often been due to mixing their ideas with those of mine, thus creating a mixed path that is neither theirs nor mine. For the fun of it, let me give you three groups I am imagining to respond to my rants above.
The first group are my self-made friends who take pride in giving me tough love, by being honest with me. They would say: "Why are all your stories about you, you, you. Maybe you should let go of your ego for a change, and focus on what's real around you." I usually find this difficult to understand. If it means "consider other people when making decisions", I have tried and failed; sometimes because I misinterpreted their preferences, and other times because I couldn't complete the task that I had little role in choosing. If on the other hand, they mean "consider the financial and career-related ramifications of your decisions", I have also tried and failed. I often fail at this for two reasons; one is because I engage in activities I do not enjoy, and othe other is because the conditions for success is beyond my faculties. The first one is obvious and happens to eveyone. Apparently societies are tolerant for people in their 20s to find their interest through trial and error, as long as they don't take too long. I did the same and found a couple of things I am, or at least I think I am, interested in. But by pursuing them, I learned that success in our time has more to do with pushing yourself to the limits, than it does with enjoying what you do. I learnt that success invariably means you have to be ready to tear yourself up in order to compete and stand out. It seems it befalls you to create a demand for your skills through perseverence and excellence. My problem is that I hate competitions with a passion, and there is nothing I enjoy enough to be ready to tear myself up for it.
The second group who do not know me well, are also self-made, and often through sacrificing their own passions. This group, who are hated by my family, would encourage me to pursue my passion for life is short. What they don't realise, and my family does, is that I have been doing this all my life with no light at the end of the tunnel. These people often know what they wanted, but could not get it due to circumstances; and they project their capacities onto me. They think if I look for my passion, it will soon be clear to me, just as their passion was and is clear to them. Having found my passion, they think I can make a career out of it. But they do not know I have problems with both stages of finding my passion, and having consistency pursuing it. That said, this group is the most fun to listen to, now that I know I should not take their words seriously. I used to take them seriously though.
The third group, which involves my family, would try to guide me in the right direction with more gentle words. They would say, "Why don't you start now? It is never late. The fact that you know your mistakes, is wonderful. Learn from the past, and move forward with a fresh start." But what this group don't take note of is that I cannot continue when I have missed the beginning of the podcast episode. When I tell them this, they often remain gentle for some time; but in face of my resistance, they quickly become accusatory that I block every path they lay ahead of me. They then loose their tempor and say, "You find a problem with every solution we lay before you. Perhaps you do not want to solve your problems after all. Do whatever you want." That is why, I keep untucking myself, rewinding the podcast to its beginning, and missing it again, and again, and again. And in doing so, I loose my friends and family, drain my resources, and end up being a nobody; alone and dreamy. And dreams are the biggest distractions when you are trying to focus on a podcast.
I can also imagine you ask "How come you can't figure a solution considering you have given it much thought?" This is precisely what I am trying to do with this website. I will unwillingly continue doing things expected of me by my community, and simultaneously try to fill this website with my thoughts. And I hope one day, the writing becomes all I do for myself and my community.