Boredom is death
July 1st, 2009 by susan5Hey,
I haven’t posted here before. Actually, I feel a bit out of place among all the angst-filled teenagers and people who have real problems and shit like that. What’s my problem? Hard to put down in words, I guess, though I spend a lot of time trying to do it. I’m 33, I’ve lived a comfortable, middle-class life with kind, if emotionally-distant, parents. Did well enough at school. Went on to university. Expected to “achieve” something. But, really, something was wrong from the start. I write this, because, I don’t know, maybe there are other people in my situation out there. But, I don’t know, I seem to have been, virtually since birth, unable to find any kind of joy or direction or purpose in life.
So what am I doing on this site, you may ask? I have no crippling emotional pain, no traumas to overcome, I just, with every day, as I wake up, ask myself, what the hell do I have to live for? And I don’t mean that in the “Oh, what glories do I have to be grateful for?” kind of way. It’s just, ever since I can remember, I have hated myself, and been bored to distraction with life and everything it has to offer. And it’s not like I haven’t tried to find something to like–I’ve tried it all, well, inasfar as I’m willing to. I just think I was born half-dead and there’s nothing I can do about it.
Sure, as a teenager, and later, even now, actually, I’ve gone down the self-destruction route. Drugs, drinking, underachieving, self-mutilation, bad relationships. None of it really did anything for me. Later I tried the self-improvement–higher education, travel, blah, blah, blah. But I still wake up every morning just hoping that today’s the day that I have enough courage to finally off-myself and be done with this miserable farce of a life I’ve been living.
So, I guess, I’m getting to the end of the line of things. Drugs, therapy, don’t bother suggesting it, I’ve done it, and, yes, when I’ve been in cataclysmic depressions, they’ve helped me get back to my baseline, but what am i supposed to do when my baseline is so far from anything I want to continue existing at? I ride the train, every day, and I look at the people sitting and standing around me, and I try to look inside them, and figure out what it is that makes them want to keep on living, and although I can imagine–family, friends, careers, maybe what they’re going to have for dinner–I’m just having a difficult time mustering up the enthusiasm for much more of this pointlessness. But, until I get a proper backbone, I know I’m not going to be able to kill myself, which makes it all so much more depressing. Why perpetuate such a useless, unwanted life?
I have a friend who’s going through a real crisis at the moment, and he has, on more than one occasion, invited me to join him in a suicide pact, but I always defer, and end up trying to talk him out of it. But why? That’s all I want to know, I guess. Why should I have to go on living, if life no longer offers anything promising or interesting to me? If it never did? Am I the only one who is so tediously bored with this supposedly joyous and wondrous gift of existence that we’ve been granted? When can I say when?
That’s all. It just need to be said.
July 1st, 2009 at 6:49 pm
if youll accept some words from an “angst-filled teen”, i dont know if youve tried this but maybe you could decide you are going to live for all the other people dealing with this same thing, try devoting your life to helping them through the crises that come up in their lives. like your friend, keep talking him down. make it your goal to keep him alive and help him improve his life.
July 1st, 2009 at 8:35 pm
I know exactly how you feel. How long can we go thru the motions? But keep on…
July 2nd, 2009 at 12:28 am
Would like to add:
“So seek to live knowing no other desire but to show My Love to your world.”
a little reminder from your creator
July 2nd, 2009 at 2:20 am
I understand. I know I’ve had my fill of existing at the baseline. Maybe part of your purpose was to post the message and let me and others know that we’re not alone. Right now I know I don’t have the guts to really harm myself. I’ve pretty much lost hope for the future as you have. How much longer can we sustain this type of existence that feels like a non-existence that will never end? I just know I’m exhausted.
July 2nd, 2009 at 3:25 am
Amen brother, the crushing monotony of this world is just unbearable. Everyday I long for something to come along, anything that will actually make me look forward to tomorrow. It never does. Never will. People like us are just cursed i guess. We cant stand the excrutiating minutiae of every meaningless part of everyday life that normal people somehow thrive on. The thought of spending 60 years going through the motions makes me physically sick to my stomach. But thats the reality were forced to face. But im not ready to accept it. Probably never will.
July 2nd, 2009 at 3:53 am
i dont know about the probably part i will never accept it
July 2nd, 2009 at 3:56 am
Well you’re still here so you mustve found some way to deal with it. im more than open to suggestions
July 2nd, 2009 at 9:14 am
Sometimes I think LOOKING for a purpose or for some inherent or intrinsic meaning in life is a ‘trap’. I don’t think there is anything to FIND. Rather, I think the people who seem to live fulfilling, purposeful, meaning-filled lives are the ones who choose to proactively CREATE purpose and meaning in their lives.
July 2nd, 2009 at 5:23 pm
You’re right, of course. That’s been my problem, looking for a purpose. Mostly because nothing I’ve done has managed to capture my interest, but I always sort of believed something, somewhere, would. And yes, you’re right, in that situation, one has to go out there and create a purpose, as Kirkegaard, or Sartre or one of those miserable fuckers said, and just commit yourself to it, as that’s the only rational response to an irrational world and all that. But why should I? Why is it necessary that I live my life at all? This is the question I ask myself, daily. I don’t know if there’s something intrinsically wrong with me, per se–some kind of congenital inability to experience joy or satisfaction with the little things in life, or if I just look too closely at things, and things always come to pieces if you examine them too carefully. I guess I’d just love to know what it feels like to experience those pleasures that seem to come so easily to others. It’s like being invited to an all-you-can-eat buffet prepared by the greatest chefs in the world, and having absolutely no appetite, and everything you put in your mouth just turns to sand. Anyway, words never solved anything. But I do truly thank you all for your input.
July 7th, 2009 at 1:04 am
Well written. I guess venting out your inner feelings is something very important. Keeping them suppressed can cause real problems – physical as well as mental.
July 7th, 2009 at 2:28 am
“Kind but emotionally distant parents.”
Such a short sentence, such a powerful force in the life of a small child.
Parents are like gods: All-knowing, all-seeing, all-powerful. Their influence is immeasurable; they are like the sun and the rain – their presence makes us grow; their absence stunts us as surely as a sunless, waterless plant shrivels and dies.
We’re taught, in this culture, not to ‘play the victim’. We’re also taught not to question authority; to shut up and take it; to ’suck it up’.
Your parents were kind; they didn’t beat you, they fed you and sheltered you, maybe sent you to a good school.
And yet, like that banquet you describe where every bite turned to sand, their presence was – an absence. A hole. A lack. A nothing where a ’something’ should have been. Instead of a real, genuine, connected relationship (which is the source of all true joy), you had, instead, people who tried, but whose hearts weren’t in it.
“No crippling emotional pain.” Really? Truly? Anyone who can write a sentence like the one about the banquet is suffering some amazing pain. It’s just that you’ve cut yourself off from it, because it’s too much to bear. We’re not meant to carry that kind of pain alone and unsupported – we’re meant to be surrounded by people who care, who _notice_ when we’re hurting, who reach out to us to hug and comfort and hold us when we’re struggling and scared. People who leave us alone with our pain are – sorry – cruel. They may not know it, because _their_ parents did the same thing, and we’re part of a culture that believes in that sh*t.
But it’s cruel, nonetheless.
You’re really smart, and you need to connect with someone who’s equally smart, someone who really ‘gets’ you. I don’t know the answers for finding this person or people (otherwise I wouldn’t be here myself), but I know that relationships are the answer. Without them, nothing else has any meaning. True, they aren’t _everything_ – even if we find the ‘right’ relationship, or friendship, we’ll still need jobs and other things to make life meaningful.
But the human connection is the root of it. And it’s hard in this consumer-driven, competitive culture to find people who are willing to put in the effort. Hyper-individualism may be the death of us all.
Anyway. You are not single-handedly responsible for who you are and how your life is shaped – you’re part of a culture, a family, a community of people who shape you and who you shape in return. So if you’re feeling messed up, it’s not just about you – it’s that your _environment_ is not giving you what you need to thrive and be happy. I make this point to maybe suggest that you’re not to _blame_ for how you’re feeling. It’s not something wrong with you. It’s normal for an intelligent, sensitive, full-of-life person to feel unsatisfied by the mental and emotional junk food that passes for culture in our country.
I think you have to trust your instincts and cast off any and all people who seem to keep you down, who don’t add color and light and life to your world. A line from a poem a friend once sent said, “The only one you can save is yourself.”
This is really true. Your ‘friend’ who wants you to commit suicide together isn’t really hearing or seeing you – he’s only seeing his own pain. He’s not in it for you. And neither are most people. Finding a true connection is the rarest thing on earth, something to be infinitely cherished. Meantime, we just have to do the best we can, reach out often, touch and be touched. Ask for help when you need it, like you’re doing by writing here. Cry out when you’re in pain – true friends will answer with a hug and a word of encouragement, an offer to help you out. Use your emotions to sort the wheat from the chaff in your life. Your feelings are your compass. Without them you are stranded in an emotional desert.
That, unfortunately, is the ‘gift’ your parents gave you – disconnection from the most powerful tools we have to keep us connected in life. You have to learn how to re-connect with that guiding force.