I’ve tried to express this before, but there’s something absurd about experiencing desires that cannot be satisfied. I can recognise that yearning after these things is making me miserable – that it would be far better for me to let them go. Even that letting go of such things is a necessary condition for any human to be happy and fulfilled in the long term, that they’re ultimately superficial and unnecessary.
My life would be better in so many ways if I just didn’t want the things that I want, or if I didn’t feel the desire so intensely. But if someone were to offer to magically cure me of that desire… I wouldn’t accept. That’s the absurd thing. I can logically recognise that this part of me is making me miserable for no purpose. But I don’t actually want to let go, despite that. I want to cling on to something that is making me miserable. Which is so fucking stupid. But then I’m just an average ape, so what would you expect?
And no one else can help me with this. The only way I could ever get over this stuff is by actively changing my life, my habits, what I pay attention to. And even then, it’d probably take years. But… I don’t actually want to. I want to waste my time obsessing over things I can’t have. Because I don’t actually care about anything else. The real possibilities that still remain to me in this life… I don’t want any of them.
And I suppose the niggling question that lies behind this is something like: are we free to want something we don’t want? Are our desires freely chosen? Could I decide to just stop wanting what I want, purely by force of will? Do I have that capacity? For example, could I decide to be happy being entirely alone?
Do I have the capacity to not desire the things that I desire? To care about things I don’t care about? Can you force yourself to care about something, if you recognise that it would be good for you to do so?
I feel like the answer to all these questions is no. That what we want emerges from forces that precede us, biological and social. That it may change over time, but as a result of those forces acting upon us, rather than conscious choice. You may over time find that you no longer like a particular flavour of ice cream, but you don’t just stop as a result of a conscious decision.
But that leaves me with stupidity. “Longing after this impossible thing is detrimental to my life. It would be better if I let go of it. I don’t want to let go of it.”
I suppose on some level I also have the desire to not be so miserable. Just perhaps not strong enough to make a difference.
I am the only one who can help me. It just seems that unfortunately I don’t want to help myself. Which is embarrassing/shameful/exasperating. But I guess that’s where I’m at – similar to many addicts or self-destructive people, who everyone else knows to give up on. We’re fucked, because we’re intent on fucking ourselves. Unless/until something changes that forces some kind of mental shift.
Part of me feels like I should be able to reason my way into that change. I’m smart, right? I can see what’s going on. I’m self-aware. But reason is the slave of the passions. Emotionally, I’m just extremely immature/dumb. I’m a fucking dumbass.
2 comments
I think there’s a sick pleasure in doing things we know are bad for us. The whole forbidden fruit angle.
I know from experience that wanting things you can’t get is safer than wanting things you can get. The moment a goal is achievable, then it becomes a personal failure not getting it. That’s part of the fear, at least for me.
and I’ve only managed to pull it back to plausible, my central goal is still dependent on so many things outside my control.
which ties back to my philosophy, no one wins, no one gets all that they want, everyone is just trying to do a little bit better than they did before.
so that’s my input; is there any way to make those desires more realistic? If there’s no getting rid of them, maybe there’s bargaining.
I do think there’s something to it being “safer” to want things you can’t get. In my case that inability is also as the result of past personal failure, but still.
I think a part of my mind does spend a lot of time desperately trying to map those desires onto something more real. The first problem is that this usually ends up with something that doesn’t feel right. Something that might look superficially similar, without providing the key points that make the thing seem meaningful. The second is it then becomes a question of the thing being unlikely, rather than actually impossible. And as I adjust it to make it seem more plausible, it becomes less and less appealing.
So I’m trying to focus on an unlikely goal that doesn’t really seem worthwhile to begin with, and then watering it down to the point where it’s actually entirely unappealing. At which point I obviously give myself not motivation to do the necessary work.