I’m not sure which is worse…
The agonizing requirements of interacting with those who don’t understand…
Or the “dead spots” when there is no one available, with whom to interact.
I honestly believe that if i could just make enough money…
If i could establish some sort of reliable method of generating income…
If i could “fix” just enough of my problems that i could have my own sustainable existence…
Maybe then i’d be content to tolerate the rest of the misery, and able to focus on sharing complex ideas in ways that those who could find them useful, would be able to understand.
And so i frame my problem thusly, and proceed to contemplate.
But there’s always another problem behind another problem, all reinforcing and feeding off each other, holding each other in their respective established obstructive positions.
Ultimately, it is most reasonable to expect that there are no employers who would be sympathetic to a condition that spontaneously manifests, and requires a person to take a day… or three… or maybe even weeks, to process all the problems that can’t be solved, and can’t be effectively managed in a way that can be indefinitely and reliably maintained.
And even if there were such an employer with such sympathy… how many could there be? How many of us can mathematically be helped in such a way? What kind of “job” or “business” can thrive, or even survive, while employing people who can’t escape or dominate the eternal struggle just to get out of bed and face the world each day?
Very unlikely.
So… how can i support myself? How can i even get any “help,” if it costs money i can’t make, lacking skills i can’t learn while i feel this way?
How can i sustain myself in a way that removes one of the most significant aspects of the burdens that both perpetuate and invalidate me?
How can i escape this paradox?
How can i escape this paradox… without just ending it all?
How can i motivate myself to follow a path that cannot possibly lead to where i want to go?
How can i find a path that CAN go there?
Does such a path even exist? Does such a destination even exist?
Can such a path, and/or such a destination, actually still exist? For Me?
Or is it just a fantasy, like so many other things so many of us are raised to believe?
Let’s assume there is a place, a worthy destination that i could still reach.
Where is it? How long will it take? What do i have to do?
How many arbitrary things will i have to juggle?
How many shallow, petty, superficial people will i have to appease?
Whose favor must i earn…
Just to have what i need, for me, to make a life worth just enough to justify my effort… that gives me enough reason to believe in a destination that exists, that i will be able to reach… and will be worth reaching, even if i have to believe i’m someone else, to get there?
Also, how can i stop being so abstract, vague, ambiguous about such things?
I just don’t know what’s worse:
being surrounded and afflicted and overwhelmed by so much wrong…
or having so much time to think, that the truths of the illusions become clear to me, and utterly disintegrate my will to… anything.
And as long as i’m in the midst of all these things i’m left to figure out on my own, how am i supposed to have any life at all? How am i supposed to live?
And if i can’t even live, then how can i convince myself i even have a life at all, not to mention one worth saving, that can become anything worth enduring endless misery to improve… or even just maintain?
There are at least a few people in this world who actually do, literally, want me to end my own life… or to at least encounter devastating hardships, and be miserable.
I know who they are, and why they think what they think, and i still think their reasons are invalid, unwarranted, unjustified… but they are those who cannot be persuaded otherwise, as they have long ago decided what to think. People tend to refuse to accept responsibility for their own mistakes, while insisting that everyone else are the ones denying their own mistakes. I don’t know how to defeat that. There’s definitely some cognitive dissonance, and also other factors in play. I think they know they’re wrong, but they insist on protecting their pride, through swearing they’re right, anyway. I’m not the one in the wrong, but sometimes pride is more important than reality, i guess.
I guess i just have to ignore that part, since there’s really nothing i can do about it.
Meanwhile, my life continues in exactly the way i feel it shouldn’t, that i don’t want, which… makes it hard to ignore the thoughts of those who would relish my suffering.
So i need to do something about it… but in the midst of mountains of insurmountable obstacles, most of which resulted from ripples of others actions that i warned against…
I just don’t know how to proceed. I don’t know how to “move on” from something that hasn’t ceased. I can’t forgive what is still happening. But i don’t think “forgiveness” is really all that important. Besides, i doubt i could genuinely forgive those who have contributed the most significant segments of my suffering, and i know false-forgiveness is almost completely worthless, unless convincing someone you’ve forgiven them, becomes the barrier to other goals… which i don’t think is relevant in my case.
I can’t seem to accomplish anything but waxing poetic and committing acts of verbosity.
Like a serial typist.
But what i’m trying to say is all so nebulous and fractal… and there are so many points i want to make, that they all become a giant black hole (or gravastar, if you will) of inescapable impossible.
It feels like being past the event horizon, unable to escape, with time remaining before my inevitable demise, in which i can but contemplate… and prepare myself to have all my particles torn apart from each other, and a… somehow merciful cessation of my tormented consciousness.
Time… our most valuable, most precious, finite resource…
And even as someone who has understood that for quite a while, i feel that mine can only be useful for reflection upon an irrelevant and overly convoluted life, that never amounted to anything… just like my 1st grade teacher said it wouldn’t.
My mom went all “mom-mode” on her, for that… but somehow it became an accurate prediction. /shrug
My mom also once told me, long ago: “don’t ever let a woman ruin your life…”
That ended up happening too. The fun thing is when i realized it meant far more than i think it was intended to ever mean, and that it was “all women” who made me feel so low… and “feeling so low” ended up being the thing that ruined my life… in so many ways.
Whatever it was about me that was so unappealing… all the ones i ever really liked, ended up treating me like less than human… like just a thing… like just a nothing, who they were sure would never be worth a chance. I am at my worst now, physically.
Skipping some of what would naturally follow that, the only reasonable way to handle that, is to assume that i need to figure out a way to find life worth living, without any hope of meaningful human companionship.
That’s a huge blow to the whole “life is worth living” idea. I really don’t think it can be, for me, without that particular aspect… and the more i try to think of how i might achieve contentment or satisfaction, without ever knowing love again… all it ends up doing is showing me just how little all the enjoyable distractions are really worth. All those interesting and enjoyable distractions have already lost almost all their worth.
More than anything else, being alone, involuntarily, indefinitely… is just boring. It even makes everything else boring. Not much is interesting, if i don’t have someone who cares, who is there, who understands, with whom to share any of it.
So as this began, i still don’t know what’s worse:
the requirements of interacting with others in a superficially acceptable way…
or the spaces in between, where there is no one around to care, and all i can do is think, and write… stuff like this… which can’t really contribute to fixing anything.
It all just feels like such a waste.
It’s weird to hate dealing with people, but then also hate the loneliness of not even having the option to interact with someone… even if they are annoying, shallow, superficial, and oblivious. Even if they judge me harshly, for the wrong things i can’t control. I guess sometimes a fight is better than being ignored. But fighting takes energy i don’t have, and hurts much more than it’s worth, especially when the fight is with someone who has already decided what to think, refuses to be wrong, and therefore cannot learn anything new.
It’s bad enough having to accept that “this is just the way it is sometimes.” I definitely don’t want this to be the way i spend my life… but the time passes while i’m trying to figure it all out, and i can’t imagine that trying to advance myself without having figured it all out, without knowing what i’m doing, and why, would ever be “better” in any way.
I know why i bother… but without results, none of this is worth anything.
And all my worries could be gone, if i could just decide that there is nothing i can do, to make use of anything that remains of my life.
I’m sure tired of being “that guy.” Maybe it’s time i pass the torch, and let it be someone else’s turn. Or maybe i’ll be the last, and the world will learn how to not need a “that guy,” and not make them anymore.
3 comments
Disability exists for those who cannot be relied upon to be at work every day because of depression, etc. You’re right there aren’t going to be many employers out there who can afford to have people not showing up half the time, especially these days with so many people looking for jobs, employers can afford to be picky and wait to hire someone who will devote their life to the job for the least amount of pay. Employers see no benefit in cooperating with someone who will need a lot of time off.
The problem with disability is that you need a paper trail that you have been going to therapy for a while and got an official diagnosis of depression, and even then you will have to apply for disability and probably get rejected the first few times.
On the other hand there are worthless people who are perfectly happy and manage to qualify for disability on their first try and live off that money forever.
But that’s what my therapist told me back when I had a therapist, that I would need a much longer record of going to regular treatment, and then I would probably need to apply multiple times to see if I would ever get accepted.
I’ve tried looking into it… it’s prohibitively convoluted.
According to my understanding of the language; the “legalese” if you will; i would almost certainly qualify, based on the actual qualifications… but would almost certainly face resistance simply due to the “red-tape,” or “paper-trail.”
I don’t have a paper trail. Any reasonable person looking at my work history will see that i’ve had long-term problems, and have tried to maintain employment despite them all, and have not been successful. Lately, like within the last few years, things have gradually worsened, and i feel like it’s time to trade my pride and bet my very survival on the ability of the system to both recognize my need, and provide the help it can… just so i can even have a chance to do anything.
I’ve never had “insurance,” i’ve never had physical therapy for the nerve injuries i sustained in high school, i’ve never had a therapist, i’ve never been on meds (unless you count ritalin for like a week around 3rd grade)…
And then there’s the problem of my ability to behave appropriately and conceal my misery, in situations where i’ve learned to do so, in order to “minimize my condition.” But it is very stressful, and it takes its toll, and it always ends up breaking me again. I can’t “sustain” myself, which is the main problem. I can’t find sufficient employment that allows me to live, without pushing me to and past my breaking point, and so i keep taking whatever i can get, and inevitably falling apart and losing it again. I’m really tired of repeating a scenario that i know is completely predictable, just because i have no other option.
I would like to go to school, but… the same problem exists. It’s hard to learn if you can’t keep a schedule and don’t know if you’ll be ready to die tomorrow, or not. It’s hard to learn anything when i feel like i have no future. It’s hard to even pay attention, with the ever-looming possibility that i will one day just say “okay, that’s enough, i’m done.”
I have a lot of problems that i can’t control, many of which do not originate inside my person (ie: external problems, environment, other people, etc.). In order to fix those things that aren’t even Me, i need to be able to support myself away from those things… which i can’t do if i’m always breaking down.
So that is my intention, at this point: to attempt… to get disability for my unique combination of problems that i can’t solve. It makes me feel like less of a person, and i’m terrified of being “marked” as a “mental defective” by such a draconian, hegelian system… but if i felt like i could just force myself to do whatever it takes to make it without help, i’d be doing that.
I’ll go on and on if i don’t stop there.
I enjoyed reading about your pain. I started to write the obligatory “well written” comment that I normally do and of course it IS well written, but that’s just what it is, y’know?
I can certainly relate. It’s a ever-going battle for the next “thing that will solve the problems in your life”. And one day, it will just go away when the end comes.
My current thing is “must pay off my house so that I can leave my job – THAT will solve my depression, I’m sure of it!” Because I can’t do this for very much longer, much less 15 more years. And it’s an easy job, really.