I am considered a social parasite. Â At this point I can actually agree with societies views. Â I know what I am. Â I have been diagnosed with bipolar disorder since the age of 16. Â I have been in and out of hospitals most of my life for my failures to conform to the everyday norms.
I actually have been doing very good with myself the last two years. Â I am off medications, live on my own and have not been to any doctors or hospitals in this duration of time. Â I do not however work anymore. Â I pay my bills with disability and use food stamps to buy food. Â I rarely leave my house anymore as I no longer feel like a part of society. Â When I go outside all I see are actions repeated over and over again in slightly different ways. Â I feel awkward in my presence of it all. Â I see people living their lives and I know deep inside I am a huge joke of a man. Â Living off of disability, essentially taking peoples money, leeching to fuel my aimless existence at others expense.
I guess that I could be proud that I have kind of gotten a handle over my “bipolar” these last couple years but that according to society is not enough. Am I just making excuses? Â Am I really crazy? Â Were the doctors just digging up reasons to justify my choices and actions? Â Everyone has their struggles and deal with them accordingly.
I have no future plans. Â I only see a vague continuity of my current existence of buying time, surviving each day, and not understanding why. Â All while slowly growing more and more resentments towards myself and everything going on around me. Â I wonder if I have died many times already trying to escape my life just to wake up to another usual day not remembering I died once again. Â What if we die just to wake up after like normal and only the people we left behind mourn our deaths? Â Can it be possible we have died in an almost identical parallel universe to the current one, except only your loved ones mourn you from that present reality? Â What is really happening? Â Do we exist in a perpetual state of multiple amnesias? Â I seriously can’t stand trudging on anymore. Â Maybe this has happened all before. Â I will never know.
17 comments
No diagnosis defines what or who you are. I’m sorry to hear that you are defining yourself based on what you believe “society” thinks you ought to achieve. I’m putting society in quotes because I myself do not even know what that word means anymore. I wonder if you can view your life and where you are at without a sense of moral judgment or comparison to what you think you should be doing.
That is one thing I wish I could honestly do is not care what other people think. It is not that easy.
^ Not easy at all man….
I think it is something everyone wishes they could do. I don’t think anyone is completely carefree from the opinions and attitudes of others. I think a lot of people say they don’t care, but I think they would have to care at least a little bit.
I lean towards not letting opinions have a negative emotional reaction with me. Nothing is that important that I can’t learn to laugh at myself and others. Looks, beliefs, even actions can be forgiven and forgotten. Even my words are subject to my opinion at the moment. It could change later if it suits me
don’t feel sorry for taking something from them. they deserve it, more than just it. what do they themselves do? the rich gets richer, but how? only when poor gets poorer. they are all robbers there, criminals. u atleast aren’t robbing anybody.
u said u r taking people’s money… but its mostly of rich since they pay more taxes. on them u r giving them a chance of accumulating some good karma/virtue..those robbers need it to nullify their sinful life. so by taking their money u r doing good on them.
its not a mere trick of words. u know why all those big celebrities and businessmen or even normal people give money into charities – to feel good…trying to nullify their sins thru doing good for others. don’t they know how they have accumulated all this money? they wake up in night and weep. you are giving them the chance to feel good. u r on the upper side, not lower.
you know what one of my future plans is after running away – become a beggar. in return i will pretend to give them blessings so that they can feel good. its a whole business here in India. but no, i’ll be a special beggar, something like a buddhist one. walking quietly and calmly from house to house…they don’t give much to shouting and begging ones anyways, an irony, i guess.
quaero. Your opinion is very interesting and holds some water. You said you plan on running away. Can you elaborate on that?
yeah, i’m planning to run away from home. i’m still within my parents control although i’m 21.
@quaero: I wish you the best on your travels. You sound like a brave heart. Americans are so jaded about beggars. In my city, you have to obtain a license to be a “panhandler” or else you face the threat of being arrested (it’s really just a way for police to legally harass them).
Unless it is an obvious out-an-out scam, I give money to beggars (when I actually have some in my wallet) because it is their business what they do with it. But that is because I do not presume to know the difference between a “beggar” and an “ascetic.”
I was extremely depressed walking through downtown one day and a beggar said words (I don’t remember what) that put a smile on my face. He didn’t ask me for a dime. Maybe he was a holy man; I don’t know.
@jswissman thanks a lot. i won’t beg in cities, but in towns and villages. or maybe i’ll have to until i collect enough to go to himalayas…i always imagined that as the perfect place for me…nature in its purity, and silence!
you sounds like a good hearted man. people often makes it as an excuse to not part their money – that what if they wasted our money. they don’t know that it defeats the very purpose of giving!
btw i’m not a braveheart but a coward for running away from facing difficulties of life and relationships. its just that i don’t want to waste my life on borrowed presumption that life is about getting stronger thru enduring suffering. what if its not? i’ll find it out, or try to find out, on my own what life is about. and for that i need to first cut all predefined bonds and give it a totally fresh start.
@quaero: Growing up my dad never gave a dime to beggars because he claimed they would just use it to get drunk. This never made any sense to me for two reasons: (1) Once I give money it is no longer mine and thus I have no care what is done with it; (2) If someone wants to get a bottle of wine to escape the pain of their existence if only for a brief time I don’t feel bad at all contributing to that.
I have a funny story too: One time I was at a gas station pumping gas and a man approached me counting up the money in his hands. He knew the exact amount he needed: He asked me for 70 cents (or some such number) for a bottle of wine. I gave him a buck and he started to give me change back lol!! That was just so funny. I of course gestured for him to keep the change.
I really love nature, but unfortunately having grown up in suburbia and living in urban areas, I have no survival skills whatsoever. I do remember being a kid and being jealous of Grizzly Adams.
@quaero: You are no coward. The kind of action it takes to cut all ties and take a leap of faith into the unknown–an unknown way of life–when one is in a toxic environment requires a great act of courage. Please just believe me on this one (I have personal experience with this kind of decision).
i don’t think any environment can be more toxic than of “people”. quite literally. i have almost “seen” it how even when i’m my calmest state of mind they make an entry with all the hatred, envy, loathing filled in their being…and it immediately gets transferred into me and i feel disgusted…even when they don’t say a word…its just flowing out of them. or maybe its in me and it get activated by them…but still.
maybe its easier for me because i’m still young. i see a lot of people here suffering because of a woman’s relationship. i also have some friends with same problem. so i guess i’m just lucky yet. as for my father and mother, that will indeed be difficult. but i think i’ll make it.
isn’t it ironic all our life we think what our mind says is right, but we find most “truth” in things of heart – things that have innocence (like in that beggar u mentioned), beauty, purity.
i think i forcibly said ‘our’. u need not agree with me on that.
jswissman-I really like your perception of things.
@quaero: I agree with you wholeheartedly. When I think of the famous quote “Beauty will save the world” by Dostoevsky, I think of the beauty of innocence, of children, the beauty of the heart, and music too.
@I appreciate that JSReynolds, particularly that you said perception. I still have so much to unlearn!