I read this essay called “On Stress” by Gwern, which basically talked about how little it takes to actually survive and be okay. I’m not sure how accurate he is. But I think we overestimate how much we “need”. Right now, I feel really stressed with school, and I keep thinking, is this really necessary? I don’t want to be stressed, and I don’t need to be stressed. I’m not sure, because I still “feel” like I should continue to stay in school. I guess, it’s more like realizing, I have the choice of whether I want to stress out about school or not. And maybe, I’m trying too hard, or trying for the wrong reasons.
I’ve been feeling like I don’t really care much about death. I read this manga called “Ping Pong”, and I really related with this one character, Smile, and something he said:
“Ping pong… and also learning English… I do all this to kill time until the end of my life”
I think, if I died, even if I didn’t care, my friends and family would care, even acquaintances would care. And besides, personally death scares me. I don’t know how much we can control it, but it’s our minds that assign emotion to everything. I don’t want to do homework, but it doesn’t involve physical pain, just like mental effort. Is there any real distinction between doing nothing and doing something? I’m the one assigning anxiety and stress to my work. If it doesn’t matter, why not just do it? Maybe it won’t be painful to work. Maybe it will be painful, but in a cathartic way, in a way that makes me feel like I’m truly living, like when the weather is cold. Maybe it will just suck to do, it will be tedious and nothing of value will be gained, and it will not be worth the potential future gains of staying in school / keeping good grades. But I will find out.
Anyway, hope that made some sense. Today, I’m grateful for finding this website and the existence of emo music, and video games, and dreaming, and the few friends I do have. I hope you can find something – anything, of any size – you can be grateful of. And if you can’t, reality won’t have changed because you couldn’t think of anything.