I was 13 when I realized that I would inevitably die.
I saw my body changing, and unlike most young teens who would
Enter a phase in which they cannot control their raging hormones and impulses, I merely noted the changes as the first leap toward my inevitable demise.
You see,
The change itself is what inspired this cognition.
I watched myself mature and it disgusted me.
My thoughts became more intelligent and clear, but apprehension and the reluctant realization of my mortality were the first discernible responses to the Change.
Life, at that moment, lost its magic.
I began writing. I played the guitar, in my room, alone.
I went up for dinner, and then immediately back down again.
I started reading philosophy, and I abandonedy religion completely by 15.
Why?
Because everything we do, every smile we flash,
Every service we attend, every bite we eat, every love we let in, every tear we shed out; EVERYTHING that we would consider essentially human is a futile coping mechanism forged to combat the inevitable: death.
Even the stars die. We are the stuff of stars, however we were
given the proper time and space to evolve and become self aware on this planet earth. Our phyiscal nature is only due to this fact. Had the earth been destroyed in the forging of our solar system, then we would still be stars. Or rocks. Carbon
Atoms and water molecules.
High school was a mess. I was subject to an environment in which learning was despised. I taught myself much of what I know today.
My parents despise learning as well. I love them, but their advice misses my ear. I am nothing. I am matter
that has evolved to the point of consciousness.
But even that is more than I can say for most.
Sadly, we live in a time and place where the mediocre run amuck and
dictate the composition of mainstream culture. I want to die when I overhear conversations about celebrities and reality
Shows. Facebook is evil. It is pulling our society apart rather than bringing it together. I hate my culture, because I hate the inferior majority that supplies its ammunition. There wouldn’t be Facebook if people were smart enough to realize its damage to interpersonal relations. There would be no market for it. Cable television wouldn’t exist if there weren’t people bored enough to enjoy its laughable content. But the majority has spoken: so shall it be written, so shall it be done.
I am not meant to be a human.
Let me be a wild animal, so I can have no soul and die in the field somewhere without the knowledge of the ruse of religion. Let me be as unborn baby who isn’t wanted by its parents; let me be aborted so I do not have the knowledge I possess about the pain and agony that is my contingent existence.
I am 21. I’m going to graduate school to avoid life. Academia is the last stop before black hole of life sucks m into a vortex that only death extinguishes. And who knows; maybe death holds nothing good for me either.
I am finished. If not now, then tomorrow. If not then, then a Tuesday night in the future.
Who. The. Fuck. Cares.
When I look at babies I smile and cry. I smile because they are a clean slate, but I cry because they will be written upon.
I’ve thought about doing the Deed. The Deed
does sound appealing. The only thing keeping me going is my awareness of the quality of my thoughts and measures. I like thinking. I live in my own mental space. If I do extrovert my thoughts, it is for a good reason. Of course, I am speaking chiefly of my relationships to people other than my family and my few friends.
I am not concerned with money. My mind will make whatever money I need to survive. I am not concerned about the United States of America. It will fall and I will move away without missing it, or it’s goddamned freedoms. I am not concerned with the food on my table, for I like to eat grass and leaves. There will always be plenty of that.
To die is to be relieved of the greatest responsibility ever bestowed: that is not only to live, but to live CONSCIENTOUSLY and UNDER SOCIETAL RULE.
If that is death, truly, then I welcome it at it’s own good time.
Emotions are more primitive than reason. If mankind persists for another 200000 years, than they will be regarded as strictly animal, just as the concept of a “soul” is reserved only for humans today. How vain does one have to be to believe in such a thing? A soul? I listened really hard in anatomy class and I don’t believe I caught the souls regular location within the body.
Now.
If you subscribe to the truth that matter is neither created or destroyed than it holds that our residual thoughts and actions may still remain after we pass because our thoughts Are the product of electrical impulses in the brain. That in no way accounts for a soul, however. A soul connotes a sort of consciousness that is formless, and not tied to the body. Even though the mind(there is no such as a “mind”) body problem is still at large and is still out there giving philosophers and psychologists a headache, it is illogical and ill conceived to believe the notion of a soul that transcends the physical body. We have large brains. We have had a long time to evolve the theory of the soul to explain something that can only be described as individual human consciousness, which is: the process of unique information in the brains of unique individual homo sapiens that result(along with a specific environment) in a cultivation a specific personality determined by environment and genetic factors. There is your soul. You die with your body. I don’t think i could make myself any clearer.
If youve made it this far, I applaud your
Patience and determination–I know it’s been a roller coaster.
Bottom line:
All I know for sure is that I do exist, and that I will die, and this cognition disgusts me.
If you want to carry on an email conversation about related topics I am happy to oblige your request: ckjarv01@louisville.edu
11 comments
Hi ckj,
I understand how you feel but I think you need to try and focus on the things you do like and avoid the things you don’t like. That way they won’t become an irritation to you.
Using Facebook is optional. Owning a television is optional. Talking about celebrity culture is optional. It’s your choice what you do with your time and who you spend it with.
Seek out the things you are interested in, along with like minded people, and you’ll be far happier, I’m sure. One of the problems we all face nowadays, at least in the developed world, is that we are swamped for choice. As you rightly say there are hundreds of TV channels, not to mention the internet where you can watch, read, or listen to pretty much anything you want. Often for free. No generation before ours has ever had such a range of choices. The problem is that there is still only one of each of us, and we still only have 24 hours in the day. If you’re not careful, all this choice can feel like it’s smothering you.
The fact that they exist is an irritation to me. The
Culture that I am immersed in praises that which is
Useless and extrinsic.
And things,
Optional as they may be,
Are moving
Towards
A state of necessity.
Facebook and technology especially.
I just think your focus is all wrong. Why worry about Facebook and those things you consider to be “useless”? If that’s how some people want to spend their time, let them get on with it. I don’t use Facebook and never watch anything to do with celebrities on TV. I’m simply not interested in either.
Equally, however, it’s perfectly possible to use Facebook and still be interested in science, history, politics, and all the things you might consider meaningful.
Incidentally, are you studying something science related. Judging by your comments you seem to have some interest in it. I love science, too. It is my religion, and Stephen Hawking is the closest thing I have to a God.
Whether you live to an age where wiping your own arse becomes are problem or whether you are struck down in your prime. The result is the same.
Facebook represents a larger idea than just itself; it signals where we are heading.
It represents the quickening pace in which we live are lives.
We have decided as a culture that we would rather meet and connect with people
On the Internet than in person. The implications are staggering considering that younger and younger kids are using Facebook to communicate in a way that they never would face to face. Marriages end over Facebook. People are bullied and ostracized via Facebook. And it’s impersonal qualities only make it a perfect vehicle for negative speech and action that wouldn’t occur as often face to face. That aside, interpersonal communication skills are being lost in the shuffle by the next generation of kids.
Especially ones who have facebook and cell phones at an early age. Facebook represents the decay of society, MY society, and I am going to acknowledge rather than just sit back and condone all of the negativity associated with it. And how the hell do YOU know what I truly “focus” on? This small passage I have written is only one continuous thought of mine, and not a supreme focus. I have fucking school, graduate school no less, to attend to. That is my focus. This is merely and observation of things that I have observed.
I meant that you are focusing too much on the negative aspects of things and failing to acknowledge any of the positives.
Ben Jedi mind tricks only work on the weak minded not depressed. You have the right idea though. Positives can be taken out of any situation, regardless of how desolate they may seem.
I don’t think being positive on this website is required. If everyone on here was positive, it wouldn’t exist. So why do I have to be positive on here, while everyone else
can express themselves fully?
Ckj
No one says you have to be positive. It just good for you, good for us, the world, animals, economy, trees…. if you could try and be positive. But you can’t can you. Because things have got you down. But remember loss of form is only temporary.
Ckj,’
You can always go primitive and live off the land.
There are still places left in the world where that type life is possible.