thehusk

What kills me is the feeling that a decent life was possible for me, if I’d just made better choices. I made a lot of terrible choices. I’m still making a lot of terrible choices. The thing is, past a certain point, you become your choices. For me to turn around now and start acting like a decent person…it just wouldn’t work. I don’t have the brain of a decent person, or the life experiences. It would be an act, and people would see through it.

I believe there are reasons I made the choices I made, reasons that ultimately extend beyond me. There were reasons […]

I am unsettled. Or rather, I am even more unsettled than usual. I received an invitation to the wedding of one my cousins. I haven’t seen him, or any of them, in nearly 15 years. The last time I saw him, we were still both young men, with life ahead of us (in theory). I still had a full head of hair.

I have avoided seeing any of them for all that time, partly because I don’t want them to see what a loser I am. How little I’ve grown or developed as a person. I’m still just as awkward and standoffish as I was back […]

I’m so desperately lost. And there’s no way out. The only way forward is to let go. Not necessarily of life, but of the kind of life I feel is worthwhile. Accept, and let go. And I can’t bring myself to do it. My mind stubbornly clings to delusional obsessions. Because if it’s not going to be how I imagined, I can’t see any meaning in it.

There may still be experiences worth having out there, if I could just let go of what is lost. But I can’t. I can’t bear to do it. I refuse to accept. And in refusing, I wear myself down. […]

It’s hard to know what to do from here. The things I value in life are largely unrealistic and out of reach. But I can’t seem to bring myself to let go. To accept that it’s over. I failed to live life in a way that effectively worked towards anything. And now it’s over – it’s too late.

While everyone else was running the race, I was sitting at the start line. And now even if I start running, by the time I get halfway round, the race will be long over.

So it’s over – I failed to participate. But these parts of me still have […]

It’s so hard to find the motivation to do anything. Realistically, even if I work my ass off and do everything right in pursuing a goal, I know it’s never going to be what I want it to be. There might still be things that are worth doing in life, that are meaningful. But it’s never going to be satisfying. There are always going to be fundamental parts of me that go unfulfilled. And I don’t know how to stop fixating on them. Whenever something reminds me of them it triggers my mind into this loop of longing, regret, and despair. And then nothing that […]

I’m so tired of feeling tired all of the time. I’ve been running on empty for 15 years now. There might be some physical issues that are contributing to it, but I think it’s probably just depression. I can’t see a way to a life that seems meaningful, so the motivation part of me has just given up. Why bother, when even if I put myself through all the struggle, I still won’t ever get to the point where things feel ok again?

There’s no positive goal that I can use to motivate myself to take action. So the only reason I ever do anything is […]

This is what I struggle with most when wondering whether I should end it. I’m not in unendurable agony, though I am in constant low-level pain. I’m not in inconsolable anguish, though I am always tired, and mostly sad, and becoming more and more hopeless by the year. If it was just me to consider, I think killing myself would probably be the right thing to do, even though I don’t emotionally “want” to do it. Despite my delusional attachment to dreams of a life, and my terror of death, I think it would be the right choice.

But it’s not just me I should consider. […]

The animal in me wants to survive at any cost, to reproduce. It’s strong enough to make me fear death, to hinder me in killing myself. But it’s not strong enough to actually drive me to succeed in life. It’s constantly undermined by the asshole personality I’ve developed since I was a child, that always wants to withdraw, to reflect, to stand back from life and observe. That would rather be miserable about the past than focus on the future, because that somehow seems more meaningful. That is constitutionally incapable of being happy.

It’s hard for me to weigh up the good that would come from […]

It seems like the way the world is going, it would be good to have my exit plan to hand, even if I don’t use it straight away. Then, if someone somewhere decides that nuclear war would actually be a grand idea, I can peace out before things get truly gnarly. I have no desire to try and survive through a  nuclear holocaust.

I’m pretty sure I have enough money to obtain my preferred substance, but it would take a lot of work to track down a reliable seller, and I’m hopelessly naïve with that kind of shit. I’m also worried about attracting the attention of […]

…What the fuck it that like? What’s it like to actually enjoy spending time with other people?  To not walk through this world alone?  The times that I feel the loneliest are when I’m around other people spending time together. It’s this stark reminder of what’s missing in my life. I feel even more awkward, even more out of place. Like I don’t belong, or I’m intruding. I shouldn’t be there…I shouldn’t exist. It makes me not want to go outside.

There’s a kind of absurdity that comes from recognizing that you’ve become the lowest of the low. A huge amount of dissonance arises. On the one hand, you’re you, and you’re an essentially good person, right? There are reasons you do the things you do, and you feel at least somewhat justified. You don’t want to hurt anyone, really – at least, not most of the time.

And then you get these moments of distance, when you see yourself through the eyes of others.  And you think back on your actions, your motivations, your desires. And you realise “Oh shit, I’m the bad guy! I’m the […]

There’s a small valley a couple of hundred miles away, where most of my happy memories are based. It’s surrounded by forest on all sides, with a stream running through the middle. It’s nothing too breath-taking. The village is pretty run down and shabby, and the only things there are a retirement home and a dilapidated old church. A lot of the forest is relatively newly planted, so it’s not that pretty. But it’s special to me. It’s where my mind returns to. The valley is high up in the hills above the flood plain of a river, and from the highest point you can […]

Living without motivation is pretty miserable. Each day I wake up feeling tired, even if I’ve slept the night before. I get maybe 1-2 hours of having enough energy to function during the day, the rest of the time I’m just drifting through, putting off anything that takes effort. Every day is the same. Nothing ever gets better, it only slowly gets worse. I suppose that by definition this is depression – I have very little internal drive or pressure to get things done. I am literally de-pressed. There’s not enough inside my mind to force myself to function.

There’s so much that I need to […]

I don’t think it’s necessarily a guilty conscience – guilt is focused on the impact your actions have on others, and I can never know that. It’s probably more like shame. Although shame is usually centred around what others think of you, and apart from a couple of ex-therapists, no one knows.

The reality of it is, I have to look myself in the mirror every day, and know the things I’ve done (and the things a large part of me still wants to do.) And somehow live with myself. And I don’t know how to do that. Because my self-image feels unbearable to face up […]

It seems to me that the overwhelming majority of the suffering that I’ve experienced  in my life comes from frustrated desire. From feeling or believing that something is really important and I should do something to attain it, yet simultaneously feeling or believing that it is beyond my reach. Beyond my reach, but not totally impossible. There’s just enough hope there that I can still torture myself with imagining that if I just found the right way, it could somehow be fulfilled. But never enough that it feels tangible, or really worth pursuing.

It’s such a waste of life and emotion. But I’ve never known how […]

Meaning is what makes life worth living. What makes pain and suffering seem bearable. I have robbed myself of any chance at what I consider to be a meaningful life. Any hope of meaningful relationships, or a future self I can respect. So all I’m left with is the pain and suffering. And although it’s not yet that severe, I don’t know how to bear it. Because I have nothing to console myself with. Nothing to use to tell myself “it’s ok”. Nothing to look forward to. Nothing to work towards. There is no positive meaning in my life.

All that is left for me is […]

I am a bad person. By which I mean that I want to do bad things. Really bad, fucked up stuff. And I’m pretty sure I’m not going to do those things. But the wanting, it hurts, constantly. My motivations, who I am on a very core level, are broken. The things that feel most meaningful to me are wrong. And I don’t think that’s something I can change. I can change my actions, and to some extent I have, but I can’t change what I want. I can’t change what feels meaningful to me. And that hurts, and it makes me want to not […]

This world doesn’t want me in it. And I don’t much want to exist anymore, so we’re kind of agreed on that. There’s just the fear that’s keeping me here, and the damage that would be done to those that don’t deserve it. But I’m not really alive. I haven’t been for years now. This world holds no place for me. I don’t belong around others.  I belong in the dirt. And delaying that natural justice causes me pain. The world wants me not to exist. To return to the mulch. To be something useful again. Something innocent. My continued existence is a violation of […]

It’s not much fun, being a monster. Would not recommend it. You get these constant reminders of what everyone thinks of you. Society loves a good villain. How can our heroes be truly heroic if those they pursue aren’t truly evil? Writers love to plumb the depths of human depravity, and audiences eat it up.

The obvious response to this is “just stop being evil.” Unfortunately, your past casts a long shadow. Some things mark you as forever beyond the pale, even after you stop. Besides which, the motivations that led you to that point don’t just disappear. If you’re sufficiently fucked in the head, realising […]

I am alone because I isolate myself. I isolate myself because I feel like shit when I’m around other people. I feel like shit around others because I feel exposed and vulnerable and out of place and stupid. Because…I’ve spent so much of my life avoiding people that I’ve never learned how to handle the unexpected little complications that they inevitably produce? Or because I’m just intrinsically socially inept? Or because I’m so insanely self-conscious and socially anxious that the tiniest little thing sticks in my mind & ruins my day?

It’s not something I feel I can solve through exposure – there have been extended […]