It's infinitely humbling to read old rants. I hesitate to even
dignify them as “blogs” as if that has a modicum of associated
respect. I'm also starkly reminded that there's always something more
to say. Every person that enters the conversation, every random
interaction or some fight gives you an opportunity to be challenged
and reflect. Probably the most amazing thing is how many times I read
the words “I hate” or “fuck this or that” without feeling the
kind of crippling emotions, at least persistently, that I might not
be incorrect in saying, most of my friends seem to
deal with.
That's what I wanted to tackle head on a few days ago. A drunk
conversation that didn't really start because agreements were made to
not have those kinds of conversations drunk, needed to end up
somewhere. I don't think I'll ever do the talk about other peoples'
sadness or stress well. I can listen or offer my perspective, but I
feel like for all my cynicism and hatred, very little if none of it
is self-directed. Yes, you can rest assured that if I say I hate you,
I do just in fact, hate you for all the big and little shitty things
you are. I didn't see something I didn't like in the mirror and say
“someone needs to be told what a worthless fuck they are today.”
As with most genuine, large, institutional or intimately personal
problems, I'm irrationally concerned about how little I think I can
do to help. Literally, all I have is my “good will” towards the
people I like. I know there are several feel good books out there
that would suggest that just “being there” or some similar
sentiment is all you may have to do to have the biggest impact on
someone's life. If you'd like to believe this, then you have to start
making decisions about how many people and to what extent you're
going to be there. If you think this is kind of bullshit, then you
just try to keep the happy times going with your friends and cross
your fingers all the shit doesn't hit the fan at once.
Like, I've already written a blog pondering why everyone in my
life, 4-5 years ago seemed angry, depressed, or anxious. For those of
you not tracking my groups of friends, rest assured there's been a
fairly large changeover, and I find myself again under a similar
contemplation. Now you may congratulate me on my capacity for
cynicism and despotic outlooks and finding such well-equipped crowds
to indulge me, but that's incorrect and dickish. I'd rather see this
as more confirmation that there's something larger going on
psychologically and socially that isn't addressed or understood
enough. I feel somewhat desperate to grasp this “large fucked up
thing with our heads.”
I can only hope people aren't insulted or put-off in how I try to
talk about it as well. I'm acquainted with the word depression, but
I've only been able to engage with the darkest places it can take my
friends fairly recently. My pop-sci answers or advice from high
school “worked” in that no one I've engaged with ended up dead,
which is hardly a reliable metric of success. I'm anxious because
sometimes I genuinely don't know if I'm going to blurt out an
obviously inappropriate epithet. That has nothing to do with the
anxiety that makes you question every single social interaction you
have and measure it against whether you should bother to continue to
exist.
So then maybe I can finally offer my speculation on the ways and
why's these pervasive and debilitating emotional states exist, and if
any of them ring true, it could click with that one person who
doesn't think I'm ridiculing them, calling them a liar, trying to
undermine what they feel or have been through, or think I'm offering
some definitive answer to what seems like some kind of evolving
social virus only the blissfully naïve seem to be able to avoid.
Let's start wide then move specific. Overall, I think there's a
huge familial and social institutional problem. I think modern
conceptions or aftermaths of families left a lot of scars on people
from my experience. I'm sure they only learned how to scar their
children from the ways their parents scarred them. They of course
were hurt by a turtle, and then it's turtles all the way down. There
are cliches about not ending up like parents abound and who can't
find a movie where someone is “shocked” they just did exactly
what they swore would never happen to them. I took divorce as an
opportunity for two Christmases. I've had people explain to me
they'll never believe in love after their parents split.
Clearly, “looking back” and only feeling the pain of the
relationships that have gone bad in your developmental years might be
a predictor for how and whether you are close to people in the
future.
I think we fail dramatically in the social institutional realm as
well. I can't go a day without hearing what the “right” or “best”
kind of ANYTHING to do or buy is. This goes doubly for relationships.
The perfect boy or girlfriend does this for you, buys that for you,
feels only these things and despite all odds love will
conquer all. Also, before you get to deal with your relationship, you
have to look a certain way, feel a certain way, be into the cool new
things of the day, and sit at the bar society has raised for you.
Every corner is a chance to not be good enough, smart enough, or
acne-free enough.
I don't think it's a very conscious thing, but by the rule of
“practice makes permanent,” I have to think reinforcing shitty
ideas about yourself or the world you live in doesn't beget positive
feelings or insight into wellness. But that's the thing, it's always
reinforced. Your friends will tell you you're doing well because they
don't “feel they have the right” to speak about something “they
don't know enough about.” Yes, things like a shitty relationship.
But who told you that friends can't “obtain rights to more
information about people willing to share with you?” It took years
of my “prying” into peoples' lives before I just became “that
guy” and people opened up presumably because I didn't shatter the
world with their information.
So fuck our shitty families and fuck the people telling us things
with their fucking agendas and consequence blindness. Great.
Another wide view institutional failure is how we react when we
clearly recognize things are wrong. Just take meds! Of course in the
modern age you can play with your brain chemicals and all will be
well in a few weeks. Just keep taking your meds of course, or we
might have to face the real significance and nature of the problem.
For those who can't or won't take meds, I don't blame you, there's
your not-a-doctor friends doing everything they can to remind you of
why you should be happy or not anxious. Or worse, they don't believe
there's even a problem and carry on like it's a phase or like a bad
cough. And what is the afflicted person do then? I bet they don't
feel motivated to “bring down their friends” with their problems.
Some people can talk things out. Some people can run for miles and
find clarity or at least distraction. Sometimes the medicine actually
works. None of these kinds of “solutions” explain or speak to why
so many suffer to begin with.
As always, the best I can do with my opinionated, angry toned
rants is try to start a conversation. I need as many inputs, as are
relevant, to paint a picture that hopefully people can learn from.
When I look at the angry or immature things I've written, I still
think there's no substitute for just laying it all out there. You
don't want citations and rationality when you're explaining how
shitty the fights are with your ex-girlfriend, but if you describe
the situation in the same words years later, you might not have
learned anything. When peoples' pain is expressed today, it's
glamorized and commercialized; equated with an exhaustive list of
pseudo-real problems. You're expected to “frame” yourself. Make
what you feel and do presentable. Ludicrous.
When you get specific, you've got every variation of the big
problems as you have personalities. The happiest and saddest person
you know could be the same person. People who are merely stressed or
going through a tough time hijack the language and blur the lines
between “sometimes I want to die” and “all the time, sometimes
I want to die.” Sometimes you just really like to smoke weed,
sometimes you don't know how you'd function “dealing with it all”
without it. I wish I could recite the laundry list of things I've
known people to self-medicate with, but I imagine you have a fair
idea already. Can you blame them? When and why is it worth bumping
the pot-head up to problem smoker?
For me, I just see them as bandages. But who's cursing a bandage
for not giving the body a chance to fix itself? I certainly can't
pretend to know someone else's mind, but if my concern was for more
than myself, I'd want to talk about the big problems and whether
there's potential for big solutions, not just go numb to it all. No,
I am not trying to equate depression or anxiety medication with
drugs. Nor do I necessarily expect people to look beyond themselves
if what they're suffering from makes them unable to do so. I just
want to separate lazy entitled bitching and indulgence from genuine
pain.
And, as always, for me the best thing to counteract the waves of
self-loathing and drama is to get out in front of it all. I still
don't know if it doesn't work for other people because of different
personality types or for lack of effort. Before I get too involved in
hating or criticizing myself, it just seems easier and worthwhile to
point the finger at as many obvious targets or responsible parties as
possible. But mostly, I don't want you to suffer. I don't want you to
feel like there's no one to talk to or no one willing to spend the
time. While I'm not in your head, here's me prying open mine, take
anything you like.
