[952] Lemme Tell You

I do things.

That is no small statement. I get anxious, I complain, and I can find myself opining about things over which I have no control, but I do things. I’m not a reactionary, nor do I sit and stew in the hopelessness of being the smallest cog of a seemingly intractable machine.

 

So many of my conversations fall into the same patterns. I say something encouraging or hopeful, someone tells me “the way it is.” I offer to begin some initiative or inquiry, someone feels it is their duty to, somewhat forcefully, remind me of what I’m up against. If I tell a story of learning and sacrifice, they share a story of what they would never be able to do or the luxury and convenience they demand. If I qualify and reflect a point or sentiment, I’m invited to its reiteration. When I find myself discouraged in work environments or ill-reduced “life,” it’s usually because I’m choosing to be done having the same conversation.

 

I don’t like the word “hope,” but I feel like my life is an extremely loud demonstration in service to what I hope for. Because I don’t hope, I work. I try. I create. I do things. If you want to complain, I will complain with you, and then I will reflexively say we should organize or experiment or whatever. I’m not attempting to invalidate your feelings or perspective, but merely complaining needs to be redirected. If you’re unwilling or unable to do so in your own life, what the hell are you doing as a leader or counselor or parent? This is the existential dissatisfaction and disillusionment. It’s not that just anyone relays hopeless cliches and sentiments to me, it’s that my authority or peer wishes to throw in with the language and attitude that lands people in prison.

 

How can anyone with a straight face say that “nothing changes” while they’re listing off the perpetual changes they don’t like? It happens so fluidly it’s a wonder you might ever catch it when you’re in the conversation. Of course, things change. By asserting they don’t, you’re denying the means and responsibility that need be displayed for them to not change stupidly. You risk discovering that it's not about them over there and everything to do with the fights you’re unwilling or unable to have. It’s okay to not want the fight, but then don’t waste my headspace with your words lighting up the strawman.

 

Because I do things, I’m genuinely invested in how those things actually work. If I just wanted to see my energy manifest as a series of chaotic movements and clouds of dust, I wouldn’t risk getting severely disappointed by empty conversations to the “nowhere” you were aiming for. But I’m clear in my goal and aim. I know that, when I can’t get anything else, I at least need to have the conversation. I believe in the power of my voice and ability to bring things to a shared consciousness. I believe the impact of that is felt well independent of your opinion on the wisdom or purpose of doing so.

 

I’m not advocating out of childish devil’s advocacy. I’m not trying to get a rise out of you in challenging the powers that be. I’m looking to maintain my agency in any given moment. I’m looking to protect the values I have in service to autonomy, choice, and whatever I might conceive as “common” about decency or sense. It’s fascinating to me how often this appears to be lost on the people I’m speaking with. Where’s the person in the cliches? Where’s the wisdom in “pick your battles,” if you don’t understand the field you’re battling on?

 

I’m battling the innate ambivalence of the very cells which I’m comprised of. I’m battling “isms” and “ists” that “ians” and conquers and psychopaths who all have a say in how I need to navigate my life. I’m trying to stand for what continual effort and attention to moments of discomfort and ambiguity consist of. I’m picking the existential battle, all the time, every moment. I’m fighting the only battle I deem worthy of actual individual people with goals that transcend literally every other circumstance. I don’t have a god; I have the eternal values his believers allegedly believe in.

 

I don’t have a “fix” for institutions I “voluntarily” join to keep the bills paid. I can’t fix prison from my desk as a counselor. I can’t live in the glory days of how some counselors preferred programming. I can’t change how my “leadership” does or doesn’t respond to questions or gives direction. I can just pay attention. I can figure out how to speak to grievances or my values in ways that don’t get me immediately fired. I can take the pain and disillusionment from previous work environments that have operated the same way and learn to not let myself get so strung up. So that’s what I’m doing. I’m comfortable saying out loud how much I’m still consistently desiring to be my own boss in my own enterprise, and the idea of working here just long enough is the most compelling.

 

Funnily enough, while I have no god, I do like some of the sentiments people offer in his name. Recently, someone said, “God puts you where He needs you, it’s your job to figure out what He needs,” or something like that. I don’t believe that, but I think it speaks to a principle of being aware and setting YOUR example in whatever setting you may find yourself in. I could concoct a roundabout subconscious story about you repeating patterns and dragging yourself into environments that reignite your demons or play on trauma to understand the sentiment as well. I don’t think you need to go through 7 abusive relationships before you find self-esteem. I think your god is pretty fucked up for thinking otherwise. I don’t care how good "Man’s Search for Meaning" is, The Holocaust and seemingly endless series of genocides before and after are in bad taste.

 

My confidence stems from knowing I’m going to continue to do things. I’m going to continue to know I have a choice to write, bowl, spend, sleep, save, or start. I’m going to keep talking, even if you will literally lose your breath trying to say enough to persuade me not to. I seek out that kind of discomfort because that’s where I grow and learn and encode in my being a way of living and behaving that reinforce the rest of what I dream about. I don’t want a massive organization in which I’m flippant about the ground floor conversations or details. I can accept that nothing is “perfect” while knowing how to deliberately steer away from and account for negligence. I won’t allow myself to operate under the illusion that I have nothing to do, learn, or try. I’m a perfectly persuadable zealot waiting for a better argument than, “Fuck you, I know you can’t.”