[1107] White Whale

An idea I brush against every so often is being "afraid of success." It's not a fear of responsibility or doing more work. It's not as if things will be unearned. But there's moments where I'm on the verge of doing "the next right thing" in service to my goals, and a flourish of panic will creep in. Some of it is just being forlorn and annoyed that I'm finally capitulating on something that's going to cost money, or be boring and time consuming. Some of it is anticipating getting the effort or the next series of incoming consequences thrown in my face. But, some of it definitely is concerned that it will simply work as intended, I'll be right, and then I'm left alone, correct, and then either waiting for something shitty to happen or dumbfounded it took so long.

Each individual piece of the complex puzzles I try to put together are never that hard. It's spending money. It's taking a giant breath so I don't berate someone for their insanity-making response to something I've said. It's asking the next question, or waiting around indefinitely for a response. Every piece of my house, every pallet and brick and tool it took to get them here, was just a series of "next best things" to do in service to the goal. I know what I should be practicing on the guitar to push me into the next level, just like I know what I need to do with the business.

It's the goal or goals that have become…looser? Foggier? Less insisted upon? A lot of what I initially drove myself to believe I could achieve came from an idolized concept of my intelligence, focus, and obsessiveness. I did, sincerely, in a manner of speaking, want to "take over the world," if only for a moment. I don't want the world anymore. I didn't have a great idea of what I meant by that when I said it at the time. I wanted more power and control. I wanted money. I wanted things I wasn't feeling I had and not claiming to want things I took for granted I already did.

Some of the more dramatic shifts have been in the underlying assumptions betrayed by lived experience. I won't necessarily succeed because I'm smart, obsessed, or focused. There's a fuck ton of luck. There's opportunities that exist at certain times in your life that are harder to cultivate or find at others, at least if you're not rich. No one, and I mean no one, can be "saved" from "the human condition" that gets addicted, self-sabotages, and exists in perfect metaphor as a refutation or contradiction of personal accountability. That's a person who can't accept that "the world" isn't a "thing" to "have" so much as a nugget of their personal narrative that maybe isn't serving them anymore. I never concerned myself that it's always the villain who has the same goal in the cartoons, The Brain didn't seem so bad.

I took my first real better step in denoting time as the thing I valued more than money. When it comes to owning a business, I was initially driven by the idea of making as much money as possible. Turns out, I can be incredibly busy with fun things I like to do, eat a ton of good food, buy expensive (to me) toys, and see people I actually want to for like $30K, $10K of that for bills. Huh. Math strikes again. If I had millions, I'm not convinced I'd be surrounded with friends or that the overall psychological morass would subside. Until I felt the financial and physical implications of even trying to manage a shed or 3, the giant dream home idea never registered in practical terms. I hadn't had a particularly long stint of feeling "safe" or "comfortable" in what I was doing or living in, so I kept looking for the next thing.

I like my house. I'd improve dozens of things, but this is my safe space. This is where I embody ownership and growth. This is where I feel free to fuck about. When I leave, I want it to be when I want and headed towards things of my choosing. That's been fairly true in an increasing way over the last 3 years. If I get a robust referral system and or yearly grant writer who nets the cash to keep the bills paid, I've won one of the hardest challenges I've set out for myself since I began. What then? I suspect the next series of problems and goals will call out to me, but I'm kind of staring over a cliff. Putting together a case load isn't rocket science.

Part of me doesn't feel allowed to be "okay." I feel often isolated in my effort and opposition to the circumstances that seem to keep us all quiet and oppressed. If I shuffle myself into some contented corner of the world, does it follow that the things I'm concerned about will burn that much faster? Should I care? Is there any way to actually measure what alleged impact I might be having? I don't suspect so. I do believe the more you account for locally you get the most positively impactful ripples macroly. I don't mean by your personal effort to recycle you'll save the planet. What's more local than being okay in your own brain?

Something I was less aware of in the past as well was needing to have my back against the wall or an adversary to fight against. Most often it was because, "Fuck you, watch this" and my so-named spite engine driving things. I didn't suspect I'd lose pretty much all of my respect for any given person as I got older. You have to understand what a naive true believer I was. I thought the world was full of adults. I thought people who did well and did things well were in charge. I thought you got out what you put in and that there were genuine forces you could put on one side or another as far as a morality or action tale.

I've remarked before how doing well in school was rewarded. I was safer when my mom wasn't pissed or finding excuses to beat me. I got recognition and handed more to do when I completed reading lists or bonus assignments. Obviously, no one gives a shit how much you do or accomplish as you get older as they bemoan trying to keep their heads above water. Don't you dare offer to help or you'll interfere with the same pride that was irrationally driving you. Little boosts like being better than average at something in high school pale in comparison to what you witness every day online so you, hopefully, figure out the joy in the work and nature of the process before you go mad trying to relive former glory.

Now? I kinda wanna watch my shows, go to music camp, go bowling, make money talking to people or helping them with things that I find easier, and mostly sit back and watch. For a minute there I wanted to get politically involved until it really sank in it's our broken cultural environment and psychology that's at bottom. I've wanted to influence "culture" since I've started writing, and I think I have and retain the capacity to do so. It just looks a lot like social work and blood feuds with irresponsible agencies more than house parties.

I've mostly always had more of an eye to the future more than the moment. Writing is a practice, not a disposition. Thinking constantly and fighting back a propensity to spiral out of anxious control is the disposition. If I'd finally done enough in cultivating my outside environment to allow me to occupy more of the present moment? Is that not just forming another excuse or metaphorical adversary? Excuse to do what? Stay salty and dream? I think I'm okay with that. I don't know that I want to be liberated from a certain kind of suffering or discomfort. I need obstacles and friction to exercise creativity and feel like I've accomplished something. Matter-of-factly stepping from one soulless series of movements to the next is like invincibility cheat codes. Why are you even playing the game?

I want a compelling story. I want things to be interesting, and I want the main characters to matter enough to be worthy of mourning. I want to see a unique expression of how genuine personalities relate to each other and their circumstances. The stories that get passed down are about the people who do things. The ones who travel to hell and back. The ones who fight monsters. The ones who look for that which is yet discovered. It's people who are trying and disappearing into the mysticism of existence itself. I wanna do magic shit.

It really is no wonder I was willing to dare the consequences of relationships or friendships that never really locked in. I wanna be in a band of cartoon pirates as much I do the fields of Letterkenny as much as I do the bridge of Serenity. I have supports, don't get me wrong. I do not have a team with a mission or spirit of adventure. I'm not part of a federation, squad, or a community thrown together by wacky circumstances, but staying together because they feel the same heartbeat.

That's another piece of my imagination that was severely lacking. I never really envisioned a future where I was alone. I took the empty sentimentality and pipe-dreaming of the friends I had much further than they ever intended. I assumed with a degree of money, energy, planning, and invitations people would be lining up for nights out and to keep the conversation going. I might be captain of the party boat, or 5th grade tag group, or CFTM, or recovery meetings, or now this nonprofit, but ain't no one following me nowhere. I do the work and tend to get what I want, but I think I'm hunting bigger monsters while many are wondering why I'm hunting at all.

[972] Just Watch

I can’t help but feel as though something is still missing.

I say “still,” because over the last few weeks, I’ve found a high degree of comprehensive flow and achievement of my goals in relatively quick succession.

I’ve played my guitar long enough to hint at my peak capacity.
I’ve started building an area that is larger than my main house and bathroom combined.
I’ve hung out with friends at the Moose Lodge, bowling, and for food.
I’ve bowled almost every weekend reaching scores that suggest improvement.
I’ve salvaged about half of the pallets.
I’ve been super caught up on shows.
I’ve started using more of my woodworking equipment.
I’ve read a book from a manga series I’ve been wishing to for quite some time.
We’ve got the application submitted to potentially be a disability provider.
I’ve spoken with someone who is reaching out about ways in which we might be able to partner with an existing counseling operation, and had some networking conversations with a few local people.
I’ve seen a couple good movies, comedians, and have concerts almost every week through October.
I’ve had absolutely amazing and painful rolfing sessions that have dramatically improved my posture, circulation, and flexibility.
I’m still full, still healthy, and still 3 to 4 months of perpetually away from being out of debt.

So much of it is to do with me though, doesn’t it? That’s not like “bad,” but there’s nothing new or exciting about how I stay preoccupied. I don’t have to learn anything, help anyone, or feel anything but whether or not it’s time to screw in another beam or switch on another show. None of the above, save the potential in the networking conversations, speaks to the largest goals and direction, and that hasn’t happened because of my effort or ability, but because my friends reached out to both me and their friends.

I haven’t noticed that before, but it might speak to this unease. This thing about “connection” and “ongoing conversations” and just showing up and being present is the only track that has me visualizing a kind of light at the end of the endless tunnel. It’s not hard. That’s the constantly striking thing. It’s not hard if you talk, share, connect, and then show up and do.

I’ve also been watching Louis Theroux documentaries throughout the day. He talks to everyone, but mostly those in worlds with particular controversy or stigma. I didn’t need to watch the ones on poverty or drug use. Those were my clients. I could hear the bullshit miles away. I registered the catchphrases and felt the naivety in his questioning. Sometimes, though, someone would state things plainly like, “The pain of the lifestyle isn’t as bad as the pain of whatever drove them there.” For all of the drama or culturally degrading lore about addiction, it’s just a heightened story of whether or not you choose to engage with the requisite level of pain.

It hurts to learn things, but it’s nothing like a pain of not knowing and being at the whims of things you don’t understand. I was willing to change how I understood myself, and my perspective on the power of words, when the pain of thinking things were up to some deity or fate drove me mad. It hurts to be out in the sun building things, but paying 5 times the amount for the same amount of space hurts too. Getting my muscles worked to death has hurt in new and exciting ways, but cramps and chronic headaches are worse. It really sucks to feel a certain kind of perpetual isolation, but staying silent and pretending I’m not witness to so much bullshit is a kind of self-destruction I can’t stomach.

I’m missing a culture that vibes and speaks like me. I’m told “the majority” has the vast majority of my values. Apparently, this stops at the moment I suggest we literally kill the literal fascists. What do we make of those other values? My instinct is to blurt out “feckless,” for what is a value you can’t celebrate nor defend?

If nothing else, I believe in trying. That’s something that can operate as a “belief,” because you still have to do something with your trust, faith, or confidence in someone or something, if we take the Google definition. Another goes, “An acceptance that something is true or that something exists.” Perfect. I accept there is trying and that it can be truly demonstrated.

I don’t give a lot of people credit that they’re trying, not because they don’t feel like they’re trying, but because they don’t admit what they’re trying to do. They’re often trying to gaslight and lie about me lol. But that’s a little too easy to recognize because, well, the words are often written down and can be reviewed when the volume of feelings have been turned down. They’re trying to convince themselves that playing guitar, and building rooms, and taking trips, and being fed and entertained, and looking socially acceptable and relevant, and finding a happy place in hobbies is the point. It’s not. The more I merely indulge in said activities, the more the hole opens up.

The point is to push, challenge, own, incorporate, and protect. The point is to raise the fucking child. Whether it’s the one in you, or the ones you’ve started spitting out. You know the areas you can work more on. You know the injustices in your field. You recognize when you’re not being accountable to the responsibilities on offer, or if they don’t live up to what you can and should be responsible for. Can you genuinely tell me you wouldn’t be ashamed of me if I chose to return to Kroger and stock shelves for a living? It’s not about the job or denigrating the work, but what kind of bullshit would I be on to shirk what I’m capable of?

I’ve never needed more indulgence, I’ve needed a few righteous stabs at the dragon plaguing our culture. More than the recognition that this is the immutable overarching goal, I’d like to hear how you sort and work the details of killing our mutual problem. In the meantime, the school shootings and lack of healthcare and general exhaustion and disillusionment are literally killing us. Are you talking about your breakfast? Your magic spells and convoluted impractical theories? Or do you have a goddamn idea how to sharpen a blade?

If you don’t, can you recognize you don’t? Can you talk about it? Can you explain why you’ve never felt the need to learn how? Can all you do is listen to others sharpening theirs and point out the sound of the “screeeeeeeed” they are indulging in like so many public masturbaters?