hummingwolf | (no subject)

Preparation has a lot to do with how well one handles things. Did you do your homework? Then, ideally, you will be prepared to do well on this test. Unless you find out you picked up the wrong text at the college bookstore, you're in the wrong class and have done preparatory work that would have helped someone else but is completely and utterly useless to you.

My early life trained me well to live by directing vast amounts of energy toward intellectual pursuits, avoiding people much of the time because I'd figured out early on that most people would hurt and betray me given half a chance. Then I ended up with an illness that drains my energy, leaves me unable to concentrate on the things I trained myself to do for so long--but somehow I ended with more and more wonderful friends than I would have thought possible when I was younger. I don't have a clue how to make a life out of this. Somebody with a completely different background would have no problem with it, I'm sure.

On an unrelated note, whatever happened to Toni Childs? And why is an album called House of Hope one of the most depressing albums in my collection?

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

I disagree. I think someone from a different background would still have a problem with it. Maybe a different problem, but still a problem.

A person who seems content is simply doing their angsting privately. Everyone can have a problem with whatever they've got if they try hard enough, and just about everyone tries hard enough.

But if you want to envy people, that's cool, too. I can see how it would be easy to envy people who, say, aren't limited to three cluttered rooms and the vast dark expanses of their own minds. But i can't prove that such people exist.

Oh, I wasn't saying that other people don't have problems. Believe me, I know lots of people who are dealing with things I would hate to have to go through! But the thing is that, though I know very few people who are living the lives they want to live, most people are living lives they seem to be reasonably well prepared for. They're using lessons they learned as small children to work with the situations they've got as adults, and their hard-earned knowledge seems to be pretty much the knowledge they need. With me, it's as if (and yes, I know I'm exaggerating again) the universe first taught me "You can't trust other people; you must rely on yourself," then turned around and told me, "You can't rely on yourself; you must trust other people," leaving me standing here spluttering with rage while the universe mocks me from a distance.

But yes, I know I'm exaggerating. I've always had at least some people I could trust, and I can still write and reason better than the average person on most days. I know that I'm not totally unprepared for what I'm dealing with any more than all the people around me are totally prepared for what they're dealing with. It just seems to me that my life did a more drastic turnaround than most lives do and it's left me feeling pretty clueless for rather a long time.

I do know the feeling. I'm in it myself. Or did you know that already? But I also know that this whole "life's lessons" thing is just a metaphor, and like any metaphor, you can only push it so far before it becomes utter BS. After a certain level, we get to the part where we're all just bits of consciousness mashed uncomfortably into corporeal bodies, thrown into something ironicaly called "existence" and left to make what we can out of it. All of our fancy-schmancy contemplating is just our attempt to make something out of it. All of our building and creating and destroying and our perceptions that we are similar or separate from anyone or anything else. It's all just stuff we made up. In truth, we're all just stuck helplessly moving in some direction or other, waiting. Dissatisfied. Confused.

Geez, I'm really in a mood, aren't i? maybe some kilocalories would help.