Ramblomatic

I’m as yet to meet a person whose parents I would describe as fully functioning. I’m not particularly disparaging parents, I rarely meet people whom I feel have a grasp upon themselves, we are naturally moody, aberrant, emotional, passionate, all of these things lead to dysfunction. It’s a fine line anyhow, emotional investment clouds one’s ability to see rationally, as is often demonstrated by the jealous lover, or the parent who has put some thought into revenge against anyone who harms their child, a bit less so is the parents belief that teenagers are inherently tied to trouble and without their constant watch or input their child is likely to explode.

A close friend of mine in high school was a psychopath, I didn’t really have a notion of the term or meaning at the time, he had, well, divorced himself from reality, his background was worthy of a exploitative novel but he had a trait I admired deeply, he never complained, I had friends at the time whom would cry if they got a bad exam mark, or if they asked someone to dance and the person asked wasn’t enthusiastic, it’s, hard, to take those problems as being serious when you’re looking at something far more challenging.

For me, my greatest source of comfort has, since I was a teenager, always been perspective. Regardless of what happens to me I can genuinely just look at anothers circumstances, or previous circumstances or hypothetical but plausible circumstances and immediately find satisfaction in the amount of power I have over the current situation.

I’ve spent a lot of time, focusing and considering my thoughts, behaviour, actions, in an attempt to gain a greater level of control. I started with an extremely difficult concept and achievement, to find happiness even in catastrophe.

Anyone with a basic understanding of psychology knows that we’re far more the results of our brains inherent structures than any conscious or learned decisions or information, but that’s convenient in a way, because it means in simple terms that the input will usually result in the same reaction, it’s insincere I suppose but it can be altered, a conscious change doesn’t rewrite the underlying basic logic, it factors it and then attempts to change it, hmm, it’s not a good description but it’ll do, let’s say you have a math equation that has an answer, you can’t change the answer, it’s always the same, but you can put that answer into a new equation and focus on the result that gives. I can’t rationalise why I feel fear, but I can rationalise the feeling of the fear itself, to elicit something different, to lead somewhere positive instead of negative.

You’re lying to yourself the whole time though, and that’s difficult, the results, so far at least for me, have never been 100%, but it is certainly feasible to reach a working example, not a perfect example though. I can’t feel happiness in catastrophe yet, but I can find genuine humour in things that ought to disgust me, I can feel enormous relief when I receive terrible news, in a lesser manner I can detach myself when I need to to achieve what needs to be done, that’s the general and simple example most people know of and have experienced. It’s not a big change, but it’s on the way. If I could do it though, perfectly, it has occurred to me that the potential for it is a concern, imagine being able to kill someone, in the most gruesome manner, but do it happily? Finding comfort, humour, and joy in the process.

Self-indoctrination is no crime. At least so long as no one who would care knows.

The worst situations I find are the one’s where you’re robbed of any power, of any influence, not in a kidnapped sort of way, I mean when something irreversible happens, something that can’t be mended, death is the simplest example. Once it’s done it’s done, that is deeply frustrating, I don’t like being powerless, ever, I spend a good deal of my life simply ensuring that options are available to me, even if I never pursue them, which is usually the way. I hate the idea that there would be something I want to do which I cannot, until very recently I’ve never felt any particular pull to any career, nothing inherently fascinating, but I’ve found one now that looks promising, it’s the first one that has ever looked promising so that’s a big thing for me, and it is the result of me keeping my options open. I’ve had many people detract from my decision to keep options open, because they feel that I ought to focus on one thing, and put my energies into that, even if I don’t like it, because the deeply sad and frankly pathetic matter of it is most people don’t like their job but they think that’s just the way of it, that no one else likes their job, and it’s a necessary evil.

Fuck that level of self-victimisation, their basic fear stops them from changing, there is this insane attitude that if you go to university and do a degree in something, if you don’t use that degree in your career you’re an idiot. Because of 3 years of your life that ought to dictate the next 40. More than that it is a decision most people make when they’re only 18 and have no concept of what it is they truly enjoy, but it’s a common belief that, logically, this decision and the proceeding 3 years should always be the basis of one’s career, a thing one will expend the most energy in to, nearly a third of one’s working life will be spent at work or getting to and from it, imagine feeling tied to a decision you made as a 17-18 year old till the day you retire? Well, that’s what many people believe they should do. Teenagers aren’t stupid, they’re astonishingly developed and for some people they’re at the peak of their social ability, they’re open minded, genuinely interested, energetic and so forth, these are traits revered the world over, so it’s not like they’re incapable of good decisions, but the reality is most people are desperately ignorant about work at that age, I was, most of the people I knew were, most still are, but that’s the age where they usually make the first of the most important and impacting decisions of their adult lives… That is insane.

In Australia, anyone born after June 1964 has to wait until they are 60 years old until they can access their superannuation, which means for the vast majority we’ll be working until age 60. That’s a long time to be doing a job one doesn’t enjoy.

This entry is all over the place, I’m not in coherent mood apparently, I’ll leave it here lest I begin talking about how to make prosciutto.