…
Is humanity some game?
I mean, it feels pretty fucking real…
But, what seems to be more frustrating is that it’s distracting. It’s too much some days. It’s got me hot-wired to live at a Bugatti’s high-speed pace, with the engine of a 1987 Geo Metro.
And I’m burnt.
Maybe we are in the Matrix.
Time to become Neo…
…
This is what a lot of us might call burnout.
As a writer, as a creator, as a laborer…it may seem like that’s just inevitable and something we have to deal with.
But, I’m starting to not see quite like that.
First, I’ve found that what seems to be a problem for most is that burnout comes from being emotionally drained. Or is it actually that we are just emotionally repressed?
Have we found ourselves dunked in tech, dopaminergically tapped?
…
See, what most of us do is try to survive the world as it is. But we may only be “surviving” if we’re not on the right track. And we’re using the search bar to find out what that track is.
What we have to find is the exterior Bugatti styling that looks like a physics miracle worth millions, and know that the engine that powers it, that will give us the smoothest ride, is the correct one. The mechanics of the machine should match the aesthetics.
In other words, the passion should match the dream.
The ability should match the representation.
…
All of us can dream.
THAT, I’m not worried about.
But, do we really have to decide on a dream by society’s subjective idea of what a “good” dream is?
And we can discuss all day what a virtuous dream looks like. How materialistic it is, how impactful it is, how legendary it is.
But will we automatically self-reject dreams because we want to make money, and the world says not to? Because we want to create a movement some may not agree with? Because we want to chase a dream that most wouldn’t agree is ‘good for people’?
Who gets to decide, by definition, what is ‘good or evil’?
…
Our biggest mistake may be that the dream we see may be overly romantic. Void of the reality of what would really make it possible.
We often dream about what we have while dreaming, more than how we’re doing it. It’s our biggest mistake in chasing something.
It’s the passion that gets us there, right? We at least have to be really excited to do it, and at most, have a feeling that is HAS to be done or else we’ll regret it.
Is ‘passion’ just as much love as it could be curiosity? Or obligation?
I think so.
…
I’ve been a lot of things.
But, why is it that all the things I’ve tried so far end in failure?
Why do we end up attempting so many different identities?
This is the second part of what I was getting at…
We’re lost.
We’re not just lost. It’s not like we’re in the blackest of lakes with no bottom and no shores.
We’re lost in the crowds.
The world is so loud.
Identity is rattled by the constant sound waves of other people’s talents, and voices, and dramas. And it’s as if we’re standing shoulder to shoulder with so many people, and we can’t find a horizon.
There is no obvious direction.
We stand, and we take in everything that isn’t us.
We see, we feel, and then we dilute ourselves.
It’s so loud that we are repeatedly dissolved by the identities of others. As we watch them, we live through them. Never truly ourselves.
So, what I worry about isn’t that anything in the world is some chaos that can’t be reeled in…it’s that all the chaos washes out who we are.
We’re overwhelmed. Overstimulated.
And we make no impact because we’re spread too thin in ALL the world’s problems.
…
So often today, we find people who find themselves in the wrong career. City dwellers who should’ve been ranchers. Boss babes who should’ve been family farmers. Tech gurus who should’ve been athletes. Laborers who should’ve been comedians…
The list is endless.
And the stupid truth?
Time is a fucking social construct. It makes the world work, sure. But only for the industrial, capitalist society to make its green stuff.
We feel rushed when we shouldn’t have to.
We feel anxiety when we shouldn’t have to.
We feel stuck when we shouldn’t have to.
We feel numb when we shouldn’t have to.
So much so, I think, that we can’t truly anchor to what would be best for us.
All because the world has us so distracted from ourselves.
From real life. From the moon’s gleaming to the sun’s shining. From the whisper of firefly wings to the crashing of the waves on the Cliffs of Moher.
How much do we really see and hear?
Or maybe that’s just some of us? Maybe some of us just need to reject the chaos because we don’t work well in it.
(Not through a screen)
…
Here’s my argument.
And my vow to myself for the next half of my life:
Take in the world as much as possible with my own eyes and ears. See and hear the world first hand. Go to the places. Face my formidable anxiety demons. Handle the sacrifices. Endure the fears. Experience the thrills.
But how will I get there?
Honestly, I’ve been working on that the last decade.
And you know what makes more sense than anything else?
Don’t try to be so much.
Live to be.
There’s nothing that makes more sense than the cut and clean logic of just doing the work, not being performative, listening to your heart…
And ignoring everything else.
…
The only thing is…
I’m barely starting to understand what that means.
I’ve tried so hard to be something, I’m no closer to the identity and life that I wanted to have.
Why?
I’m super scared to just be myself.
Maybe because I’ve never been able to let go.
I’ve never been able to just exist with myself and be okay with figuring it out. With being okay with not having answers and saying so. With listening to, not the excitement of money and progress, but my heart’s pull to what makes me speak and smile in the first place…and even more so, how big the fear is that makes me turn away from it so quickly.
It’s not about whether I’m good on camera or not. It’s doing what I think, and being who I think I am on camera and on paper.
“But what if someone calls you out for acting like a victim? Or for being too brooding? Or for being boring? Or being insensitive? Or being ignorant?”
(my biggest fears)
I don’t have an answer to that, except for facing it.
What matters is that I’m there. That I’m willing to be whatever comes, without having to weigh out the risks first that end up being me doing nothing at all.
To be ready to be unready.
…
It seems to me, that the most influential people, the most intimidating ones that seem to be able to move the world…and also the ones that seem to really be enjoying the fuck out of it…are the ones who don’t try to take in the whole world.
The ones who define the world that THEY need and want to live in and pay attention to only that. To disregard 80 percent of the chaos that exists and only give energy to the things that make them grow or make them happy.
We need order over the chaos in our lives.
And maybe that means personally removing most of it.
…
Can we separate ourselves from the grips of humanity?
Is it our job, truly, to have our heads in everything besides our own lives?
Could that be the answer to why so many of us feel dissatisfied?
Is it the lie of the internet that tells us we will find the answers to life through its existence?
My niece might say it’s the devil’s illusion…
Is it there to take our lives from us? Is it sucking our souls out from us?
We can’t live our lives online.
Even if our careers are there. Even if the money is there.
Our lives aren’t in self-made cells.
We have to know our limits.
…
I don’t want my life to be there.
I want humankind to leave me alone. The large portion of it, anyway.
But I have to be the gatekeeper.
I have to be the one to make a stand for myself so that I live my life with my own two feet and not through the lens of an iPhone.
I don’t want to watch the universe turn from behind a glass, I want to feel it for myself.
I want to feel the dirt at my feet, the salty waves on my skin, the clear anti-city air in my lungs, and the thousand-year-old stones in front of my eyes.
So what do I do?
I don’t know.
I just hope that I still have the energy to find out.
Here’s to you and your strength to hold off the unnecessary girth of humanity.
Truth and Love, Reader.
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