As much as I like TED talks, I'm mostly one of those people who absorbs the ideas worth spreading rather than spreads the ideas themselves. This particular talk, however, hit home.
I've long been an opponent of cynicism in most respects. I think this talk exposes a lot more than it lets on.
So get out there and do something that makes you happy.
You know, I'm going to be honest: I've been thinking a lot about money lately and how I have tended to not have much of it. Wait come back! I'm not bitching and moaning, this is the precursor to a year-long project I've got in mind that I am starting as of today. It's neat! I promise!
In the first year of being a full-time independent contractor, I've been cutting back on spending so that I could conserve what little money I do make, and since I'm close to doing it already, I want to try out a hyper-minimalist lifestyle that may or may not actually change my entire life (or at least it will for an entire year). And why am I telling you this? I need to make myself accountable. Having said (or published?) this publicly, I am now responsible for upholding a promise.
There. Now, who says blogs aren't useful? ;)
Anyway, I hope I don't have to amend to the project, because I think I've got it figured out for the most part. I've outlined what I am able to do and what I am not able to do, along with some exceptions. I'm not necessarily planning on working 24/7 -- even though many weeks sure do feel like that. No, the objective is really for me to become frugal, not batshit insane. There is a lot of room for leisure, but what I'm suggesting is that that leisure does not always have to come at a price.
Reader, I humbly introduce to you A Year On The Clock.1
The clock starts now.
From Castlevania 2: Simon's Quest
Caveat: Coarse language ahead.
Back in 1650, Thomas Fuller once mused that "It is always darkest just before the Day dawneth." The meaning is simply to suggest that after circumstances are at their worst, circumstances tend to get better.
Of course, this simply isn't true. I'm not referring to the optimism, I'm referring to the darkness in the literal sense. It's really darkest at midnight, when your time zone is facing 180° away from the sun.
I'm bringing up these two facets of the same phrase because I've had sparse presence not just on the internet, but in the real world -- and at the root of this withdrawal is a conflict between inspiration and pragmatism.
Back it up, let's take it from the top.
I forget which BiSCuit1 affected the phrase "emotional hangover" to be regularly used to describe the endorphin-avalanche withdrawal following an event that gathers a good number of your internet pals in the same city. In any case, emotional hangover seems to be the proverbial straw that broke the camel's back upon my return from Chicago for the 20SB Summit. Chicago, Chicagoans, and my experience there, were all kinds of good things. I expected that and I was not let down.
The "return to reality" was what caused a deep dive into what I didn't really want to admit might be a case of clinical depression (jury is still out on this). I don't mean to sound like my haircut, things didn't get emotional. Things just got broken in a very large and nebulous sense. It's not that emotions got the best of me, it's that all of a sudden I didn't have the drive to do or feel anything.
It was a spiritual Blue Screen of Death. There was a whole lot of nothing. I still had work to do, and I did it of course, but a lot of it slowed down because I couldn't concentrate due to the constant need to just lie down and do absolutely nothing and deplore myself for not being able to solve what had not even been an issue before.
Moreover, I'm having trouble here because being dismal doesn't make any sense. How can someone who fancies himself an optimist, someone who genuinely appreciates life's small joys and a loves to revel in inspiration, suddenly turn terminally meh? And for days on end, for that matter?2 I lost interest in damn near everything for a little over a week. I'm ashamed to say that even picking up the guitar and singing from the heart didn't help.
For a long stint there, I just didn't give a fuck about anything. I wanted to give a fuck, but no fucks could be given because there were none. And fucks have to come from somewhere, right? Does one make fucks, or get fucks, in order to give fucks? The point is that I possessed no fucks for giving, and I didn't know where to get or make new ones, and I still don't.
I have no fucking clue what is bringing me down. I thought that writing might lead me to some kind of answer and it seems I've written myself in circles and ostensibly whined about being melancholy. I can't justify this with any sort of logic and so it's difficult to reconcile what I feel with how I think.
I looped this song last night thinking that maybe a song that is explicitly about Daybreak might lend some insight into the metaphor of "it's darkest before dawn" and subsequently how I might metaphorically deal with it.
You know what I figured out? Fuck this shit.
I am sick of feeling down so I am going to do something about it.
By now, I've ample evidence already that time heals nothing by itself, so I am going to make myself accountable here and now for getting off my ass and getting out into the city, even when I feel at my core to hole up and retreat away from the world. I already fell back for more than a week and I'm well aware of how that didn't help.
To be clear, I don't want to get out. I still don't feel like talking to people. I definitely don't want to talk about my feelings. However, I recognize that these are important steps to getting the fuck out of this mess. This post took an entire day to write. It was a struggle because I'm still not entirely sure what this giving-a-fuck-less-ness is and I am making myself incredibly vulnerable by even trying to write about it. I did it anyway.
And that social schedule that's a little more than overwhelming? Yeah, we're doing that. No backing out.
You can go fuck yourselves, dark days. I am taking a stand. I will not be conquered by you.
Besides, every nightowl knows that the darkness only lasts until daybreak.
Also from Castlevania 2: Simon's Quest
Setting: Downtown Independent, roof, after a Zaptra show.
Nico: "I have to move to the west side."
Jyrki: "What? Nooo! Why?"
Nico: "I'm commuting there right now."
Jyrki: "You commute to the west side?"
Nico: "Yeah."
Jyrki: "Dude, you have to move!"
Nico: "That's what I'm saying!"
Jyrki: "If you don't move, you will just generate so much road rage that one day, you'll be angry enough to do something you'll regret later. Don't let it happen, man."
LA traffic can suck a dick. Wait, no it can't--because it is stuck in traffic.
While I had already considered it before for professional reasons, my friend, Jyrki, is right. I have to get the fuck out of here if I am going to survive.
This is a shame, because living in this house in north east LA afforded me proximity to people and things to do that I like very much. However, as indicated earlier, my psychological safety and the general safety of others is at stake here.
So, moving time it is.
I've decided to ask the internet for help. To give you a better idea of what's going on traffic wise on a daily basis, I've diagrammed our freeways:
If anyone has any ideas, I would appreciate suggestions. I am in the market for an apartment south and east of the leviathan. That giant spider who lives next to the dragon is a motherfucker.
"Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity."
-Seneca the Younger
I've always been careful to not mention too much about work when I blog (that would1 be unprofessional). Mostly, I just say "I'm working."
These days, I'm working on things that are very different than those of not too long ago. Okay, that's vague, but I'm keeping it that way in terms of public acknowledgment.2
To continue with the metaphor (which at this point is an allegory) from the past handful of posts, we now have the following:
Still here? Ok. So where are we with the story?
Well, I'm on the ark, but I just got here. I'm not really sure what's going on. I know that I'm lucky.
I'll let you know how it goes.