I had plans for today, but…. they didn’t happen.

Specifically, I had been planning to walk the two block to my local Shopper’s Drug Mart, buy Xmas cards for my family, then buy the postage and send it them off. ^[1]

I have already foot-dragged far too much on this by being so school-focused that I forgot that I still have a life independent of school.

People always tell you to get a life, but as it turns out, they are very high-maintenance.

I got into my Good Pants (I have two pairs!) and was getting ready to go, but then the Jagoff stepped in and convinced me to play my current video game (Darksiders) “for just a little while”. Three hours later, it’s getting dark, and I have lost all will to mount my expedition, instead opting to stay home and order KFC.

It’s like I don’t even know who I am any more.

This choice makes this point in my life extremely important, because how one deals with failing to live up to your expectations is a crucial pivot point in deciding what kind of life you are going to lead.

On the one hand, approbation. This has been my go-to for decades. It would be very easy to excoriate myself over this. Rake myself over the coals, unleash all my self-hatred, tell myself I am a pathetic loser, I suck, I’m a blight on the world who can only hurt those who come near him, yadda yadda yadda, sis boom bah.

On the other hand, forgiveness. Eh, big deal, I will do it later. And that’s the direction pop psychology would dictate. Forgive yourself. Be nice to yourself. Allow yourself to be human. Accept that you are flawed.

The problem with that is that if you take THAT attitude, you better watch the fuck out, because the next thing you know, 20 years of your life have gone by while you were excusing yourself for everything, and surprise, you hate yourself.

You hate yourself like you would hate anyone who keeps making promises to you without ever intending to keep them and who fails you time and time again, and blocks your personal growth in favour of laziness and lassitude.

Both extremes are terrible, and can really destroy you when they work together. The answer, as always, is to strike some kind of balance between them.

But that’s a lot trickier than merely computing an average.  This is a whole new equilibrium, and finding and stabilizing one of those is a lot less like math and a lot more like trying to walk a tightrope during an earthquake.

So how does one find that blessed isle of stability and sanity in between the two extremes? So far, all I know how to do is to let the string continue to vibrate at smaller and smaller amplitudes till it falls silent.

And by that somewhat abstruse metaphor, I mean that if I don’t try to force the outcome, and instead just watch it, I will vacillate between the two extremes by an ever decreasing amount, and when that runs out of juice entirely, well, that’s where I set up shop, I guess.

It’s not a complete method, and while it may be wise it’s hard to argue that it is rational. It deals with things far below the level of mere rationality. And like I like to say, when you travel outside the light of reason into the darkness of the subconscious, subrational mind, you have no choice but to feel your way around.

See what I did that? Feel your way around. Like how in the dark you might feel around for a light switch, but also how the subconscious mind is a realm of irrationality where the only way to navigate is to follow your emotions, or feelings.

OK, so it needs work.

I think that’s been one of the hardest parts of my quest to become less rigidly rational and more emotionally integrated and hence a lot more mentally healthy : learning to let go of rationality not just as an inner sense but as a method.

It’s futile to try to rationally examine one’s irrational mind. I try, because I can’t help myself, it’s all I know. But I recognize the absurdity of it all. The only “system” that applies to the subconscious is its own. Rational referents will only produce garbage output.

See, even when I try to talk about my subconscious mind, it all comes out in overtly rational language. I analyze, therefore I am. This means that I unconsciously project (an expect) order in whatever I perceive and I am always looking for a pattern by comparing input to what I already know.

That’s no good for the irrational world of the subconscious. Comparing things to what is known in one’s subconscious is like trying to sculpt with water. To examine one’s subconscious mind is to do the opposite : to wait, and watch, and listen, and see what emerges, without judgment, categorization, or analysis.

It is what it is, and any logic in it is entirely self-referential.

Wow, I just mentally wandered away from doing this blog for like, an hour. Two days out of school and already my mental discipline is slipping!

Aw, who am I kidding? I never had a lot to begin with. Never needed it. Everything came easy. at least school-wise. In some ways, I feel like I have been conning my way through school all these years.

Not in the sense of not doing the work. Just in the sense of it being way less work than others put into it for the same (or better) result.

But if it’s a con, I hope it keeps paying out at least to the point of my acquiring full time employment. I suppose it’s not impossible that I will land a line of work I also find easy.

Which would be cool in a Jagoff sense but bad in an “actual personal growth” sense.

Super excited that Ross is coming. 6 days!

I will talk to you nice people again tomorrow.