I really ought to give myself more credit in life.

I have done a lot considering my issues. Going to Kwantlen then VFS was a pretty big deal. I wrote a million words in 11 months. I’ve done hundreds of original videos, written 1000 words a day since 2011, written novels, gotten paid to write animation scripts. I wrote, directed, and was featured in my own original play. I started two online communities that are still running strong today.

That’s not nothing. That’s very much something.

And yet, it is so hard for my to really value it. My depression is always there to devalue and discount everything I have done.

It’s the only solution to the conflict between the concept that I have done things that count and that great black devouring darkness inside me.

It can’t count because I don’t feel any better.

I don’t feel any better because it doesn’t count.

It’s a heck of a catch, that Catch-22.

It’s the numbness. That darkness inside me is not some foreign invader. It’s the result of my mind numbing itself as a response to unresolved mental trauma. Like my mind is producing its own anesthetic to deal with all the pain inside me.

ALl that ice may isolate me, but it also keeps me safe. I wear it like armor to protect myself from the world I so greatly fear. Like a turle’s shell, it gives me someplace into which I can withdraw when I can’t deal with the world.

Of course, I would be better at  dealing with the world if I spent less time withdrawn into my shell. Another Catch-22 situation.

My life is full of them.

I guess I feel somewhat better today than yesterday,. The depression is still there but it is slowly fading. I still have a very great urge to hide from the world out of shame for what a horrid piece of shit I am, but it lessens by the moment, and I am sure I will be back to my more usual level of malfunction soon.

I was actually doing quite well until Friday night. I was feeling pretty good about myself. I was managing to remember that I am awesome on a fairly regular basis.

Which makes me suspicious about the whole damned thing. Part of me feels like, somehow my depression orchestrated the whole thing. It’s just a little too convenient that I got knocked down this far right when I was on the rise.

But if part of me really did bring this all about, then my hat’s off to it, because I can’t figure out how it did it.

I have long suspected that what we call fate or destiny or even luck is a result of a deep, deep level of intuition influencing our seemingly normal decisions in order to bring use closer to a certain emotional state or destination. We think we are making our choices based on logic and our immediate emotions, but behind the scenes this deep mind is weighting the scales so that we makes choices that move us closer to its goal.

That’s how people end up in the same situations over and over again, seemingly by chance. No single decision seems suspect and so it is only through seeing the pattern can we get some idea of the tricks our minds are playing on us.

And the desired state is not necessarily a pleasant one. On some level it is pleasing in that it relieves some deep inner fear or tension, but on the conscious level, it may suck.

A perfect example would be the people who keep ending up in abusive relationships. It might seem like they have the worst luck in love or that they have terrible taste in partners, but the truth is that some part of them wants that abusive situation.

Why? Because it’s familiar to them. Because it’s known. It’s a situation they understand. They know who they are when they are in that familiar role. Our minds will put us through a great deal in order to avoid having to deal with the unknown.

That’s the truth behind all that new age bullshit about attracting what you think about and changing that via some repetitive practice, like affirmations or mantras or writing you wishes down every day.

What that is really doing is reprogramming that deep part of you that influences your choices so that it seeks a different state.

And the thing is, this level of our minds involves a level of calculation and intuition far, far, far too complex for the conscious mind to hold. So subjectively speaking, it really does seem like some kind of ouside force is operating on us.

But it’s not fate or destiny or Jesus. It’s our own vast subterranean subconcious minds that are far, far smarter than the interface layer we call consciousness.

Damn it. I wandered off into intellectualization again, didn’t I? It’s so hard for me to tell when I am doing it. Maybe I need to limit my vocabulary when I try to write about myself and my own problems.

Pretty hard to intellectualize when limited to a third grade vocabulary.

Blah blah Donald Trump! *canned laughter*

I don’t know how to overcome my inability to value my own stuff. Perhaps that’s the point. The conscious mind I think of as myself can’t solve this kind of problem by its usual logical, rational, analytical means.

All it can do is try to move to a space where I feel comfortable valuing myself and thus change the state that my deep mind seeks and preserves.

I think that must be what is behind all my talk about new versions of myself. I have to sort of imagine my way towards a new default state. Otherwise, I will keep returning to the same old familiar place at the bottom of a dark cold ocean of depression.

In the immediate future, that means I am going to try to seek out the sorts of things that make me feel better about myself.

Because I deserve to feel good about myself.

After all, I’m a pretty amazing dude.

And it’s time I finally accepted that.

I will talk to you nice people again tomorrow.