I've been reading Stephen Hawking's A Brief History of Time lately, and it's gotten me quite lost. Lost in the book. Lost wherever I am while reading it. Lost in thought. It's not the same sort of lost that often comes up when someone discusses their missing car keys or where they are on a map. This kind of lost, the kind I've always been drawn to, is a bit of the opposite. Instead of disappearing into the unknown while everything else is present, I am actually burning as the only light around while all else is dark. The best part about this type of lost, is that wherever I tread, I light the surroundings as I go. This may sound like the most romanticized view of life, but if you read a little of A Brief History Of Time, then this scale of what we are and what we know contrasted against how much we aren't and how much we don't know might start to make more sense.
People who know me may know that I like being this type of lost. Trudging through snow drifts on the sidewalks of Chicago and pacing the wide empty stately streets of DC well past midnight stand out in my mind. In the same way you would explore a level in a video game, say Grand Theft Auto San Andreas, I like to walk and drive and bike and go places I don't really know. There's not so much a point to it as there is a rhythm. It's especially nice to get to know a place at night when it's quieter and subdued. It's less safe, but it's more revealing. And in time, I find myself more acquainted with the place as I might a new friend. I may not know every detail, but I have a sense for them, and I begin to wonder how they see me.
That is the more difficult side of this being lost, worrying about how I fit in with any of it. If you spend too much time on that side, you will lose yourself in the same way as the car keys. It is in this way I am trying not to lose myself. I fall in love with whatever boring, strange, wonderful, or even awful thing I find lit in my path, but then I grow disillusioned by what I'm doing there in the first place. As I look for the next step, next job, next city, next life, I find myself clutching the daily things I fear I might one day take for granted, and mostly I find myself avoiding eye contact with the fear of doing anything to change anything.
The weird thing about staring into a lit screen in the middle of a dark room is that you quickly can't see anything else but the glowing, dull screen. Meanwhile, the longer you stare out into space the more stars, planets, asteroids, and the universe you see. I don't know what that means, but I like it.
I relate most to the latter half of this post wherein you begin with, "that is the more difficult side of being this lost, worrying about how I fit in with any of it." Though my doctor would simply imply this is my own ADD getting the best of me, I too feel I become so lost in the dark corners of my mind, the blurry depths of my thoughts, that I fail to live in the present moment. At times it's a simple case of over-analysis, yet it can also border on dissociation (the most threatening possibility involved with feeling "lost"), and I am forced to enact very specific tactics in order to bring myself back into real-time-- tactics typically involving meditation, exercise, physical contact, or doing something immediately tangible like cleaning my surroundings. I'm well aware that what I'm describing could in no way be related to what you've posted here, but it definitely struck some sort of chord with me wherein I clearly felt the need to share. In essence, my apologies if I've misread this.
ReplyDeleteMy favorite line: "I find myself clutching the daily things I fear I might one day take for granted, and mostly I find myself avoiding eye contact with the fear of doing anything to change anything"... I'm really interested in this specifically, and wish you'd possibly further extrapolate as to what you feel you're too afraid to change. I'd love to hear more.
I like that you apologize for interpreting my writing in your own way - that's what it's there for! And it's also not surprisingly very close to what I was thinking about when I wrote it as well. If there's anything I do when I write (and Edward can easily attest to this) it's get lost in my head and overanalysis.
ReplyDeleteAnd as you could see that the real meat of the post didn't come out til later on and even then I was pretty brief; I use my wandering train of thought to avoid what's at the heart of my motivation for writing such a thing. I guess I'm afraid to change from something even if that something is already recognizably bringing me down, because I'm afraid whatever I change to will be worse or more difficult. That's such a general statement of typical life fears that it's kind of funny to read over in my head, but it's true. When so much time is spent listening to the struggles and hardship of life, it's hard as hell to let go of something that's stable even when it's making me numb and complacent and boring.
I've been trying to build momentum though in getting resumes and cover letters together for the first time in a couple years, and I'm pushing my photography more. For me, I have to go after something that interests me just as much because I'm interested in it as because it will distract me from all the things I'll start complaining about if I don't distract myself.
That's the sort of exploring I guess I was trying to get at - things like band names, video game and movie tournaments, this blog, photography, jfp; they're all crucial in getting me through and letting me breathe. But now it's more a matter of pushing the next thing, whatever that is.
Wow. Now this is truly the kind of conversation I was hoping to have. I love "real" talk-- I love back stories and analyzing root problems and self-awareness. This is quite intriguing.
ReplyDeleteFirstly, I too seem to share your unique quality of avoiding the true heart, or actual point of a piece by letting my mind wander and become lost in tangential ideas. I wonder why we do this? (I'm sure we do "this" in different ways, but avoidance is avoidance is avoidance, no?) It seems like every time I set out to write something with a make-shift thesis in mind, I end up spending so much time getting caught up in my own fascination with interesting words and curious imagery, that I only briefly hit home the actual purpose of the entire piece. It's really my biggest self-proclaimed weakness in terms of my own writing-- perpetual tap-dancing around the point. Edward does not share this dilemma... he really seems to cut right to the center of a thing as soon as he starts to write. It's annoying, but I'm fascinated by it... could you comment on this, please, Edward?
I completely empathize with your fears regarding the abandonment of that which is stable in life. Before transferring many times/traveling/living alone in different cities, I'd spent a lot of time in my life being cripplingly frightened of change. I've always dealt with control issues (feeling like I have no control over anything in my life, and certainly no control over the one looming absolute: death), and it has led me down paths of self-destruction wherein I not only cling to the familiar, I pervert the familiar in unhealthy ways in order to invent forms of control for myself (i.e. eating disorders, reckless behavior, etc). My fears regarding change lessened when I began living alone. I came across a few authors that are technically considered "new-age philosophers," though I hate the term, and their ideologies slowly began to open my mind in ways I'd never known to be possible. My all-time favorite is Dr. Wayne Dyer, but I also love Deepak Chopra, Eckhart Tolle, Geneen Roth, and certainly the Dalai Lama. I really think you'd get a lot from any of their writings or lectures, which are so negatively/annoyingly stigmatized as "self-improvement" teachings. What's so wrong with wanting to improve oneself to be the best version of themself they can be anyhow? I don't enjoy when negative people thrive on poking fun at that.
I remember one of the first friends I made in a new city told me, "You just have to jump, and the net will appear." I remind myself of this even now. Sometimes we (I) focus so intently on the predicted outcome of a major life decision that I end up settling for situations that are comfortable, yet not inspiring. I've made it a point to not let myself fall into those self-destructive patterns anymore. We (presumably) only have this one life, this tiny snippet of time here on this less-than-mediocre star in this strange galaxy... I think, if nothing else, we should not only follow Socrates' advice of living an examined life, but go a step further and listen to our dear friend, Confucious who said "They must often change, who would be constant in happiness or wisdom."
ReplyDeleteI definitely understand the metamorphosis (I'm aware that sounds a bit dramatic, but I love the word), you're going through at present when postulating about the future. The good thing is, and as Stephen Hawking would suggest, the future doesn't exist, neither does the past. As we know, time is simply a man-made concept. All we have control over is this very second. So, I'll go ahead and dreamily/ideally say we all should only invest in doing what makes us happy each second of every day. That is the only form of logic my brain can seem to understand tonight.
You guys are weird.
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