| Miscellaneous 1 |
| I haven't written here in 4 months, so I figured it was about time I added something. The following pieces are just things I wrote over the past several weeks. I didn't think any of them was monumental enough (or long enough) to deserve its own separate page, so here's all of it. August 10 I like to think of myself as being quite empathetic and as compassionate as possible. Whether others see me this way or not I don't really know. Either way, this characteristic makes me much more forgiving of other people than I am of myself. Often, though, being able to forgive ourselves is more important than being able to forgive each other. After all, we have no choice but to live with ourselves, whereas it is always possible to sever contact with another person who did something unforgivable... Damn, I'm doing it again. As with pretty much everything I've written over the past year and a half or so, I find myself distancing myself from what I'm writing. Periodically this leads to an interesting page or two, but by being completely impersonal, it accomplishes little more than being interesting. It's just that I end up feeling somehow selfish when I write about personal matters. I can't seem to convince myself that anybody else really gives a shit. This is strange, given how much I enjoy reading other people's more personal journal entries on here and on their various websites. Obviously, if I care enough to read about them, someone probably cares somewhat about what I might have to say on a personal note. Oh, well. Since there are probably only a few people who will ever read this, I suppose it doesn't really matter, anyway. --later that day (from an AIM conversation that I saved) g mali vuk: i don't think it's death i'm afraid of lysbyth: okay. g mali vuk: i don't know what i am afraid of, but i'm pretty sure it's not death lysbyth: i don't know what i'm afraid of either. maybe i'm just afraid of never changing. lysbyth: most people fear change. i would give anything for a little change. g mali vuk: yeah g mali vuk: i think for me it has to do with losing control lysbyth: that's a scary thought too. g mali vuk: not in all cases, though. I'm well aware that i can't control everything lysbyth: right. g mali vuk: but control over certain things lysbyth: yeah? like what? g mali vuk: perhaps my emotions? for instance, if i put all my thoughts out there for people to see, maybe i'd have less control (or feel like i had less control) of my emotions g mali vuk: because they're easier to control when others don't know them, perhaps lysbyth: okay... i think you're afraid of being vulnerable. g mali vuk: also, my worst concrete fear is losing control of my own actions. lysbyth: okay. g mali vuk: have you read or seen "puppet masters"? lysbyth: i'm afraid of trusting people, because the last person i trusted implicitly fucked me over (in many many ways.) lysbyth: nope, i havne't. g mali vuk: it's a book about aliens who take control of people's bodies, but leave the person at least somewhat conscious of what's going on g mali vuk: i've had nightmares like that, where something causes me to hurt people i care about lysbyth: wild. g mali vuk: it's kind of a wierd worst fear, in that it's unlikely to ever happen, but i think it's probably connected to a more general fear of losing control lysbyth: right...or being vulnerable to another person's control. g mali vuk: yeah g mali vuk: actually, that's probably closer to the truth lysbyth: i'm deathly afraid of vulnerability. g mali vuk: because as i said, i know there are some things that i can't control, but the ones that i accept most readily are things no other individual can control, either g mali vuk: yeah, vulnerability and trust definitely go hand-in-hand lysbyth: yep. lysbyth: in order to trust, you have to be vulnerable. g mali vuk: exactly g mali vuk: at the same time (and perhaps in part because of my own fear of being vulnerable) i want others to be able to trust me and therefore to be willing to make themselves vulnerable lysbyth: because then you have the control. g mali vuk: right g mali vuk: so i either have too strong a desire for control, or i try to make up for my fear of losing it by attempting to control others (or at least to be in a position where i could control them, should i want to) lysbyth: makes sense. August 13 Why does everyone make such a big deal about things like drugs, sex, and death? And I'm not just talking about those who think all three are evil. People who think all three are always positive are just as ignorant. Saying "drugs are bad, no one should ever do drugs" is in many ways the same as saying "drugs can be good, everyone should try drugs at least once." At least, it's the same in its basic ignorance of the differences between individuals. For some people in some situations, drugs (or sex or whatever) can indeed be harmful. If you're of the mind that psychedelic chemicals can "expand the consciousness," you should still accept that the levels of specific concentration necessary for, say, driving are hard or impossible to achieve while tripping. So there are situations where drugs are always dangerous. On the other hand, if you believe your consciousness can be expanded with chemicals, you're probably basing that belief on a very positive personal experience with said chemicals. People who say drugs are universally bad are obviously ignoring or denying the potential for such experiences. Similar arguments can be made about sex. And here I'm talking about lustful sex as opposed to lovemaking (which is almost always seen as a good thing). Some people think that whatever consenting adults do is perfectly acceptable. Indeed, if both (or however many) people are truly comfortable with whatever sex act they are partaking in, and precautions have been taken regarding cleanliness and health, there can't really be anything horribly wrong with it. However, how can you tell if everyone is perfectly comfortable? Women (and men) who (legally) pose for erotic and pornographic pictures (and videos) qualify as consenting adults under the law. However, numerous studies have concluded that workers in the pornography or prostitution business are greatly harmed by the exploitation that takes place. Granted, many of those studies are clearly biased, given that they were conducted by people expecting to find such results, but the fact remains that a great deal of sexual exploitation can take place within the legal definition of "consent." Furthermore, no camera is needed for such exploitation to take place. And that brings us to death. I'm sure there are people who believe death is always positive, just as there are those who feel similarly about sex and drugs. However, these people form such a small minority that I'll focus on the larger group of people who have seriously contemplated murder or suicide. Homicide and suicide alike are nearly always committed without considering the wider consequences of the action... Damn, I just had an impression of where I could go with this, but it escaped me as quickly as it came. So on to those who think of death in all its forms as something bad. Such people are clearly ignorant of the fact that death is just as essential to life as birth is. After all, how could life be at all special or significant if it lasted forever? People who go around and claim suicide is a sin generally do more harm than good. After all, how can you make people who feel suicidal any less depressed by telling them they'll burn in Hell for all eternity if they take their own lives? Okay, I've gotten bored with this entry. September 7 God, Mysticism, and the futility of Western thought Yesterday I was taking my first philosophy class and we were talking about God. The professor is choosing to use Yahweh/Allah of the Abrahamic traditions, because that God has been written about, argued about, and overall simply described more than any other modern version of God. I understand why he wants to use a version of God that we can actively discuss in class, but that doesn't mean I like it. Sure, you can't have a logical, involved argument about a god who can't be described in words, but it is only in Western Philosophy that people have assumed human logic can be used to describe God. In Catholocism, you're considered a very good Christian if you can pose good logical arguments for the existence of God in the form accepted by the Church. In some types of Buddhism, on the other hand, merely attaching a single lable like "God" to it is already too much. Personally, I much prefer the Buddhist version of the Ultimate. I have some fairly simple mental impressions of my view of God, few of which can adequately be put into words. However, there is one image that I've used in a poem before that I'd like to reiterate here. My normal everyday thought process is like being in a flooded storm drain. The torrent of thoughts pushes me along uncontrollably. Every once in awhile I might come to a manhole cover or something else that lets the light in, but these small views of the outside do little more than make me aware of my situation here. And then every once in awhile I embark on a line of thinking that ultimately leads to nothing. That is, there comes a point when no more logical thought is possible on the matter. This is when the torrent of thoughts and the sewer pipe both simply end, thrusting me out over an infinite space. The weightlessness I feel is not that of falling but that of floating. (In order to fall there has to be something toward which you're falling.) I've never been in this place long enough to turn around, but I think I know what I'd see if I could: Behind me would be only the hollow pipe with its torrent of consciousness, floating as freely as I am. The pipe and the flood of thoughts are my own creations. Everything else is One. The space inside the pipe is the same as the space around the pipe and the same as the space around me in that infinite expanse of nothing. God is everything, everything is God, all our mental constructs are no more than infinitely thin spiders' webs which trap us. There is no prison but the one we create for ourselves. These entries and more can be found in my online journal, but I want a smaller audience for that than everyone I direct to this page, so you'll have to email me to get any of the details. Back To Essays |