Chrono Compendium
Zenan Plains - Site Discussion => General Discussion => Topic started by: rushingwind on October 23, 2008, 04:29:12 am
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You know, I'm not sure if this kind of thing is even allowed. If not, please delete and accept my apologies.
I must be the opposite of the Springtime of Youth. The Springtime of Youth board makes me smile, but in a way it frustrates me. Why? It's because I can't even remotely find that kind of vigor in myself. I'm 24, and I feel like my life has bled away before my eyes, turned to ash and dust. I'm so tired, physically, mentally, emotionally...
While everyone around me is moving forward, I feel like I'm literally standing still, at a dead stop that I'm unable to break free of. I do have things going for me, but they all feel colorless and bland, pointless. In fact, everything in my life feels colorless and bland. I have so many things I need to do, but no idea how to go forward.
I know I'm likely depressed. My good friend recently died at the end of August after a four-year battle with leukemia, and it hit me really hard. He was doing better, on his way up after battling bravely, and was scheduled to have a bone marrow transplant two weeks from the day he died. But he'd been talking to his father, and had gotten what he'd always wanted to hear: an unconditional "I love you." Two days later? He died. His heart was worn out, and just stopped. He was 29.
His death has made me think very hard on the purpose of life. Is there any purpose at all? Is it to have children? To make discoveries? To die? I don't believe in an afterlife, don't believe in some great beautiful hereafter. So what is the point?
Probably the worst thing is that I don't even know what I want from life. A while back someone (Zeality, I believe) started a thread, discussing the penultimate/ultimate/secondary desires they had in life. I thought long and hard after reading that thread, reluctant to even try to reply, because I honestly don't know. It's stuck with me ever since I read the post, trying to think about what I want out of life. It isn't necessarily love (I don't believe in true "love", anyway), or power, or specific achievements. I mean, I have things that I want to do, but they're not anywhere near the penultimate/ultimate purpose of life level.
My current wish? I want to get a book published. I've written the book, been turned down five times by publishers, only to have the most recent publisher send it back to me three times asking me to revise parts of the story. I want to believe that they're interested and may eventually pick up the text, but I don't dare get my hopes up.
That's my problem: I don't dare hope for anything. I don't think I know how anymore. If there's no hope in my life, then there's no point to life. Then why live at all? Why continue to live if I have no purpose and no hopes or dreams? In fact, if there's no real purpose to anything, then why does anyone live at all?
I don't know if I'm overworked and simply exhausted. I don't know if I need to talk or shut up. I don't know if I need more rest or more action. My family doesn't care, and my "friends" don't care to listen. I'm just so tired.
I need to speak to my father, but I don't know how. He's done a lot of bad things, but I know, somewhere in the deep recesses of my mind, that he loves me. But I'm so upset by his mere presence that I can't even speak to him. The problem is that he doesn't have much time left on this Earth, so what do I do? Do I go with the path of least resistance, the one that will tear me up less? Or do I potentially derail my sanity for a week and go see him anyway?
I'm not exactly sure why I'm posting this here. I've been lurking on this board so long that I feel like I know a lot of you, even if I don't post very much. I'm sorry to whine...sometimes venting helps me figure things out.
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I feel exactly the same as you with a lot of things. I'm 22 and I had all these dreams and ambitions in high school and now it just seems like life is just passing me by. I am just completely overwhelmed and confused as to what I need to do. It seems like every time I make a step in the right direction that life just throws me another curve ball. Also I am terrified of death. I have no real beliefs or anything, but I am just terrified that when I die I am going to cease to exist and there will be nothing. It gets on my mind so badly that I cannot sleep when I'm thinking about it. I have tried many things, religions, alcohol, drugs, new jobs, new partners nothing just seems to make me happy anymore. I think it's just this age that we are in. We have been pretty much following this set path for the majority of our lives and now we don't have a cookie cutter life style where everything is pretty much planned for you. Now we are left without most of the friends we have known all our lives and pretty much without any help well for me it feels that way.
I would try the springtime of youth thing, but I'm pretty sure it would come out full of bitterness and self loathing.
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I would try the springtime of youth thing, but I'm pretty sure it would come out full of bitterness and self loathing.
Yes, yes, YES.
I too, feel like I'm watching life just fly by. The worse part of it is that I don't even know how to "jump in" and join everything that I watch happen. Every time I try and something good happens, two bad things happen.
Also I am terrified of death. I have no real beliefs or anything, but I am just terrified that when I die I am going to cease to exist and there will be nothing. It gets on my mind so badly that I cannot sleep when I'm thinking about it.
Yes. I do not get as upset as I once did, but at times in the past the prospect terrified me beyond belief. I could not sleep, lost appetite.... Sometimes, especially since my friend died, it bothers me even more than it used to.
I think it's just this age that we are in. We have been pretty much following this set path for the majority of our lives and now we don't have a cookie cutter life style where everything is pretty much planned for you. Now we are left without most of the friends we have known all our lives and pretty much without any help well for me it feels that way.
Maybe so. I feel like everything is so bland. I'm working 50 or more hours a week (which, given the current state of the U.S. economy? I am not complaining about now.), and I just don't know what the damn point of any of it is anymore. I should be happy that I've got a decent job, and that I'm almost a college graduate, but I don't. I feel so lost, so confused, so overwhelmed, that I don't see any point.
I'm miserable all the time. I don't hope for anything. I don't even have energy to go out and try something different, something that might break me out of the monotony.
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Death is nothing, it's being alive that's fearful.
I'm sorry for your friend, but at least his suffering is gone.
I had a friend commit suicide, so I know how it is to lose someone close.
Sorry if a sound like a douche, I'm trying to be nice, but my words feel like they're filled with spite and anger.
Must be the lateness.
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Death is nothing, it's being alive that's fearful.
I'm sorry for your friend, but at least his suffering is gone.
I had a friend commit suicide, so I know how it is to lose someone close.
Sorry if a sound like a douche, I'm trying to be nice, but my words feel like they're filled with spite and anger.
Must be the lateness.
You don't sound like you're being awful. I prefer when people don't sugarcoat things (it usually doesn't help anything). And you're completely right: his suffering is over. I agree 100%. The whole situation is just so unfair. He did nothing, he didn't deserve it. He was a nice guy, and look what happened. However, thus is the nature of the universe, right?
I also agree that living is fearful. I'm unsure of where or how to go on from here. I don't know the way, don't even know how to find it. I feel isolated and alone in a crowded field of family and pseudo-friends.
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You know, I'm not sure if this kind of thing is even allowed. If not, please delete and accept my apologies.
I must be the opposite of the Springtime of Youth. The Springtime of Youth board makes me smile, but in a way it frustrates me. Why? It's because I can't even remotely find that kind of vigor in myself. I'm 24, and I feel like my life has bled away before my eyes, turned to ash and dust. I'm so tired, physically, mentally, emotionally...
The weariness is understandable. Indeed, I might agree with you in that I don't quite favour entirely the Springtime, either, as I think if it burns to hot, it'll whither and turn to ash. I've never been one for the gaudy dawn, nor the dissembling spring... I look to the twilight and the fall. In part because spring contains too many vain hopes. And it is not in hoping so highly that we find peace, but in understanding what must be, and who we must be.
While everyone around me is moving forward, I feel like I'm literally standing still, at a dead stop that I'm unable to break free of. I do have things going for me, but they all feel colorless and bland, pointless. In fact, everything in my life feels colorless and bland. I have so many things I need to do, but no idea how to go forward.
I know I'm likely depressed. My good friend recently died at the end of August after a four-year battle with leukemia, and it hit me really hard. He was doing better, on his way up after battling bravely, and was scheduled to have a bone marrow transplant two weeks from the day he died. But he'd been talking to his father, and had gotten what he'd always wanted to hear: an unconditional "I love you." Two days later? He died. His heart was worn out, and just stopped. He was 29.
Perhaps you are depressed. In part that becomes a chemical effect, but in part it is something you can draw yourself out of. The only suggestion I have is this, that in acting something you can become it. That is, not acting something you are not, but deciding what you are and being it. That is, if you see things as colourless, make a point to see colour, even the slightest. I will not admonish an artifical smile. Indeed, there's an old saying that says 'a sad face is good for the heart, and wisdom lies in the house of mourning.' This is true. It is in suffering that we learn the most. Or a line from an old Greek play: pathei mathos. One learns through suffering. What you can be assured in is that though you suffer now, though you feel dim and dark, you are learning, and when you come out of the darkness into some new light in a day to follow, that learning will serve you well. Even if you cannot even now see it, it is building in your mind and heart. You are wondering on things and question that you would not ask save through this suffering, and that is the great blessing and benefit of suffering that no amount of passion for life or zeal can match.
The one suggestion I can give you is to read and to watch tragedy. Not the badly written stuff that is depressing. But the true high tragedy. For the ancients thought, and I think they were right, that the way in which to combat melancholic moods were not to bolster with high and jovial moods (which in their fading lead only to darkness worse than before, a rising and falling upon stormwaves.) Indeed, we are cast upon stormwaves. But should we look in the trough of the wave to be risen to the height of the crest? No, that'll lead to our ruin. So we look rather to the leveling of the waves. To the evening of our spirit. You should not look to cheer yourself up, but to calm yourself. That is my admonition, and for this I suggest Tragedy. You'll not see artificial happiness in it. But in good tragedy, you will see beauty amidst suffering. Read Aeschylus, such as the Agamemnon and the Eumenedies, or yet the Persians. Read some Sophocles. Read Hamlet and MacBeth. You'll find beauty in the words, but more, beauty in the suffering. And then through that you will see meaning in your own dismal state. And soon the state will not seem so dismal. It needn't have changed, but you will find it being beautified. Your mind can make a heaven out of it's hell, you know.
And if the things you know to be going for you feel bland, continue on in them. Do it by rote if you must. The meaning in them will return if you don't let your sparks for them utterly die. For you yourself speak the saving words: that you have these things going for you. You know it in your mind, your spirit and heart only cannot feel it. But isn't that just it? It's only a feeling. And feelings can be conquered. Your mind must be your guide. You know what is right and you know what is good. Cling to these things. Tell yourself there is meaning in what you have going for you. Force yourself to see it in despite of your heart.
And if all this is difficult, as it most certainly must be, remember that this one further meaning can be had: the human spirit of rising up against adversity. Of feeling all that weight against you, and refusing to fall utterly. Of having, as it were, a victory against yourself. If you can, even to a small extent, work past this, you will have something to be proud of. And that might be the fulcrum upon all else can be raised up.
Finally, one more word to this part, a lines from the Iliad. This is from book 24, line 49, and Apollon is speaking of how mortals are given to suffering the loss of those dear to them, and how it has happened before and will happen again, in speaking of Achilles and the death of Patroklos. But how we after due time of mourning (note, mourning has its place), continue on. He says:
'For the fates have given to Men an enduring spirit.'
Enduring there is the Greek word Tleton. As a verb it's tlao, and I often say to myself its future. Tleso. I will endure.
His death has made me think very hard on the purpose of life. Is there any purpose at all? Is it to have children? To make discoveries? To die? I don't believe in an afterlife, don't believe in some great beautiful hereafter. So what is the point?
Probably the worst thing is that I don't even know what I want from life. A while back someone (Zeality, I believe) started a thread, discussing the penultimate/ultimate/secondary desires they had in life. I thought long and hard after reading that thread, reluctant to even try to reply, because I honestly don't know. It's stuck with me ever since I read the post, trying to think about what I want out of life. It isn't necessarily love (I don't believe in true "love", anyway), or power, or specific achievements. I mean, I have things that I want to do, but they're not anywhere near the penultimate/ultimate purpose of life level.
Heh, you don't believe in true love either, eh? Well, never mind that one. I was cynical on that too, if you saw my list... cynical to the point where I put one of my wishes to keep myself APART from that. Anyway, this is a difficult question. I must say I cannot precisely answer it because I have as long as I can remember had a certain goal that I have been moving towards. But certainly there are things you know that you enjoy. Even if you cannot now consider them to be great or to the degree of ultimate purposes (which are, you must understand, excercises in understanding one's self... that is, I think the people who were posting those were attempting to glean from their self-knowledge who they were at the core of their being... whether or not they are accurate in that is uncertain, but at least some came to that understanding after much deliberation.) Anyway, take those things that you enjoy, and slowly work on them. Focus on them. Obviously (from the next paragraph), you enjoy writing. Very well. That is one thing. And as you do it, take joy in it. Not in the publishing, but in the act of writing, which is a part of yourself.
My current wish? I want to get a book published. I've written the book, been turned down five times by publishers, only to have the most recent publisher send it back to me three times asking me to revise parts of the story. I want to believe that they're interested and may eventually pick up the text, but I don't dare get my hopes up.
True. Don't get your hopes up. Be content with how things are in the present, and you will be all the more pleased with a good event in the future... but even then, you must not expect good fortune to last. That might sound cynical, but it is a fact of things, and to not be dependant on good times makes one impervious to fortune's turns. So with this, consider the worst case... they don't pick it up. But you have a story that you wrote and that you enjoy. Something that is your own. What do you need the others liking it for? It might be an added benefit, but do not rely on others to keep you content.
That's my problem: I don't dare hope for anything. I don't think I know how anymore. If there's no hope in my life, then there's no point to life. Then why live at all? Why continue to live if I have no purpose and no hopes or dreams? In fact, if there's no real purpose to anything, then why does anyone live at all?
That is a teleological question, and it's tough to answer. If you do not believe in an afterlife, then you must create some meaning in your present. Now, to be a bit Nietzschean here, yes, life may have no purpose, but it can have meaning. And that meaning is in the present experience. Honestly, do you need any hopes and dreams? For most often what are hopes and dreams run far too high, and in not achieving them we fall prey to disappointment. So do not hold to them. Make use of things you wish simply to give you a direction, but if you live for a future, you do not have the present. So what you do is live in the present, though being mindful of the future. It's the old admonition of carpe diem. That is, not fall prey to hedonism, but perhaps more of an epicurean enjoyment of life. It's difficult when one's thinking nihilistically as you are, but nonetheless, I think it to be true.
I would personally suggest trying to be stoic. Read some Seneca.
I don't know if I'm overworked and simply exhausted. I don't know if I need to talk or shut up. I don't know if I need more rest or more action. My family doesn't care, and my "friends" don't care to listen. I'm just so tired.
Well, talk always helps. As such, talk, and even if no one directly replies, at least the act of speaking is cathartic. Do you need rest or action... well, you need both. You need to act, and then in rest contemplate your actions. That is, understand yourself in what you do and in the decisions that you make. If you have done something that you do not like, then decide to learn from it, and do differently next time. Don't vow that you will beyond doubt change - that'll only lead to disappointment - but that you shall do your utmost. And having done your utmost, be content in the knowledge that you have given it a most excellent attempt.
This is difficult to manage when you're tired, I suppose. But if it's weariness overcoming you, then you must first of all step back and calm yourself with something. Sit outside and watch the sun. Read a good book. In this state I'd recommend Seneca. Read 'On Tranquility' or 'On the Shortness of Life'... I've always found those two to be heartening, and when I felt unsure and assailed by fortune and what not, his Stoic virtue is a powerful voice of determination. A stoic, you see, needs be master of nothing about him, about no aspect of life or circumstance, being only a master of himself. A stoic expects nothing to actually happen, so will not be dissapointed when it doesn't (but still works for it); and if some misfortune befalls, why, things were not his to begin with, and he is happy to have had it at all. Therefore each moment of life is a blessing. And so on and so forth, though Seneca says it better than I. Basically, fear nothing and be ruled by nothing.
I need to speak to my father, but I don't know how. He's done a lot of bad things, but I know, somewhere in the deep recesses of my mind, that he loves me. But I'm so upset by his mere presence that I can't even speak to him. The problem is that he doesn't have much time left on this Earth, so what do I do? Do I go with the path of least resistance, the one that will tear me up less? Or do I potentially derail my sanity for a week and go see him anyway?
See him. It will not tear you up less, but far more if you don't. If he doesn't have much time left, it will most likely haunt you that you did not. Even if it's difficult now, later you will thank yourself for having done it.
I'm not exactly sure why I'm posting this here. I've been lurking on this board so long that I feel like I know a lot of you, even if I don't post very much. I'm sorry to whine...sometimes venting helps me figure things out.
Absolutely. Don't feel bad about it. Nor is it whining. I very much understand venting, and its benefit is unmeasurable. It helps put things into order, and is cathartic. I do that myself very often.
Anyway, so for the current moment, I would suggest reading some of Seneca. Read 'On the Shortness of Life', or 'On Tranquility.' Let's see...
http://www.forumromanum.org/literature/seneca_younger/brev_e.html
http://www.stoics.com/seneca_essays_book_2.html#‘TRANQUILLITATE1
And read some Tragedy. Some high Tragedy so that you can level out your spirit with sombre beauty and high melancholy. Read Shakespeare. Read some Milton (Paradise Lost?). Read Homer's Iliad. And Aeschylus. For Aeschylus... if you go to a site called Project Perseus, they have most ancient texts there. Or, here, this is a bloody prose translation, but is alright:
http://www.theoi.com/Text/AeschylusAgamemnon.html
Or.. here it's performed: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vqFgCGuBn4A
And here, a very good little bit of Aeschylus' Agamemnon, read by Robert Kennedy at the night of Dr. King's assassination: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FQQ-DwLqoGY
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Death is nothing, it's being alive that's fearful.
I'm sorry for your friend, but at least his suffering is gone.
I had a friend commit suicide, so I know how it is to lose someone close.
Sorry if a sound like a douche, I'm trying to be nice, but my words feel like they're filled with spite and anger.
Must be the lateness.
Being alive is fearful? Hmm...
See my quote? See the part that reads 'neque mortem neque vitam timeo'? That reads 'I fear neither life nor death.'
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I feel exactly the same as you with a lot of things. I'm 22 and I had all these dreams and ambitions in high school and now it just seems like life is just passing me by. I am just completely overwhelmed and confused as to what I need to do. It seems like every time I make a step in the right direction that life just throws me another curve ball. Also I am terrified of death. I have no real beliefs or anything, but I am just terrified that when I die I am going to cease to exist and there will be nothing. It gets on my mind so badly that I cannot sleep when I'm thinking about it. I have tried many things, religions, alcohol, drugs, new jobs, new partners nothing just seems to make me happy anymore. I think it's just this age that we are in. We have been pretty much following this set path for the majority of our lives and now we don't have a cookie cutter life style where everything is pretty much planned for you. Now we are left without most of the friends we have known all our lives and pretty much without any help well for me it feels that way.
I would try the springtime of youth thing, but I'm pretty sure it would come out full of bitterness and self loathing.
What is fearful in ceasing to be?
There is no reason to fear death, as Socrates once said. If there is nothing, and we cease to exist, what will we care? Or if there is something, what can we know, and so if we fear we only fear the unknown, and that is irrational. The Phaedo is a very good discussion of this: Socrates in his last hours before he drinks the hemlock.
I'm not sure exactly what to say to you, but I think the problem might be is that you're looking for something in giving yourself pleasure. You say you've tried all these things and all, but all those are things that are trying to instill a certain mood in you. But really, you've gotta have the mood come from inside, as it were. Indeed, I would call it folly to try and be happy. What you should aim for it to be more or less content (a bit of discontent is good, however.) Hm. This is very difficult for me to describe at the moment. But basically, you shouldn't be relying on those exterior things to make you happy, or trying to glean happiness from them. The joy should be innate in all experience - and joy is something different from happiness - and basically is... finding or making something from everything. Overcoming yourself in everything. I guess I would say, well, introscpection. Understand yourself by really thinking about yourself. And not just where you're going. How can you know that anyway? Yeah, I have things I'm going for, too. Or think I am. That is, I have plans, but who's to know I won't die tomorrow? And if that's the case, what'll become of all those plans? They'll be nothing. So we should live mindful of death, as it were.
Man, I'm not bringing this across well right now. It's awefully late, and this is rather foolish of me, as I have studying to do tomorrow. But by doing your best, and finding beauty in things wherever you can - small, great, doesn't matter. Size doesn't matter, really. Let it sink into your heart. Laugh, and laugh deeply. Frown if you must, but be ready to laugh. Think about something, and feel joyful for having done it, not necessarially because it gave you a feeling. It's kind of an oxymoron. We think we should feel happy because something MAKES us happy, but really, WE make the things happy. So if we are content just to sit and stare at a leaf, that will make us happy, even though there is nothing intrinsically happy in us. Nor is it making you happy, per say, but you are making yourself happy by being content in doing whatever you are doing. Don't expect too much in things. If you can find just one small glimmer of joy, focus on that, think about it, relish it. And you know what? You can even turn adversity, and suffering, and even lack of direction into that. It's an obstacle, yes. But it's a bloody war, one against yourself, for the most part. And there is not only gain in that struggle, but just like in any combat you can win glory for yourself, even if it's only to your own eyes. Turn your disadvantages to advantages, and take joy in trying to do that as best you can... even if you can't wholly succeed. I don't know, those are my suggestions, though they're fragmentary. I'm trying to think what works for me. I've felt despondent and that life was doomed and meaningless before (hell, I once thought I was for sure death-doomed... in a more shortterm sense... I'm well aware in the long term we've got Thanatos waiting for us), but I just don't feel like that now. In part it's the Stoic things I was talking about in the other post. Even if things are crappy... well, then I've got the chance for a good battle to show myself my character, don't I? Opportunity at all turns. Fortune is rendered impotent.
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Daniel Krispin, you are an amazing human being.
Thank you, from the bottom of my heart.
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So, in other words mustardbate...sweet sweet (tangy? sour? salty?) mustardbation...
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When I was in college I fell into a deep, nihilistic pit of total meaningless, and yet one thing managed to hold me together: my sense of duty. In fact, it's increased to the point where I've found a distinct purpose and direction in life that becomes all but inevitable. That's why I'm only serving in the military for a few more years before getting out and doing other things, because I can do much more for the world, and I feel as though because I can, I should.
But even though my sense of duty -- a duty to help people and to do what others can't -- is what drives me and makes me click, the thing that I've realized helps the most when you're feeling down is simply having a few companions and a good sense of humor, even if it's just on an Internet forum like this. Nothing does more to kill your ability to live or achieve anything than taking yourself too seriously.
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My current wish? I want to get a book published. I've written the book, been turned down five times by publishers, only to have the most recent publisher send it back to me three times asking me to revise parts of the story. I want to believe that they're interested and may eventually pick up the text, but I don't dare get my hopes up.
Not to get your hopes up so that they might be dashed against the rocks, but even getting a personalized rejection letter is quite the accomplishment in the literary field. Having a publisher ask you to make changes? Even if they don't ultimately take the book up, you've already gotten farther than most aspiring authors.
One of the things that can be very depressing is not reaching your goal. It is a good thing to take satisfaction when you have achieved something, but failing to do so can be a blow to our egos. But if I may so suggest, it is also good to take satisfaction when you have made progress. A rejection letter is a reason to celebrate; you've overcome the fears of rejection that prevent many would-be authors from even submitting. A personalize rejection letter is reason to celebrate; such are coveted objects. A publisher that asks you to make changes is a reason to celebrate; they see the spark and find it worthwhile to foster it for a time. Submitting your manuscript to five different publishers is itself a thing to celebrate! You've stared rejection in the face and rejection blinked. It is reasonable not to get your hopes up, but it is also reasonable not to sell yourself short.
Though, as a piece of practical advice, are you sure that most publishers in your field consider submissions from authors? There are some genres that will only accept a submission if it comes through an agent; if you have written in one of those genres, you might be better served by finding an agent before worrying about a publisher.
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My current wish? I want to get a book published. I've written the book, been turned down five times by publishers, only to have the most recent publisher send it back to me three times asking me to revise parts of the story. I want to believe that they're interested and may eventually pick up the text, but I don't dare get my hopes up.
My current wish is to finish a novel. My fiction writing teacher says I have a lot of potential, my classmates say my the work I share is excellent, but I'm afraid to send things in per rejection.
The first thing I want to publish is Nightmare:Calling, but that died for me a long time ago. My friends want me to continue but I can't bring myself to go on.
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I know what it feels like to fear death. Almost every day I have a panicy episode about it. I know how it feels to be horribly depressed. It's part of the whole Bipolar thing. I know what it's like to lose someone very dear. My foster mother, Nancy, died from pancreatic cancer last year. It still hurts deep down. If you look at the past pages of my Springtime of Youth, I just stopped caring. I used to state the date and what day it is in Latin, but now it's just 'Hi.' Try something new. I felt like I was going to get really depressed today (stuff with family) when all of a sudden, something just happened.
Keep trying with the book; if you have the will to write it, you should have the will to get it out there. And when it is, tell me the title and it'll be on my list of books I want. Who knows, maybe there'll be a series!
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Each day, I wake up and have an internal war with myself. I don't know if my choices are good ones, or if my current ambitions will even be fulfilled. If I could really live the springtime of youth, I'd be a lot farther along in learning Czech; I'd have written at least four more poems and two more short stories over the last month; I'd have finished Crimson Echoes dialogue, and improved myself in other ways...
I feel so emotionally and even physically fatigued at times. I've taken to sleeping at least one 12-hour session every week to rebuild my stamina. I never anticipated how much accepting ambitious challenges would exhaust my willpower, and I never imagined that willpower was something that could be exhausted and needed recuperation.
I give people the advice to "analyze one's desires", but the simplicity of that statement may underestimate just how hard it is to create meaning for oneself in life. I always had my ideal of love and desire for a relationship as deep as they come since age 11, but it took the loss of a woman named Alisa J to show me just how important and dear this is to me. Gaining that sense of meaning and importance through suffering has given me a clear reinforcement that I will be fulfilled by love, as have my other relationships with people, even best friends.
I still don't know where my other ambitions lie, though. I've continued with an accounting education because it and my English language will enable me to live in virtually any region on earth. But I know for a fact that accounting does not fulfill me, and that I want to continue exploring writing, so every day I have to deal with doubts over my current plan to facilitate my first dream, and the question of what I'll do after I achieve it.
I don't dare hope for anything.
I know this feeling. After Alisa J disappeared, it's like I can't even expect the sun to rise in the morning. Nothing can be taken for granted, and I cannot even believe in such a thing as winning or fulfilling a desire until I've woken up the day after and reality reaffirms. There's even someone very dear to my heart right now, but I can't even allow myself to hope that my desire will be fulfilled, or that we might be happy together, because to hope is to open myself up for the pain of defeat.
Nonetheless, I manage. I knew this path would be difficult, and there are so, so many things to fear. But in my most lucid, willful moments, I dictate my life decisively and deal with the consequences, like Odysseus strapping himself to the mast in order to sate his curiosity of the siren song. Over the last few months, my spirit has hardened. But each day, it's still an emotional pain to think about the wild possibilities of the future; it's still a sadness to acknowledge how weak I presently am. But I'm still moving. I haven't died yet, like the people around me who've instinctively castrated their own potentials and accepted fates of gray, personal mediocrity.
Anyway, that's all unrelated to the point. It sounds like you're in a very low valley of depression. I've been there a few times, and two things have recently saved me. Perhaps they can help you. The first is defying fate. I've always defined fate as what will happen in my life if I'm not proactive, and so I imagine myself like that. Is it fate that I've fallen where others have succeeded? That certain things make life harder for me? In this way, I cultivate a temporary anger towards the world that I use to motivate myself to action. This world is populated by cretins, and I'm not going to give up in such a place. You can possibly unlock this by getting angry at the publishers; be cautious of course, since anger is useful only when it's directed towards a positive end. The second is what's easiest. I last hit a hard couple days of depression in August, and it lifted when I finally admitted to myself that going ahead with my plans was a hell of a lot easier than just retreating.
And that's part of the springtime of youth. It's making your mistakes on the side of action. There may be a mountain near your house that's been promised to afford a spectacular view of the countryside. Still, ascending the mountain is a rigorous, tough process, and you don't know if the view is worth it.
The springtime of youth is echoing Picard:
To try or not to try. To take a risk or play it safe. Your arguments have reminded me how precious the right to choose is. And because I've never been one to play it safe, I choose to try.
It's saying, "if I stop worrying and just climb the stupid mountain, I'll see if that view's worth it." It's refusing to cut down wild potential because of the possibility of hardship. And it creates meaning. Good god, it's not easy, but I couldn't live with myself if I were in Oklahoma right now, wondering how life would be different if I had taken the hard path and expanded my experiences by planning to go to Europe and making new friends, no matter the emotional cost. Without going into detail about Alisa J, I want to live a life of no regrets now. Maybe it's impossible, but "impossible" should cease being a meaningful word to all of us. Life will get much better. I know it; I'll make it happen.
~~~
terrified of death
My mind used to recoil at thoughts of the universe's end or death, but somehow it's not a problem anymore. I think it's because of the springtime of youth. I'm living in such a way that I'm going to achieve what I wish. If I weren't, I'd be much more concerned about dying before I'm fulfilled. In this way, before you worry about death, worry about life. Make a list of what you want to do and go.
We have been pretty much following this set path for the majority of our lives and now we don't have a cookie cutter life style where everything is pretty much planned for you.
Even in this world's economy, there's still leeway to do stuff. I'm taking my business degree that I'll have in December 2009 and going to Europe to expand my experiences. After that is a big, annoying question mark, but whatever.
~~~
As a last note, I know another woman with boundless ambition in writing. She's going to have rejection letters, but she's going to use them as a fulcrum to achieve her final victory. Something that's not quite represented well enough in motivational literature is just how much one's going to fail before one finally succeeds. Failure is temporary but pervasive; success is singular and eternal. Failure is such an emotional stress and discouraging thing, but at least recognizing it as an inevitable stepping stone can blunt the pain a little.
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You are all awesome people. Thank you.
Thought, I will look into an agent. It's something that honestly hasn't occurred to me. (Thanks!)
V_Translanka, you are awesomely random. ^_^
Teaflower, Ramsus, and Zeality, you are all simply awesome.
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I must be the opposite of the Springtime of Youth. The Springtime of Youth board makes me smile, but in a way it frustrates me. Why? It's because I can't even remotely find that kind of vigor in myself. I'm 24, and I feel like my life has bled away before my eyes, turned to ash and dust. I'm so tired, physically, mentally, emotionally...
The responses of others in this thread prove that you are not alone in your feelings, and perhaps you can take some comfort from that. Human beings possess the power of thought beyond any other creature, but with the power of thought comes all of life’s suffering and pathos. When our lives are not mired in the physical hardships of ages past; when our hands are idle and our bellies full; then our minds get into to all kinds of mischief. This is a part of who we are. Knowing that doesn’t make it any easier, but it’s nice to know anyway…just because.
I find myself wondering what it is that makes you—you in particular—tired and weary. All of us are familiar with that feeling, but for each person the anguish comes from a different place.
Sometimes it comes from doubt. We spend our lives building up our worldview, developing a sense of what is precious, and devoting ourselves to what we decide is important. Then, one day, something cracks that we thought was unbreakable. And we doubt ourselves. Our entire sense of self-worth goes on trial. I’m a writer too, and I’ve visited that doubt on a couple of occasions. What if my stories aren’t enough? What if I can’t write them to my satisfaction? What if they don’t give me the sense of fulfillment I want from them? Everyone has moments like that, in their own way, and these are depressing moments…moments that can last for an hour, or a lifetime. This is the depression that comes from a person doubting the worth of the life they have built for themselves.
Sometimes the anguish comes from despair. Rather than doubting ourselves, we can doubt the whole universe with a simple question: What if there’s no point to any of it? Indeed, actual meaning is something that can only be created, not discovered. The world itself simply is. All the color in it is make-believe, existing only in the space between our ears. Most people never, ever suspect that, but those who do are forced to confront a lifetime of belief that the world has some kind of inherent order to it, assigned either by a god or by nature. Even doubting that idea, let alone rejecting it outright, is more than some people can bear. This is the depression that comes from a person feeling as though all things were futile.
Sometimes the anguish comes from detestation. We grow depressed when we live in slavery, and it doesn’t matter whether the yoke is literally a yoke, or something much more modern, like the pressure to fit into a certain clothing size. Slavery is to be deprived of one’s self-determination. We are strongly pressured to act, live, and even think in a certain way. Sometimes we are only barely aware of these pressures, despite their overwhelming influence on us. But, aware or not, as a result of their power, life becomes artificial and cheap. It is not the life we want to live, yet it is the life we have…and so we grow to resent it. When that resentment wears out, all that is left is a weariness with the world that no sleep can heal. The mind closes in defeat. This is the depression that comes from a person wanting something they cannot have.
Sometimes the anguish comes from disembodiment. In contrast to slavery, sometimes life becomes so abstract and free—as it has for those of us who enjoy the benefits of a materially successful society—that the mind loses its way. Without a strong sense of identity, people end up drifting. They latch on to anything that stimulates them, but it never lasts, because there is no foundation, no strong personal identity, to act as a fertile soil. That’s what leads to burnouts like Britney Spears…people who never had a strong sense of self, getting caught in a spiral of having to become more and more extreme just to feel normal. This is the depression that comes from a person knowing that they need something, but not knowing what.
Sometimes the anguish comes from disillusionment. The world is as jam-packed with promises as it is devoid of guarantees, and it often seems as though the warranty on a thing expires the day after you start to care about it. As children we cook up all kinds of wonderful excitement, only to grow up and learn that life is full of disappointments, rigid customs, lies, and mediocrity. This is especially hard for people who invest much of their self-worth in the outside world…in the form of friends, or hobbies. When those things lose their value, as they so often do, the individuals suffer mightily. Nor is this disillusionment caused only by the outside world. It can come from within as well. Each of us realizes at some point that we’ll never be the best, or even all that unique. Even someone like Michael Phelps will only be competitive for a very short while in his life, in a very narrow feat. If any of us is “one in a million” on this Earth of over six billion, then there are over six thousand of us right now. Our every thought and emotion has been experienced already by someone else. Our every feat in life is very likely to be the same. It’s a disappointing, disillusioning world, and we are just another part of it. This is the depression that comes from a person reconciling their unbounded imagination with the practical constraints of real life.
Sometimes the anguish comes from disenfranchisement. Some people are simply out of their league in this life. They possess not the smarts, the wherewithal, the relationships, the abilities, or the accomplishments to contend with life. They are outgunned and outclassed by a remorseless world that is far bigger than them and an imperfect society that did not sufficiently empower them. And the worst part is that, eventually, they figure it out. This is the depression that comes from a person who feels all of the same human impulses as the rest of us, but does not even know how to ask the first question.
I wonder if your anguish, your fatigue with life, comes from any of these sources, in part or in whole. It looks from what you have written as though you are losing your vivacity, your will to live. I call that the spark of life. It is the difference between being young and old. Most people will lose their spark over time, early in life or later on, and when that light goes out it doesn’t come back. We can only be made once; we can only be broken once. That’s where the saying comes from, “Life’s a bitch and then you die.” I have met my share of people who lost their spark, or are losing it.
Even so, there is hope. You’re young, for one thing, which means you very likely still have a malleable mind. If you can change the way you think, then you may find a happy ending to all of this. The spark of life is not replaceable, but it is resilient, and what remains of yours will roar back to life, if nurtured. For another thing, you are a writer, and I always give writers extra experience points. =)
While everyone around me is moving forward, I feel like I'm literally standing still, at a dead stop that I'm unable to break free of. I do have things going for me, but they all feel colorless and bland, pointless. In fact, everything in my life feels colorless and bland. I have so many things I need to do, but no idea how to go forward.
My very good friend, one of my very best friends, who is from England and speaks accordingly, told me once that it is okay to spend one’s twenties in a state of motionlessness. The teens and early twenties are for radical development of the will. Those are the years when our personality matures into its adult form. Afterwards, the remaining years of one’s twenties are, properly, an era for soul-searching, introspection, and contemplation. I know exactly what you mean when you say that you feel as though you are “standing still” while everyone else is “moving forward.” But make no mistake! The motion is yours. Even by asking these questions, and suffering these conflicts, you are developing in a way that many of your contemporaries are not.
This is the time of your life to determine who you are and what you are about. Take the time to do it well. Take all the time you need. Take years! This is one of the great chapters of your life. You are young; your tale is not yet one-third told. Your outward circumstances will, eventually, start to move on their own accord. For the time being, it is perfectly okay to not make progress outwardly. External progress is nice, it’s not at all a bad thing…but don’t feel as though internal progress is any less valuable. To the contrary, internal development is more important than anything. These are the years whereby you become a person, in the fullest sense of the word. I tell you this: True satisfaction is knowing who you are, knowing what you want, and appreciating where you are. Now ask yourself…how much of that is internal, and how much external?
Making money, building a résumé…those are fine things, but so many people fill their lives too fully with these outward commitments, which then sap all of their time and energy, leaving scant little for true internal development. Poor fools…before they know it, they look up and they’re in their fifties. People who plunge headlong into their careers or families in their twenties are either being foolhardy or they are exceptionally ahead of the curve.
Don’t try and go forward until you know where you are, and who you are. Don’t try and go anywhere. No. Stop. Look around you. There are many things to see. Find them. Look at them. Touch and smell them. Appreciate them. Grok them. Marvel at the simple act of picking an apple from a tree, or pouring a glass of milk. Is the glass beautiful? Is the milk creamy? Does the kitchen light reflect off the glass and onto the smooth countertop? Does the glass filled with milk feel cold in your hand? And what does “cold” really feel like? What can you learn from that?
Be aware, wherever you are. Look at the flowers by the side of the road. Watch the clouds roll through the sky. Feel the rushing wind and its touch on your clothes and face. Think of the artistic beauty and clockwork precision of this world which you are so graced to inhabit with a sentient, curious mind and a healthy body. Let these thoughts seep into your being. As a writer, let them flow back out of you with your character affixed to them.
Honest: There is nowhere worth going until you can be glad to be where you are, even if where you are is a terrible place. Even the bad times…sickness, smelly garbage, and the loss of dear friends…even these things and perhaps especially them must be appreciated too.
Make sure you have the time you need to be alone with your thoughts. No excuses. Make the time. And, if you think it would help, find yourself some satisfying manual work to perform that allows you to wander freely in your thoughts even as you expend your physical energy.
When you are there, free in your thoughts, seek to cultivate your inner awe. It is that curiosity toward the world and ourselves. It is amusement. It is thoughtfulness. It is fascination, awareness, excitement. It is playfulness, and friendship, and imagination. It is vivacity, vigor. It is the spark of life. With these powers…a person will never be tired.
I speak, of course, from my own perspective. Daniel Krispin advises that you read tragedies because that is his experience, and he thinks well enough of his life as yet. Likewise, my experience is awareness, creativity, gladness, and a strong desire to know things. I can attest to the satisfaction these qualities have brought me. You may or may not be anything like me, but it is hard to imagine that these qualities could ever but enrich a person. Find them in your own way, in your own style.
Look for these qualities in your dreams—your real dreams, the ones you have when you sleep. When you first wake up in the morning, write down any interesting dream you had.
Look for these qualities in the things that delighted you as a child…movies or toys or stories. The slide or the merry-go-round, the Game Boy…those things may not provide you with the satisfaction they once did, but if you can understand why they delighted you in the first place, you can look to find that delight elsewhere. It’s out there.
Look for these qualities in your daily life. Look at the rooms in your home with new eyes. Stand in different places. Eat dinner under the table for a change. Move the furniture. Try to discover the details. Ask yourself each night, what combination of lights would make you the most content? Be in touch with yourself and your surroundings.
Keep looking, because here’s another secret: Even if you were never to get another step further beyond the quest for self-awareness, you could die saying that you were living well.
I know I'm likely depressed.
Daniel Krispin is half-right. There is some value in putting on a smile, even if it is a fake one, because sometimes that fake smile will turn true. Try it, right now. Smile from ear to ear. Let your whole face smile, not just the muscles around your mouth. Even if it doesn’t make you feel good, it will almost certainly make you feel better.
On the other hand, he left something out: It’s okay to be sad. It’s okay to be tired. It’s okay to be depressed. When you are any of these things, don’t pretend that you aren’t. Let them work their dark magic in you. Accept them. We humans have a wide range of emotions, and they are all valuable to us. The best time to put on a Krispanian smile is when you know you are sad and can accept it. You have to know where you are before you can move forward.
His death has made me think very hard on the purpose of life. Is there any purpose at all? Is it to have children? To make discoveries? To die? I don't believe in an afterlife, don't believe in some great beautiful hereafter. So what is the point?
Ah! Who am I? Why am I here? Is there nothing more? You ask the central questions of humanity. Grappling with these questions is like nothing else.
For me it happened throughout my senior year of high school, as I began to transition from adolescence to adulthood, and it culminated when I read Cosmos by Carl Sagan. That book was like a period mark at the end of a sentence I had spent my whole childhood creating. When I read that book, I knew who I was.
To me, the purpose of life is to learn all that is learnable, and then use that knowledge to shape the world in my image, letting other people’s lives wash over me and shape me, while pursuing all my life’s ambitions. The universe may not have one grand creator, but the Earth is full of little ones. That is the evolutionary heritage we enjoy: Life must be resilient, and adaptive. We have evolved our powerful minds as a direct consequence of their usefulness to our continued existence. Once there was no one who could behold the wonder of the universe. Now there is us.
The material that makes up our bodies and our world was forged billions of years ago in the inferno of supernovae. We are, as Sagan put it, little pieces of the universe, trying to understand itself. We are star stuff. And as we go through life trying to pay the bills and all that, I try and excite people into remembering why we are really here. It turns out there is no “why,” only a “how,” and the “how” of it is that we are here to decide for ourselves what to do.
Probably the worst thing is that I don't even know what I want from life. A while back someone (Zeality, I believe) started a thread, discussing the penultimate/ultimate/secondary desires they had in life. I thought long and hard after reading that thread, reluctant to even try to reply, because I honestly don't know. It's stuck with me ever since I read the post, trying to think about what I want out of life. It isn't necessarily love (I don't believe in true "love", anyway), or power, or specific achievements. I mean, I have things that I want to do, but they're not anywhere near the penultimate/ultimate purpose of life level.
Life offers us two great prizes. One is ambition, and the fulfillment thereof. What the ambition is does not matter…be it the ambition to invent time travel or simply to get married and hatch a kid.
The other prize exists independently of ambition. This is serenity. After becoming aware of the world, one can become serene in it. It’s like being in that warm place where life began. It is the very opposite of the bliss that may come from living in ignorance. This is the bliss of awareness…which I call serenity, because it is undertaken knowingly. When one is serene, all things are both familiar and novel at once—familiar because they invite cogent thought, and new because they are exquisitely unique. Serenity is happiness without passion. Passion belongs to ambition. Serenity is thankfulness, gratitude, and good cheer. Serenity is relaxation, ease, and the utter death of all self-doubt. It is the ability to say, “Whatever I am, I am glad to be. Wherever I am, I am glad to be here.”
When one becomes serene, ambition becomes less important because it is almost as good just to dally about and savor the moment. Of course, a person can have both ambitions and serenity, or one or the other. Each is a great prize, worth having, and while some people are not ambitious, everyone is capable of finding serenity. So if you don’t know what you want from life, then worry not. Maybe it will come to you someday, because people who retain the spark of life can always cultivate new high ambitions, even into their twilight years. Maybe it won’t come to you, and that’s okay too, because you can still look for contentment and happiness by embracing the world and your presence in it. I said earlier that it’s okay to be sad. Well…it’s also okay to be happy. That is the power of serenity. You don’t need a further reason. If anyone asks why you’re looking so cheery, you can say “Just because.”
I need to speak to my father, but I don't know how. He's done a lot of bad things, but I know, somewhere in the deep recesses of my mind, that he loves me. But I'm so upset by his mere presence that I can't even speak to him. The problem is that he doesn't have much time left on this Earth, so what do I do? Do I go with the path of least resistance, the one that will tear me up less? Or do I potentially derail my sanity for a week and go see him anyway?
I would say that you should definitely see him, but that isn’t necessarily true. If you love him, or ever loved him, then you should definitely see him. Otherwise, he is dead already and you should move on with your life.
I'm not exactly sure why I'm posting this here. I've been lurking on this board so long that I feel like I know a lot of you, even if I don't post very much. I'm sorry to whine...sometimes venting helps me figure things out.
I know what you mean. =)
My current wish? I want to get a book published. I've written the book, been turned down five times by publishers, only to have the most recent publisher send it back to me three times asking me to revise parts of the story. I want to believe that they're interested and may eventually pick up the text, but I don't dare get my hopes up.
I’m a writer too, as I said before. One of the hardest lessons to learn in this trade is not to take defeat personally. Even if you get rejected fifty times, you will still be in good company. It takes a lot of patience and a very thick skin to get published. Being rejected is not a statement about your character or abilities as a writer. It is the consequence of participating in a prohibitively competitive industry. Besides, the people judging your submissions may themselves not have the best judgment, or they may be under orders to look for a certain style of writing. Whatever! When you do get published, you can stick your tongue out at them. And if you ever make it to J.K. Rowling status, you can use your money to become the next Stalin and RULE THEM ALL!!
In the meantime, work on your craft. Write more, and write better. Then submit those pieces for publication as well. Be sure to blog, and write to newspapers or magazines to inquire about getting your work published. Try to build up a little bit of a name for yourself online. Remember, if you start your own website, you’re guaranteed to get published there, any time you want. And, who knows! Maybe some people will even read it. If they do, maybe they’ll like it and stick around. They’ll become your loyal fans. They will go to your readings. They’ll buy your t-shirts. They’ll take bullets for you. It can only help, when you’re submitting your pieces to the big publishers, to be able to mention that you have three thousand rabid fans.
Good luck! Maybe you’ll treat us to a sample of your non-Chronoverse creative writing on the Compendium sometime? Seriously! Whoever you are, behind that screen name, I’m glad you’re here. Thanks for venting.
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The other prize exists independently of ambition. This is serenity. After becoming aware of the world, one can become serene in it. It’s like being in that warm place where life began. It is the very opposite of the bliss that may come from living in ignorance. This is the bliss of awareness…which I call serenity, because it is undertaken knowingly. When one is serene, all things are both familiar and novel at once—familiar because they invite cogent thought, and new because they are exquisitely unique. Serenity is happiness without passion. Passion belongs to ambition. Serenity is thankfulness, gratitude, and good cheer. Serenity is relaxation, ease, and the utter death of all self-doubt. It is the ability to say, “Whatever I am, I am glad to be. Wherever I am, I am glad to be here.”
When one becomes serene, ambition becomes less important because it is almost as good just to dally about and savor the moment. Of course, a person can have both ambitions and serenity, or one or the other. Each is a great prize, worth having, and while some people are not ambitious, everyone is capable of finding serenity. So if you don’t know what you want from life, then worry not. Maybe it will come to you someday, because people who retain the spark of life can always cultivate new high ambitions, even into their twilight years. Maybe it won’t come to you, and that’s okay too, because you can still look for contentment and happiness by embracing the world and your presence in it. I said earlier that it’s okay to be sad. Well…it’s also okay to be happy. That is the power of serenity. You don’t need a further reason. If anyone asks why you’re looking so cheery, you can say “Just because.”
Well, said Lord J. Very well said indeed.
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In the meantime, work on your craft. Write more, and write better. Then submit those pieces for publication as well. Be sure to blog, and write to newspapers or magazines to inquire about getting your work published. Try to build up a little bit of a name for yourself online. Remember, if you start your own website, you’re guaranteed to get published there, any time you want.
Just as a warning; some publishers see First Online Publishing rights as different than First Publishing rights, but unless things have changed recently, most do not (especially for new authors). If you post a story online, you may be using up the very publishing rights that publishers would want to buy.
And, of course, getting published in someone else's ezine is always more impressive than getting published on your own website, though you have to put in the research to find a good ezine (if the ezine is a joke, it can make you look worse, not better). However, that said, I've heard good things about the Intergalactic Medicine Show (http://www.intergalacticmedicineshow.com) (but I'm also do not have my hand on the pulse of the publishing industry, so that might mean crap). It's editor is a well known writer and getting published in it counts towards the requirements for joining Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America, Inc (but if you don't write Sci-Fi, Fantasy, or Horror, that really doesn't do you much good).
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You write as well? Damn girl! you sound better and better every time you log on.
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You write as well? Damn girl! you sound better and better every time you log on.
?
Oh, I was wondering there for a second. Heh. Didn't realise rushingwind there is a girl. For a moment I was like 'who in the world is he talking to?' I guess that's the unfortunate bias of video game forums.
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I hate how guys just seem to think, 'Oh, video game forum. We're guys. Boobs or gtf out.' Guess what? This is an RPG based forum and an RPG is like a play or a story.
I write as best as I can, but my sis is the author in the family. She wrote a small series, called 'Seven'. It's complicated. I start things, but never finish them.
And yes, I know, I'm just awesome.
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I hate how guys just seem to think, 'Oh, video game forum. We're guys. Boobs or gtf out.' Guess what? This is an RPG based forum and an RPG is like a play or a story.
I write as best as I can, but my sis is the author in the family. She wrote a small series, called 'Seven'. It's complicated. I start things, but never finish them.
And yes, I know, I'm just awesome.
Tits or gtfo ;)
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We actually had quite the heated debate in Latin about the role of the woman. Many people seem to feel that everything was just peachy keen in Rome. Ha. If I were in Rome, I would run the hell away.
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We actually had quite the heated debate in Latin about the role of the woman. Many people seem to feel that everything was just peachy keen in Rome. Ha. If I were in Rome, I would run the hell away.
You're not like a feminist are you, and if so do you like Sarah Palin?
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I love my free speech rights and I believe that, if God DID make the universe, he made women as well as men. We should have the same rights as men.
I. Hate. Palin. I feel that she should be taking care of her children. She has a child with Down Syndrome and she's going for vice president! Her daughter is pregnant and it seems like she isn't supporting her at all! Ugh! I feel that women should have a strong say in our government, but when our families are like that, we should focus on them first and then our job.
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I love my free speech rights and I believe that, if God DID make the universe, he made women as well as men. We should have the same rights as men.
I. Hate. Palin. I feel that she should be taking care of her children. She has a child with Down Syndrome and she's going for vice president! Her daughter is pregnant and it seems like she isn't supporting her at all! Ugh! I feel that women should have a strong say in our government, but when our families are like that, we should focus on them first and then our job.
Women do have the same rights as men.... If you overlook the whole men make more money for the same job thing. Anyway I'm bored so I thought I'd joke with ya some.
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Honestly, I feel that we're still viewed as nothing but objects. I know we can't change everywhere, but if I'm a theater teacher and my friend's a theater teacher and he gets more money even though his kids get worse grades, I'm gonna kill something! I hate the fact that most guys think of us as weird gossiping creatures with boobs. I hate that we're seen as things that make sandwiches and clean up everything! I hate that WE have to raise the kids all on our own! Hey, guess what? It's your kid, too! Help out once in a while!
... heheheh... I'm having rage issues right now.
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Sexism is alive and well, and as despicable as ever.
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Sexism is alive and well, and as despicable as ever.
I thought for a second that you said delectable. 0_o
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Honestly, I feel that we're still viewed as nothing but objects. I know we can't change everywhere, but if I'm a theater teacher and my friend's a theater teacher and he gets more money even though his kids get worse grades, I'm gonna kill something! I hate the fact that most guys think of us as weird gossiping creatures with boobs. I hate that we're seen as things that make sandwiches and clean up everything! I hate that WE have to raise the kids all on our own! Hey, guess what? It's your kid, too! Help out once in a while!
... heheheh... I'm having rage issues right now.
I like to watch The O.C. and gossip..... but I like football and raw meat too ;) Anyway my brother pays child support on his kid when she was the one that was unfaithful. His child doesn't have his last name and he only gets to see him about twice a month even tho he desperately wants to. The women he pays child support to does everything possible to try to make his life worse. At least women are favored in custody battles.
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We actually had quite the heated debate in Latin about the role of the woman. Many people seem to feel that everything was just peachy keen in Rome. Ha. If I were in Rome, I would run the hell away.
Nonetheless, it was freer than my societies before and after. At least in Rome women could own and manage property, and the dowry was in fact kept in their possession and they were allowed to use it at their discretion. Pray, if you were to run from Rome, where to would you run? To Egypt? To Parthia? Gaul? I'm not sure these would treat you much better. Indeed, in all the ancient world, few cultures were freer in this regard. Perhaps the Scythians, or Massagetai, which employed their women as warriors; maybe the Minoans, though we know little about them; likely the Egyptians. Beyond that, I'm not familiar with any culture which was more gender equitable than Rome. At any rate Greece certainly wasn't.
By the way, since you were discussing it in Latin class, read some Sulplicia. She's the only Roman poetess from around the golden age of Roman poetry.
Anyway, I don't think the majority of guys see women like that. I'm sure some do, and it lends an unforunately tained impression, but I cannot imagine it is even the majority. After all, judging by things one might hear and see, it could in similar fashion be said that women view men as little more as a means to earn money, etc. etc. Just remember that for every woman that feels men don't respect them, there are men that suffer the same. Of course, the lot of women has traditionally been worse, yet if we are speaking not of societal placement but the pure interaction between the sexes, I'd be willing to say that the objectification can be a charge applied to both sexes equally.
If I did not know any better, teaflower, I would be inclined from my experience to claim in similar fashion that women see only muscles and vigour in men (even as you say men look chiefly to breasts and so), and that whatever lies beyond those surface qualities are disregarded. That they are seen only as the 'defenders' and that it is favoured that they be stupider rather than more intelligent. Yet my reason tells me that such an assertion is most certainly in error, and that oftentimes a view from one perspective can hardly give an accurate account. I think that in all likelihood that that frustration is equally distributed amongst the sexes, with variation only in specific complaint.
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What I want in a guy is someone I can have an intellectual discussion with. Or someone who's just too awesome for words. That's why I like my friend Parker the Autistic Genius and Jay the Ultra-Really-Tall-Kinda-Scary-Junior-with-Rage-Issues. I know I would be better off in Rome than anywhere else, but I think I would run away into the future. I know guys pay child support, but maybe I'm biased because of my own family. Remember, my father still owes me $110~ and still blames it on me and my brother doesn't have to do anything if he doesn't want to yet my sister and my mother and I do.
We'll probably read actual poems in Latin III or IV.
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Well, teaflower, I honestly doubt you'd come across Sulpicia even then. She's rather obscure, I think, and there aren't many poems that she wrote (only six), and seeing as they were found as a chapter in the works of Tibullus, some think that she didn't exist, and it's just his experimenting. I'd reject that view... her style is entirely different than Tibullus. Far less polished, and even in Latin sounds more like a young girl talking, rather than an adult poet (after all, judging by the way she's talking, and the customs in Rome, she's probably something like 14.) Anyway, she seems like someone who isn't yet all that deft with the use of language, and so makes things needlessly complex... interesting, to be sure, but all the same makes it a challenge to translate. I've not happened upon her till now, and I'm in a mixed 400/500 level class, which is essentially graduate level. So the chances of you being shown Sulpicia in class are essentially zero.
If you do any poems, they'll be excerpts from Vergil, Ovid, and perhaps Catallus and Horace. These are all excellent poets (though, I must admit, have a certain dislike for Vergil on the grounds that he is very highly lauded, and yet his Aeneid is, for all its excellent Latin writing, Augustan propoganda written in the mode of Homer fanfiction!) and a tad easier. Nonetheless, even these, even in a first year university Latin course, would only be looked at in simplistic and cursory terms. When you get to the tougher writers... well, you'd have to wait for a long time to get to those... or you can always glance at her yourself. Hey, you're not having to do it for class, so find yourself a translation, find yourself the Latin, and compare the two. Rather than having to struggle through translating yourself, you can learn why and how things were done in the poetry, which can be very beneficial!
For example, this is one of hers (a translation I found on this site: http://www.geocities.com/romanelegy/sulpicia.htm) It's not a bad translation:
My hateful birthday’s come, which must be spent in gloom
in the boring countryside -- without Cerinthus!
What’s nicer than the city? What girl would want some cabin,
and the chilly river of Aretium’s fields?
Now do stay put, Messalla; you try too hard to please me:
trips, my uncle, are not always welcome.
My heart and soul will stay behind, although I’m gone,
since you won’t let me act as I would wish.
The Latin for this runs:
Inuisus natalis adest, qui rure molesto
et sine Cerintho tristis agendus erit.
Dulcius urbe quid est? an villa sit apta puellae
atque Arretino frigidus amnis agro?
iam, nimium Messalla mei studiose, quiescas:
non tempestivae saepe, propinque, viae.
hic animum sensusque meos abducta relinquo,
arbitrio quamvis non sinis esse meo.
See what you can make out of that. And when you get good enough at Latin, you can try writing your own elegy! I've managed a translation of a full sonnet of mine into proper Latin verse, but it takes a very, very long time, even when you've got a good grasp of what you're doing. Nonetheless, it can be ever so fun. Latinum gaudium est!
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Has anyone mentioned that you're too awesome for words, Daniel? Because you are.
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This basically sums up how much I respect women http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qqXi8WmQ_WM lol no seriously tho it's hilarious.
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Has anyone mentioned that you're too awesome for words, Daniel? Because you are.
Hm, nope. Usually it's just frustrated sighs as I have a tendency to talk a tad too much about things that excite me, in particular antiquity.
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Thank you, Lord J esq. Your words mean a lot.
This basically sums up how much I respect women http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qqXi8WmQ_WM lol no seriously tho it's hilarious.
O_o
I don't find that funny. At all.
I have a sense of humor, but that is downright offensive.
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Great. Now I need to wipe my history. My mom's against me seeing this sort of thing (I'm the good child), so wipey wipey, Mr. Compie!
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This basically sums up how much I respect women http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qqXi8WmQ_WM lol no seriously tho it's hilarious.
- Er...Idiotic videos like that I just do not find funny. They're to the point of stupidity where it's just not funny.