This is what happens when I read too much psychology and philosophy in a short period of time.
And believe me, you're getting the dramatically shortened version of the whole mental spiel that led to this. XD But while driving home from work today, I think I accidentally stumbled across my life philosophy. So, being self-involved the way I am, I assume that you all want to hear it, so I'm going to share it with you. :D
We need some background information for this to make sense, so we'll start with existentialist philosophy. Existentialism states that life is suffering, and to survive is to find meaning in that suffering. I partially agree. It's true that life is miserable, painful, and hard. We have to spend most of it doing stuff we don't want to do. Seeing people we love die. Getting into car accidents, losing pets, having our hearts broken, delayed flights, dealing with Republicans in power, war and terrorism and bigotry and hate and all kinds of awful things. This sounds really terrible and depressing, and it is, but it also really depends on how you look at it.
I think that once you realize that you're always going to suffer in some way, I mean really think about it and on it and accept it as a part of life, it's easier to let it go. You don't have to spend as much time angsting and questioning, "Why is this happening to me? Why do I have to feel like this? Why is this so painful and hard?" You feel those emotions, of course, but then you accept it as an inevitability of life, and it frees you to move on. I don't think there is a meaning of life, not one big one, anyway. All that life means is whatever you want it to, really. You can choose how you react to things. Because once you realize that your reactions are a choice, then they become so. So to sum all this rambling philosophical junk up, it can be boiled down to this-
Existence is suffering. Living (as opposed to just existing) is finding joy in it anyway.
One of the other things I think I've finally come to understand is that I am only responsible for my own happiness. (This is a hard one for me, because I have a hyperactive sense of responsibility and I want so much to make everyone around me happy.) But an extension of that is that I am the only one who is responsible for my own happiness. And while I still have a long-ass way to go before I actually internalize this and quit making myself miserable for misery's sake, well, I'm working on it. And that counts for a lot.
I've been feeling better lately than I can remember feeling in a long time. Sure, some of it is the drugs, but I like to think that a lot more of it is a fundamental change in my thinking. I made some huge, life-altering decisions in the past few years that forced me to take a good hard look inward, spent pretty much all of those years being absolutely intolerable while I tried to puzzle my shit out, and I think I'm finally coming to the other side of it- as unforgivably cheesy as it sounds- a better person.
I still worry, all the time. I still angst and obsess and take things too personally and overreact and do things that I know I shouldn't and don't even really want to just because I'm too used to it not to. But I'm making a genuine effort to be aware of the things I do that I wish I didn't, in order to become conscious enough of them to change them. I spent so long not really knowing who I was, and not really liking what I thought I did know. (I don't think I'm special or anything, I know most people hate themselves, at least at some point in their lives, and everyone has emotional problems they have to learn to deal with, and I am not a unique snowflake. But this is my journal, and I'm taking some me-time to be proud of my accomplishments, dammit. :D) I have real trouble accepting compliments because I just assume that they're either lies, or the person giving them has something seriously wrong with them that warps their perspective enough to think that something about me is worthwhile. But I'm done with that now. Or, I'm at least trying to be. So I'm going to make an effort to believe the nice things that nice people say about me, and be happy and grateful for those people, and let everything else just slip off my back. Because life really is too short to wallow in suffering, especially when I have so much to be thankful for.
We need some background information for this to make sense, so we'll start with existentialist philosophy. Existentialism states that life is suffering, and to survive is to find meaning in that suffering. I partially agree. It's true that life is miserable, painful, and hard. We have to spend most of it doing stuff we don't want to do. Seeing people we love die. Getting into car accidents, losing pets, having our hearts broken, delayed flights, dealing with Republicans in power, war and terrorism and bigotry and hate and all kinds of awful things. This sounds really terrible and depressing, and it is, but it also really depends on how you look at it.
I think that once you realize that you're always going to suffer in some way, I mean really think about it and on it and accept it as a part of life, it's easier to let it go. You don't have to spend as much time angsting and questioning, "Why is this happening to me? Why do I have to feel like this? Why is this so painful and hard?" You feel those emotions, of course, but then you accept it as an inevitability of life, and it frees you to move on. I don't think there is a meaning of life, not one big one, anyway. All that life means is whatever you want it to, really. You can choose how you react to things. Because once you realize that your reactions are a choice, then they become so. So to sum all this rambling philosophical junk up, it can be boiled down to this-
Existence is suffering. Living (as opposed to just existing) is finding joy in it anyway.
One of the other things I think I've finally come to understand is that I am only responsible for my own happiness. (This is a hard one for me, because I have a hyperactive sense of responsibility and I want so much to make everyone around me happy.) But an extension of that is that I am the only one who is responsible for my own happiness. And while I still have a long-ass way to go before I actually internalize this and quit making myself miserable for misery's sake, well, I'm working on it. And that counts for a lot.
I've been feeling better lately than I can remember feeling in a long time. Sure, some of it is the drugs, but I like to think that a lot more of it is a fundamental change in my thinking. I made some huge, life-altering decisions in the past few years that forced me to take a good hard look inward, spent pretty much all of those years being absolutely intolerable while I tried to puzzle my shit out, and I think I'm finally coming to the other side of it- as unforgivably cheesy as it sounds- a better person.
I still worry, all the time. I still angst and obsess and take things too personally and overreact and do things that I know I shouldn't and don't even really want to just because I'm too used to it not to. But I'm making a genuine effort to be aware of the things I do that I wish I didn't, in order to become conscious enough of them to change them. I spent so long not really knowing who I was, and not really liking what I thought I did know. (I don't think I'm special or anything, I know most people hate themselves, at least at some point in their lives, and everyone has emotional problems they have to learn to deal with, and I am not a unique snowflake. But this is my journal, and I'm taking some me-time to be proud of my accomplishments, dammit. :D) I have real trouble accepting compliments because I just assume that they're either lies, or the person giving them has something seriously wrong with them that warps their perspective enough to think that something about me is worthwhile. But I'm done with that now. Or, I'm at least trying to be. So I'm going to make an effort to believe the nice things that nice people say about me, and be happy and grateful for those people, and let everything else just slip off my back. Because life really is too short to wallow in suffering, especially when I have so much to be thankful for.