Addictions and More

First, a quick note. There's now a PayPal Donate button located on the right side of this here thing. If any of you can spare anything, from $5 to $500, that would help myself and the love of my life come up with the last bit of cash to finalize everything we need for our upcoming wedding, I would be eternally grateful. Seriously, anything that can be given would help a great deal. I hate asking for handouts, but there are some times in life when it cannot seem to be avoided, as much as I would love to find another way.

Now, on to business. Through this blog and some Facebook posts, a number of people have been tracking the progess of my week without caffeine. Overall, the experiment has been mostly one in self-flagellation; between the intermittent headaches, the horrible leg cramps, and being excessively tired, I have little to show for it than a stubborn resolve to stick to my guns and teeth that are probably whiter than they've been in years by the grace of not being stained by a constant flow of coffee and tea.

What it has given in benefit, though, is a dose of perspective and plenty of food for thought in the realm of addiction, withdrawals, and the whole "doing without" aspect of life. I think that it's really shown me, both through my own actions and in things going on around me, that people really can become addicted to anything. Work, school, friends, family, drugs, emotions, the whole range of things with which we're capable of interacting becomes a minefield of potential additictions when the collective human inclination to attach ourselves to that which we enjoy kicks in. We embrace those things in life which give us pleasure, and this becomes a form of avarice through our desire for more of that selfsame pleasure; we are driven to seek out the things that we enjoy, even if those things may be obviously self-destructive or detrimental. Look at the case of the smoker, such as myself, who knows the risks and dangers of engaging in the activity and says that they are going to, or are trying to, quit, but just need that one more cigarette to help them calm down, they've had a stressful day at work, and I just can't sleep when I'm feeling jittery like this, and well, now it's morning and I don't want to face the day without this anchor that helps me wake up, or take a break from the day while toiling away at work -- the cycle is nearly endless.

Look, too, to the abusive relationships of the world, to the people who cling to their non-lover despite the clear and undeniable acts of violence or hate, of sheer uncontrollable rage; oh, that's just how he is, he doesn't mean to hurt me -- excuses formed to keep ourselves from having to face the reality of cutting ourselves away from what we know and, for strange reasons, find comfort in. Change is a scary thing, even when that change is for the better; thus, we allow the addiction to take hold, we become enslaved to our own perception of what we need, what we want, what we idealize about the things we have, flatly ignoring the blaring klaxons screaming at us to wake up and see the light and break ourselves from our own self-terminating tendencies. We begrudgingly light another cigarette, tell the nurse that we fell down the stairs, pull the tourniquet tight so we can get a good shot at that vein and find some relief in our death-obsessive desires, all the while knowing that any moment could be our last because we've chosen to hold to the objects, sensations, emotions that we know and understand, the comfortable realm of the already-experienced, daring not to tread into the dark waters of help and healing.

And why? Is it just fear? Is there no reason besides a deep-seated desire to avoid the unknown that makes us keep our shackles even though we hold the keys? The ache in my legs right now says, "Not at all". It's not just that we can't overcome some sense of paranoia that wells up from looking into the darkness; it's that we know that unfamiliar ground can be painful. The abusive boyfriend may leave bruises, but those fade faster than emotional scars. The cigarettes may cause cancer, but that's in the future, far off from the cravings and the mood swings in today's attempt to kick the habit. We stick to what we know not only because we find comfort in it, but because we know that out there, in the world away from where we are, there's a lurking pain just waiting for us to leap willingly into its grasp, stalking us at every turn and waiting for the slip where we finally decide to plunge into the darkness from whence it can strike; and once it has struck, we find ourselves yearning for the relief that only those very same corrosive habits can offer; the succor of a well-known hurt, of a masochistic indulgence that we've already embraced.

As this week draws to a close and I wait to re-embrace my own vice, I will muse on the idea of cutting oneself off from addiction and the various rites and rituals there entwined; more next week on the subject, once I'm caffeinated and have had more time to reflect on all of this. Suffice it to say that this has been a very interesting and surprisingly thought-provoking experiment on my part, and I'm excited to use the lessons therein.

Addictions and More

Cathartistic Talent

I had a discussion with some associates of mine today about "what is art" and other such examinations; the conversation basically achieved nothing, but it got me thinking, and thinking is the fuel for ... well, whatever it is I'm doing here, which is pretty firmly established as not being art, whatever one's definition of art may be.

I'm not going to wax poetic on the meaning of art, or what makes something "art" versus "a waste of canvas" or whatever else. My thoughts on the matter aren't really relevant to anyone, since I'm not an artist or an overpaid art critic or a magazine columnist upon whom the world waits with baited breath to know the next genius splatterpainting themselves across the landscape of Our Great Nation. I'm an essayist, a socio-generic commentator, an examiner of the finer points of our own faltering ridiculousness, and I maintain that essays are not a form of art, even if they are a form of expression. My ever-so-mediocre talents don't permit me the narcissism of calling myself an artist, nor does my feeble witlessness echo with the tides of time like a significant zeitgeist burned into the collective memory of those that were there.

Now, this causes me to wonder, to really think on what it is I'm doing by chroncling my relatively unwarranted discourse on the meaning of life, the universe, and nothing in particular. I muse for the sake of musing, I think, but to what end? I'm told there are a handful of people who, for reasons beyond my ken, trudge through the mire of my twisted linguistic ambulation; it's possible, perhaps, that some unfortunate soul from among their number does so from their own perverted masochistic desire rather than the sense of obligation impressed upon my friends and family to whom I've passed the notion that I write at all anymore. So, perhaps I'm writing for them, whoever they may be; perhaps I'm trying to provoke thought in some individual somewhere who might take that thought and, like so many before them, turn that thought to action, and forge a brighter new tomorrow by way of inspiration gleaned from betwixt the rubble of my mental landscape.

I used to think I wrote to chronicle things, to leave evidence that I had once existed and known myself to think on things that I considered relevant or important; this, though, is too arrogant -- and I'd be claiming credit, whatever the case, if that was my end. I'm rather distinctly trying to separate the identity of my physical self from that of my online presence, and here, I'm just spouting ideas for the sake of it, spreading my own personal brand of propaganda, the end result of which I couldn't possibly imagine. Long story short, I'm pretty sure I'm not in this for the fame and glory. Because essayists are so often lauded with praise and seared into the public memory to be regarded as heroes for generations to come.

Am I right?

So, that leads me to a conclusion that there is no conclusion. There is no real reason that I scribble my brainwaves across the digital framework of our greatest achievement and biggest failure, the internet. It's without form or function that I give gravity to my own meandering internal monologue, breathing to life some swan-song of far-from-epic neural activity and hoping to cast some gimpse of that which I might lean on to define myself as an entity separate from any potential audience, some vain hope that someday, long after my passing, the thoughts I've collected into my fluctuating journal of the mundane will blossom into the brain of a worthwhile philosopher and bring about something -- even if it's only a thought, in passing, a mirrored glimpse of that which sparked my own lack of creativity, furthering the chain of human-to-human conceptualization which breeds the creative necessity of life.

Cathartistic Talent

Inspired Lyrics

A second of reflection can take you to the moon; The slightest hesitation can bring you down in flames.
- Covenant, "Call the Ships to Port"

None can change in me these things that I believe, but I don't know what happens now; I am too scared to close my eyes.
- VNV Nation, "Legion"

None of us will go unscathed by private battles we have braved.
- Assemblage 23, "Anthem"

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I think that blog posts centered around repeating the words of others have little to no value; even so, I feel compelled to do this, not because I cannot find words to echo these same emotional imprints, these imperatives, but because I feel I honor the intent of that poetry by allowing it to breathe in places where it normally would not.

I've selected each of these in particular for a variety of reasons. First and foremost, probably, is the fact that I've been inundating myself with these artists, and similar, over the past couple of weeks. My musical taste travels in waves, and I'm on this kind of kick right now; it's also serving as a replacement for the philosophical conversations I haven't been having, something which I examine perhaps more carefully than I would otherwise so as to engage my mind in something more thought-provoking than data entry and video games.

Second, though, these choices all share a common thread above and beyond the simple musical cohesion that brings them together; they speak of hope, and of fear, and of how we strive to make ourselves more than what we have been in the interest of achieving those hopes and dreams despite the fears and the wounds which we inevitably bear coming through those things which force us to hesitate, to consider, to imagine the possibilities of what may come should things all fall apart.

But there's another sense, and I think it's more important; the push that, while we fear, we should not hesitate. While consideration, of course, is a part of everything we do in life, I find that the things which are the most monumental, which are the most life-altering for better or for worse, are those things for which we allow ourselves to cast aside the depth of our trepidation and plunge whole-heart into the abyss, praying for the best and realizing that we don't care if it kills us, because the other side of the darkness holds so much more brilliance. It is those moments in which we allow ourselves to be more than Man, to transcend the shackles which hold us to life as we know it, and thrust the very essence of our being against the ocean of chance, struggling even as we let our bodies falter and the tides of time and fate swallow our reality.

When was the last time that your dream became yourself?

Inspired Lyrics

Cut to the Quick

Do you ever get the sense that, despite the fact that you love what you do and worked hard to get there, it's just not the right fit? I'm not talking about your stereotypical "Woe is me, I hate my job!" junk, or the lamenting that one's position is not ideal -- more like wearing a glove that, while it fits, isn't the right color to match your eyes to make them sparkle just so with that mischevious glint that lets the world that you're up to something, and you mean business.

Anyone can hold down a job that they don't like, and begrudgingly storm into work every morning, sucking down the black bitterness of daily coffee that seems the only thing to make the day tolerable -- that's easy, if unpleaseant. It takes a special kind of person, though, to take a job that they love and still feel out of place. It's not the company, the environment, the coworkers, the boss, the tasks ... all of those are great, but there's some other piece missing, some vital key that makes the whole thing jive to the hip swing of the soul. The verve, the elan, the cog that makes the whole machine click, and reconciles all sides of the self -- because the "work" side of the self is certainly at the forefront of today's society, and allowing that to be stifling prevents a certain degree of open freedom in other arenas in which we hope to succeed.

Maybe I'm just not accustomed to my relatively-new position. Maybe I'm just not hitting the numbers I'd hoped. Maybe I'm just crazy. I wonder if anyone else gets this ...

Cut to the Quick