September 3, 2020

 I feel like shit today.

...

I spoke with my therapist, and I felt like shit. 

In that creative part of my mind I saw an oozing, slimy, black substance, slipping out of a vagina or a massive womb-cave. Mind says that's not good.

I don't think I will see my therapist again. Either she does not understand me, or I don't understand myself. When she repeats back what she thinks I mean it seems way off, and it is immensely frustrating.

...

I have sent an email cancelling my future appointments, ending our relationship.

...

I've reached a tipping point. I don't want to waste any energy on anyone who uses the slogan ACAB (All Cops are Bastards) or Blue Lives Matter. My life is too short and to waste my energy on those things. I wish I didn't care. But I do care. So I have to fight to get my resources back from these warring ideologies.

ACAB is stupid and short sighted.

Blue Lives Matter is closer to being reasonable, but it's just another slogan. It is the seemingly inevitable counter-counter-movement to the counter-movement.

BLM (Black Lives Matter) has lost its way. It has become meaningless. It has run its course. But the problems remain.

If there is a revolution, I will likely die a coward and a traitor by the hands of whichever side pulls me out of the gutter first. 

...

So much heat and no light in my world.

Better to find a new way.

...

I finished At the Existentialist Cafe. I've been meaning to read it for a few years now. I couldn't get around to actually reading my physical copy, so I listened to it as an audiobook, mostly during my semi-regular morning walks. I learned a lot. I cured me of my fascination with existentialism. I like Sartre and Heidegger much much less. I like de Beauvoir a little less on a personal level, but my respect for her work remains the same. Meanwhile my love and respect for Camus has grown. (I'm working on his book The Rebel, and it is life affirming.)

I may need to look further into the less known existentialists like Merleau Ponty. It's hard to keep track of all of the other less famous names because I'm using an audiobook. (This little clip of Hubert Dreyfus discussing Ponty is promising.)

...

Studying philosophy and misc. intellectual ideas has been a long and unfolding drama. Sometimes it feels like nothing more than words—woven air. Other times it's brilliant. Today it feels like one or the other from hour to hour. At the moment, intellectual pursuits feel like bullshit. 

I know I can't quit reading. I sort of wish I could. But that would be death. 

I used to think that reading would make me great. It made me greater. But I am not great. I'm starting to get diminishing returns. I'm not an intellectual like Camus or any of my other heros. I am unusual but in an unremarkable way. 

...

I miss the gym. I miss lifting weights. I hope I can return to it someday. I feel weak without it. I would be sad to see my body continue to go in the direction that it is going at its current rate. —Feels like death.