2-15-25
I feel bliss, pure bliss. I have no desires outside of my reach. Clothing, shelter, food, love, all other achievements are before me. It is simply the act of taking them.
Last night I once again related pursuing art to shoveling against the flow of the universe. => Though truly, I suppose what I mean is against the flow of society. Though that doesn’t feel quite like the right word. Just like yesterday’s writing, I’m hesitant to claim that anyone is out to get me. So then I might say “… shoveling against the flow of lethargy/complacency.” The latter feels most accurate. Because I feel my repulsion- god, I need to have a dictionary by me. Okay, yes. Repulsion as in pushing back, I do not mean it as disgust.
But, complacency is something I have found myself repelled against, or to put less eloquently but more like how I speak: “It’s too early to call it quits.” I still want more. If I stayed where I am, I would not be happy. Therefore, my happiness is a sort of ouroboros. My goal is to be happy, but where I’m at will not suffice, so I am motivated to do more in order to become happy. My happiness is the fuel to become happier.
It’s not quite perpetual motion, but it is something that is motivated by itself. To take an even wider view, life is the motivation for living.
But that word “life” has so much magic to it, more than “living” does. Because “life” is a thing we all have, but there’s also a version of the word that is so aspirational. To consult the dictionary once more…
Okay, let’s really get into the weeds of it. (It’s at times like this that language really feels like a science. And maybe all that humans make is “science.”)
LIFE, in its most basic form, is what occurs between birth and death.
But when I use it as the motivation for living I mean it as:
A way of living.
Livelihood: means of support or substance. Quality or state of being lively.
Or spirit/animation.
What a crazy word. We mean so much with it and use only four symbols to represent it, how simple.
Anyway, back to the ouroboros. The desire to have a good life is the motivation to have a good life. This will cause one to do the work necessary to have a good life, and in turn, their goal will be achieved.
I hate to point to any religious text or holy book, but I believe all of this to be stated in Sartre’s Being and Nothingness. I hate to skirt my own thinking in favor of relying on some holy text, but I only mention it as one, a form of citation to explore these ideas further, and two, to acknowledge a text that stated things I had already been thinking/feeling but could not fully articulate. - So, I suppose in both regards, as a tool.
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I AM ONCE AGAIN ABOLISHING WORDS/PHRASE SUCH AS “I FEEL” “I’M THINKING” “MAYBE” FROM MY LEXICON. THEY DO NOT SERVE ME. THEY ARE TOOLS USED IN ORDER TO BE ABLE TO TAKE PARTIAL OWNERSHIP OF MY IDEAS.
Now, to what I was thinking before that declaration. I am entering the spring of my life. At the least, the spring of my adulthood. But I say of my life (my personhood) because I feel (acceptable use of feel) as if previously I was a bulb. Alive, yes, but underground, protected from life’s harshness, but able and aware to reap its benefits. Nutrients from the soil, and the water that would trickle through it. But *insert Plato’s allegory of the cave CD here to listen along at home*.
Many branching thoughts here:
Life underground is life. Beings can be fully sustained by all they get underground (nutrients and water).
Sprouting up through the dirt is a trial. You are going against gravity and your only tool is brute force. Just push. That is all that is required to get to the sunlight.
Budding, growing, just simply living above ground is a fuller, more rewarding experience than living below ground. You can feel the sunshine and be nourished by it. Get soaked by rain and know how quenched your roots (and whole being) will be. You will also have to weather cold, frost, animals trying to eat you, fungi, rot, disease.
But you can only grow flowers above ground.
What a far more interesting and fulfilling experience. Why remain underground? Why accept all current circumstances? Why be complacent with less?
I want more.