despair – The frustrations of an overthinker

Awakening from the sneaky despair

I feel the awakening from a time of having my spirit subdued. I’ve been asleep I think. How do I know this? Well, there’s some seriously disturbing clues that makes me wretch and feel disgusted as the light of recognition exposes something that I’d really like to be hidden.

Over the last 8 months I’ve succumbed to the spirit crushing shit that life seeks to spoon feed us. I started to quite like those blandly vanilla twats on This Morning and developed an unhealthy liking of game shows. The Chase and some shit where they push counters have been appealing to the point where I’ve reprimanded a child as they’ve entered the room during the final round as I need to avidly listen to it.

What the fuck has happened to me. I do recall seeking to resist this when I first started watching this shit. I verbalised the ‘Why the fuck are we watching this shite’ to my wife at the time but then I got sucked in. I’d have more respect for myself if I’d been sucked in by something proper like crack or heroin.

In conducting an autopsy on my spirit, there’s some clues as to what was causing this dis-ease. Obviously the pandemic is central here. I was aware of the stress I felt by the more obvious changes in behaviour. The comfort eating and getting pissed more. I noticed more fluctuating moods at times, but sinking into spirit crushing mediocrity really crept up in me. When I find myself recording This Morning and scheduling in The Chase with a pleasant coffee and piece of cake, suddenly there’s a realisation that things have slipped horribly.

Is this what happens when your inner spirit dies? Is this the result of spending all our time and energy on work and kids so that all you can do is vegetate in our own shit as you let this dross wash over you. No winder depression is on the fucking increase.

In being compassionate to myself, I can blame the fatigue and need for comfort brought on by the pandemic. You can blame the pandemic for anything – maybe rape and murder is pushing it, but drug use and theft is definitely worth a try. Maybe I needed just some light stuff to soothe my stressed noodle. The fact I’m disgusted with myself (and everyone else who by their incessant viewing encourages more of this drivel to be made and broadcast to endlessly dull our senses and keep use docile) must mean that my pandemic mood is evolving.

Maybe it’s a good thing; maybe this awakening is my inner anger for all the losses and difficulties the pandemic has brought is now coming out. How will I control this or at least find a way to express it. We’ve already established that we can’t use the pandemic as an excuse for murder but I don’t think stealing lots of stuff (unless it’s drugs) is going to soothe the potential inner rage.

I will experiment with resolving my inner unease by killing the neighbours cat and writing a ransom note in it’s blood. This may sound harsh, but there’s a lovely element to this as I plan to use the ransom money to get it stuffed and will then return the pussy; perfectly preserved forever. It’s actually a thoughtful gesture in some sense as Burbank is now immortal in a way. Just the thought of this means that I’m now feeling a bit more me. What next – infiltrate Holly Willoughby’s makeup team and replace her caked on face powder with a semi-permanent face dye that makes her look like an oompa-loopa for a month.

Passive aggressive behaviour where we do some funny as fuck stunts – this could be the start of my new cult. It’s a bit Fight Club-esque. Who’s in?

It’s Time to be More Free

I’m trapping myself once more in the unnecessary needs of my own suburban life. I’m self-employed and I continually expect the business to grow which means I tend to put more in, feel stressed if I have a low week/month and feel guilt if I’m not doing the marketing and admin aspects of it that I don’t really see as necessary to the day to day activities. As it grows, I then buy unnecessary shit like a summer house or new windows. This adds more pressure to fund this which means that I don’t take enough time off which stresses me which means I want to ‘treat myself’ with unnecessary shit to soothe my noodle, which creates a further need to earn more and therefore not take time off. And so the fucked up hamster wheel continues.

Part of the desire to run my own business, beyond doing something of purpose that had solid ethical roots and was run to a very high standard, was to have the freedom it gives. It does give a whole heap of freedom such as doing very little on Thursdays, being able to do most of the schools runs (although that doesn’t always feel like a privilege at times when we’re looking for the lost shoe once-a-fucking-gain when we need to be leaving the house) and spending more time with my children. It does come with the restrictions that are ultimately self-imposed restrictions. Most of our pressures are self-induced pressures anyway and evidently I like squeezing the absolute fuck out of myself.

It’s like I’ve lost touch with my former more philosophical self. That Self was making decisions where finance and money were in the background. The decisions were driven about doing something of value and purpose that had a positive impact on society as a whole. The income was secondary and I was willing to have a lower income in place of a greater sense of fulfilment. This was fuelled from being sick of the spirit-crushing corporate world which seemed half-full of misdirected people who couldn’t find a vocation and were convincing themselves that the business world was for them. The other half seemed to be sociopathic twats who were out to boost themselves from a status and financial perspective by taking from anything and anyone in their path. It was a place of pointless paper pushing, despair and disgust for me.

This despair helped lay the foundations of what I do now and why I do this. Over the years I’ve lost focus on the ethical and philosophical foundations of what I do. Writing this serves as a decent reminder to reconnect with that part of me. Over time, I’ve grown and I’ve taken on new responsibilities which has added pressures to provide. My vocation remains strong and wonderfully fulfilling and maybe it’s time to let go of some of my self-induced needless pressures.