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plague journaling
Jun. 4th, 2020 07:41 pmAt some point, I'll have to go back through these posts and see if I can spot a pattern. A schedule. Because today, I feel too exhausted by everything to even be upset any more. And I wonder if there's, like, a three-day cycle or something similar.
Outrage, despair, numbness.
Whatever the schedule might be, it feels like I keep cycling through those three emotions endlessly. There's always something new to be furious about. That feeling is too big and unmanageable, so it curdles into a helpless sadness. Then my mind shuts everything down in self-defense against the overwhelm. Again and again.
I can see my brain trying to protect me. From all sorts of threats, in all sorts of ways. I feel transparent, like all the Rube Goldberg machines of my mind are on display, all the rat mazes--just follow the rat as it scurries from level to level, flipping switches as it goes. Maybe that's why I feel so unconcerned about some of my, let's say, indulgences. The overeating, the video games, the rereading--normally, I would beat myself up about these things, because I should be doing Something Important.
But see, I can watch through this glass skull of mine and see the neurochemicals getting dumped into my bloodstream when I play Pokemon and eat one more cookie. I can see all the red alerts going off and all the little rats that get launched into motion to respond to them. And I think, what a good brain. Look at it, keeping me alive another day. Look at it, making this bearable.
It knows better than I do. I'm trying to impress someone, if only myself. I'm trying to think long-term. I'm trying to live in a world with career ladders and retirement funds and yearly physicals.
But that world isn't here right now. And my little brain, this little rat animal trying to stay alive, only cares that right now I'm sad or lonely or bored or scared. It knows how to fix that, at least for right now. I think of all the self-help books dedicated to overcoming our instincts, dedicated to mastering ourselves in some way. Don't let the social media or the food industry or the television hijack your brain. And I think, yes, but sometimes the little rat knows best. Sometimes, there's just the pain of this moment and what will make it bearable.
Right now, there is only right now. Maybe that makes me a fool. I don't know how to care about that.
Outrage, despair, numbness.
Whatever the schedule might be, it feels like I keep cycling through those three emotions endlessly. There's always something new to be furious about. That feeling is too big and unmanageable, so it curdles into a helpless sadness. Then my mind shuts everything down in self-defense against the overwhelm. Again and again.
I can see my brain trying to protect me. From all sorts of threats, in all sorts of ways. I feel transparent, like all the Rube Goldberg machines of my mind are on display, all the rat mazes--just follow the rat as it scurries from level to level, flipping switches as it goes. Maybe that's why I feel so unconcerned about some of my, let's say, indulgences. The overeating, the video games, the rereading--normally, I would beat myself up about these things, because I should be doing Something Important.
But see, I can watch through this glass skull of mine and see the neurochemicals getting dumped into my bloodstream when I play Pokemon and eat one more cookie. I can see all the red alerts going off and all the little rats that get launched into motion to respond to them. And I think, what a good brain. Look at it, keeping me alive another day. Look at it, making this bearable.
It knows better than I do. I'm trying to impress someone, if only myself. I'm trying to think long-term. I'm trying to live in a world with career ladders and retirement funds and yearly physicals.
But that world isn't here right now. And my little brain, this little rat animal trying to stay alive, only cares that right now I'm sad or lonely or bored or scared. It knows how to fix that, at least for right now. I think of all the self-help books dedicated to overcoming our instincts, dedicated to mastering ourselves in some way. Don't let the social media or the food industry or the television hijack your brain. And I think, yes, but sometimes the little rat knows best. Sometimes, there's just the pain of this moment and what will make it bearable.
Right now, there is only right now. Maybe that makes me a fool. I don't know how to care about that.
