What Can Be Done

I go back and forth between feeling like the future is already set to a limited degree in a negative direction with consequences for myself, and still having the hope that positive change in my personal life is still possible.

For example, I am having some night time dreams that feel like premonitions. These dreams are ones where I am grappling with the fall out of a great societal calamity, a change to the laws and social order, imperfect though they are now, but completely unworkable in the near future with personal drastic results for the vulnerable, especially within my own family. Or the dreams are of the nature of my experiencing the results of an unpreventable global war, my being called away to fight in a long-suffering intolerable mess that drags on for years until I am ultimately capable of getting reunited with the remnants of my family.

I know, especially having written them down, that these dreams could be seen as manifestations of my age old anxieties and difficult emotions surrounding my insecurities. I've literally spent years writing about them in my blog. Still, it's hard not to feel like maybe they actually portend something terrible. Logically speaking, I suppose it is possible they could even be both premonitions and irrational emotional expressions of my current state. The universe is a mysterious place. 

But, the strange things is that, at times, I allow myself some emotional space to admit, for hope's sake, that these dreams may not be premonitions at all, finding the small feeling of hope telling me that my dreams are symbolic rather than temporal. Maybe, for me, the future both in the physical world of 'here' as well as in the 'hereafter' will not be as bad as I think. Maybe my fears have created their own reality to justify their existence. 

With that said, it doesn't take a genius to see the world struggling with dark forces and negative behaviors that could result in a lot of global regret and overnight calamities arising from a few poorly timed choices and miscalculations.

I'm caught in the middle. As I said before, I feel like I am waiting for some kind of shoe to drop. I told my mom today that I had always tried to avoid failure, but maybe what I should have been doing was trying to build success, the one being passive and inert, and the second being proactive. The two are not the same. My finances being an example of passive avoidance versus active exertion.

If I make friends with God, allow myself to change belief into behavior, and acquire the practical virtues of patience, long suffering, wisdom, and restraint, maybe I will feel as if my life is turned around for the better. An old man needs hope as fish need water. The world does not need another bitter old man waiting around for an end and the elusive dropping shoe.

Not Doing So Hot

How did things come to a pass like this? I'm living life like I've gotten my diagnosis and found out it's terminal: trying to connect with my sisters, relate kindly to my parents, spending money for treats that I can't really afford, and preserving my energy for coping with the news of another horrible blow to come. Why did 'helping' become something to be hated? A media drenched society is drowning in a sea of bad news, at the mercy of a pervasive evil. 

I'm really trying to cope without losing myself in hopelessness. I realize I can't save my family, and I am not sure I have the skills to support myself alone. United we stand and divided we fall. 

Took my vulnerable sister to breakfast and paid for it. Wanted to bond in a way that went beyond work or typical family nonsense. Trying to say through memory for the future that despite our occasional disagreements and misunderstandings, we're a family. 

Thinking about doing something similar for the other sisters.

Argued with Mom briefly. Can't really say for the hundredth time that I am worried, indirectly ask for the reassurance none of us feel, or describe my fears in a way that doesn't weary our ears for the sheer routine of the complaints. 

I keep my deepest fears hidden because I know the futility of expressing them to reach a satisfying conclusion is impossible. Words are weak. In these days before the stunning blow, I try to connect. Feel the moment. Create the memory. And above all else, I pray for mercy for us all that the divine chastisements that await us in justice will not torment us overlong.

Update on the Now 2024

Still worried about the future, but not as attached to the feelings of inevitable disaster as before. For example, I still believe, with evidence I think, that the future will be incredibly difficult in the next few years. And, I hold no illusions that I will somehow be exempt from the jaws of tyranny, of cruelty, or suffering. But, I think I am resigned to whatever happens.

My reasoning is this: as it would be impossible or foolish of me to try and resist the will of God, as long as I act as righteously and as faithfully as I can, then whatever must be must be. I am not declaring defeat, of course. I am merely saying that there are only so many things that are within my ability to either influence or control. If I do my best, and continue to try in my efforts at improving myself and my circumstances, then perhaps I might be guided to where I need to be. 

It's still hard to accept sometimes that my suffering and struggle might be the inevitable consequences of living my best attempt at life, my coping with previous life choices, but I can rationally see no other alternative. It is what it is. 

Currently, I live with my parents, work at their business, and serve their life needs as they age. (Buying groceries, giving rides, taking them to doctor's visits.) This also sometimes includes tasks for my disabled sisters and their extended families. Through all of it, I try to develop into a noble soul as best I can see it. 

With the global tragedies unfolding before us in surprising ways, I can imagine a circumstance where global events reach a point of causing more sorrows than people's ability to endure. My nation, so enamored as it is of material things, is especially vulnerable to this kind of grief. I only hope to survive the difficulties, so that I live to serve as long as I can, and so that, when I face the Lord, I truthfully can say that, when I matured, I did the best I could.

Cassandra's Worries for the Future

 

It's been five years, maybe? Not sure. But, maybe that doesn't matter. What is time when everything is uncertain? It used to be that I had a plan for the future, a design on which skills I could gain, which path I could take, in order to bring myself closer to an ideal circumstance, but the only things that seem certain are difficulty and challenge. I am not looking forward to living life alone on my own terms. Right now, I do not have the financial means to support myself, and it doesn't look like I will for a long time. No retirements for me, no inheritances, no windfalls—just continued poverty as old age creeps around the edges of my life. I worry about homelessness, but I know I also make moral choices to support the people already in my life, and maybe that means they get more money and attention than I do.

I've been a little charmed (perhaps beguiled is the right word) by the overly sunny video blogs about the vanlifers, the people decades younger than me having grand outdoor adventures in vans that cost as much as a house did when my parents bought one. Like some people who imagine what they would do with lotto winnings, I sometimes imagine what it would be like to live long term in a van. Somehow, that seems more obtainable than owning a home, retiring with a significant savings, and providing a meager support for my family and friends. I have no illusions. I know this is all social media where the ugly parts are hidden, the hidden supports are concealed, and the 'facts' are only true in terms of entertainment. Still, it feels emotionally relaxing to consider this as a possibility, even if I acknowledge that, intellectually, it is a fantasy. 

Note for the net: I am still exercising my esperanto language skills with web apps. Youtube doesn't have as much videos as the used to, which is a shame. I have also started to learn clawhammer banjo. I am getting better with my rhythm hand, but I tend to play the same five or six chords in the same tuning. Should I put more effort into it? I hope I become a superlative banjo playing with the grace of God. With the same fervor, I hope that I can increase in personal virtue, wisdom, and knowledge to accept the unseen challenges of the future with the aplomb and dignity I wish. 

In a strange way, I am thinking a lot about the Harold and Maude movie from the early 70s. In a weird way, maybe I want to be a male maude, a vibrant, almost emotionally exuberant person celebrating every inch of life with the wisdom of a lived experience. I'm not a libertine like her character was, and I will not cause conflict and contention if I can help it, but I am thinking about conscious spirituality in the face of a world intent on descending into horrors and cruelty that people can't envision at the moment. 

How did Cassandra, from ancient Greece, and who was cursed to know the troubles of the future but also not to have anyone believe her or listen to her admonitions, not go insane with worry, frustration, and anger at the willful blindness that absolutely surrounded her. The answer seems to be a radical detachment from the outside world, and a powerful connection to the inside font of spirituality that directs her steps.

Reaching for Reason and Hope

Most of my posts seem to be me exploring my inner emotional life in one way or another, and that exploration, in some form or another ends up with depression. I wish I could say "most of my posts lately...", but that is not the case. It now seems to be a permanent facet of my adult emotional life. Of course I worry that is had been so long that it is more of a habit than a reality, but I am not sure that is the case.

I feel anger slipping out every once and again. When I think on something that concerns me, something that seems amiss, I worry it like a stone in my pocket, until I find myself having angry conversations with imaginary people in my head. Not the schizophrenic conversations, as in hearing voices, just the everyday scenarios people play in their heads about what should have been done or said or felt, etc.

At the root of it now, all of it, all of the depression, worry, anger and whatnot seems to be frustration with the course of my life and my feeling of helplessness over things and upcoming issues that I do not think I will be able to prevent. Imagine a ship's cabin standing on a bridge and seeing an iceberg slowly approaching—one that will definitely sink the ship. It's too late to change course, the engine room isn't responding to directions, you're just drifting to disaster, unable to stop it. That's a pretty good metaphor for much of what I think I am experiencing.

We live in interesting times where chaos and contention seems to be a rule. Everyone and everything is caught in a whirlpool of anger where they project their fears and concerns into a ball of concentrated hatred. You see it happening all around you. You know it's wrong, but you can't seem to be able to stop it. No one listens to you. They're so wrapped up in their fears that nothing breaks through the cocoon.Sometimes, I am the same way. Except that I refuse to hate anyone else except sometimes myself.

And that might probably be the root of most of my trouble. Part of my own frustrations, angers, etc. is my belief, as solid as any, that I am not worthy of acceptance or praise. I feel like I have tried my best and lost. I was naive and let opportunities fly by thinking that I had an unending series of chances. Frustrated then, I fought against what I thought were injustices or unfair circumstances, only to make choices that did actual harm instead choosing to let those imaginary harms go.

The thought I have in my best moments is essentially this: if I nurture positive, humble beliefs about myself, maybe I can forgive my own mistakes, learn to be detached from the imaginary outrages that seem so real, and be the man of virtue I wish to be. Easier said than done, of course. It seems that this is a daily battle. And one thing about my personality that is a long-standing issue is that I easily give up when I perceive I have failed, when all my negative biases about myself are confirmed, and then, feeling like I have slipped back to the beginning, have even less resolve to continue to fight against bad habits, negative thoughts, less motivation to make good choices based on reason and hope, rather than fear and anger. 

Fires Continue to Burn

The fires in the Northwest continue to burn making most of the valley smell like a campfire, or the inside of a barbecue pit. The weather apps on ones pocket phone notifies us of "smoke" as our local weather. Not "Cloudy." Not "Chance of Rain." Not "Freezing Fog." But, "Smoke." That's a new one for me.

It also happens that just as these fires pour out the ash into the atmosphere, fires that are hundreds of miles away and largely unseen except for dusty atmosphere along the horizon, I have been thinking about my own life and how it feels that something hidden in me is on fire somewhere, pouring out the haze of smoke into my thinking, clouding the normal hopes with a dusky uncertainty about whether or not I can overcome the challenges I perceive.

Therefore, I have been thinking hard about the many choices that we make, how despair is the paralysis of the spirit, and that keeping oneself healthy emotionally and mentally better equips us to face the difficulties that we encounter each day.

Another thought. Today, I was trying to think of a metaphor. For example, a man may be such an expert at building a house that there is nothing he does not know about the subject, and there is nothing he is not capable of doing in regards to houses. He may have all of the money and tools he needs to accomplish the task. Every material may be laying at his feet. There is nothing stopping him from building a house. But if he doesn't want to do it, he doesn't start. Then, imagine him standing there, a time passes.Then a day, then a week. After a time, guilt and worry about not doing something he could actually do sets in. The worry and guilt build, and the task which could have been simple, seems harder than every. Eventually, the worry and the guilt are replaced by shame as he tries to hide from himself. The job becomes a reminder of his failure. Then, that shame and failure becomes despair, and he is spiritually paralyzed by the whole affair. Maybe even lost.

Of course, one who is healthy, and not haunted by those inner weaknesses wonders why he did not just do it. It was a simple matter in the beginning after all. But, life presents us with problems and challenges before we are even clear on what those problems are.

End of History

Yesterday, I had the strong feeling like I was living at the end of history. The red sun because of the haze from the fires in California, the bizarre news stories and contentiousness on the television, the heat of the day (hotter than it has been), and all of the artificial ways we use to mitigate the heat with air conditioners, and avoid the conflicts on television with denial, gave me this odd feeling. I know every society on earth has believed themselves to be the pinnacle of history and development, and for a time, they were. The 1100's, 1762, the middle 1830, 1982 - each were the most advanced for their day, and had difficulty imagining what was the come.

And here we are, living in this science fiction reality, where the earth seems to be burning up with either fire, heat, or anger.

My realization that I cannot prevent any of this societal drifting into trauma is humbling and sobering. My life of insignificance and wasted chances make the same thought utterly laughable.

It really does feel that we're out to sea, the waves are tossing back and forth, land is out of sight, and all we can do is keep floating, sailing, fighting to remain upright as we are tossed back and forth.