user 115627
It's all so tiresome.
- Joined
- Apr 27, 2014
- Messages
- 4,979
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This is the first serious thread I ever created aside from diary entries, so pardon the potentially awkward tone inhabiting it. And it's gonna be a long one. So get some coffee, tea or cocaine to stay attentive.
I've been here for more than 1.5 years now and a lot of the regulars probably know me by sight and posts. Actually they are the ones this thread was initially directed at. But maybe I'm just giving myself way too much credit for leaving a proper impact on the public sphere. Narcissism much? I doubt I would realize it even if I tried. When I first joined this place I had left a forum for loners behind and was looking for a new place. I remember how I talked about trying to remain sane and keeping in touch with the world. So the plan was to be among people and occasionally put myself out there to reflect on whether I can still be considered reasonable. I'm just gonna say it outright: I think I failed.
I thought about deleting my account and looking for another forum till I realized there aren't exactly many places left to go. Looking through a couple of message boards I noticed they were either clinically dead or way too politically correct for me. That's something I always cherished this place for. While there are rules of conduct I could swear like a sailor if I wanted to and be myself out there with almost no fear of censorship. Even if this merely consisted of raging rants, absurdist humor, scary tales or messy artworks.
Before I bore everyone to death who bothered to read this I'll try to pick up the pace a little. Unlike others who came to place plagued by intense feelings of loneliness I was almost always comfortable being on my own. Yet I have parents who often treat me like a child or somebody who can't do anything on his own. But I have worked hard to get where I am now and I accomplished most of it on my own. I know I seek validation as any other person does, but mine is more focussed on my ability to analyze, deduce, create and entertain than on the recognition as someone worthy of being liked and loved - a theme I noticed around here very often. This dissonance is the very problem that leaves me with no other place go.
Based on this realization it's no surprise I have lost all friends I made around here. And lost means I cut them off knowing I couldn't fulfill the basic premises which are the foundation for a long-term friendship. Even if the other party thought otherwise. Later on you'll understand why I never was able to in the first place. You see, I have always considered many things in personal relationships to be jobs that need to be done. Especially when nobody else seems to be willing to do them. My dad holds family values very high and raised me accordingly. But the feeling of gratification for doing good things for the family or others seems to have eluded me all this time. I am bound by blood to my family and owe them my upbringing. That's a duty I will never abandon. What about the people I meet along the way of life though?
The simple act of caring about somebody and putting it into actions seems to be normal procedure to upkeep a relationship. Of course the other party has to act similarly, otherwise you end up with an unbalanced or even abusive one. Now when you only remove "caring" from the equation what does really sustain it? My answer was duty. More often than not I slip-n-slided into friendships (and also relationships). People value me for whatever of the following reasons: Levelheadedness, rationality, humor, honesty, reliability. You'd be surprised how often I questioned the how or why I ended up being somebody's friend. And once you're in it, it's **** hard to get out again without causing pain and suffering.
Throughout the times I noticed that a lot of these friends depended a whole lot more on me than I did on them. That's also the reason why I was in a couple of abusive interactions. When you're guided by duty and an analytic mind your purpose is to solve problems. Turns out solving people is not always that easy. Now nothing is more frustrating than being unable to solve a problem for me, but when you're not in it with your heart, it's easier to walk away. It becomes even easier when somebody attempts to blackmail you emotionally, but notices they have no leverage. But even if some of these people were bouncing back and forth in an emotional rubber room for a whole set of reasons, the important factor is that the majority usually cared - emotionally dependent or not.
I'd like to believe I have brought amusement, insight and support to all the people who were my friends at some point and I never asked for anything back. What little I asked for has been repaid at least twice or more. Because something I realized years ago is that no matter how long my life lasts, I want to stay out of debt. When I no longer have a sense of duty towards a person and when all debt has been repaid, there is nothing left to sustain a friendship. Now you say friendship is no business or a term to serve. It is for me. And I have witnessed enough uneven interactions to understand that an unequal distribution of "care" dooms a friend-/relationship to a slow and painful death. I'd rather just up and leave. Of course I could revel in my accomplishment of winning people over. But I am not a manipulator or a festering leech. Neither am I a hero or anybody's personal savior. I gain nothing from other people's unconditional care and neither do they. And I can't teach myself to care.
Full circle now. My lack of emotional attachment to people in general leaves me with the potential to commit evil, but also to do good. In both cases failures will leave you unharmed. While being bad has its advantages it usually clashes with my desire for the absense of conflict. And being good...I've been there too. I've talked to people who were directionless, suicidal or lonely and I gave support using the only useful tool I have: My brain. But in the long run that's the wrong set of tools. I had to face that often enough once things got a little too up close. When you open your eyes and notice what you do means nothing to you and you only do it because you have to - it's time to stop.
With this understanding the only solution is to actively deflect all friendly approaches - just business. A phrase you hear from me pretty often. My liking for everything twisted and disturbing has been nothing but helpful in this regard and I'm sure some of you out there consider me to be intimidating or scary. Others think I'm just somebody who's stuck in his edgy teenager phase...who knows. With regard to the prologue of this thread, now would be the time to say it to my face with little consequence. It's a bit of an experiment really. I have spent most of my life observing, but this time I wanted to leave the observing to others. And I wanted to leave room to express what they made of these observations.
Originally the thread posed a very simple question: "What am I?" Surely better than the "Do I seem insane to you?" poll I had in mind at the very beginning. Having burrowed your way through all these paragraphs and with my general conduct in mind, I'm sure you got enough material to answer this question. Simple statements or astute conclusions, it's free-for-all.
One last thing. Only very few individuals are excluded because I know how things would turn into a giant clusterfuck if they would get involved - so do they. And they know exactly who they are. This is a request, not a threat. I know some people can't even honor that when they are in full sermon mode. To all the others, fire away. I literally have nowhere to run.
I've been here for more than 1.5 years now and a lot of the regulars probably know me by sight and posts. Actually they are the ones this thread was initially directed at. But maybe I'm just giving myself way too much credit for leaving a proper impact on the public sphere. Narcissism much? I doubt I would realize it even if I tried. When I first joined this place I had left a forum for loners behind and was looking for a new place. I remember how I talked about trying to remain sane and keeping in touch with the world. So the plan was to be among people and occasionally put myself out there to reflect on whether I can still be considered reasonable. I'm just gonna say it outright: I think I failed.
I thought about deleting my account and looking for another forum till I realized there aren't exactly many places left to go. Looking through a couple of message boards I noticed they were either clinically dead or way too politically correct for me. That's something I always cherished this place for. While there are rules of conduct I could swear like a sailor if I wanted to and be myself out there with almost no fear of censorship. Even if this merely consisted of raging rants, absurdist humor, scary tales or messy artworks.
Before I bore everyone to death who bothered to read this I'll try to pick up the pace a little. Unlike others who came to place plagued by intense feelings of loneliness I was almost always comfortable being on my own. Yet I have parents who often treat me like a child or somebody who can't do anything on his own. But I have worked hard to get where I am now and I accomplished most of it on my own. I know I seek validation as any other person does, but mine is more focussed on my ability to analyze, deduce, create and entertain than on the recognition as someone worthy of being liked and loved - a theme I noticed around here very often. This dissonance is the very problem that leaves me with no other place go.
Based on this realization it's no surprise I have lost all friends I made around here. And lost means I cut them off knowing I couldn't fulfill the basic premises which are the foundation for a long-term friendship. Even if the other party thought otherwise. Later on you'll understand why I never was able to in the first place. You see, I have always considered many things in personal relationships to be jobs that need to be done. Especially when nobody else seems to be willing to do them. My dad holds family values very high and raised me accordingly. But the feeling of gratification for doing good things for the family or others seems to have eluded me all this time. I am bound by blood to my family and owe them my upbringing. That's a duty I will never abandon. What about the people I meet along the way of life though?
The simple act of caring about somebody and putting it into actions seems to be normal procedure to upkeep a relationship. Of course the other party has to act similarly, otherwise you end up with an unbalanced or even abusive one. Now when you only remove "caring" from the equation what does really sustain it? My answer was duty. More often than not I slip-n-slided into friendships (and also relationships). People value me for whatever of the following reasons: Levelheadedness, rationality, humor, honesty, reliability. You'd be surprised how often I questioned the how or why I ended up being somebody's friend. And once you're in it, it's **** hard to get out again without causing pain and suffering.
Throughout the times I noticed that a lot of these friends depended a whole lot more on me than I did on them. That's also the reason why I was in a couple of abusive interactions. When you're guided by duty and an analytic mind your purpose is to solve problems. Turns out solving people is not always that easy. Now nothing is more frustrating than being unable to solve a problem for me, but when you're not in it with your heart, it's easier to walk away. It becomes even easier when somebody attempts to blackmail you emotionally, but notices they have no leverage. But even if some of these people were bouncing back and forth in an emotional rubber room for a whole set of reasons, the important factor is that the majority usually cared - emotionally dependent or not.
I'd like to believe I have brought amusement, insight and support to all the people who were my friends at some point and I never asked for anything back. What little I asked for has been repaid at least twice or more. Because something I realized years ago is that no matter how long my life lasts, I want to stay out of debt. When I no longer have a sense of duty towards a person and when all debt has been repaid, there is nothing left to sustain a friendship. Now you say friendship is no business or a term to serve. It is for me. And I have witnessed enough uneven interactions to understand that an unequal distribution of "care" dooms a friend-/relationship to a slow and painful death. I'd rather just up and leave. Of course I could revel in my accomplishment of winning people over. But I am not a manipulator or a festering leech. Neither am I a hero or anybody's personal savior. I gain nothing from other people's unconditional care and neither do they. And I can't teach myself to care.
Full circle now. My lack of emotional attachment to people in general leaves me with the potential to commit evil, but also to do good. In both cases failures will leave you unharmed. While being bad has its advantages it usually clashes with my desire for the absense of conflict. And being good...I've been there too. I've talked to people who were directionless, suicidal or lonely and I gave support using the only useful tool I have: My brain. But in the long run that's the wrong set of tools. I had to face that often enough once things got a little too up close. When you open your eyes and notice what you do means nothing to you and you only do it because you have to - it's time to stop.
With this understanding the only solution is to actively deflect all friendly approaches - just business. A phrase you hear from me pretty often. My liking for everything twisted and disturbing has been nothing but helpful in this regard and I'm sure some of you out there consider me to be intimidating or scary. Others think I'm just somebody who's stuck in his edgy teenager phase...who knows. With regard to the prologue of this thread, now would be the time to say it to my face with little consequence. It's a bit of an experiment really. I have spent most of my life observing, but this time I wanted to leave the observing to others. And I wanted to leave room to express what they made of these observations.
Originally the thread posed a very simple question: "What am I?" Surely better than the "Do I seem insane to you?" poll I had in mind at the very beginning. Having burrowed your way through all these paragraphs and with my general conduct in mind, I'm sure you got enough material to answer this question. Simple statements or astute conclusions, it's free-for-all.
One last thing. Only very few individuals are excluded because I know how things would turn into a giant clusterfuck if they would get involved - so do they. And they know exactly who they are. This is a request, not a threat. I know some people can't even honor that when they are in full sermon mode. To all the others, fire away. I literally have nowhere to run.