Playing Jeopardy

So, this whole "Black Friday" thing... I think I made it out intact, and without buying a bloody thing, and not just because I was flat fucking broke. For me, and for certain like-minded others, it was International "Buy Nothing Day," the best freaking holiday ever on the biggest shopping day here in these United States. I find that I've been in an activist/world-improving mood lately, and a decrease in consumer madness is a cause I can get behind. After all, we have the world we make, don't we?

I've given some thought lately to the way I interact with the world, in a number of ways. I do, after all, have a lot of time to think, since I'm hardly ever spending that time communicating my inner workings effectively. (Why am I simultaneously so strongly desiring to help the world and pick on myself?) Why do I no longer spend the time and effort using the online mediums which I'm more traditionally known for? I no longer post in my other online community sites or newsgroups (and haven't for some time), e-mail many of my friends, sign on to instant messengers frequently, or any of that. Am I so very disconnected from my past? Maybe I'm just sick of the act. Is it so obvious that I spend so much time playing the fool and hiding those parts of me that mean anything that no one's willing to spend the time to find them? Or is it that I play all too well, and it's gotten hard for me to express truth anywhere where I think somebody I know might stumble across it. Whatever the pathetic little story, I want to keep the loved ones that I have, but I want them to see me as something that I have no idea how to show them. And if I were to find a new group, I'd probably just fuck it up again. After all, how do you get people interested in you without putting on a show? And if you do draw them in, how do you keep from becoming the show in their eyes and in your own? Hell, what defines a person besides the fact that they are conscious? Don't we, as consciousnesses, have right to create definitions as we understand them? Can the parts of me that are hidden from others even be said to exist if no one else can see them, and I refuse to define them? Can something that doesn't exist, in the strictest sense of the word, hurt?

Ugh, too much thought for this early in the morning. Why can't I just be happy with the friends my shell's made? I used to take pride in my ability to seem interesting, why only now has it become important to me to be loved for something I actually am? And who cares what I want? Haven't I given up any right to demand anything out of my relationships by hurting others and being openly , or more often, just loosely dishonest? Hell, isn't my (relatively) careful anonymity a form of dishonesty? (Not that I'm arrogant enough to believe that anyone actually reads this whine-hole, but if anyone were to read it, would I be lying to them?) Who the hell wants honesty, anyway? The truth hurts more than the games we play, and I always lose at the game where we stop playing games. I can't lose and can't get hurt if you can't pin me firmly to anything, so what is it in me that wants the risk now? And who'd even want to be there to be the reward for that risk? Who could love something that has trouble pinning itself down long enough to be looked at, that's barely strong enough to stand up to the light of scrutiny, that's too shadowy at the the borders to be sure it's really there and not just a trick of the light?

I've been worried over recently, but with every questioning soul that expresses concern, I've known how to turn them aside, to at least tide them over until they get distracted by something more pressing or less indefinite. I want with everything in me to be strong enough to decide to be something because that's what I want to be, and not because I think it fits in with a persona I've generated or because it's what I think someone else wants of me, but because I'm happy with it. I'm better about that than ever, and it's an uphill battle, but I could win it, I swear. But more than that, I'd like to have something that others love about me that isn't mere physicality, or something I'd intended to show them, although being well aware that my charm isn't in my looks, having some part of them complimented is a rare treat. Ugh. Now I'm just being a bitch. The world is what it is, and it's hard to remember that there's nothing I can control about it but me, and to try to increase others' control over themselves rather than influence them to act in the way that I prefer.

*sigh* I think I've emoted enough for one morning. I should sleep. After all, I'm a being with responsibilities, right? Can't disappoint.

To live by..

I find in myself a need to get back to some kind of base, to re-define why it is I do all the crap I do, and just as I was beginning to worry that there was to be no method to my madness, I found a document on my computer with a list of life rules I pulled from some forum or something. I've long lost the name of whoever I got these from, and I definitely modified them a bit to fit within my worldview, but more interestingly, is a rules-based life what I want? I mean, I've always had ethical principals, and I modify them as I find necessary, but to what extent can even broad self-imposed mandates be right or wrong, even for me? And what does right or wrong even mean? There's definitely "right-" and "wrong-feeling," and there's the religious ethical code, and the sense of justice that laws are meant to defend. I suppose the best use for an ambiguous, lazy creature such as myself would be "right" as a square peg fits a square hole. So how do I know when I've found the most fitting way to be? Certain things that have felt like they might have fit in my life at one point have since proved to be quite incompatible with my often-contradictory nature. If I'm wrong about the fit of a guiding principal, what kind of chaos could I cause? At least I know that I'm not alone in my belief that the world does not have a guaranteed reward for anything. No matter what I do, I might never have any of the big things I want. But on the positive side, being "moral" is something I do for its own sake, since I can expect nothing from it. The smug satisfaction that I get from knowing that despite what I and most of close friends say, I'm a "good" person. Hear that, buddies? Not that anyone knows about this place. Maybe I'll eventually be comfortable enough with being/sharing myself to tell someone about it. That'll be the day. *shakes fist* You'll never get the chance to take me seriously! In the meantime, for the random people I don't know who might read them, here are those rules that have attracted my attention for the time being.

1. Happiness is at least as much a state of mind as it is a condition.

2. You are responsible for you. You are responsible for all of your action and hence for all of the foreseeable consequences of those actions. People make their own fate. Yes, there are victims, but most often, your own misfortunes are your own doing.

3. If you don't like they way things are going, the conditions of your life or something about yourself then change it. Don't whine about it and expect it to change itself.

4. Everyone has opinions. That doesn't mean everyone is right. However, don't give up on yours just because someone tells you that you are wrong.

5. If someone doesn't like who you are or something you do then fuck them. You don't have to answer to anyone and if push comes to shove, you don't need someone like that around. Always be true to yourself.

6. Know the people who love you and stand beside them. One day you are going to need them to stand by you.

7. If you are afraid to try, know this: if you give up you will almost certainly fail, and definitely have failed yourself. However, if you try you might win. Possible success' is a lot better odds than 'almost certain failure'.

8. Let the little things slide, because, seriously, who needs that kind of aggravation?

9. If you live only for the weekends, you're wasting an awful lot of time.

10. You are always worth it.