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What's in a name?
18 years ago
General
Today I got the funny realization that I'd just met one more "Matt" who happens to be an asshole.
...
Yes, I know, I know, "All Generalizations are False, including This one" --Mark Twain; not EVERY Matt is an asshole, but I've distinctly detected in Matt observations an otherwise inexplicable tendency to be assholes. And here's something to consider: I am absolutely SURE that I am an asshole deep down in my heart--not just the regular everyday "Everybody's an asshole, really"--I mean that if I did not clamp down on myself with an IRON FIST, I would, daily, be making the lives of the people around me 75% WORSE, AT LEAST.
But you see, that's what makes it worthwhile to me... that I care enough to attempt to make a difference, even if it doesn't always work out. It's not dishonesty to self (I know I'm a jerk, and I admit that I'm a jerk); it is merely that it is within my capability to make a more positive (or at least less negative) impact on the experiences of those around me, and if you can't accept any reason for me to do it other than a selfish one, I'll GIVE YOU a selfish one: it makes me feel good. When I make someone's day, it makes MY day. And when I've had my day 'made' and I feel great, EVERYBODY has a much better time! It's like a good mood grants me a +12 ability modifier to my otherwise quite unfortunate charisma. When I feel good, and I wing it, life only gets better. If I feel bad, though, PLOOM! Everything bombs straight to shit. I've witnessed this. It's interesting to watch.
Lately though, especially the past few days, I've been slowly, excruciatingly climbing a ladder, attempting to shovel my way out of this shit hole mood, and it has been the very definition of arduous. If you've never been depressed, it isn't POSSIBLE to have it adequately explained to you just how badly it affects every corner of your life. The internal feelings of uselessness add up to a constant emotional, mental, and PHYSICAL fatigue. My arms were feeling like they were made of lead. The universe weighed on my shoulders and dragged at my every step. But now... it's almost gone. So close, soooo close....
See, what I did lately was... confess to something. I don't really know whether or not it's true, but... it is about something I have been doing for quite a long time.
For a while, I was extremely disdainful of the catholic church. Whenever a discussion about religion ensued, I plied my every fiber of focus toward tearing down Christianity... In every subtle reference I made to do with philosophy or theology, christianity was to blame. And living with the people that I used to live with didn't help this problem any, at all... In fact, staunch atheists that they were, I felt attacked whenever I made note of even the small bits of belief that I DID have at the time. Eventually, I made a rather large mistake; I shut spirituality out of my life.
Now, there's something really special about my new roommates. They know that a personal journey is, after all, a personal journey. They are extremely spiritual, somewhat occult, and even themselves supernatural... very well-developed in the realms of spirituality. Naturally, I attempted to piggyback, and was met with resistance that I didn't expect. That's fine, though, because that's when I realized, this was the personal part of the personal journey. In a fell swoop they pointed out to me a large chunk of hypocrisy I'd been crippling myself with; which I have subsequently taken head on and work on even as we speak.
But you see, we had many discussions about faiths, and it eventually came to the point where they had to ask me, "What IS IT with you and Christianity? What did it ever, EVER do to YOU, PERSONALLY?"
... That stopped me dead in my tracks.
Well, what DID it do? DID it do anything? I was surely angry at the hypocrisy involved, the corruption, the greed--but that happens with EVERY large-scale institution, even ones that are only a few decades old. By all rights, if THAT was the reason, I should be hating everything. They asked me, "Why can't you just forgive, you know?"
...That was another good point my friends had. Why CAN'T I? That is probably the single easiest thing to do to someone that you can't remember doing anything to you in the first place...
I was asking myself, but I was not getting any answers, at all... and then I started to wonder: When do I usually hide things from myself? When I feel guilty. When I feel extremely guilty. Certainly it's always a bad idea to just jump to conclusions, but all that was on the line was my respectability, and that, to me, cannot hold a candle to Personal Truth.
I dug deeper. I guess I never -really- believed that the fact that society killed a man 2000 years ago just because he thought we should be nice to eachother had any direct effect on MY LIFE. Of COURSE there are indirect effects: ancestors could've been forced to carry out the raising of closer ancestors by the following of Christianity or even specifically the Catholic sect of it. But honestly, Jesus DYING to sync all our 'sins' away and give us a fresh start ... It feels like a copout to me more than anything. And for that matter, I think a lot of extreme catholics KNOW that it's a copout, and THAT would be why there is so much make-yourself-miserable in Catholic tradition; They're doing penance for something they were told not to feel obligated to do penance for. But I never felt like it did me any good to sit in a church for hours a week. Sure, if it discernibly made me feel happier or gave me a better part of wisdom, maybe, but I'm a heck of a lot LESS wise than a lot of people who have never gone to church a day in their life.
All it boils down to is: I was being forced to eat something I did NOT like the taste of, and I was forced to do it for 17 years. "Oh, BOO HOO," a lot of people can feasibly say, "I've had to..." ...and then they'd go on for thirty minutes about their life, which was admittedly at least thirty times worse than mine; I doubt I would've survived two steps where they have walked and labored for decades. But all that means is... My boil-down, plus 400 penalties, I told Den-Mother in front of Alpha Female that the reason I've had so much animosity toward Catholicism is because...
"... I can't have my cake and eat it too; I'm too lazy to commit myself to what it demanded." --which was in fact not exactly the wording I was going for.
This, naturally, conjured in them a few minutes of disgust. Den-Mother lost so much respect for me that moment that it made her almost physically ill with upset. She had to take a walk with alpha-female where she could be calmed down.
... I know something else: Everybody tells me that I am too hard on myself. This is probably the case. Hindsight is 20/20, and there is something I meant -more- to say, but did not want to go too -easily- on myself (and thus amped it up to damage myself the most that I could... not smart... ugh...)
What I meant to say was:
I don't believe that Jesus Christ is my "lord" and "savior" any more than I would believe ANYTHING that would be so improbable AND have so remote an impact. It is my duty, it is my gods damned RIGHT, to have to respect my own decisions and face my own consequences, and though I'm very flattered by the offer given to me by a God who says "Hi! I can be your scapegoat!" ...I'd rather not.
What I DO believe is that I WANT TO FIND a faith for which I WOULD want to invest responsibility--even a LOT of responsibility, if it really fits me. I want to find a belief system that is true to who I am. I want to learn all the paths that I can and assemble my own theology from it. I will pick and choose a Pantheon to suit the virtues that I feel are necessary, because any other way would be a deceitful affront to the very concept of faith. I need an honest religeon.
If there is something I believe in... it is honor.
And I did get my just desert of agony then, when Alpha Female told me later that night that I'm not an honorable person. Well, hearing that, I certainly did not feel honorable... and I know I've not been acting very honorable... but these facts have been nagging on me, and even though I apparantly SUCK at it, I simply must refuse the assertion that I can't have anything to do with honor. I believe in it, it hurts me when I break it, I hope to find within me the capability to live up to it again as soon as I possibly can, and that's all there is to it.
So they have half directly, half inadvertently led me to several startling chunks of self-knowledge that they likely didn't even know they were going to:
1. I have nothing to hold against the catholic church except that I'm sorry I led it along for 17 years. I regret that I let my parents push me into a confirmation, and, I'm sorry, Jesus... It isn't you, it's me.
2. I can't stand the idea of being an atheist anymore and I am willing to find a home for my soul, finally.
3(a). This is kind of coming out of nowhere, but... I have no reason to be depressed, either! It came about as a metaphor with the catholic church. I was no longer looking for reasons to explain why I felt a certain way, but rather, I had begun searching for excuses to perpetuate my problems on. In the case of Catholicism, it was the perpetuation of Hatred--which is a bad trait for ANY REASON, and by NO MEANS should you ever let yourself be infected by it, if you can help it. In the case of my depression, it was the perpetuation of feeling sorry for myself and being a DRAMAKEG.
3(b). I'm living with the best IRL friends I've ever had; I should be fucking ELATED! :D And NOW, I AM!!!
4. I may very well not have one single solitary Planck-Scale measurement in any dimension of Supernatural in me at all... and I'm okay with that. Not everybody can wield spiritual energy like a limb of their own body. Not everybody can see spirits or colorful auras of psycho-emotional potential. Not everybody can pray to the spirits with honesty in their heart and know that something will come of it if it must... I'm not special, at least not in the ways that my dearest friends are, but that's just who I am; it's a quality that makes me "Me", and it wouldn't help anybody more than me if I were to somehow change, thus rendering the change dishonest... and I'm not cool with dishonesty right now.
4(b). Furthermore, It's likely that whatever I'd be pursuing IN THAT MANNER would feel mocked or even grievously insulted and disrespected. I do not have an ounce of disrespect. I have faith in my friends, and I know I can put faith in them, even if I have no business intruding on their ways of life with my Naiveness and patronizing misconceptions. If they think I need to know something... they'll tell me. And that's just fine.
5. A Non-Sequitor, stumbled-across by the musings on the previous issues while I was trying to figure them out:
A: "If I told you I was a compulsive liar, would you believe me?"
B: "Yes."
A: "Why?"
B: "Well you see, I'd be merely adopting a general distrust for you, which couldn't hurt anyone except the relations between the two of us, which would be entirely your fault because you admitted that you were a liar--and if you admitted to lying about that, you'd still be a liar, and I'd still win."
A: "... okay. Um. Just to clarify... I'm not a compulsive liar."
B: "Sure you're not."
...
Yes, I know, I know, "All Generalizations are False, including This one" --Mark Twain; not EVERY Matt is an asshole, but I've distinctly detected in Matt observations an otherwise inexplicable tendency to be assholes. And here's something to consider: I am absolutely SURE that I am an asshole deep down in my heart--not just the regular everyday "Everybody's an asshole, really"--I mean that if I did not clamp down on myself with an IRON FIST, I would, daily, be making the lives of the people around me 75% WORSE, AT LEAST.
But you see, that's what makes it worthwhile to me... that I care enough to attempt to make a difference, even if it doesn't always work out. It's not dishonesty to self (I know I'm a jerk, and I admit that I'm a jerk); it is merely that it is within my capability to make a more positive (or at least less negative) impact on the experiences of those around me, and if you can't accept any reason for me to do it other than a selfish one, I'll GIVE YOU a selfish one: it makes me feel good. When I make someone's day, it makes MY day. And when I've had my day 'made' and I feel great, EVERYBODY has a much better time! It's like a good mood grants me a +12 ability modifier to my otherwise quite unfortunate charisma. When I feel good, and I wing it, life only gets better. If I feel bad, though, PLOOM! Everything bombs straight to shit. I've witnessed this. It's interesting to watch.
Lately though, especially the past few days, I've been slowly, excruciatingly climbing a ladder, attempting to shovel my way out of this shit hole mood, and it has been the very definition of arduous. If you've never been depressed, it isn't POSSIBLE to have it adequately explained to you just how badly it affects every corner of your life. The internal feelings of uselessness add up to a constant emotional, mental, and PHYSICAL fatigue. My arms were feeling like they were made of lead. The universe weighed on my shoulders and dragged at my every step. But now... it's almost gone. So close, soooo close....
See, what I did lately was... confess to something. I don't really know whether or not it's true, but... it is about something I have been doing for quite a long time.
For a while, I was extremely disdainful of the catholic church. Whenever a discussion about religion ensued, I plied my every fiber of focus toward tearing down Christianity... In every subtle reference I made to do with philosophy or theology, christianity was to blame. And living with the people that I used to live with didn't help this problem any, at all... In fact, staunch atheists that they were, I felt attacked whenever I made note of even the small bits of belief that I DID have at the time. Eventually, I made a rather large mistake; I shut spirituality out of my life.
Now, there's something really special about my new roommates. They know that a personal journey is, after all, a personal journey. They are extremely spiritual, somewhat occult, and even themselves supernatural... very well-developed in the realms of spirituality. Naturally, I attempted to piggyback, and was met with resistance that I didn't expect. That's fine, though, because that's when I realized, this was the personal part of the personal journey. In a fell swoop they pointed out to me a large chunk of hypocrisy I'd been crippling myself with; which I have subsequently taken head on and work on even as we speak.
But you see, we had many discussions about faiths, and it eventually came to the point where they had to ask me, "What IS IT with you and Christianity? What did it ever, EVER do to YOU, PERSONALLY?"
... That stopped me dead in my tracks.
Well, what DID it do? DID it do anything? I was surely angry at the hypocrisy involved, the corruption, the greed--but that happens with EVERY large-scale institution, even ones that are only a few decades old. By all rights, if THAT was the reason, I should be hating everything. They asked me, "Why can't you just forgive, you know?"
...That was another good point my friends had. Why CAN'T I? That is probably the single easiest thing to do to someone that you can't remember doing anything to you in the first place...
I was asking myself, but I was not getting any answers, at all... and then I started to wonder: When do I usually hide things from myself? When I feel guilty. When I feel extremely guilty. Certainly it's always a bad idea to just jump to conclusions, but all that was on the line was my respectability, and that, to me, cannot hold a candle to Personal Truth.
I dug deeper. I guess I never -really- believed that the fact that society killed a man 2000 years ago just because he thought we should be nice to eachother had any direct effect on MY LIFE. Of COURSE there are indirect effects: ancestors could've been forced to carry out the raising of closer ancestors by the following of Christianity or even specifically the Catholic sect of it. But honestly, Jesus DYING to sync all our 'sins' away and give us a fresh start ... It feels like a copout to me more than anything. And for that matter, I think a lot of extreme catholics KNOW that it's a copout, and THAT would be why there is so much make-yourself-miserable in Catholic tradition; They're doing penance for something they were told not to feel obligated to do penance for. But I never felt like it did me any good to sit in a church for hours a week. Sure, if it discernibly made me feel happier or gave me a better part of wisdom, maybe, but I'm a heck of a lot LESS wise than a lot of people who have never gone to church a day in their life.
All it boils down to is: I was being forced to eat something I did NOT like the taste of, and I was forced to do it for 17 years. "Oh, BOO HOO," a lot of people can feasibly say, "I've had to..." ...and then they'd go on for thirty minutes about their life, which was admittedly at least thirty times worse than mine; I doubt I would've survived two steps where they have walked and labored for decades. But all that means is... My boil-down, plus 400 penalties, I told Den-Mother in front of Alpha Female that the reason I've had so much animosity toward Catholicism is because...
"... I can't have my cake and eat it too; I'm too lazy to commit myself to what it demanded." --which was in fact not exactly the wording I was going for.
This, naturally, conjured in them a few minutes of disgust. Den-Mother lost so much respect for me that moment that it made her almost physically ill with upset. She had to take a walk with alpha-female where she could be calmed down.
... I know something else: Everybody tells me that I am too hard on myself. This is probably the case. Hindsight is 20/20, and there is something I meant -more- to say, but did not want to go too -easily- on myself (and thus amped it up to damage myself the most that I could... not smart... ugh...)
What I meant to say was:
I don't believe that Jesus Christ is my "lord" and "savior" any more than I would believe ANYTHING that would be so improbable AND have so remote an impact. It is my duty, it is my gods damned RIGHT, to have to respect my own decisions and face my own consequences, and though I'm very flattered by the offer given to me by a God who says "Hi! I can be your scapegoat!" ...I'd rather not.
What I DO believe is that I WANT TO FIND a faith for which I WOULD want to invest responsibility--even a LOT of responsibility, if it really fits me. I want to find a belief system that is true to who I am. I want to learn all the paths that I can and assemble my own theology from it. I will pick and choose a Pantheon to suit the virtues that I feel are necessary, because any other way would be a deceitful affront to the very concept of faith. I need an honest religeon.
If there is something I believe in... it is honor.
And I did get my just desert of agony then, when Alpha Female told me later that night that I'm not an honorable person. Well, hearing that, I certainly did not feel honorable... and I know I've not been acting very honorable... but these facts have been nagging on me, and even though I apparantly SUCK at it, I simply must refuse the assertion that I can't have anything to do with honor. I believe in it, it hurts me when I break it, I hope to find within me the capability to live up to it again as soon as I possibly can, and that's all there is to it.
So they have half directly, half inadvertently led me to several startling chunks of self-knowledge that they likely didn't even know they were going to:
1. I have nothing to hold against the catholic church except that I'm sorry I led it along for 17 years. I regret that I let my parents push me into a confirmation, and, I'm sorry, Jesus... It isn't you, it's me.
2. I can't stand the idea of being an atheist anymore and I am willing to find a home for my soul, finally.
3(a). This is kind of coming out of nowhere, but... I have no reason to be depressed, either! It came about as a metaphor with the catholic church. I was no longer looking for reasons to explain why I felt a certain way, but rather, I had begun searching for excuses to perpetuate my problems on. In the case of Catholicism, it was the perpetuation of Hatred--which is a bad trait for ANY REASON, and by NO MEANS should you ever let yourself be infected by it, if you can help it. In the case of my depression, it was the perpetuation of feeling sorry for myself and being a DRAMAKEG.
3(b). I'm living with the best IRL friends I've ever had; I should be fucking ELATED! :D And NOW, I AM!!!
4. I may very well not have one single solitary Planck-Scale measurement in any dimension of Supernatural in me at all... and I'm okay with that. Not everybody can wield spiritual energy like a limb of their own body. Not everybody can see spirits or colorful auras of psycho-emotional potential. Not everybody can pray to the spirits with honesty in their heart and know that something will come of it if it must... I'm not special, at least not in the ways that my dearest friends are, but that's just who I am; it's a quality that makes me "Me", and it wouldn't help anybody more than me if I were to somehow change, thus rendering the change dishonest... and I'm not cool with dishonesty right now.
4(b). Furthermore, It's likely that whatever I'd be pursuing IN THAT MANNER would feel mocked or even grievously insulted and disrespected. I do not have an ounce of disrespect. I have faith in my friends, and I know I can put faith in them, even if I have no business intruding on their ways of life with my Naiveness and patronizing misconceptions. If they think I need to know something... they'll tell me. And that's just fine.
5. A Non-Sequitor, stumbled-across by the musings on the previous issues while I was trying to figure them out:
A: "If I told you I was a compulsive liar, would you believe me?"
B: "Yes."
A: "Why?"
B: "Well you see, I'd be merely adopting a general distrust for you, which couldn't hurt anyone except the relations between the two of us, which would be entirely your fault because you admitted that you were a liar--and if you admitted to lying about that, you'd still be a liar, and I'd still win."
A: "... okay. Um. Just to clarify... I'm not a compulsive liar."
B: "Sure you're not."
BUT...THIS is why you are "My Cub", and it's hard to call you Matt. I don't see "asshole" as fitting you, though "Cub" definitely does.
On the "Why don't you just forgive" aspect: You need to forgive yourself first. Sounds corny, I know, but it's wholly true. Everything begins in the Self, be it love, hate, forgiveness, peace. Give it a try sometime.
On "Spirituality/Religion": hey, be yourself, do your research, there is bound to be a diety/several dieties/a pantheon/several pantheons that you have yet to find that absolutely fit YOU. Personal note: "My" Pantheon evolves every so often, as the dieties I work with ebb and flow into/from my work. Anubis is still there, always has been, hopefully always will be. Many of His pantheon are, too. However, there are a few that have faded back: Aphrodite (*gasp*), Pele. And one to have been called on recently: Odin! (Go figure, eh?) You will find what's right for you, even if it happens to be nothing at all.
*HUGZ* It's been a long weekend, My Cub.
I'll tell you.
IT KILLED MY PERFORMANCE.
It made me PERPETUALLY tired and weak!
It made me MISERABLE that I wasn't living up to the standards they wanted me to set for myself, standards I just ... CAN'T give a shit about; trying to give a shit about such pointless, menial tripe made me feel like I was being dishonest! And that made me feel WORSE!
But last night... I just didn't care. I just... did... not... care. And I actually finished two aisles! I worked three pallets and five carts, moving, and I measured by watching the 'net weight' gauges, seven hundred pounds of shit o.o
And the night before that, I couldn't even move HALF my weight... Mostly because I was too busy beating myself up about how much "i suck". Which... doesn't make any sense to me, now...
...I guess I'm kind of unleashing my inner asshole. I have no business punishing myself! In a way, that's even -worse-. And... suddenly it seems that I don't feel like explaining myself anymore.
I'll just leave it at this:
I feel pretty good.
Congrads on self enlightment.
Click here to level up. <3
But really, for the whole religion thing if you want one, go for it by all means. Find something that fits you. Wiccan's interesting if you wanted a suggestion. o.O
Or, just invent your own. I don't see any laws against it.
It's also good to hear from you, even if I am a little late on seeing the journal.