Discard Life?
Apparently after calculating that I'm not depressed enough, YouTube placed the following video in my feed:
Originally published to:
I suggest that you listen to that video before reading this post, which is largely a reaction.
Because there are times when I can relate, and I know others that seem to be making this transition, I listened to it.
Then, I used this to transcribe it:
Then I went through the transcript and wrote my notes, but I'm not going to bother reviewing them for now.
As frustrated as I am with humanity, I think I still have some value to provide, specifically in writing for my children. Then my body will start to really decline and I might be more inclined to let it go, especially as typing at a screen becomes increasingly unpleasant for me due to eyesight and other physical declines. As long as I have purpose (and preferabily, capability), I don't see myself giving up on life.
I observe in confusion as others that seem to claim some understanding make efforts towards goals that don't interest me. Everyone seems trapped in a system they seem to like, don't understand, maybe don't even see, and for which they don't consider alternatives. We are indoctrinated into this system from birth. My marriage was part of such a system that tried to keep me in it. Awareness of this system is a sort of a curse; being part of it might be meaningless but it might be easier and result in less suffering.
I don't understand why I can't be like all of the people that simply accept it, but after seeing it, I don't want to be like them. I knew all along that I did not like this system and did not want to belong to it but I got distracted and still don't see realistic alternatives. Maybe most importantly, I was concerned about how others might judge me. As a result, I lost track of myself, though I'm still not certain that an individual and permanent self actually exists; maybe I'm simply part of universal consciousness. A sense of self often feels like a false construct, especially as I want the freedom to change.
Lately I am working to determine which of my thoughts are inherent or determined from my experience rather than implanted by external factors such as society.
Somehow I think that we are all both individuals and part of a collective consciousness. I try to always retain the ability to see things multiple ways, even if they conflict. I also try to apply evolutionary theory - each person must struggle for their own interests, but we are also part of a collective. Different people fall in different ares of this spectrum - some are too self-centered while others lose track of their own needs and interests.
In general, I find that many people don't really want to think, which might be why so many fall into the pattern of the American dream - educate, work, house, family, retire, die, without ever really living.
One thing that really bothers me is when people, for example religious people, think they know anything, and reject the thoughts of others. Nobody knows anything; we believe things. Even our science is just models based on our senses. The categories, and models, and hierarchies that we create help us to understand the world, but their excessive simplicity can cause problems, especially when they are used for exclusion.
Definitely most suffering seems to be in our minds, which makes it a choice. That doesn't mean that I discount suffering, but so much is from unrealistic expectations of the world and others and even ourselves. Many people always seem to want more rather than simply accepting what we have. Some even complain about the good things that they have.
While there are times when boredom is important, I think it's critical to always work towards at least one chosen goal. Otherwise, I lose purpose, lose motivation, drift, waste my time, seek pleasure and enjoyment, develop bad habits, and basically lose myself and my time.
As Jordan says, the system really prevents us from being our true elves.
Much of the system is designed to benefit others, such as working (producing) but not getting the full value for that, and consuming, which is a cycle that propagates wealth upwards, to those that are already rich and powerful. The system also keeps us dissatisfied so that we want to consume more, thinking that will bring happiness, so we have to produce more. I kindof want to write a book or something just about this. I don't think most people realize how this works. I'm not a communist, but Marx had a lot of good points. Many people let the system define their goals instead of defining their own.
Advertising is a huge part of the problem, manipulating weaknesses in human psychology on a global scale. Social media - including paid influencers - makes this worse. Most people seem to lack media literacy and have no idea how advertising actually works. Anticipation of purchase is often more pleasant than ownership, and buyer's remorse is real, especially when one result is debt. Many wealthy people don't seem very happy.
I wouldn't say that work became modern religion. I would say that money became modern religion. I am concerned that technology is becoming modern religion. I don't have time to follow and share everything I see, but AI is society and many individual people, and I don't just mean job losses. Some people know to use it as the tool that it is; I want to be one of those people. I think that the poor and uneducated are most at risk from AI, although it may never replace labor jobs, so there's that.
Some of what the video says about work becoming an escape may be true only in certain environments, especially air conditioned offices with water coolers and socials, and also when working with technology.
I think that many people live in fear that controls them.
I think that people losing access to nature and not valuing it is catastrophic.
We get caught up in the moment and lose track of what's important.
I do not want to be the same person from day to day; I want to always learn and grow.
I don't always like my own company.
I think the part that mentions the river is about what in Chinese can be described as We Wei, or effortless action. In Western culture, it might be called getting in the zone - doing what comes naturally, what your best at. In Japanese, it might relate to Ikigai, or finding the meaning in your life.
I believe that every person can be lazy in different ways or about different things. I am working on it, but I have been very lazy about caring for myself.
I agree that there is a difference between being alone and being isolated. Being alone can be a choice, and can be healthy. Feeling isolated can be a very bad thing. Maybe some aspects of organized religion can help to address that. Unfortunately, I believe that, as a human power structure, organized religion has largely been corrupted. Western Christianity often seems corrupted to support capitalism and specifically the transfer of labor value from the poor to the wealthy. For example, the prosperity gospel does not appear in any Christian bible. There are plenty of good people that have permanent financial disadvantages and plenty of bad people with lots of money.