assorted feeling

it can be nearly impossible for me to remember that mood swings are normal and okay when i’m in the middle of one. no one likes feeling bad. no matter how much work i’ve done to intellectualize, to hammer the words into my brain that feeling bad is an inherent part of being alive, i still get to that point and i really don't want to be there. and sometimes, when it's bad enough, i forget what it's like to feel good. that's the most dangerous part.

the experience of living in a body is one that we don't really talk about very much on a day-to-day basis. so much so that i have no idea if the fundamentals of how i experience life are anything like what others are experiencing. i imagine… it's complicated. i sit here at the kitchen table, my left leg crossed over my right, my right hand and left forearm resting on the table as i type these words into my phone, and i know that rhe people who read this will interpret the image i have just described through different lenses. some may picture me; others may picture themselves in my place; others still may picture nothing at all.

apart from visualization, i doubt very many people would seek to recreate or understand the specific physical sensations that i am experiencing and failing to describe. the differences between the pressure of my right leg holding up my left and the table holding up my hand and arm. the way that it feels to look out of these eyes that have not completely been able to see for over two decades. living is such a thing, isn't it? and yet we often take that away from other beings without thinking about it.

that's—that’s often the cause of whatever makes me feel bad. the cruelty that exists in the world. i am not inmune to being cruel myself; i never intend it, though that's not always the point. still, many of the systems that i contribute to are ones that intentionally inflict cruelty. that's a dissonance that i’m not sure what to do with, because if i don't survive, i can't help anyone else, but if i do survive, it is at the expense of other people.

(i know life is not a zero-sum game. still, capitalism has been very successful at turning it into one.)

this feels familiar, the thing of writing a blog post and not having any answers at the end of it. ah well. i mean, i’m going to continue surviving as best i can, because selfishly i have things that i want to do that i haven't done yet. i think that’s all for now.