Eight weeks into quarantine. I think. I’ve lost track of time truthfully. Every day is just a day. Which is terrible, especially for myself and what I’m studying – but a little more on that later.
In a nutshell – my last (present-day) blog post, The Wrong Boat explained my feelings of being on the same boat as everyone else right now, although actually, not everyone is on the same boat and that I found myself stranded on a boat, not to my preference.
Did you get that?
Admittedly, living a life in quarantine, I was finding myself in a darkish place. Not as dark as I’ve been, but a dark grey cloudy day kind of dark. When it looks like it’s about to piss down.
So, in a metaphorical construct, I decided to walk under that dark grey cloud, without an umbrella or raincoat, just normal clothes that I knew I’d get soaked in and therefore feel more miserable.
In reality, I sat myself on the sofa between my parents whilst they were watching TV.
It didn’t take long for the TV to be paused – God forbid missing anything.
I sat there and listened, taking a mental battering as they discussed futures for me, ideas or argued over who was right about what I wanted, without really asking me, nor listening attentively to me when I did speak.
Generally speaking when the rain stops, the sun comes out.
And I suppose it did in a way.
Once their unhelpful words were finished being spoken, I returned to my slumber.
What happened next was unusual for my character, but I was feeling miserable still and just wondered what bullshit would come back to me after my Google search.
“What is the meaning of life?”
In my view. There is no meaning. There is no rhyme or reason. Only what you create through imagination.
I came across a bloke called Mark Manson, an interesting author from Austin, Texas, USA.
He has written a few posts on “the meaning of life” and coinciding with my beliefs of no particular meaning or reason to life. He asks different questions such as,
“What’s your favourite flavour of shit sandwich and does it come with an olive?”
It’s an interesting question that suggests we shouldn’t necessarily look to our passions for answers and pursue a career within our passions, but actually evaluate the things you dislike the most and select the best one.
“Everything sucks, some of the time.”
Mark Manson
So that got me thinking about all the ideas I have flying, swimming, jumping – you name it – my ideas are completing some kind of activity in my brain constantly.
I also thought about my lack of productivity… and realised… how demotivating I actually was to myself.
If I ate badly, I scoffed at myself. If I ran badly, I looked disapprovingly at my time.
Which is ridiculous.
The fact that I removed myself from the comfort of my bed to work my muscles, should be enough of a positive to uplift myself.
My friend Felix from Bavaria was super positive. I found him inspirational to be out and about with. He would simply admire everything, even if it was a simple utter of the word “nice”.
Over the last couple of years, I’ve actually improved a lot when appreciating things, but I was still my own bully.
This wasn’t an overnight change though.. oh no… not that simple. It took two, maybe three weeks to reach this point.
And among those weeks I learned more, which actually makes me question myself, whilst writing this…
Did I need that down time?
I looked to my YouTube subscriptions for inspiration. Interestingly a few of them have found Christ in recent months.
As I mentioned in my previous post, a spiritual reckoning has awoken inside myself too.
Not to suggest that I believe in a Him – or Her, but at the very least a spiritual binding of all living things.
“Human beings are not meant to live alone. There is a fundamental biological imperative that propels you and every organism on this planet to be in a community, to be in relationship with other organisms.”
Bruce H. Lipton, The Honeymoon Effect: The Science of Creating Heaven on Earth
I already found that blessing my food before consumption improved my appreciation.
So in the search for self-improvement, I started to apologise each morning to the Universe for my vanity.
You know what? It helps me.
“You’re so vain… you probably think this song is about you”
Carly Simon
Everyone is vain in some way. I was also a fairly cocky person when it came down to something I was good at, and although I try to rein that vanity in, I still struggle with other people’s stupidity.
And of course, I can be stupid at times. I stepped on a rake and hit myself in the face for fuck sake.
But other people’s stupidity really frustrates me.
So now I apologise to the Universe every morning for my vanity, and to accept others for any flaws they may have.
“It is just like man’s vanity and impertinence to call an animal dumb because it is dumb to his dull perceptions.”
Mark Twain
Eventually these practises saw me through the bad time to this point, and now I’m writing this post.
I still haven’t got a structured day, but it’s more productive than it was.
I believe a key factor to my current mental wellness, was my bike ride to London.
Thirty-two kilometres down the River Lea to the River Thames. After riding around London and riding back, we accumulated a strong total of eighty kilometres.
And I enjoyed a well-deserved chocolate milkshake from Wimpys.
I know, I know. Completely against my dietary advice, but it goes back to that critical thinking and once in a while is not bad.
So yeah. Although I try to keep my short fuse damp, there are still quarrels at home, which in a positive way only push me to purchase more items towards my next travelling goal, which is to explore Britain.
I hope you’re all staying well out there. It’s important to remember that every situation, circumstance and society is managed in variety of ways.
Even myself with my plans and goals lost myself for a couple of weeks.
If you are feeling similar to me in my previous post, think about the things I just mentioned and how you could perhaps incorporate them into your routine.
And another two points that helped me, were perspectives of life after death.
One perspective actually comes from the Netflix series Altered Carbon. When the main character Kovac feels it is pointless fighting on, he says:
“I could blow out my stack. Make it all go away.”
Only for his subconsciousness to respond:
“If you do that, it won’t all go away. Just you.”
The world will never be a better place if we give up on that ideology of love, supportive societies, and co-operative communities.
The second perspective was this…
Whether God exists or not, we don’t know what is after our time on Earth. It could be nothing, it could be better – like a Heaven or a Valhalla… but it could also be worse.
I do believe that everything is at random, an accident so to speak, yet everything is also connected.
A Universal Entropy.
At least that’s my belief on the natural order of things.
Unfortunately a small percentage of humans have decided to play God over multiple centuries.
Speaking of which, the quarantines seem to be lifted in most countries now and I hope they remain that way, though I suspect another “pandemic” will occur in the near future.
That is for another day. Another day for fighting.
Today I write, celebrate life and most importantly of all, ride my bike.
