How are there so many frivolous things in here, while so many important things have been left unrecorded? Seems to be a “weight” and bandwidth issue. The world has been upside down for a long time, but it’s just accelerating and becoming more scary. I’ve had existential dread and fear issues I’ve had to start working through with my therapist. A lot of it is climate collapse and this mass extinction event so much of the population is oblivious about. Water future going up on the stock market set me off pretty bad, I was livid. There is this strange lack of “milestones” in all of these tragedies and happenings, but the water one seemed to really mark the occasion, it registered in my mind as the beginning of the end, even though we’ve been on this destructive path for so long and some are assuming they’re die before shit really hits the fan so they get to age out of the problem, while others bank on Elon to get us to Mars or anywhere else. We’re pouring so much time and money and resources into something that’ll either likely never happen or won’t advance fast enough for a mass exodus to another planet, and even so why can’t we put that kind of effort into saving the first home? Maybe it’s better we can’t reach other places to wreck, and I hate thinking that so much because I value life so much. I value my life, I value the lives of others and want to see us go on. I dream of an Altered Carbon technology where stacks can go into sleeves where things like autoimmune and other ailments can be edited out, where you can needle cast and see other planets. It all sounds like an amazing cyberpunk dream, but I’d want it without the even worse from many centuries in the making class warfare and disparity, poverty, and overall unfairness in the system.
I had a bad time in a mental loop about the great filter and the Fermi paradox after the bf happen to bring it up in passing. He felt absolutely awful about it, but he didn’t know my mind fixated on this kind of stuff, or that I’ve spiked my anxiety on these things at 3am out of nowhere by myself on my room. At least that time it wasn’t 3am and I wasn’t by myself. I could talk it through safely in his arms. This is what got me to bring it up in therapy, instead of only primarily discussing polycule drama, which was good since this existential weight seems to be getting worse. Therapist recommended some materials to watch and a book. Bf recommended Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind, so I grabbed a copy and hopefully my ADHD will calm it’s shit enough for me to read and absorb the material. I am embarrassed to admit I am still trying to make peace with my death, but now I’m trying to find that peace. I feel like I’m doing a shit job, but I’m not holding it in like a bad secret that’s just going to eat me from the inside out.
Earlier this year I was reflecting back on situations and interactions I’d had through the years, and wished I’d been more kind and patient, that I’d ended things better when they needed to come to an end. I wish I had more compassion. This is still a work in progress. Recently I caught myself expecting the worst in my meta because she “calibrated” me to expect it, she taught me I couldn’t take her words at face value, or that her actions were theater and would say on betray her. That is incredibly exhausting and that’s not who I am. I like to believe what’s being presented, it doesn’t mean stick my neck out and blindly go with everything, but I’ve had to remind myself more than once that empathy is not the same as condoning what happened, it is not approval. I am trying to revert back to taking things at face value. It’s been really hard, I don’t see her making real effort to meet me half way despite the gestures I’ve been hearing about second hand. They feel trivial compared to the “real work” that hasn’t been picked up, but now that I’m writing this out, it feels harsh. I don’t want to be dismissive of progress, it again I would expect incremental progress to build up into real initiative and change. I keep hearing she’s just not there yet, she might not get there. But she’s getting closer in acquiring the help she needs, so that’s good.
Today I spoke to a former gf on zoom for a couple hours. We hadn’t spoken since 2017. We were a thing a long time ago but remained friends until we got into a heated argument. Her and I both have our own sets of difficult health situations to manage, and she put in a lot of work to figure out how to heal and improve her quality of life. I’d done the same in my own way, and felt that wasn’t being acknowledged when she got upset at me for not doing what she recommended. I think we all want to share information we’ve found useful, or want to communicate what’s helped us to basically everyone. But the thing is these steps are not a one size fits all, especially when it comes to diet. We all have a unique physiology, different needs, triggers, and reactions. I think it’s fine to make a helpful suggestion, but it’s a problem when someone gets mad because the recipient decides it’s not for them, or they’re not ready. This is what sparked that bad interaction. Today we caught up on what’s been going on in each other’s lives the last three years, and health came up and was a little reminiscent (but civil) of the last time we had this dialogue. We agree on some points but not others, this time I felt better prepared to discuss such topics.
I’ve made various, slow, changes over the years for health. I dropped gluten in 2012, but got very sick due to stress and circumstances in 2013, started to pick myself back up in 2014 and got my career back, got more physically active in 2015, and was kind of stagnant in 2016. I tried to sustain and do the right things from there. This year has been difficult due to incredible stress and limitations, this is true for everyone. I read up, I made more dietary changes and restored my insulin sensitivity, resolved my hypoglycemia, chronic nausea, and inflammation and burning in my intestinal tract after eating. I didn’t know these things were fixable, doctors and I always blamed it as side effects to other chronic issues. Those other chronic issues are also being managed better now, which I am grateful for. I am tackling gynecological issues again since they’ve increased in severity recently. I’ll be addressing those in office mid January, hopefully this resolved smoothly. But I guess, even despite all of these challenges I’m still finding ways to handle my health and finding options that are more optimal. I found a resistance band system that allows you to lift heavy without the same risk of injury, and taking advantage of variable resistance training has been beneficial too. I’m still dealing with tight muscles and need to organize a space to pick yoga back up, I’ve been negligent there since the move, but I’m getting things done around here slowly. This has been an ongoing endeavor that picked up speed over the summer, and I hope that I keep learning and improving.