Fuzztopia: Follow the Smoke toward the Riff-Filled Land

[Invisible Man]

Been doing a lot of soul-searching because I am absolutely miserable with my job situation...which is sort of normal, but very disappointing. Had a couple realizations yesterday and wanted to float them out there. Thought about putting this in SHRAMI, but...didn't.

1) Even though idealism is as big a trap as cynicism, it shouldn't be abandoned. Both approaches/lenses can make people miserable, but one can actually help move things along, while the other puts people at the center of their own universe.

2) 'Success' can be really damaging. It creates a kind of boss-battle, video game logic. 'What's next?' At some point, the crumbling systemic bait-and-switch of 'progress' becomes painfully apparent, and people rewarded by jumping through hoops discover that the hoops have disappeared. Hence burnout.

3) 'Purpose' is a crazymaker. I can only speak for myself, but my goal was to 1) do work that has something approaching intrinsic value; 2) to not have to justify every decision on its financial impact; 3) avoid having a boss at all costs. That led me to my field, but the field has changed around me even in the ten years I've been working in it. The game has changed, and business has won/is winning. We didn't make the rules, in other words, and not everyone is OK with going along to get along.

Are these things worth the effort of their own maintenance? Idealism, success, and purpose all ideas with net positive impact at least as far as they exist in the common lexicon. I get that they can take a lot of work, cause some pain and angst, &c, but how do we improve our lot without them? I don't see a paradigm for changing our shit systems/institutions without having some kind of ambition. So my approach has always been 'belly of the beast' because it's the only one available, and I've been very aggressive about not compromising my own beliefs in the process. But it is hard fucking work--you can never make a mistake, and you have to keep your nose 100% clean and say 'fuck you' to a lot of people who could make your life easier if you relaxed your scruples a bit.

It's clear that probably not a lot of ILFers care about this shit, and that maybe I'm out on a limb in terms of giving a shit (drop out of life with a bong in hand, &c, as 'philosophy'). I'm probably asking for it with this post. Some days I think I'm beating myself up for no fucking reason, and that I should just check out, drink a little to anesthetize myself at the end of the day, and maybe give less of a shit. And then I think about people I admire, people who maybe did some shit with their life, and whether they did good work because of their circumstances or because they never backed down. I/O, basically.

Maybe we can only help one person--ourselves--and we have to learn to live with that, but I find that really hard to take.

[JonnyAngle]

Some things to think about:
You are in a career with a lot of bureaucracy. With bureaucracy, comes the "boss battle" or "what's the next level" of thinking. It's not only educational institutions, but large and medium sized companies as well.

In the large corporate world, idealism is for upper management only. If you are a grunt and have an idea, nobody cares. If you're entrepreneurial, then it's a great quality to have.

There are different definitions of success. A lot of people here say they want to "do what they love." Sometimes, you can get a job that works 9-5, no overtime or weekends, and allows you to have the free time to do the things you love. You don't necessarily have to find your bliss in working.

If success = $, then what do you need/want the $ for? Security, stability, or just to buy nice things? There is a cost, usually time, with earning more $. Another cost to earning more is "playing ball" with the organization.

[ibarakishi]

I think that a very big problem with not only progress, but also with common ideas (turned into ideals) of success and then also purpose is that everything is very much conditioned to be quantitative. In basic theory this would make sense (food, water, shelter, ect.) but when abstracted into things beyond what is functional from a very primitive standpoint things go illogical pretty fast. This is an unconscious social condition that is very much tied into more things than i am guessing you or anyone really wants to spend time talking about here. But what it comes down to at the end of the day, is that even if someone doesn't bully you into thinking it, you are still conditioned to equate nearly every part of your social existence and personal experience to numbers. And the higher the number, the better. This is devastating i think. And how many areas of life this migrates into is brutal. Your feelings of wanting to check out are understandable. But like you said, i agree that ideals are the better of your two proposed frames of thought. Mainly for one because you are/can claim responsibility for your own existence in its own right, from your own right, despite the absurdity of it all. And hopefully after that, you are able to find the footing to then proclaim that the other, the one outside of yourself is by extension a part of that as well. At the end of the day, i think we only have the fullest control over helping ourselves like you said, but i don't see how seeking to by extension pursue those around us is a futile ambition, despite the many arguments towards it. For me looking at such arguments it seems that that would be the easy way out, whereas actually investing in something outside of the self for something hopefully beyond the self too seems a more difficult path, but with the labors of such an effort giving the possibilities of fruits that are beyond what could ever be tilled for only ourselves (and often are not even for us to taste in the end after sowing them). Even if in the reaching nothing in the end is touched, i still want to have said that i tried to palm that distant light in the darkness. And if if i catch it, i want to have been able to say i was able to send it back through those black waves to others in some way before my ship finally fills with water. This comes back too to what i was saying before, in that so long as you carry your flame through those waves while reaching towards others, i think it is the littlest of moments that hold just as much weight and accumulate in the larger narrative of our lives, if not more so than the larger ones. I find it near soul crushing in how so much emphasis is put on 'more means better', and how this leads to our collective savior complex mindset. If i have the opportunity to truly reach out and change at least one person's life, truly, for the better, and truly help them in the sense that you are talking as well, while still at the end of it all keeping my ideals in tact, then that is one light that i will forever see roaring across the night sky as i keep rowing as well. I would rather help a small group of people in my life and know that i gave those people one hundred percent than knowing that i gave three percent to thousands. I am sure others won't agree, but i see the point in an existence without a point even if it is only your own declaration out into the void. This mindset has affected my life in many ways, my financial situation be one that immensely has been impacted, to the confusion of many of the people around me. But at the end of the day, only you are the person that can draw the lines of how far you are willing to go for certain ideas, and how many storms you are willing to weather through. Despite the waters, i make a point to have tried to keep the lights i loved touching my hands, within the stars, floating on the horizon, or strung through my heart. You will have to figure out where you fit in your constellation and how you want to move across the night.

[JonnyAngle]

Here are some memes:

[friendship]

It's worth noting that nice things don't actually make us happy and the security/stability that money promises to buy are illusions. Moreover, success in whatever form you define it as will not make you happy, because you will adjust to the present condition you've achieved once you are Successful. You will need to replace it with a new definition of success, or simply raise the stakes of what you deem successful, which is why the wealthy can never be wealthy enough, the powerful can never have enough control, the famous can never have enough accolades. The old chestnut "it's lonely at the top" contains a darker meaning, which is that once you climb to the top you realize you haven't ascended into a permanent state of fulfillment. You're still the same dissatisfied self, but surrounded by different possessions or other ego totems.

[ck3]

Maybe employment outside the tradition-bound shackles of academia would promote less cynical analysis of your work environment via removal of undesirable factors, e.g., rectal-cranially inverted administrators who can't appreciate a good "hail Satan" joke. However, though I can only speak from the perspective of 18 years of employment at almost all levels in the human services field, certain workplace irritants and adversities tend to be omnipresent. A shift in perspective can sometimes allow for a work environment to be more tolerable, though human beings can only endure so much prior to breaking. Your personal best is really all you can do and may look different depending upon an inordinate number of variables. Still, it pays to know your limits, especially if you plan to leave with a good reference. When a job is no longer fulfilling, I tend to immediately explore other employment, which has even led to relocation at times. Each new employment experience has been far from ideal, though it has been beneficial to carry forth lessons from prior jobs to inform my course of action moving forward. Mental and physical health can also be measures of success.

[JonnyAngle]

It's worth noting that nice things don't actually make us happy and the security/stability that money promises to buy are illusions. Moreover, success in whatever form you define it as will not make you happy, because you will adjust to the present condition you've achieved once you are Successful. You will need to replace it with a new definition of success, or simply raise the stakes of what you deem successful, which is why the wealthy can never be wealthy enough, the powerful can never have enough control, the famous can never have enough accolades. The old chestnut "it's lonely at the top" contains a darker meaning, which is that once you climb to the top you realize you haven't ascended into a permanent state of fulfillment. You're still the same dissatisfied self, but surrounded by different possessions or other ego totems.

there is truth to this, but memes are still funny

The old chestnut "it's lonely at the top" contains a darker meaning, which is that once you climb to the top you realize you haven't ascended into a permanent state of fulfillment.

I disagree with this. I work for my parents, so I am perceived as an owner... I always tell the funniest jokes that anyone has ever heard. My ideas are always the best. I do not get the enjoyment of genuine camaraderie. I'm like the 5 year old playing poker with his grandfather who always wins. I have to challenge myself, because no one else will. That's what "it's lonely at the top" means to me.

[Ugly Nora]

Invisible Man, have you accepted the lord Jesus Christ into your heart?

[$harkToootth]

I am already sooooo down for this thread and I will type some long-winded, unsolicited responses as soon as I finish up a few things for work.

In short, Invisible Man, I know you are older and wiser than me...but I think of these things all the time and am CONSTANTLY changing my mind and evaluating my sentiments/opinions/principles. Keeping it music related, it's kind of like Philip Glass patterns that shift > evolve > become a new pattern > shift > evolve > devolve > back to the original pattern > REPEAT but differently. Or some later period Stockhausen. Or graphic scores.

I liken life to an ever evolving Janga game where as soon as you are about to place that last piece, the shapes change and you need to start from scratch. It's not rectangles anymore...it's RHOMBUSES that need to be stacked! My brain has been breaking a lot lately. Or a Sudoku puzzle where right when the last number is to written, you blink, and it's all shifted and changed...and it's not numbers anymore.

[Invisible Man]

Invisible Man, have you accepted the lord Jesus Christ into your heart?

Sorta.

Invisible Man, I know you are older and wiser than me

Gtfo

[jrfox92]

NSFW: show

I fell off a jetski in the middle of a lake during a storm when I was younger.

Fuck jetskis.

[drolo]

beautifully said ibarakishi

As for Invisiman's last question about whether we can only help ourselves, I'd say, if you can manage to help yourself and maybe a few people around you, it's already an achievement that is not negligible (and I'm not talking about helping yourself getting a Jet Ski)

If you break down trying to change the world it's probably not going to help a lot of people, especially not those around you that will need to pick up the pieces. Follow the pre-flight safety demonstration instructions and put on your oxygen mask before your kid's.

Ultimately only you can judge what is worth or not fighting for. I for one have needed to retire from society as much as I can because I am a human sponge and not tough enough to face the wast amount of humans' BS, and filter or ignore it. So I'm in hiding, for now.

[Ugly Nora]

drolo, have you accepted Jesus Christ as our one true lord and savior?

[drolo]

drolo, have you accepted Jesus Christ as our one true lord and savior?

Hell, yes!!

[$harkToootth]

Have you accepted Jesus Christ as our one true lord and savior?

"Okay...so you're our one true lord and savior?"
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mqFLXayD6e8[/youtube]