Pride goeth before the fall...

Strong as I am, as self aware as I am, as powerful, cunning, clever, and analytical and in touch with myself as I might be, I am still not in a position to control of inhibit the baser impulses of my inherent human nature. I find that I am still susceptible to the most basic and intrinsic foibles of my species and unable to rise beyond or above, despite my numerous talents and abilities. A pawn all too easily moved about the bored and made to provide fodder and diversion for the more able upon the board. Such is the plight of this poet. So easily ensnared and beguiled, so simply influenced and by little else than a dancing light of smoldering passion. Oh how grandiose it would be if I could easily and shamelessly embrace the most basic and demure inclinations of my kind, to succumb and allow seduction by all that is against my better instincts. To ignore a lifetime of eye opening and temperance of self, and simply follow blindly the whims of subversion that blow me toward what they hope is inevitability. My pride stings, my analysis is reawakened in full force and unwavering in it's accuracy, following a level of sophistocation and unrivalled ability that has been developed almost zealously over a lifetime of hardship and necessity. It is my resolute and unwavering acumen that brings me solace at all times when emotional sentiment is abhorred, and it is from this mechanism of sorts that I have been lucky and insightful enough to garner some of the most astute and impressive deductions of my time. Despite the almost trite, cliched, and hackneyed mention of it, the truth is that there is immeasurable point of fact in the rhetoric so often extoled by yours truly: Systematic detachment from emotional reaction. Break free of the bonds of emotional servitude that bind you to a behavior you despise and embrace the independence that comes from absolute freedom. Stop finding happiness in slavery, start seeking release and lasting solace in something within yourself and outside the arms of a being only truly capable of betrayal when the opportunity arises. Stop capitulating with the part of you that lusts for satisfaction in emotional fulfillment and start allowing the more logical and rational side of your better nature to influence you. Too often I find the humanity within me too hard to extinguish and unwilling to give up it's compulsion to both nurture and encourage that which the logical side of me screams against in abject agony, the ideation of blind feeling over rational thinking. Cold, calculating, methodical thinking is so often villified because it allows for unspeakable atrocities to be committed but it I feel it is only through such self realization that we can ascend. Forty-six & 2 just ahead of me.

Ideation, expectation, disappointment

It seems to be an nearly inexorable cycle that compels me toward the vestment of hope and in turn leads to overt disappointment. There is an innate and seemingly inherent stipulation toward any measure of faith that it be tested, negated, and ultimately provide punishment for the blind belief. More on this story as it develops

Emotional Enema, Table 2?

The days keep ticking by and with every passing second I find a myriad of emotions to sort through. Things I’d thought sufficiently stuffed down and reasonably well enough forgotten. Instead I’m left to manage my way through overwhelming guilt for actions I undertook and set in motion while blinded by immutable hate and disdain. In addition I’m left deciding if I’m capable of connecting with anyone. The great practical joke being that while espouse the importance of cultivating and making long lasting relationships work by investing yourself in the people you encounter. I’m left burying myself behind layer after layer of emotional armor as a means of staving off the hurt that I find inevitably comes from my investment in people.

Too often it becomes far too convenient for those I let in, those chosen few who have become confidants, to simply pack up and leave when the association proves slightly more taxing than simply offering passing acknowledgements. The self absorbed, lackadaisical behavior so easily exhibited by so many is sickening. I think I’ve finally reached the paramount of my disgust with the dregs of humanity. People too concerned with their agendas and furthering of events to accomplish their goals that they ignorantly destroy others to see their will done. I’m guilty of the sin in a way. My arrogance and pain mixed and blended to destroy the only thing in my life I ever genuinely cared about.

It’s always a bit humorous to me to hear people question my emotional investment in things. Friends, family, acquaintances, you name it there’s been an expectation that I assign some emotional attachment or meaning to it, but sadly I don’t feel invested in anyone or anything. Trinkets that once held great importance are nothing more now than idle objects, devoid of any inherent meaning. My bonds with people aren’t anywhere near what they once were. I’ve become hollow, an actor playing the part of what I should be.

The rationalization begins and ends that I’m simply reacting to a change in emotional stability brought on by my sleep patterns being cast into massive upheaval. Sadly though, I’ve been inclined to examine the true standing of it all and I think I’ve found the true cause of my issue. I’m wracked with guilt at having so much figurative blood on my hands that I’m now beginning to punish myself by pushing away and tainting any and all prospects for meaningful relationships. It’s a popular fact that I’m a force of chaos in the world, my sheer presence can make one guilty by association no matter the medium of contact and serve as an almost surefire way to complicate life. Sadly it doesn’t stop there either, I’ve noticed my analytical acumen slipping and I think it’s because so much of it was tied to who I was then that I don’t feel I deserve to have the talent any longer. Where once it was something innate and automatic, I find now that I miss the most obvious and worse yet, can’t draw conclusions anywhere near as well as I once did. It’s like my brains running on mute.

I’ll admit that a large part of it is most likely the breakneck speeds at which my life has run since the old dynamic came to a close, but I don’t buy for a second that it’s the whole story. I’m realizing that I’ve got to systematically deal with dynamics that I’ve recently begun because they’re based around false ideas. I’m not reaching out for the reasons I should be, to invest myself in someone else, to feel happy, or be connected; to benefit from all that another person has to offer. Rather I’m producing these dynamics en masse because they serve to punish me for all that I’ve failed at. It’s idle, it’s sick, it’s reprehensible and honestly no sane person would do it. But I do, freely, self aware, and reveling in all the madness and negativity that will come flowing from it.

I don’t deserve to be happy, not from where I sit. I ruined something that wasn’t mine to be a part of to begin with. The social contract dictates that my feelings are spared for the most part aside from the acknowledgment and clarification of the dynamic, but it doesn’t exculpate me from guilt. I took it a step further and actually put fire to the stake. I torched the whole thing and danced in the rain of ashes. I’m a deplorable human being, capable of the worst transgressions and vile actions imaginable in someone. Serial killers may torture, maim, rape, or taunt their captives but ultimately death is a release and a solace for those tortured souls. I afford my victims no such courtesy, choosing to allow them their lives, and watching idly from the shadows, my tendrils still snaking about as they’re left to piece their lives back together in the aftermath of my involvement in it.

I’m rambling and don’t have a point, well aside from now I’m back to whiny bullshit. Oh well hopefully my readership is down enough that this one will be glazed over and nothing more need be said.

Brace yourself for the Brit invasion! Well, maybe....

            It seems a levee of sorts has broken. A kind of emotional wall that dammed up all of the free floating emotions that once fueled and propelled my ramblings has been torn down and now the stream of thoughts that once permeated my consciousness is again being laid to words. Two posts in just as many days, you guys are going to get spoiled.

            I’m wrestling right now with the demons of the past, the hope of the future, and the wisdom to balance both without sacrificing or endangering either. Temperance is my word of the day, not only because somewhere along the line a playwright decided it’d make a nifty name for their lead character, but also because in this society full of excesses and overt indulgence it’s far too easy to get lost in the pursuit of what we believe will make us feel good.

            Now I get, and I’ve even extolled as such, that there is a biological imperative that dictates that we gravitate instinctively toward feeling good and avoid pain as much as is possible. But when you become so blinded by the pursuit that you lose sight of the intention, or worse begin to sacrifice and prioritize irrationally, it becomes hedonism. I bring this up because for two and a half years I toiled and fought for my own gratification and was heedless of the cost I paid as a result. Looking back, the “death toll” is easy to see, but at the time it counted for virtually nothing.

            More than anything I find myself overwhelmed with a new sense of amorous intention, and I’m unsure how to proceed. It should seem fairly plain and more or less obvious what I should do, but fear, trepidation, and too many phantasms of botched gambits refuse to let things unfold. It’s made even worse by the balancing act that must be undertaken in order to preserve discretion.

            I’ll admit, I’m severely over thinking the entirety of the situation, but I feel it necessary to devote every ounce of cerebral processing ability to it as the feeling speaks of something greater. Only admitted within the strictest confidence, there is an intention to make this count for something more than just an idle indulgence of rutting. That said, the ideation that it could be as grandiose as hoped for, is staggering if for no other reason than because it’s such a massive admission and an invalidation of previous sentiments.

            Okay by now I’m fairly sure a lot of you are wondering what the hell it is I’m talking about. I imagine a lot of you have given up referencing the dictionary and are resigned to the fact this post is more of a mindless rant of some deep seated emotional quarrel, as opposed to a widely approachable topic of discussion. That’s true to an extent. The issue I have with full disclosure at this juncture is that while the situation is more than obvious to those that care to pay attention, I’d prefer not to completely tip my hand is it’s at all avoidable. Should a full explanation be desired, feel free to contact me privately and I’ll be happy to discuss things, and even get ideas.

            Back to the point, it’s an awe inspiring thing to realize that the better parts of your nature you once thought only elicited by the interactions of a specific stimulus are actually innate and immutable. I’m being forced to recognize that the more admirable attributes of my character are not relegated to memory or simply the result of an isolated influence. For all my posturing at being an irredeemable, sin filled deviant, it would seem that I’m actually more decent than I give myself credit for.

            At this point the course of action is unclear, the future is gaseous and intangible in any form, and I’m bumbling blindly into it, hoping to find something solid to hold onto. To feel the completion once more, to revel in the exhilaration of being whole, it’s a pursuit I’m inclined to undertake with close minded devotion, but temperance is key, and caution is paramount. I fear botching the endeavor before it begins and can’t bear the thought. As such, I’m learning a new behavior as I simply let the universe unfold and am mindful of my impulses and inclinations; wrangling them into submission and finding contentment in going with the flow instead of forcing my own agenda to be satisfied.

            Only time will tell what is to come, but for the first time in a long time, I’m actually filled with a sense of hope, happiness, and anticipation that isn’t tainted by the worst case scenario I’m usually so quick to adopt, and inadvertently enact. Wish me the best, and of course for the astute of you out there, feel free to put the pieces together and comment freely. 

The reports of my death....are probably pretty accurate

So it’s been way too long since I’ve posted anything up and I’m pretty sure most, if not all, of you probably thought me dead, dying, or kidnapped by angry bookies. But I have returned, like a phoenix from the ashes, I’m back. I can’t speak to the quality of this post because I’m unsure of what it will become (I’m not really writing with a clear topic or idea in mind, just more reassuring my audience that I’m alive after 2 months).

To put your mind at ease it has not actually been any aliens or the like that kept me away but rather a lack of impulse to write. It struck me some time ago that I may very well have murdered my muse. I know that sounds a bit melodramatic but let me explain. The final chapter of the Nicole saga has been written. On her three year wedding anniversary I decided to embrace the darker side of myself, the little bit that had been hiding in the shadows for oh so long, and when I did I found the strength I needed to force her into admitting to her husband that she’d had an affair. As to the extent of the aftermath and fallout from that, who knows, but I did it. In doing so a part of me died.

The impulse I had harnessed for so long, the driving force behind my better writing that was done more for catharsis than anything else was snuffed out in that singular action. So dealing with the truth of what I’d become, what I’d found myself capable of, was both sobering a bit disconcerting. It’s annoying as can be to find that you can’t trust yourself. But I’ve since realized that while the action may have been the most depraved and vicious act I’ve ever undertaken, I did invest some of the most pure and intense emotions of love, affections, trust, and honesty to this woman while we were together. So in that regard I don’t feel like such a cad, just more like a man who had reached his breaking point.

Think of it like a drug addict who finds that his drug of choice no longer affects him the way it used to. So off he goes to find a greater high. I had been releasing torrents of raw emotion in such a way as to make them palatable to you, and still managing to find my own catharsis, but it got to a point where it wasn’t enough. I needed to bleed (figuratively) and cut away the last lingering tendons of that failed dynamic and move on to something better. What I didn’t expect was getting so much release that I’d end up contentedly numb. Thus, the site has since sat here collecting dust and remaining silent. I’ve got cleaning crew coming to dust and repaint. Hopefully they’ll be here before the week is out.

So with all of that out in the open, I’m sure the question has become, what has brought me back? What or who has stirred the creativity within me in such a way that I’m back here to deliver a heaping helping of my bathtub mixed fuck sauce? Oh wait you guys are here for the blog, not my fuck sauce. My bad. Nikki, put the bottle down! We’ll have them on sale in the lobby after the show for the low price of only $9.99. Anyway, to answer the question, the thing that’s brought me back isn’t so much anything concrete but rather the return of a great feeling.

When any of us enters a new dynamic or relationship with someone we really adore, even if it’s someone we’ve admired from afar for a while, there’s generally a sense of anticipation and hopefulness. A kind of trepidation that things will work better, will be better than before. A kind of unspoken promise that the universe has altered the rules ever so slightly and we’re not doomed to repeat the same mistakes. For most of us, the feeling comes and goes almost as quickly as it shows up. We embrace the feeling, most often without realizing it, and then fall into the grind of day to day living, our significant other chasing away the feelings of loneliness and isolation, and slowly but surely we begin to reconnect with the world. Before long we’ve got a permanent plastic grin on our face, and we’re reveling in all of the innate beauty of the world, farting rainbows, shitting unicorns, and unable to be less than six inches off the ground at any time. But when the feeling, the novelty if you will, passes, the world begins to return to the normal luster and intensity of the attraction is gone. Life is no more harsh that it once was, but because we’re making the trek with someone it seems less vicious and only when the dynamic ceases to be does the universe begin to seem like it’s singling you out for condemnation and retaliation. Almost as though a penance for your happiness is due and the universe has decided to foreclose on you.

The reason I bring it up is because right now I’m assailed with those who’ve been in relationships for any length of time, bemoaning how they want to break out and live their lives. See the world, find fulfillment, be unchained or unburdened by the expectations of what it is to be attached. And on the other end of the spectrum I’m bombarded with those who’ve lived the single life for so long that they’ve begun to actively pursue, almost desperately, anything they can get their hands on to fill the void.

Now it wouldn’t be so bad, but it seems that on both ends of the spectrum the issue is that everyone is looking for what’s been lost, the passion and the fire that comes from a new relationship dynamic. We’re barely aware of what it is when we have it and once it’s gone, we can’t work feverishly enough to get it back. So we mire away in the discontent, masking it with the joy we feel in the relationship, reveling in the happiness of the other person, but our hearts slowly begin to want more and more for that feeling.

Now I’m not saying that all relationships get like this, just that an implied understanding for the ones that do work, is that the passion eventually goes away. Nicole told me once that my passion for her would burn out eventually and that we’d end up in the same rut she was in with her husband, because nothing lasts forever. But my counter then, and now, is that unbridled conviction, devotion, and unwavering passion in the face of all obstacles can and will maintain if there is understanding of where it comes from.

From where I sit, the primary issue facing most relationships is that the love within is based on the ideal of who the people are, not the reality of who they are. All the honesty, disclosure, and confiding will only serve to show a measure of trust, but it doesn’t truly convey who they are. To bare one’s soul, to lay everything out on the table and express all feelings in that moment, everything from lust, discontent, satisfaction, want, affection, joy, disillusionment, betrayal, you name it, the feeling should be conveyed regardless of the detriment to the other person’s feelings. Not brutally, but honestly. Too often the kid gloves go on for fear of losing what you have, so many fights, discussions, arguments, and disagreements are choked away before they begin and then explode into massive episodes when the boiling point is reached.

Telling someone about Nicole is great for disclosure. Relaying all of the things I did, the lengths I went to in order to keep her happy and make it work, is testament to my feelings for her, but to truly show what kind of person I am it’s the things I do every day, and not just for her, but for others. Gestures that have no expectation of recompense or compensation, advice offered without judgment, and a genuine intuitiveness and understanding of the nuances that makes the person you’re with feel that they truly are the most important thing in the world to you. I know first hand that it’s not hard to produce this kind of behavior. Just listen, pay attention and respond with honesty about what you think, feel, or believe.

I know a lot of this probably wishful thinking, clouded reasoning, or even just a pipedream behavioral expectation, but it does work. I’m testament to that fact. So really I think it just boils down to the simple fact that if you’re miserable do something to better your situation and if you’re content take a second to realize and make note of it so that if the feeling begins to slip you know what to fix.