I’m sick this weekend, which means paradoxically an easier time than most today, because T is watching our kid. Time to blog

fighting the gods

There’s a movie called the Odyssey, and for once T and I finally saw The Current Movie while it was new in theaters. It’s very good! One bit that stuck with me was when Calypso says “you have to stop fighting the gods if you want to get back home.” As that’s what Odysseus has been doing this whole time. I get it, Odysseus. I want to fight the gods - not out of pride, but anger. How could you all do this to us?

resentment

Resentment as responsibility gone rotten: “resentment comes from taking responsibility for something you shouldn’t, or not taking responsibility for something you should.” Post is about relationships and reality TV no less, but it made me think about: is Odysseus’s (… my?) resentment the same thing?

fully formed emotional product

I was expressing a feeling to someone, and cutting it off partway - something like “oh god things feel awful - well y’know not that awful - I mean it could be much worse” and they were like:

“You know, while you’re expressing a feeling, it doesn’t have to be fully formed. I’m not here to attack you. You can say e.g. ‘I’m the most cursed person to ever exist’, knowing that eventually, you’ll get through it and the fully formed logical thought will be something like ’that was a rough day.’”

People say “you have to feel your feelings or they’ll just lurk and subconsciously control you” and I say “ok, how do you do that??” and I think this is one piece of that “how”. One way you can “feel a feeling” is to express it to someone. And to express a feeling, you have to be willing to express it as it is, not just the fully formed emotional product at the end of the process.

omelas

why? man this is the stuff of Internet Discourse and I’m getting sucked in but I’m allowed because I’m sick.

Omelas, Je T’aime: Of course we can’t think straight about Omelas, because it’s a completely unnatural thought experiment. Would you trade your city for Omelas? Yes: there’s way more than one kid-in-a-hole in any modern city, we should be delighted for the suffering to be so low! No: but we don’t tolerate or condone that, we are always striving for the no-kids-in-holes city. Arghh how do we reconcile these– well, look, we don’t have to, because you can’t pick Omelas. There’s no “suffering kids -> prosperity” machine IRL, Omelas is just a fucked up little trolley problem.

But you all are missing the point! (In my opinion. Of this open-ended story with many points.) The point is “why can’t we even believe in nice things.” Le Guin sets up this utopia and then is like “but you don’t believe me, do you? sigh fine, here’s a suffering kid, do you believe it now?” Why can’t we believe in good things? Relevant SMBC - “By Zorcrom, it is bad to be human.”

(Possible counterpoint: sure we can believe in nice things, but not in the form of a story. We set up stories to have conflict or something. Being Ursula Le Guin and writing “here’s a nice city” is like a metal band with the metal band font and faces painted and dressing like Slipknot, singing “I love you, you love me” - you’re probably not just going to leave it as that.)

(Possible counter-counterpoint: if this is how all our art is, by Zorcrom, it is bad to be human.)

one feelings hack

If you find yourself saying “for the rest of my life”, you can just not.¹ Even if it’s correct, it’s not a thought pattern that is gonna lead you to happiness. I like this because it’s so concrete; those words can be a tripwire. (I have not tried this yet.)