April 7

 The feeling of being sick all the time is still being kept at bay. Not great, and at times it feels a little.. mehh, but, a lot better. Still sticking to a diet, but, adding a few things in. Yesterday. Sugary things. Greasy things. Just. Poking around the waters. So far. So ok. Ish.

I am loathe to try any kind of spicy things however as I am pretty damn sure that somewhere in there is a proper landmine. I have a lovely nduja sauce in the fridge. Love it. Not sure at the moment it will love me. I might give it a few days and try it. If it fucks with me, meh, something learned.

Today I am still teetering on that edge of being ok / not ok. So close to actually feeling somewhat better I can taste it. But not quite. And fragile. I felt my mood descending this morning as I talked to myself in the shower. I have kind of noticed over the years that it can be a sign of a "bad pattern" in me. I can talk to myself at considerable length. 30 minutes or more. Long, and pretty much always, dark, diatribes into all sorts of shit. Philosophy. Nihilism. Explaining to people how shit they are. IT stuffs. It doesn't make me feel good I have learned. And either chicken or egg, it's either a sign my mental state is, ehhhhh, not great, and or, it makes my mental state, ehhhh, not great.

I never used to pay much mind to it. I would walk the dogs in the woods, and for the whole journey, talk to myself.

But over time I've seen it's not a good pattern. I get too focused. I really do just disappear into the words, I lose track of time and space - I would walk around the woods and not really be aware of any of it. Just when I left. Like the whole thing with a book ( everyone gets this.. right .. ? ) where you can read a book, and the whole world disappears and you are just in the book. I think that's normal. That IS normal right ? Ha ha. Anyway. I used to be able to do that with myself. Talking to myself. And visit many dark places.

I have sorta learned I needed to snip that off. Stop. Beyond the obvious of, ok, you are focusing on something negative - it wasn't... always.. negative.... - there is something.. deleterious about me focusing to such a degree. It's hard to explain. It's kind of. Emotionally exhausting. Some kind of exhausting. It sucks a certain kind of energy out of me. And leaves me zombified. It's. Hard to explain. And it's hard to realise. But after so many years of doing it, I have realised it's definitely a thing.

There is something of a pro and a con to it. The pro is. You're always thinking. You're always going over facts and theories and situations. Practicing. When it actually comes up in real life, you're often a wall of logic, facts, quotes, eloquence even and fuck me. Yeah. See. I am doing homework. A lot. Con. It's just another aspect of honing your education and thinking and doesn't make you happy. Is draining. Is the opposite of learning to smell the flowers. And is very prone to spiralling. Nuts.

In one of my many many conversations with myself, I came up with a new analogy for education. Intelligence. Whatever. Being smart is like Uranium. Undoubtedly useful, powerful, you can use it to power shit, get things done, it can be the heart of everything else you make. Also. It makes you sick. The closer you are to it. The more intense it is. The sicker you get. Hold a lump in your hand. Die of sickness.

Being smart is like that. Without it, you're not going to get shit done. Get too tight with it however, and it's going to kill you. And if it doesn't kill you, the resulting fallout and toxic waste is hard to deal with, and never goes away.

There is some.. eh.."happy" medium, somewhere in between the two extremes. Less happy. More tolerable I suspect. But I think everyone struggles with that spectrum. Either wanting to be able to do more. Or wishing they knew less. Or both. Ha. Oof.

Perhaps it's just me. I don't think so though.

It is absolutely about innocence vs knowledge. Pandoras box. And really. In another way. It's just a parallel for the whole journey of child to adult. Innocence to responsibility. Responsibility is heavy. As a child you can't wait to be an adult. As an adult you wish you were a child. Too late. No takesie backsies. Such is the loss of innocence. One way trip.

But. Context is important here. Whilst the nihilism of the universe is going to always* be what it is. A lot of very earthly patterns don't help with the whole knowing more. It just makes you aware of all the shit and injustice of the current systems. The lop sided gains of capitalism to raise up the corporate emperors at the cost of millions of struggling to get healthcare peasants. The rotten ways of politics and its blatant bribery and exploitation. The lies and fear peddling. That's a hard world to live in if you can see the shit.

Perhaps then, it's not good to be smart in a shit world. Better to be less aware of how shit it is. In a good world it perhaps wouldn't be as bad. But. Nihilism and all that. The universe would still not care. Still not give you a meaning to life. Perhaps in a Utopia, it's something everyone could work on and figure out however.

Interesting.

Perhaps the ultimate conclusion then is not that being smart is toxic per se. Although. I still think it is. But perhaps it's more that being hyper aware in a shit world, is not good for you. Ultimately, people are still gonna people. I am not entirely sure, but, I think even in some better Utopia, people would still lie. Have negative energies. And that alone, if someone was good enough to see beneath the surface in realtime, would cause someone pain.

Being a human lie detector is quite the burden. But that's another tangent.

Right. Enough miserable philosophy.

Today. Hmmm. Chiro appointment. I will cancel it going forwards from today. Done with the chiro. I think I need to replace it with something though. Not sure what. I think the routine helps a bit. A proper massage would be cool. Hot diggety damn, but having my calf muscles literally punched the hell out of is so nice. Never had it done professionally though.

Going to walk the old lady with Hazel. She needs some errands run, so, is keen on having an "access to car day". Athena is very stiff today. We went for a nice walk yesterday, ended up pelting down. She was fine with it all. Bouncy. Happy. But today she's super stiff. I will see if I can tone her down on a walk today. If it wasn't for Hazel, I'd give her a rest day today for sure.

Will do a tiny bit more housework today. Just to make a little progress.

And I think that's about all I can manage for today.

Pathetic really. Ooh. Stop that. Yeah. I know. I don't think *I* am pathetic. But it IS a pathetic output. I do understand why however and I am not blaming myself. Positive thinking and all that. Do not kick yourself for struggling. The height of dumb assery.

Positives

Still reaching for that better place. Still achievable. Today seems to be a maintenance at a given altitude day however. Slow progress. Think positive !