apennyformythoughts

[apennyformythoughts]

So this is…a vent blog, I guess. I mean, I’d like to think of it as some sort of modern philosophical platform, but of course I would. Either way, it’s just one person’s thoughts on whatever seems pertinent to think about.

I journal a lot, I always have. I’m very good at writing a whole lot about what many would probably think is very little. Did me wonders in my English classes, but outside of classist academia, not much merit in long-winded rumination. I find meaning in the things I write about, obviously, but I’m aware that most people wouldn’t. That’s not to say no one would, this whole exercise is done in the thought that someone out there might care what I think, enough to maybe tell me what they think in turn.

I suppose I could tell my friends, and they would listen because they’re good like that, but because they care about me and not necessarily because they want to hear a ten-page contemplation on the naturalistic roots of human morality or my thoughts on the word “pretentious.” I am endlessly grateful that if I put another analogy for anxiety in front of them, they’d take it with honest consideration, but I see no reason to have them humor me more than is necessary or reasonable. So instead of biting my tongue and coinciding my deepest thoughts to the pages of a google document, I’ve decide to throw them to the entropic void of the internet and see if it makes any difference whatsoever.

I’m not going to dance around it, I’m lonely and I like to talk about myself. Really, I think that’s true of just about everyone, we’re just aware that those around us generally don’t want to hear us talk about ourselves endlessly so we curb it. Nothing wrong with that, healthy relationships are give and take, and humanity would’ve gotten nowhere if we did exactly what we felt like all the time. Still, social media is special in that you can kinda say whatever the fuck you want and people are bound only by their interest—not social graces—to listen, so why not take advantage?

Maybe it’s dumb of me to want to overshare, my mother would certainly think so. Last week, we had a conversation about how everyone puts everything online these days. Don’t get me wrong, she had a point and I’m taking this out of context, I just think about how desperate humans are to connect, and how self-conscious we are to really try, and how platforms like this create a “brave new world” of psychology in that that arena.

We all want to talk and we all want to feel like people want to hear what we have to say, but the fact of the matter is everyone won’t. Either because of topic or mood or how you say it, a majority of the world probably couldn’t give less of a shit…but it really is a big world, and even a small potion of it should be enough to feel heard. It’s a screening process.

Growing up I wanted to be a character in a story. As I got older, I realize stories are built on characters’ suffering and discomfort, and found the idea less enchanting. Still, there was something to the thought of being known…it’s so easy to feel close to characters in books and stories. Sure, they’re simpler than actual people, and you project a fair bit, but I think there’s something to be said about the genuine care and concern we can have for people who don’t exist.

Honestly, I think you can almost feel closer to a fictional character than your average person because the narrative puts you so close, in their thoughts and actions and experiences. Imagine, knowing someone that thoroughly and wanting so desperately for their success and happiness despite it having no tangible effect on you at all. That’s what your doing, because how well can your brain distinguish fiction from reality anyways? You can love someone that much. There’s something really pure in that, to me.

I think a reason we tell stories is because that’s how we want to connect with each other. We want to care that much, be cared about that much, to be understood and understand in a way that is honestly so difficult to achieve between two living people with so much going on in their own heads. Not everyone can convey themselves as simply as if their thoughts were a book, and some defining experiences are only shared with ourselves and a god if there is one.

So…yeah. This is a vent blog, a modern philosophical platform, a story with an unreliable narrator, a whistle in the dark.

We’ll see how long it takes me to delete it.