#i say draft because it is literally half-written lmao but goddamn the first half that I wrote alr has me feralizing

[catcze]

.... And what if i said i have a sylus smut in my drafts where he is so sickeningly in love with you. What then.

[magistralucis]

I sometimes seriously wonder what I contribute to this world. It’s unquestionable that I must contribute some things, given that people who love me and support me exist, and I’m not in the business of invalidating that. It’s just that I’m not really sure what I contribute is relevant. Even after taking into consideration that I show in my tumblr life less than 20% of what my actual life is like - because, to be quite honest, that’s none of y’alls damn business (no offense meant, these are just standard privacy issues) - is what I do, like, meaningful? Even half as important as I would like to pretend they are? 

I make shitty gifs and write fics and every once in a blue moon I put on my academia hat. I’m in a perpetual state of academia hat normally so maybe the latter’s actually relevant. Then again it’s the humanities, so according to a good chunk of the world, maybe not. And I know not everything you do in life has to matter, per se, but it does kind of get old when the things you are trying to make matter and the irreverent things you don’t care so much about both get the exact same treatment. A shitpost is a shitpost is a shitpost and all. They don’t matter. But what about the things I put research into. I want them to matter because they mattered to me when I was writing them. It might be selfish of me to want other people to share in a personal experience, but isn’t that the point of writing? Or any kind of art? Why does anybody draw or write at all if the personal experience of other people fundamentally doesn’t matter to humankind? 

I want to write things that actually inspire people to think. Sure I could communicate the same things in an essay, fully cited and supported by theory, but the strongest criticism of such academic activities is that they make information inaccessible. So I form narratives that can be enjoyed on the surface, but maybe that makes me an hypocrite to want all those things because I really do want to teach people a lot and spark interest in the things I study. But most of this seems to be dismissed as irrelevant, or otherwise just some niche shit that tumblr user magistralucis occasionally rants about lmao why does she think any of that other shit matters when she could expand more on the drama and/or madness? (Ymmv because to my experience plenty of readers over the years I spent writing haven’t wanted madness.) 

All this could probably be solved by lowering my expectations on other people’s perceptions on all of my written work - fanfiction, original fiction, academia. I know this. I have uttered countless times that you cannot please everybody. That was a mantra I first picked up when I started writing fourteen years ago and it’s been a valid one ever since. People not liking my stuff or filtering past the things they have no interest in is literally normal. I sift through posts on my dash that are just Not My Thing all the time. Humans dislike and are disinterested in things on a perpetual basis. They do not need external justification for this. Most kinds of dislike in most contexts just boils down to a big ol’ shrug and an ‘I just don’t like it/care enough’, after all. But fuck it. I don’t want to lower my expectations. This sounds really fucking terrible but I literally do not ever want to pander to the lowest common denominator just because sexy/wild/dramatic shit sells better. I do not want my vision(s) watered down for the sake of aesthetics or more wild shit happening. If that makes me elitist and terrible then I am elitist and terrible. I’m not of the opinion that I’m wrong for feeling this way and probably won’t ever change my mind so there’s no use in debating. But then the problem of how to make people care about the things I think is important still stands, and then... and then what?

I think the answer is that I can’t. There are things about my writing that stand out to others and gain fans, but the things I want people to like about my writing aren’t one of them. And the reasons for this probably have very little to do with the audience. The conclusion must be that tumblr user magistralucis can’t shine the spotlight on the things she thinks that matters for one of two reasons: because tumblr user magistralucis is a shitty writer (or a shitty person with shitty expectations), or because the things she thinks matters don’t actually matter at all. Either way, the point is, tumblr user magistralucis loses out, and it’s pretty much entirely her fault. And leaving writing aside for now since I’ve gotten super sidetracked, I think this condition applies to pretty much everything I contribute to the world. My belief that I’m not getting adequate compensation for the things I contribute are just delusions of grandeur. It has to be, otherwise the world outside of my brain is a bunch of shit, and I don’t think I can accept that. 

I think it’s really miserable to go unchosen by the people you want to be chosen by. Infinitely worse when you’ve not done anything wrong, per se; it’s just that you were as good as a worker ant to those people, that’s all. When it’s nothing you did, but because you were just some rando not worth paying any attention to, and that’s all you’ll ever amount to. We can do so little about this. Our worth comes from other people. You can speak about inner worth all you want, hell it’s one of my favourite activities given philosophy and the inalienable rights and dignity of human beings, but I bet deep down inside we all want to be validated and that means handing over that right-to-validate to someone else. And it’s nigh fucking impossible to imprint one’s worth upon someone who won’t even acknowledge your existence. Having just a bit more money or being just a bit more pretty or just being a bit more talented isn’t enough. To imprint your existence upon the world requires shaking up what other people perceive of you from the roots up. I’m ugly as fuck and writing-wise I’d have go from whatever I’m doing right now to literal goddamn Tolstoy level shit to be of any real importance; I’ll never manage this, but out of seven billion people in the world, just how many people are capable of becoming Tolstoy overnight?

I think I am just a worthless person, really. I can validate myself all I want and often get by by doing so, but whatever people perceive me to be is probably already set in stone. I alone won’t be changing that unless I do a supernatural amount of work, which I’m not willing to put in. Perception is some really fucking cruel shit if you think about it. I kind of understand why Sartre devoted a whole area of philosophy to it because I cannot stand the idea of people looking at me. Just the idea that I exist and have a self people make decisions about is terrifying. I can imagine the whispers like: tumblr user magistralucis is sooooooo weird, like, I don’t know where she gets all of those ideas from.  Do they mean that in a good way? Bad way? Probably both. Probably the former more than the latter, because I need to reiterate that most of this is entirely normal experience shared by entirely normal people and I genuinely do not think the vast majority of human beings intend me any harm. Quite the opposite. I just do not know what the hell I am doing wrong to feel this way. 

Maybe I’m just digging myself a niche hole that no sane person would voluntarily enter. Like what could I possibly say to a person who tells me: tumblr user magistralucis I love you and support you but you cannot expect us to learn an entire language to appreciate your work. Or academia-wise: Kim I love you and support you but there is nobody in this department who could read your particular essay topic and you’re going to have to choose another. Nothing. That’s a fair assessment. Bypassing those limitations is literally not a thing I can expect of people. And yet the lack of this ability to belong, and the choice I appear to have between digging my niche hole and just hovering on the surface never doing anything of any importance, is lowkey killing me. I simply do not know where I belong.  I don’t actually think I need to live. I’ve been mulling over the above questions for years now and I still don’t have an answer as to why I need to be alive. I don’t do anything that’s worthy of letting people stick around. Is there a point? I’m not really sure there is. But then, most of us exist perfectly well without having a point, so the tl;dr is I have still not said anything of consequence. Now I’m going to go draft stuff for aksug before bed and adjust fonts for my main and try not to give into the impulse to delete everything and disappear