unique – Observations and Misunderstandings

I was lying in bed this morning feeling frustrated. I’ve not been sleeping as well as I usually do and that usual is to close my eyes and suddenly the alarm is going off nine hours later. I’m not sure why I’m not, but for whatever reason I find it understandably annoying. The frustration I suspect is like a wind that gives the fire oxygen but it’s a lack of something that’s the kindling.

I’ve led a reasonably interesting life so far, been to a few places and met many faces. I don’t really feel proud of it like it’s some accomplishment despite the positive response I get when I tell some people. There is certainly a lack of contentment and despite how it may appear I feel a constant drive to achieve things. I often see some of my friends or really successful famous people and I’m envious of their lives. They seem to have a success I don’t. Careers, homes, families and bank balances yet I’m thirty four and my instincts have rejected all of these things until now. In fact I still see the futility of some of them and I know the things they have sacrificed to achieve them, things I’m seemingly still unwilling to as I plan my next adventure. Can we adventure forever though? We can’t eat our memories, we can’t shelter under them and eventually we just become those repetitive old travellers others avoid because all they have is their stories. I don’t often tell my stories unless they come up as a relatable anecdote, I don’t want to be that person.

So why the frustration? I hope you don’t feel me to be self indulgent with this piece but it’s simply I know expressing thoughts like this can help others with their own thoughts. I’m not saying my thoughts are anything special but more that I’m not unique and we all suffer the same things just through different eyes. The frustration stems from a lack of something in life as I said. I’m not sure if it’s a home because I have one now and it’s great and safe but it’s not going to bring me happiness on it’s own. Maybe it’s a family? A wife and kids. Again I’m unsure of that, although I don’t doubt it would be nice to have a woman in my life. Perhaps it’s just wanting it all, or more precisely wanting an idea of how I imagine it’ll be.

I was thinking that for all the knowledge I’ve learnt over the years; meeting wise people, reading wise texts, experiencing moments of understanding; I still don’t seem to put much of this into practice in my own life. It would explain why it is still knowledge within and not wisdom. The only thing I’ve learnt is that unlike twenty five year old me I try to avoid giving wise enlightened advice or talking in that empty way people do when they think they know it all. I feel an immediate inclination to end the conversation, or I’ll carry it on but sometimes it just feels stupid. I know it can impress people, and you see people taking it in but it doesn’t feel real. Unless you start living it it’s just a series of empty words.

A series of desires about something we imagine we want and a series of empty words then. I know the rhetoric about contentment and desires but I’m not content and I still desire. I know the words that give the impression of a level of enlightened but I feel as far from enlightened as I’ve even been. This is the frustration then. Why what I know doesn’t correlate in any way to how I act. This is why I feel confident I can say this aloud and it will resonate with others, another thing I know is that others don’t act on what they know either. Perhaps it’s just part of being a fallible human. Perhaps we just need more than knowledge of words. This drive to achieve life, live it to whatever fullest version we choose. Again this is just an idea of a desire. I think I need to end this here because I can see myself going in circles. The answers aren’t attached to my tail. Maybe the answers aren’t attached to anything. Maybe there are no answers. Perhaps that’s what I’m missing, but what does that even mean? Just empty fucking words again.

How accurately do we imagine ourselves to how other people imagine we are? That is of course an impossible question to answer as it is not only unique to the one person being imagined but is unique again to each person doing the imagining. People either think unreasonably highly of themselves or unnecessarily lowly of themselves and everything in between; as a result of a lifetimes worth of experiences justifiably or unjustifiably leading to that conclusion. We all know examples of extremes both ways in our friendship or acquaintance groups and these are well worn examples of perception and self-delusion. What we don’t always think about though is whether we view that person accurately or whether what we think is actually part of another delusion.

There was a time when I used to believe that there was nothing unique left in the world. I shared this information with a rather creative friend who made music along with a variety of other interesting and inspired works of art and bodies of thought. He was a character, potentially a genius but certainly someone who viewed the world in a way uncommon to most. I have avoided using the word unique there because it would be too easy but he was horrified at my suggestion that it didn’t exist. I can’t really remember my argument anymore for why nothing was unique but I think it came from an idea that everything came from something; music for example was inspired by other music and never existed independently from anything else. These are not necessarily my thoughts anymore and I would likely agree with him now as no one piece of art will ever be exactly like another. Some may be inspired by others to varying degrees but there will always be something put into it by the creator, even not obvious at first, which came solely from the person making it, their unintentional signature move it could be said.

It is with this that we view others too. You may believe it is obvious that your friend thinks very highly of themselves but others view that person with eyes inspired by a completely unique set of experiences and past conditioning. We get easily frustrated when people don’t think like us when we believe what we think to be obvious. The way we view people is unique just as how your friends view you is unique. You may have an idea of your character but if you have a group of five friends, to them there are five different versions of you running around doing things in five different ways. Nobody views you as you view yourself, it is impossible yet we get so hung up on what people think of us. Just imagine how horrified we would be if we really knew how people thought; each and every version. Perception is a remarkable thing.

Tag: unique

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