Ego, Self-esteem, Self-image

This last blog felt good to write. It had been on my mind for a little bit. Someone pointed out that I have low self-esteem, a chapter called The Burnout Society led me to question my self-image, and bigredhoss pointed out that my will and my ego have been broken since poker and my breakdown/breakthrough.

I see a therapist. I see her once a month. We have goals and strategies that we are working on. I don't really get a chance to express myself unfiltered for as long as I want. We'll have conversations. She may relate some stuff to her life. Sometimes she just takes notes. Sometimes she probes a little further. Sometimes she'll point out stuff.

So, this is like a form of therapy for me. Sometimes it's kind of like crowdsourced therapy but none of you guys are therapists. When I am in the moment of writing these things I don't care about anything. I just have to get the feelings out. I never quite know where it's going to go. Here's the thing though. After it's sitting for a bit and I am sitting at home and feeling a bit of the anguish. I do long for a response. Supportive, insightful, critical, whatever. I think what human beings can't stand the most is no response. It's cool though. I know writing on nepotism helped me tremendously. I always kind of repressed that.

It's still wage slavery though. I'm still renting myself out to an owner who's power is illegitimate until proven otherwise. Slavery is a choice but what are we going to do kill ourselves? Run to Finland? I can't run to Finland that's impossible. Will they even have me? So, I'll comply. I'll comply. I'll rent myself out to an owner and do the whole dance. NO! I will not use such a beautiful word dance in that context. I'll rent myself out to an owner and comply. Comply so I can eat, sleep in my bed, and have a little extra leftover to spend time with the people I truly want to spend time with. It's not ideal. Of course it isn't. There's no negotiating with the fates. At least there is some negotiating with the masters. Their authority CAN be legitimate remember. The authority is just never legitimate until proven legitimate.

Competence hierarchies CAN exist. They just always seem to get tainted by manipulation, coercion, and exploitation. Even in a tainted culture there can be some legitimate authority. Humans are flawed. If we all learned from the capitalist playbook and the playbook says to exploit well that's what is going to happen. They can still be pleasant to go to dinner with, or go to a bonfire at their house, or race around their acres in old school jeeps. They can still be cynical about the whole process and want to retire and hate the masters just as much as anyone else. When it's game time they are manipulating their bosses, their subordinates, the customers, everyone to keep their piece of the pie. That's everyone involved in this whole mess. So, yes, competence hierarchies CAN exist but they never do and even though a person's authority may be legitimate they've likely done some shitty things in the past and will do some shitty things in the future. Even if it's just constant micro-manipulations in the daily negotiations that occur.

You want to keep your share. You want to keep your market share. You want to improve your market share. That's true of people as well. They want to keep what they have. They don't want to lose what they have. They actually want more than what they have. The individuals are looking for power and infinite growth as well. The goals align.

Most of these fucking non-profit jobs are dealing with the media and lobbying policy makers. That sounds horrible. I like greenpeace but they don't have any openings that really make sense.

I may do something a little crazy and join the Peace Corps. I was just talking about how I like sleeping in my bed and hanging out with friends though.... hmmmmm dot dot dot. We will see.

afhgjkegneklg;, all these damn non-profits are all political. I guess policy is the best way to make change in today's world. So, many things I'm frustrated by. Probably the biggest being that I am an artist that doesn't create any art. Actually I did today. What did that guy with the ponytail call it? Non-consumptive art? I just started dancing in my car in a traffic jam and tried to get everyone to join me. Some people smiled or laughed. No one joined me. That's ok I was feeling it.

My dog got lots of love at the beach today. I would like to make some theory that they were coming up to us because they wanted to talk to me but really I think they just wanted to pet my dog. He's a handsome, charismatic fella.

One theory I was thinking about though is sometimes I'll be walking and there will be an attractive woman and a guy and I will kind of check the woman out and the guy and just kind of go about my day but I noticed sometimes the guy will like put his arm around her and pull her closer. Actually, I don't know what that means. It kind of feels like he's marking his territory. Whatever bro, I am flattered you may think I am a threat though.

I've been feeling pretty uninspired on Tinder recently. It's tough. I don't even really put in effort to keep the conversations going and when I do I just kind of go with crazy shit to see if they are down with it. Even ones I've been talking to for a bit I don't really feel like driving 40 min. to go on a first date.

Does anyone know if there are any other entities out there like Greenpeace or Peace Corps?

There's got to be a way I can be more helpful than the Peace Corps. I am just cynical of anything dealing with the government. Why are they marketing so hard for people to join? Why are there recruiters?

Actually, being a high school history teacher looks like it makes a lot more sense compared to Peace Corps. I'd definitely push it to the limit. My favorite high school history teacher was on the edge and I loved it. I remember I wrote a horse shit paper and he gave me a D and told me it was a horse shit paper. That never happened to me in high school. I remember I gave kind of a bleh presentation on something I don't even remember now and in front of the whole class he said "You can do better than that. I mean, what was that? You really think someone's going to want to go to the Sweetheart's Dance with you after a presentation like that?" I was one of his favorite students though and he definitely gave me praise on many occasions as well. He was like the Gordan Ramsey of high school history.

I'd want to show "Earthlings" in class and talk about the C.N.T. and F.A.I. We could read "The Dispossessed" and Chomsky. Really get fired up about things. I remember another high school history teacher that would just put "Roots" on the tv so he could grade papers. Nothing was ever written. The only grades were on fill in the blank tests. Fucking joke.

Honestly, it kind of feels like the number 1 way I can help the world in this moment is to continue reading Edgar Morin.