Allusions to Actual Freedom existing before Richard

[scout]

@Vineeto

Are you saying that the moment you become aware how you experience yourself, the fact of being aware makes the experience “painful and exhausting”? Or has it been like that all along, and you were refusing to/afraid to acknowledge it?

The latter, but lending it attention makes the pain feel more acute than numbing it (even though I remain low-grade agitated while numbing too). I’ve been trying to work on not fighting it, it’s just hard bc if I don’t it feels kind of overwhelming.

@Vineeto

Then have a look at your resentment. Perhaps you can see (to a small degree at first) how silly it is to waste energy in objecting to being here, since it is a fact that you are here.

Yea I feel resentment a lot. I’m unable to work even a kind of chill home job right now bc I have been dealing with some weird medical symptoms that leave me constantly fatigued and slight stress provokes sometimes scary symptoms. I’m scared I won’t be able to support myself, but I’m also scared that things will get worse if I keep working since that’s been the trajectory thus far. I’m decently young too so most of my peers are out enjoying their lives and I’m in bed a lot of the time, I know comparatives aren’t helpful but I really wish I could function normally and that basic stuff like eating wasn’t a source of constant pain.

I don’t think any of these feelings are serving me in getting better. But it feels like I can’t help it; when I sit with myself long enough I cry like a scared child in pain.

@Vineeto

Once you genuinely recognize and acknowledge that ‘you’ are your feelings (including your feelings about pain) then you find that you do have a choice about how you want to experience being alive.

I can’t see this clearly yet honestly. I see that I do have a choice as to whether to engage narratives around certain feelings with my attention, and that if I stop giving those narratives attention then the feelings lose their edge, and diminish sooner. I don’t feel in control of what emotions arise in a given moment at all, just in how I respond to them.

I’ll keep exploring. I appreciate the engagement.

Thanks for your perspective too @Felix, what you wrote in your journal recently resonated.

@Felix

Lastly - this is just my opinion - but are you eating enough, getting outdoors, exercising a bit, not overworking etc etc? Actualism needs enough space and time and wellness for you to be able to explore the human condition in peace, without being way too busy or sick or under pressure.

Might be where I’m struggling. I am on leave from work and I’m taking care of myself pretty well, but getting a handle on my health has been challenging and draining. But living more intuitively to figure out what my body needs has made it apparent that my psyche is like a cancer, sapping energy and creating stress and making it hard to heal. So I feel there are literal physical stakes to this. Maybe it’s leading me to put pressure on myself here which is getting away from the point. I do feel an urgency; I want to be well.

This morning I am feeling ok though.