litost & schmaltz: a (non)crucifixion
i recently received an e-mail from someone who said that as a form of self-validation he sometimes tries to convince other people to live life the way he does, even though he isn't sure that the way he lives has ever actually made him happy. maybe he was trying to warn me that he's a bit of an asshole, but, being the cancer that i am, what i saw was a sad and confused person who was experiencing a bit of litost*. this, of course, induced a wave of empathy and the empathy got me thinking about what it means to be happy (corny, i know) in hopes that some graspable explanation might make his doubt go away. this is what i came up with, it's nothing profound but right now (and i'm not exactly sure why) i feel like handing it over to posterity... sometimes you just have to go with these feeeeeeelings:
'when i think back i can remember times when i've been happy, but as i lived those same times i never realized how happy i was. maybe all you can do is try out as many different scenarios as possible then go back to examine each and hope you didn't burn the bridge to the one that turns out to have made you happiest. or maybe maturity is being able to define that golden scenario and recreate it for yourself. or maybe happiness is for the ignorant and the naive. or maybe it's just something your brain fabricates and then coats memories with so that everyone doesn't jump into traffic. who knows?'
(ugh, god. am i a schmaltzy dork or what? no wonder dudes are totally freaked out by me, i'm a 25 year old middle schooler.) so on top of those ponderings i am also reminded of a dream i recently had. in the dream i was on top of a platform which stood on stilts very very high up in the air and sort of wobbled and swayed. it was frightening. then on the platform appeared, a small disjointed landscape with buildings and people and trees all scattered around like building blocks. they were there to serve as a place to live. there, i would be able to find refuge from my fear because i'd be too small to fully realize that, in the grander scheme, i was in a frightening place. have i written about holding your palm up to your fave and then trying to read the lines on it? i probably have. it would be like that. then a voice in my head said that i could build that landscape into anything that i wanted it to be as long as i had the wisdom to decide what i wanted. basically, i had the ability to make it as perfectly matched to myself as i wanted, but if i didn't know myself well enough or if was was too scared to choose, then it would sit in shambles and i'd be left with no place to find comfort. what i'm trying to extract from this dream is a little hard to say and i'm afraid i'm not saying it very elegantly, but this is the best i can do right now. my attention span is short more often than not (there's a circumstantially funny statement for you) and i keep running into brick walls when i try to think of where i was going with any of this or what i should say next. i suppose i don't have to go anywhere with any of it. it's not like everything i ever do has to have some great lesson attached to it. nothing i ever said or did before ever had any lesson attached to it, no reason to start now. why not enjoy doing things that involve a little bit of myself and not feel like i'm disappointing the world? the world really doesn't expect much and if it doesn't get what little it expects it simply loses interest and moves on, that's the only punishment for bad self expression. like, did you ever hear that song "a singer must die" by leonard cohen? well it's really nothing like that at all. yyyyyeah.
*litost is supposedly a czech word which has no equivalent in any other language. it is defined by milan kundera as "a state of torment caused by a sudden insight into one's own miserable self." really that's all i know of the word, but i like it. if someone happens to be reading this, to you i say don't bother attempting to google 'litost' because you are only going to get a bunch of other lame ass self indulgent blogs talking about the same shit from the same book i read.
'when i think back i can remember times when i've been happy, but as i lived those same times i never realized how happy i was. maybe all you can do is try out as many different scenarios as possible then go back to examine each and hope you didn't burn the bridge to the one that turns out to have made you happiest. or maybe maturity is being able to define that golden scenario and recreate it for yourself. or maybe happiness is for the ignorant and the naive. or maybe it's just something your brain fabricates and then coats memories with so that everyone doesn't jump into traffic. who knows?'
(ugh, god. am i a schmaltzy dork or what? no wonder dudes are totally freaked out by me, i'm a 25 year old middle schooler.) so on top of those ponderings i am also reminded of a dream i recently had. in the dream i was on top of a platform which stood on stilts very very high up in the air and sort of wobbled and swayed. it was frightening. then on the platform appeared, a small disjointed landscape with buildings and people and trees all scattered around like building blocks. they were there to serve as a place to live. there, i would be able to find refuge from my fear because i'd be too small to fully realize that, in the grander scheme, i was in a frightening place. have i written about holding your palm up to your fave and then trying to read the lines on it? i probably have. it would be like that. then a voice in my head said that i could build that landscape into anything that i wanted it to be as long as i had the wisdom to decide what i wanted. basically, i had the ability to make it as perfectly matched to myself as i wanted, but if i didn't know myself well enough or if was was too scared to choose, then it would sit in shambles and i'd be left with no place to find comfort. what i'm trying to extract from this dream is a little hard to say and i'm afraid i'm not saying it very elegantly, but this is the best i can do right now. my attention span is short more often than not (there's a circumstantially funny statement for you) and i keep running into brick walls when i try to think of where i was going with any of this or what i should say next. i suppose i don't have to go anywhere with any of it. it's not like everything i ever do has to have some great lesson attached to it. nothing i ever said or did before ever had any lesson attached to it, no reason to start now. why not enjoy doing things that involve a little bit of myself and not feel like i'm disappointing the world? the world really doesn't expect much and if it doesn't get what little it expects it simply loses interest and moves on, that's the only punishment for bad self expression. like, did you ever hear that song "a singer must die" by leonard cohen? well it's really nothing like that at all. yyyyyeah.
*litost is supposedly a czech word which has no equivalent in any other language. it is defined by milan kundera as "a state of torment caused by a sudden insight into one's own miserable self." really that's all i know of the word, but i like it. if someone happens to be reading this, to you i say don't bother attempting to google 'litost' because you are only going to get a bunch of other lame ass self indulgent blogs talking about the same shit from the same book i read.
posted by floaty at 9:36 PM
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