people write about how simplifying life can bring out the joy in it.
clearing away the clutter allows for feeling the simple pleasure of life.
just now, i thought, "my clutter is pretty much clear, but where's the joy?"
I own a bag's worth of neccesities.
i had read an article that was asking 'why do you do what you don't love?'
and i was thinking of what i really loved or wanted.
i think about the activities that, in the past, ive found joy in, but its not consistent.
i can't bet my bottom dollar that i will stay happy if i get these things.
what i seem to really want is feeling joy in living, in whatvever situation comes.
without having to have any goal, and yet always feeling the amazingness of life.
because i dont know if ive really ever felt that. (and somewhere I believe that life
is supposed to be awe-some and i'm just not seeing it)
it can sometimes seem as though it has mostly been one long awakeness
with varying shades of feeling sad, isolated and like suffering the feelings of 'what's the point of this,'
is what this ride is about.
i dont want joy to be dependent on anything I can come up with, because that just seems
like a recipe for never feeling it, because its limited to a certain, detailed set up that can never occur
in the exact same way again.
can i help if joy appears to be limited to something my heart has dwelled on since before i could think it up?
for a long time, i must've thought it lay in a relationship.
that total dropping away of personalities, just being with eachother, nothing else really mattered except
experiencing living in this 'together' way.
but that was rarely the case for longer than about an hour at a time.
i thought if i could just find the right one, i'd consistently feel the joy in life.
i've also thought that if i had a real career in singing, and songwriting,
that i'd consistently feel the joy in life because i'd be doing something i love all the time.
it's a very logical conclusion. To notice where and when you seem to feel good,
and to set life up to have more of those situations.
i noticed i felt good when performing with others in "a chorus line", when being silly with close friends,
when loving a boy and holding his hand and lying with him and talking to him,
when being in the sun, when eating good fruit only, when dancing, when looking fit and tan,
when singing with a group I really liked, when recording a great song, when writing,
when getting rid of things.
But can "I" really set up life and manipulate it to have more of these things that were originally
a surprise or just a flowing natural occurence?
that's what most of my time went to for years. looking to get to more of what felt good.
it's such a scientifically logical idea. a biologically sensical idea to move toward what feels good,
away from what does not. Easy enough for a child to do.
i started losing steam because it wasnt really working- i either wasnt getting the things,
or they werent feeling like i thought they would, or they wouldn't last.
so it felt like I was flailing around more now in the 'i don't know what to do, i don't know what i like' state.
life is just happening on a spontaneous ride, and it's flying beneath me, pushing me around
like they do with a host on SNL. The host has no idea where the next scene is, and it's taped live,
so there is a crew ready after each scene to strip them of one skit's clothes, put on the new ones,
and push them to the next right set. The host is just a vessel that starts to perform when it's told 'you're on.'
there's a feeling of not really choosing anymore, and not having the energy to make up new
ideas about what would feel good.
and not believing that they will work anyway.
there's an sense of just taking whatever comes without any effort or ideas.
Which, in turn, feels like there's a lot less going on.
But there's also still an echoing voice saying you have to come up with things, or you
will just always feel blah. If you don't 'try' for anything, nothing will feel customized and specifically fulfilling.
Ah the contradictions persist.
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