and i can't be running back and forth forever between grief and high delight

my dreams are on a monstrous streak, the worst they’ve ever been: i am eaten alive by some cross between a coyote and a bobcat, i am sexually assaulted, i am on either end of breakups and betrayals, and so on. this is all highly unusual; historically my nightmares have always consisted of chases and heights and math contests. a few weeks ago i screamed in my sleep for the first time and woke up three of my housemates. some other very disgusting things have happened that i don’t feel like explaining here because i do not want to pollute this blog with their filth. to be honest my life has been fairly stress-free lately so i really do not understand where all this is coming from

maybe the answer is that i have spent too much time in my head lately? my imagination has been running amok and this past weekend i spent 20 hours reading scifi. a few weeks ago i entered an extended daydream and lingered in it for way too long, to the point where i was having trouble working and paying attention in meetings and was maybe spending more time in dreams than real life. and i realize that’s an utterly idiotic thing to do, but the daydream was so much more pleasant than reality that oftentimes i did not notice myself entering it. eventually i could feel the addiction taking root and then my fear of brain rot kicked in and i got things under control. (i am endlessly grateful to my fear of brain rot; it has saved me dozens of times and empirically seems to be one of the most unstoppable forces in my life)

i am still grappling with how bizarre all this has been. i have gotten addicted to video games and sugar and social media before but not my own imagination. though i suppose my feelings have entered uncharted territory in more ways than one over the last few months so this is not terribly surprising

sometimes when i feel unhappy i wonder if i am really dissatisfied or just bored. my inability to clearly distinguish the two has caused problems and unnecessary angst in the past - with relationships, with projects, with school - and i think i am better now but you can never be too careful with these things. my boss has a related view: People misunderstand what is meant by ‘acceptance’ in meditation and Eastern texts. Acceptance is about accurately seeing the value of what we have. If we don't accept what we have, then we're ignoring its value. This results in wasteful behavior: we'll spend a lot of energy throwing away what we have and seeking out value in other places (grass is greener syndrome) that's not actually higher value than what we have, but that we perceive as being higher value because we undervalue what we have.

am i appreciating things for what they truly are? do i really understand what i have right now? is the urge to tear everything down more about truth (things actually deserve to be torn down) or power (asserting my control over things)? how much are specific people and feelings distorting my view of the rest of my life?

Am I hurting? Am I sad? Should I stay or should I go? I've forgotten how to tell, did I ever even know?

i’ve never been satisfied with any fixed lifestyle for more than a year at a time. is that because of growth and ambition, or because of impatience and immaturity? the hardest sentences aren’t violent, they’re monotonous. i keep thinking about how i have no conception of what it means to be 50 or 60 or 70 - life is probably longer than i imagine and progress is probably slower than i expect. could it be the case that what i already have is all there really is? not in the sense of my current life is perfect but in the sense of maybe the changes that i think are improvements will merely be different and not better? it’s hard to say; i’ve blown up many good arrangements in search of something better and in some cases that was a stupid decision but i believe that most of the time i’ve chosen correctly

i think the conclusion i’m arriving at is that youth is a double-edged sword. on one hand it’s true that i’m impatient and immature and my inability to comprehend multi-decade-scale timelines or stay put in the face of long-term discomfort is killing me. on the other hand it’s also true that i’m not going to figure out value and appreciation and truth by sitting around; i need to explore more environments and collect more experiences to properly learn all this and there’s no better time than the present to explore the world and collect data