This isn’t about a recent thing but I just got reminded about how sometimes depressed dudes argue with me in a strangely earnest and hopeful sort of way. It’s kiiiind of a “suicide by cop” energy, where you find a kind person to be annoying to until something gives
1. If the person gives up on you, ha. Kindness is bullshit! Nihilistic misanthropy wins again
2. If the person has no boundaries and persists with trying to help you, ha. Free attention and makeshift therapy from a sucker
2. If the person has no boundaries and persists with trying to help you, ha. Free attention and makeshift therapy from a sucker
People are complex and layered. I do believe that practically everyone has some part of them that wants genuine connection. But some people who are tied up in their issues will basically use their light as a sort of siren song bait to drag other people down with them
Life is pretty crazy in this sort of rocky territory. I’m intimately familiar with it. I used to be a musician who hung out with people battling addictions and other issues. It’s very messy and there’s no clear right or wrong, good or bad, no simple answers
The guiding question that I think was helpful for me was: what sort of life do you want for yourself? What sort of people do you want in your life? You have no obligation to force yourself to be around miserable people. You don’t *have* to be a full-time savior of the broken
when I was going through my transition phase, I second-guessed myself a lot. I was becoming happier, but was this happiness fake and bullshit? Isn’t it just an echo chamber, to surround yourself with good people? How convenient! How delusional! How fake! Etc etc
But what the miserable don’t point out so much is that all configurations are self-reinforcing, ie misery forms an echo-chamber too. You can’t really escape this
You have to save yourself first, if only so that you have the energy to keep playing
I used to obsessively try to help other people, from a place of neediness. If I help to fix other broken people maybe I will be less broken myself. It took a long time to learn that I can help others *by* taking care of myself: embodying a nourishing vibe
“I’m trying to save you here” is a frame that seems positive but it can sometimes actually reinforces the dynamic that the other person is a hapless victim that needs saving, and will always need a savior. Ultimately I think we each have to take responsibility for ourselves
Which isn’t to prop up some simplistic “by your bootstraps” individualism. We are social creatures, we need each other. We flourish amongst each other. But there’s a diff between needing help and being needy. Neediness is a sort of corrosive fixation that can ruin relationships
