Alright, this sounds like a strange topic for a blog that has a theme of “On the Path… It’s a Wonderful Life.” I agree but let me explain. I’m all for having and creating a good and happy, positive life. I’ve written about my earlier years. Times of chaos, unhappiness, anger, confusion and the usual childhood family experiences that many of us have had. Very dark times I survived. I got through them with no major wrong turns, fortunately.
So, I have always sought a better life than my early years led me to believe was my future. I at some point realized that I had to go my own way. Create my own life, rather than just do what I was told to do. That was the path that saved me from a very bad life of deep, dark depression. Something in my inner self pointed me in the right direction. I looked for and sought out a positive way of living. I sought out religious and spiritual wisdom and guidance and knowledge. Yes, I became acquainted with the self-help literature. I learned how to be more positive and battle the negatives of life. It worked. My life turned out good. It turned out wonderful, in fact. But, underneath the “good life” I was living, there was always a dark place staring me in my face if I let it. The bad things in life. The negative, the evil, etc. Yep, always there.
Now that I have lived many, many decades and survived so many twists and turns on my path, I began to realize that something was missing. So much of the happiness seeking and self-help literature seemed to be missing something. Like so much of church experience, there was a lot of “fluff,” stuff preached at us that was not really honest and substantial. I consider myself a real, deep, and substantial person, so I looked at this situation more closely. How could seeking happiness and positive thinking be lacking something or not perhaps the best way to live?
Well, happiness is good. Joy in life is wonderful. Self-help literature can certainly be helpful and a good thing. But there’s the other side of life. Life is sh*t, the world is f*cked. There’s evil out there. Study history. I did, it was my major in college and I’m deep into studying it now in my continuing adult education. How do you reconcile it all, living a good, positive happy joyous life and seeing the crap of the world?
I needed a new, different perspective on life that was more realistic, real, true, yet good and helpful and positive. Then I came across two interesting books that got me thinking more along these lines of how to be happy and live a good life amid all the muck in this world. The titles are a bit unusual and, well, gross. “The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck,” and “Everything is F*cked.”
Read the two books. Couldn’t put them down and then discovered there was a third book, “The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F**ck Journal.” Wow, that really got me working on looking at my life in a new way. A different way to see things, consider how you are living and how you may want to live to deal with life now. For me, that was great. Just what I needed. Basically, telling us that there are only limited amounts of f*cks to give in life, so be deliberate in deciding where to give your attention. Don’t waste your life energy on unimportant things in your life. Give your energy to what really matters to you in life. Forget the rest. That not giving a f*ck is one of the greatest skills in life you can learn.
Well, I could go on and on, as usual in my blogs, but you get the point, I hope. There is so much we cannot control in life. Being unrealistically positive and denying the bad in this world does not work, as I see it. I say denial is never a good thing. There is a lot of crap in life. So much of life is control and manipulation of us by others. Parents, family, teachers, friends, the education system and the business world and politics, etc. There is always pain and suffering and conflicts in life. Everyone has their own agenda. Many want to hurt or harm us in one way or another, make us “play the game” (their game, their way). Perhaps you don’t see it that way, but I do. I’ve been around a long time, seen it all.
So, from these books and this personal working journal and my stoic philosophy, I see things much more clearly than I ever did before. We all hurt at times. We have been hurt. Sh*t happens. There is pain and suffering in life. Even Jesus says this. The Buddha, and others. Such is life. Life is learning how to handle all of this, and that is what we have to do, really. Otherwise, we are in denial and living a false, fantasy life. A totally pleasurable, happy all the time life, with no problems. no dark times ever.
So, yes, give a f*ck. But give good f*cks. About things you really care about. Be love, give love, live totally in love, as I see it. Deal with reality. We are going to die, you know. Just live a good, ethical life so you can feel good about it all when you must say “goodbye” to everything and everyone.
I could go on, and maybe in later blog posts I’ll include some more insights gained from these books. I’ll just briefly say a few more things brought out in my reading of these books.
Shut up and be grateful. Eliminate what is not adding value to your life. Create a “F*ck it list of things you will not get involved in. Do not let emotions hijack your decision making. Don’t hope for a life without problems. There will always be problems. Make your life about having better problems (yes, this is possible). There are problems you can actually enjoy having and enjoy solving. Know your values. Ask what problems you enjoy solving in life. Focus on what you can control. F*ck the rest. Find greater purpose in your life. Is that enough to begin thinking in new, unconventional ways? Thinking in these ways have proved very beneficial for me. Enjoy your journey.
Wally