saccharine, part 4: fugue state

Posted on March 13, 2018 by qrparker

Survival is so hardwired into the earliest synapses of life that it is very normal, even healthy, to find suicide disturbing. The problem with disturbing things is that, by their very nature, we prefer not to examine them. This gives disturbing things an extraordinary power to persist in the shadows, surviving through generations, affecting vast swathes of the population in silence.

4_01

Most of the people who knew me when I was depressed did not detect a major difference in external behavior. This was partially due to the massive amount of time and planning I took to minimize depressed behavior while in public, but it is also due to the uncomfortable truth that the psychological distance between a healthy and a depressed mind is much shorter than most realize or admit.

4_01a

The most insidious aspect of depression is this:

depression feels more like a solution than a problem.

4_01b

If you break your legs, you are unlikely to see broken-leg-you as your “true” self, and will likely do everything in your power to expedite your recovery.

4_02

When you break your mind, their is an overwhelming sense that you are “seeing the truth.” That it is reality, not you, that is fundamentally broken, and those who seem happy exist only in some pathetic delusion.

4_03

There is also a cultural tendency to mythologize the depressed, with no end of historical artists and geniuses to reinforce this idea.

4_04

If I had to hypothesis why this correlation exists between depression and artistry, it would be similar to the blind-improved hearing hypothesis. That is, a blind person will often have improved hearing, not because the lose of vision improves the ability to hear, but because the person will naturally focus and be more in tune with the sense they can rely on. So then, when the cognitive, social, and emotional management section of this mind is impaired, the artistic and instinctual sections are forced to take a front seat.

4_06

The problem with viewing depression as something artistic, or normal, or honest, is that many people will allow themselves to remain depressed, keeping it a part of them like some sort of character trait.

At least, that’s what I did.

4_05

(finale next Tuesday)

Brain Conversation

Posted on May 15, 2014 by qrparker

~Fin

I’ll Draw Anything

Posted on April 10, 2014 by qrparker

UPDATE: Keep commenting. Rather than responding one at a time, I’ll compile the drawings into a post next Thursday. Also, thank you for all the very kind, very thoughtful comments.

Hello everyone. First off, let me tell you that you’re beauty is outweighed only by your sparkling intellect and management skills.

Let me tell you, life is really wearing me down. I’m dealing with some medical shit, which leads to emotional shit and also monetary shit (money is the emotion of America).

I’m going to take a break from blogging until May, just so I can finish up school and try to get my life back on track. I’ve been humbled by all the amazing feedback and encouragement I’ve received here. After years of believing comment sections to be evil places of dangerous vitriol, I’ve been amazed by the intelligence, insight, and general good will of those who comment here. This blog has received almost 500 comments, and I haven’t had to block a single one. That’s kind of amazing.

To prove I’m not vanishing (and to prove I love you), anyone who comments here will get an original, ms paint, digital art picture. Ask me to draw anything, and I swear to Vishnu-Jesus I’ll do it.

(comment below)

~Fin

Motivation for Future

Posted on December 5, 2013 by qrparker

As the year begins to unwind and the days grow short and dark, I find myself unable to summon motivation to perform the simplest of tasks – even if these tasks are essential to my survival.

I think this is a pretty relatable feeling for all of us who have no one to take care of but ourselves. If parents get this way, they go to jail.

As the sole guardian and caregiver of myself, I have to admit, I am quite negligent. If I could fire myself, I wouldn’t, because that would mean I’m being paid just to stay alive. That would be awesome. However, I would give myself a stern talk about my future employment, which I often do anyway.

If I spend too long thinking about the future – even twenty-minutes-from-now-future – I feel like I’m falling into a void. The future is full of possibilities, but most possibilities are pretty unappealing.

Even if I, by some miracle, manage to rise above the ever-growing pool of mediocrity and rise to a grand realm of aesthetic and emotional success, you could still die alone and forgotten. It happens all the fucking time. Just try to think of all the formally successful people who died alone and forgotten. Can’t think of one?

THAT’S BECAUSE YOU FORGOT THEM!

~Fin

The Troglodyte’s Guide to Ego

Posted on November 7, 2013 by qrparker

Sometimes I look out at the fleshy, squishy, hairy collection of cells we call the human body and I wonder how anyone could possibly have an ego.

Now, that isn’t to say I don’t understand why we have an ego. The ego is what makes your emotions feel real. In order for a tribe to survive, there has to be a certain drive for personal achievement. You have to be willing to fight saber-tooth tigers.

Emotions are our quickest and most accessible tool for deciphering a situation and, as such, we rely on them way too much.

Unfortunately, egos can be damaged and, like a balloon filling with air, the larger they get the quicker they pop.

Our emotions pass through our ego, inflating it, telling us when someone has insulted us. They feel so very powerful, we assume they’re real. And they are real.

But real and objective are not the same thing.Perception is important. It’s what makes us unique.

But unique and correct are not the same thing.

No matter how amazing you think your idea is, it’s been done before. Through the power of the internet, the whole world is connected. Concepts and thoughts and mindless chatter all mix together and swirl around to give voice to every idea ever conceived.

Your job is to interpret this whirlpool as honestly as possible. Grab in with your hands and clasp an idea you believe in.

If an ego is useful for anything, it’s sorting out the problems in yourself. When you feel it flare up, that means you’re doing something wrong. You’ve fallen too deeply in love with yourself. You can’t admit you have flaws, because they’re cauterized into your psyche and you know removing them will be painful. Shaving off the infection will take some of the skin. Skin you’d like to keep.You don’t want to fall.

But sometime you must fall into the six-lashed eye.

And we all do eventually.

~Fin

Silent Knowledge Accumulation

Posted on October 24, 2013 by qrparker

For a good chunk of my childhood, I did not speak. This was the height of my popularity.

Because, at this time, my parents were hippie liberal bohemians, they decided it would be best if I got my education in home environment where I would be free to till the garden-heart of my inner creativity. They purchased a book called Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons and some puppets and some building blocks and I went on to receive the greatest early childhood education anyone could ever receive.

After just 100 lessons, (which were as difficult as advertised), I became literate. I mostly used my newfound power to figure out which cereals were most delicious.

I was an excellent reader, and probably had far superior vocabulary and much clearer syntax than any of my peers, but for some reason I never felt the urge to express these skills through verbal communication. Even when I spoke to my mom it was in a whisper.

Any free time not spent reading was spent staring at walls, trying to help my dolls process the accumulated knowledge into the key to unlocking the doors of perception.

I continued this trend of silent knowledge accumulation until about fifth grade, when I began to grow tired of never getting my way, but was still unable to speak.

So instead of talking, I began to develop “anger issues.” I would break things and throw things and cry. This quickly ended my reign of popularity.

My once endearing silence had become terrifying. My parents had no choice but to readjust their strategy.

~Fin

Sad Times For No Reason

Posted on October 18, 2013 by qrparker

Sometimes I think that human depression is caused from an unfortunate mixture of empathy and imagination. Empathy opens you up to dark feelings that aren’t even yours, and imagination makes these feelings real and able to hurt you.

Just to keep yourself safe, you start to close off any vulnerabilities you see in yourself. You patch them up so the feelings that follow you can’t wriggle their way in and burrow inside you.

You feel proud of yourself for cleverly blocking off the hole in your chest. You don’t even mind the emptiness. The emptiness is safe. You care store all sorts of things in the emptiness. Usually some cash-money.

Everything seems to be going okay for a while. You’re lying to yourself, and you know you’re lying to yourself, but you don’t think it matters because everyone lies to themselves.

Material things do a good enough job filling the hole. You’d use something better if you had some idea of what that was, but you don’t. Maybe Jesus could fill the hole for you, but you don’t really trust him after two-thousand years of child crusades and inquisitions. Besides, you’ve visited too many museums to believe the earth is 6000 years old. So instead you just wait…

When I get like this it’s you don’t ever want to leave your bed. You know when they’re this close it’s only a matter of time, so you kind of hide to delay the inevitable. The only way you can manage any interaction is to become a quiet lonely starchild who loves with the cold distance of a terrible ice demon or human father.

You let it in the hole is filled. You feel a little less empty, but you can’t help but feel calloused, uncaring. You’re content with yourself but you don’t want anyone to see you. And you let it consume you, fearful of what may someday emerge from the void-egg around you.