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PaperclipPerfector  7mo ago (text post)   29214 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of March 4, 2024

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Well, my experience is the complete opposite. I am in constant, inescapable, attention-grabbing pain and I wish I were never born since I can remember, even when I was not in such dire circumstances. Success does not bring me joy, achievement does not bring me joy, relationships do not bring me joy. I am quite disgusted by the world and by existence at large. I have the mental faculties to endure otherwise I would have killed myself years ago, nevertheless I still do not think that it is worth it. My only consolation, as I said in the Sunday thread, are my escapists fantasies that I know one day will stop working, because their efficacy wanes and every time I get up again they become less and less appealing. Good for you for not experiencing such hopelessness, but it is not the rule, mostly because there are no rules.

It sounds like we're talking about somewhat different things.

When I say attention-grabbing what I mean is that it seizes control of your thoughts and leaves virtually no room for anything else. It's not that reading a book or watching a show is unenjoyable while in pain, it's that you're not mentally capable of doing it because so much attention/mental capacity is directly occupied by the pain.

What I'm saying is that if you were currently in this level of pain then you wouldn't be browsing TheMotte, let alone writing comments.

That's not to diminish whatever it is you are going through too much--I'm sure you're in a lot more pain than I am now, and it sounds like you've been in pain for much longer too--but I want to make it clear that I don't think physical pain is your problem, as much as it may feel like it is. Success, achievement, relationships, etc. should operate on a totally different channel than physical pain and be mostly unrelated. In other words physical pain should not diminish emotional joy. They should remain separate and you should experience them as two different sensations happening simultaneously.

When they do interfere with each other it's usually not due to the pain itself but due to how you feel about the pain. The only reason pain should directly harm your mood at all is if you are doing what I described and trying to experience all of your future pain at once. Not only experiencing pain in the moment, but looking ahead at all the expected future pain-filled moments and dreading them.

Physical sensation cannot hurt your mood, or diminish other sources of joy, unless you let it. The sensation itself can be fruitfully separated from the emotional impact of the sensation.

There are plenty of indirect reasons pain should harm your mood--for example, maybe you're disappointed that debilitating pain renders you incapable of performing most jobs or accomplishing most goals--but these are normal emotional states to be dealt with like any other problem. You mention achievements and relationships, so it sounds like there is some hope to that aspect of things.

You have my sympathy. If you feel hopeless, though, I think depression or aimlessness are more likely culprits than physical pain.

Ok, have it the way you want. I don't really care.

Sounds like you care more about arguing than about improving your own situation. If you're in pain you can literally try what I'm describing right this very instant and see for yourself. It's really not hard.

I'm not arguing. I'm saying that you win.

I'm not arguing to win debate points. I'm arguing to convince you of things that have meaningfully improved my life. If your life is not meaningfully improved by my words then I haven't won.

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