Allowing

My post yesterday was a worried one. But today after posting the same question on a few websites I have gained some reassurance. I am me. If writing about me is where my instincts take me then that is where I should go. I suspected this but was afraid I was wrong, that I needed to create completely new characters but a lot of authors, if you examine their books have characters which are pretty much the same.

No matter how far you try and take them away from yourself they will alwaysretaina part of you. People read books not only for the characters but for the author as well. If you fight against your instincts then you're going to struggle.

This information has re-invigiorated me as I was worried a character ina  book was too like me but fuck it I'm just going to let it be and bust on.

Another thing that was said to me was that some writers need to get some personal things out of their system before they can move on to other topics. That's true I have a lot to deal with. Maybe wriitng will help, I think I will need at least some therapy, if I ever get round to it. I remembered a quote from someone who said an artists/writers first work is always autobiographical.

Feeling good about my art at the moment.  

Post

I get a restless feeling a lot these days. I want to something but can't sit down to do it. I have become more impatient. My thoughts are always flitting around the place not making much sense. Where I used to be able to command myself to do something now my mind says, "No! No! No!" and hops off on a pogo stick to some other random place making me go with it.

I'm struggling to write this post at the minute. It doesn't want me to confront it. It wants me to go to bed and have a wank. Well, that can wait. I want to be more disciplined and that's going to take hard slog. Why can't this shit be easy?

I suppose it wouldn't be worth it then. I need to calm myself down and focus on the moment not the outcome of my actions. Because if I don't act now, there won't be any outcome. I want discipline but there's a huge part of me that doesn't. Even when I sit down to write I don't put in as much effort as I could. I think it's good enough that I'm doing something while others do nothing but it's not enough!

You may think since I regularly update this blog that I have a good amount of discipline but the truth is that it is itself becoming a distraction from my other work. I can do nothing all day and then do my blog post at night and it's still a good day. That's how I think and it's wrong.

I believe I have unbelievable talent and have the potential to achieve great things but I don't believe I will have the courage to fulfill that potential. Is there a point in saying I will overcome the demon inside me holding me back when I don't know what's on the other side of that? When I scared to find out? The person who'd emerge would be different and I'm not sure I'm ready to face him.

Sometimes I wish I'd be in a major accident where I have a near death experience. I think this would be the only way to spur me on to live life to the fullest. Isn't that a fucked up paradox? I want to do something worthwhile so badly that I'd be willing to almost die to get myself to do it.Yet, if I want it so badly to contemplate this then why can't I just go ahead and do it?

I need to get better, I will get better, I will get better. A positive mental attitude will work, it has to fucking work.

Getting Past Myself

I like to write blogs and journalistic pieces but I consider myslef a creative writer first and foremost. This has created a problem for me since I started. At least one of my charcaters has always been based on me. I have found it almost impossible up till now to write a main character that isn't exactly like me.

Have I not been trying hard enough? This is definitely one possibility. I am writing a story at the moment basing the main character on a real person but still as I write he is turning into me. I was determined this time to make him different but as I go along he is talking to another guy about my problems and I can't seem to help myself. I'm getting these ideas that I have issues with myself and until I get over these I won't be able to write characters which aren't like me. But is that just me being lazy? Is it another excuse not to do it? If I push myself harder will I get there? Will I ever be the person and the writer I want to be until I get get over them?

It is a difficult question because it is so serious. Maybe I do need help but maybe I do need to work harder. Neiter might be the answer, or both. The truth is that I'm afraid to let go of my demons. I think sometimes they are all I have. My issues are my identity. What sort of a life would I have without them?

My life is based on me. I know everyone's is but I think I live within myself, not in the world. Does anyone feel the same?

The Greatest Shame: Savita

The posters still hang outside the Dail for the children’s referendum as people gather for a candlelit vigil in sadness and in anger over Savita Halappanavar’s death. One says ‘Protect Children’. Yes, protect children, little boys and little girls. But even after another referendum was held decades ago, a Supreme Court ruling made 20 years, or five general elections, ago the government still won’t introduce legislation to protect women.

Savita died last month in Galway University Hospital. She was refused an abortion even though the baby had zero chance of survival because of our lack of political will and lack of legislation. She waited in agony for days as doctors refused to perform the abortion as the fetus still had a heartbeat. This meant her cervix would not close and she developed septicaemia. When the fetus' heartbeat finally stopped, it was removed but Savita died sometime later.


What can you say about this? It is horrible, sad, disgusting, disgraceful, heartbreaking, sickening, despicable, but words don't cut it. You could get the greatest writers who ever lived to weigh in on this and Shakespeare would be lost trying to grip the feeling around it. It would take James Joyce longer than he took to write Ulysses to come close to expressing it.

A woman in a supposedly developed nation lying on a bed in agony being told ‘This is a Catholic country’ so you can’t have proper medical treatment, a woman dying because she couldn’t get a simple medical procedure. Jesus was meant to be a caring person who wanted everyone to go to heaven. What happened in Galway sounds like hell. There is nothing pro-life about this. The fetus is dead, Savita is dead.

The main focus should be on this woman and empathy with her family. But how can you not get angry? It's been twenty fucking years since the 'X' case and no government has had the balls to do anything about it. A woman died because TDs are too afraid to annoy a section of society they know will vote in every election. Young and middle aged women obviously do not matter.  Irish politicians, past and present, need to feel great shame today. You have failed at your job, you have failed a gender in your country and you are a bunch of cowards.

Legislation that may have saved Savita’s life was before the Dail earlier this year and the government voted it down. They said that something like this wouldn’t happen, that the legislation was there to deal with this kind of thing. Well, it has happened and now you have no more excuses. 15 Fine Gael TDs said if the government introduced such legislation they would vote against it, even with the government whip. I’m guessing those TDs are very silent somewhere right now.

The tragedy is terrifying for pregnant women in this country. And it should be terrifying for everyone else because as was said outside the Dail this evening it could be your mother, your sister, your wife or girlfriend who is next. If the government doesn’t act on this it is more shameful than the way the previous government acted during the banking crisis. If you knew someone was in real danger of being shot to death you would be expected to tell the Gardai. The government is expected to protect the lives of women and they did nothing. 


They have said they were waiting on the expert group report they commissioned on the European Court of Human Rights ruling on the ‘X’ case before doing anything. I read last night that this had just landed on Minister for Health, James Reilly’s desk. How convenient? Now you must legislate on this as soon as it can be done properly, which shouldn’t be that long. Ireland is a proud nation and has held onto this throughout our financial meltdown but it has been shaken by Savita's death.

Politicians sitting in today’s Dail and in their homes on retirement have questions to answer. There is a long streak of slime from a slug of backboneless governments. And as you sit sucking your thumbs underneath tables in Leinster House trying to think of bullshit excuses remember you have no right to spin this. You fucked up. You should kiss the feet of Savita’s family because you owe them more than you’ll ever be able to give back. Her heart was broken from losing a child; it was stopped by your inaction.

A protest will be held tomorrow 17/12 at 4pm in Dublin. We will meet at the Garden of Rememberance and march to the dail. You have a responsibility to go to this if you can. I'm not asking, I'm telling.

Superstition

Was going to bed but then I saw I had 13 posts done on the 13th. Don't like that number. How I feel about superstition can be best described by paraphrasing John Steinbeck. I think it was in either Cannery Row or Tortilla Flat (Underrated and heart warming) where he said the people of _____ didn't believe they would get bad luck by walking under ladders or stepping on cracks in the pavement. It was, of course, silly superstition but you could be sure none of the residents would risk it.

That's it, I don't believe in superstition but I wouldn't like to chance it just in case. That's why I always salute a single magpie and feel good when I see more than one. Most people say you need to salute/blow a kiss at/ wave at the first one you see a day but I do it to every lone one. Not wanting to look weird on the street sometimes I pretend I'm just scratching my head then flick my hand out.

Oddly enough I actually like stepping on cracks in the pavement. Far from avoiding them I will go out of my way to step on them. I like the way it feels. As I walk along I will try to get the front part of my foot to touch a crack, then the other front of the foot, then the middle of both, then the heels and finally the middle again. I do the middle again because otherwise it would add up to six and I don't like that number. This usually takes a couple of goes.

Am I on my own here?

Or when I'm in a car driving down the road I will try to twitch a bicep in between the different telephone poles. I will try to create some kind of a pattern. This has nothing to do with luck, probably some form of OCD but hey want you going to do. Tap your foot three times, tap your foot three times, tap your foot times...

Mind on a Pogo Stick

Tired, tired, tiredness. I'm wrecked from thinking. My thoughts are zipping round my brain like loose electrical cables. It's like there is something broken in there. This won't be a long post, I'm only writing to keep up the routine.

I don't know whether I'm coming or going for the few days. Trying to discipline myself but feel like my brain is on a pogo stick refusing to stay still. I don't fuck it, I'm going to bed. Sweet dreams people.

Journalism is for Kids

I've recently started a journalism degree programme and when I flick through papers, magazines etc. and look at the articles, all I can think is, "I want to write fucking none of these." I love writing. I love writing this kind of thing and creatively even if no one seems to want to read it.

But when I look at the sheer volume of stuff out there for people to read I wonder is there any point of writing an article. If I were to do journalism I would want it to make a difference but can it really do any good?

If a journalist finds out that a care home is abusing its patients and reports it, the home will be shut down. That's great but it's just not enough for me. Every day we read about scandal, heartbreak and atrocity but how can we ever take anything seriously enough when we'll be after moving onto something different five minutes later?

It's like reaching into a big bag of sweets. You take one, then another, and another and before you know it you're sick, want to go to sleep and forget all about them. There's too much for us to handle. Our brains will just naturally reject it all, it in no way means we don't care.

I understand why things need to be scrutinised and that you can't just release a few stories and forget about others but I don't want to be part of the overwhelming ball of jelly thrown into people's faces every day. I want my work to mean something and that seems to be getting harder.

Journalism is a vital profession but it's a childish one. It's the blame game. Every day they have to criticise when in fact, people might be doing a good job. But saying someone is doing well usually makes for shit articles. Yes, politicians need to be criticised and will take advantage of any leniency the press shows them but surely there is a more grown up way of doing both professions.

I often think that as a species we are in our adolescence. We blaze through our days, soaking up highs and beating the shit out of one another without out a care for tomorrow. People tell us there will be problems ahead and although we know this we don't seem to care enough to do anything about it. Journalism is a bitter, bickering profession in its current form, as is politics. We need to grow up and evolve. How this may be done, I don't know yet. But I will spend time trying to figure it out.

Finished

Okay, I've finished Assassin's Creed 3 and am done neglecting everything else in my life. I know I said the other day that I shouldn't let these things stand in my way but fuck! That game is unreal, seriously, even if you don't like video games, get someone you know who does and sit down beside them as they are playing. The story is mind-blowing.

Since this blog is called Recognising My Demons I suppose it's only right I look at one of my biggest ones for the second post in a row: procrastination. Sometimes I sit there doing nothing at all and I'll be thinking, "Move! Go do work!" This might go on to a certain point in the day when I'll say, "Ah, I'll do it tomorrow." And the process usually repeats itself. I am getting better but it's a painfully slow road. I'll get working good for a while then slip back into laziness.

It's like there's two people inside of me; one, who wants to work hard and succeed and this other guy; who wants to sit on his arse, get fat and play games/watch TV etc. There is a battle going on between them and it's amazing how such a lazy bastard can do so well in a fight.

Sometimes I don't even notice. In between this paragraph and the last one I spent five minutes on Facebook. I didn't even think about it, it was automatic. I did it again! Just before the last sentence. I swear on all that is holy I'm not making that up.

I need to get more disciplined. Will Smith said (I know, Will Smith, isn't exactly Plato but he's right here) that the people who make it are the ones who work hard. They're the ones who put up blog posts or worked on other things while me and 7 gazillion other people played games the past couple of days. I have to become one of them.

Sometimes I think I need to go to Asia and get monks to beat the shit out of me with sticks for 2 years to whip me into shape. Although I laugh at the idea there is a part of me going, "Do it, do whatever it takes. You want to succeed so you have to go through pain and sacrifice. You want something and if that's the way to get it then go to Asia, look those monks in the eyes after they hit you, bend over and say, 'Please sir, can I have some more?'"

Procrastination, Video Games and A Succinct Ulysses

It wasn't the main reason I started this blog but one was to get me writing everyday. I decided to dicipline myself and make sure I uploaded the post no matter what I was doing, and today I am doing it again. But fuck all else.

The reason for this is a long  walk on the beach where I actually got some writing done but mainly because I bought Assassin's Creed 3. Today I was supposed to: write a travel article, brainstorm ideas for an arts magazine, do a legal project for college, do a mock exam for college and get a haircut. None of these things was even attempted.

I am always wanting to buckle down and put extreme, committed effort into my life and work but it rarely happens. Yet, I have no problem spending hour upon hour trying to capture an imaginary city from virtual aliens. If I could put the same amount of effort into my life as I do into games I could literally take over the world. I never give up when I'm playing the Xbox and what am I achieving? Nothing. 

When you complete a hard game you look around and are filled with this great satisfaction for about two seconds until it dawns on you, "I did it! I accomplished... eh... sweet fuck all".

What if Playstation had have been around when Mozart or other greats were around. Would they have been too busy trying to beat their friends at online pool to bother creating all that art and  amazing inventions? Would Ulysses just have been, "Yeah, this lad walks around Dublin, life's ain't all you hoped it would be. Gotta go, Fifa tournament."

I'm firmly committed to get up tomorrow morning and get on with my work but the first thing I see when I wake up is my Xbox and who can say what will happen? Assassin's Creed is very good, maybe I'll spend all day tomorrow trying to pass it and then I won't have anymore distractions. Sure.

Loneliness

I've always enjoyed being on my own. Some people say they can't stand being alone for a second but I really enjoy my own company. There is a flip side to this though, loneliness is terrible.

Josh Billings said, "Solitude: a nice place to visit, a poor place to stay". That is very true, it's good to get away from everything and be with your own thoughts but if you're alone with them too long, those thoughts can turn on you.

We need human interaction; people who are lonely die younger than those who aren't. I'm not sure but I think it's a lot younger as well.

It is hard to meet people though, especially if you're shy. For some it takes time to get to know someone and to be really comfortable around them and most don't give people the chance.

It's not all their fault though as a shy person's seemingly unwillingness to talk can be taken as a sign that they're rude or they don't like the person sat next to them. This is a shame because the best friendships take hold over time and do not grow in a couple of hours.

Loneliness depresses you and people don't want to be around depressing people. So a vicious circle keeps going and you end up chewing off any hope you had of gaining friends.

What some people need to realise is that conversation, however simple it may be to them, is almost impossible for some when they don't know the other person.

Take the time, that is true here and the further I go on in life I see it being true everywhere.
You can dismiss this blog as neurotic ramblings which it is to be fair. It's a plea on my part but maybe it will help someone, maybe it'll make someone feel less alone and take away pain for a moment.

Everything

A lot of times when I go to write I start with the word 'every'. It is usually when I'm not sure what I'm about to write and is normally deleted or scribbled out but it's strange that it should pop up so often. What am I trying to say?

There must be something there, otherwise I would surely be writing a lot of other words. It's not an ordinary word as there are so many possibilities to go after it. Every time, everywhere, every person/man, everything...

So let's just follow the word and see where it takes me.

Every person I meet seems to know something I don't know, every person I see knows a little less about something that I know. If we combine our knowledge everyday, get everybody somehow engaged, would we all discover all knowledge and everything?

Maybe everything is what we're supposed to see and the only way to see it is by seeing everyone. Take every footstep you'll ever take and you would be able to walk to every land. Would we all meet each other then or miss everyone else in our wandering?

Every is all-encompassing. It's a word that seems to want to cover all things. Everyday I search for meaning and am left wondering, does there have to be meaning in anything? Or is there meaning in everything?

Life is a question which has never been answered.

Living on the Edge is Different for Everybody

Electromagnetism is something I have no idea about and am not going to write about. We are here on a little marble spinning round a star like giddy children on a carousel horse. It feels like the ride will go on forever but by the time it's over it will seem like it's gone too fast.

But that's life and that's death. A lot of people spend their whole lives worrying about death. I should know, I'm one of them but isn't it stupid? That is just a moment at the end of our lives, a brief moment that may not happen for years.

It's like sitting on the carousel horse and not enjoying your ride because you know it'll be over sometime. Death hangs over us. I often look at animals, dogs especially, running around all happy. I wonder do they have any idea that one day they'll die?

Some people say you should live every day like it's your last. Yeah, but remember that it probably isn't. A lot of people say live life on the edge, live life to the full and this is something which really gets to me because they are usually talking about bungee jumping or something.

And that's where a lot of people go wrong. Living life to the full to some people is adrenaline rushes or getting off your face every night but it's a relative concept. Living life to the full for others might be getting a degree from college, finding love or raising a family in a quiet neighborhood.

Life is strange and wonderful. For different people, in different ways. What makes some smile, bores others, what is the essence of life for some is a little too much for someone else.

Live life and don't judge others, if you think you're a free spirit living the hipster life remember a man in a suit may be just as free or you may be just as imprisioned in your own lifestyle choice.

Change

Right, I've decided to change the blog after day one. I've always had the idea to keep a diary but never really got around to it. It will still focus on the things laid out in the first few posts but they will just be a part of it now.

I got the ideas for a thoughts diary a while ago and it's been jumping around my head since then. The blog will explore whatever thoughts I'm having and how they change from day to day.

Today I'm feeling okay with the world. Life isn't so bad, I'm not beaming but I feel better than I did for the past couple of days.

This post is going to be a bit shorter because it's much easier be negative than positive. Why is that? Why can we rattle on for hours about what we hate but struggle to say a lot about how good we feel?

If you get a kick in the teeth you will tell everybody you know about it. But if you find some money on the ground, you might tell a few but then you wouldn't want to be going on about it forever. You feel like you shouldn't be rubbing your happiness in their faces.

It's a strange world where it's embarrassing to be happy. It's a sad world where that is true. But I think it is.Be happy folks, not the best post ever but fuck it, who reads this shit anyway?

Sure of Myself

I am so cocky and sure of myself when it comes to writing. I was just thinking about my ambition to be the best writer ever and thinking, “But am I really that good?” The next thought that came into my head was in two hundred years time some people looking over words that I wrote doubting myself and saying, “Even the great Yours Truly doubted himself sometimes.” 

Every word I write has an agenda, is designed to make me seem great in front of people. None of it is for myself. Some is written so I’ll be respected, some is written in the hope of sex and some is written so people will fall to their knees praising my genius. Nothing is written for me, just for my mind and my goals. I write for others but only if it benefits me. This doesn’t mean I don’t care. I care deeply about lots of things, some of the stuff happening in the world makes me cry and feel like shit but when I write about when I say I care I mean it there is always in the back of my mind a voice saying how will this make me look? Oh, they’ll like that one, you’re a genius. Girls will see that and want to have sex with you.

What the medical definition? Narcissist. Definitely. I think the world revolves around me even though most people don’t want to spend much time with me. 

My writing is always for something. Never just for me alone. Things like this would never appear in a magazine but I dream of sometime years from now them being discovered by a scholar or something and read. On the other hand, what’s the point of writing something if it’ll never be read?

I suppose I have a need to document my life. I believe I have a special mind and it is worth people seeing. I’m definitely growing more bitter. I don’t want that, I want a saviour but who can save a person who sees only himself as right?

I want to accomplish things but when I look at history and see what people have done, and I’m talking about the likes of Gandhi and Jesus here, no one has matched my ambitions. Help me please.

Sadness

Politicians are not perfect. That’s something people need to get into their heads. People always expect answers from them on every subject known to man and they are in trouble if they can’t deliver. On every radio show and television show they do their best to fill the minute or so after every question with some good sound bites. People want answers, they demand answers but it’s impossible to know they amount of stuff they are expected to know. So you don’t get answers, you get bullshit because that’s the only realistic option. 

But then people get annoyed because politicians are always talking nonsense. That’s because you’re expecting the impossible. People need to be able to let politicians say, “I don’t know,” every now and again. Maybe the minister for transport doesn’t know how long waiting lists are in hospitals. This doesn’t mean they shouldn’t be grilled but for fuck’s sake, there is no way for them to know everything. 

Some will say they should be informed about what’s going on. Well, they can’t be, not about everything. It might be frustrating for a politician to say I don’t know but is it anymore annoying than staring at your television  screen at a politician talking and there voice in your head going, “Shut the fuck up! Stop bulshitting! Stop it. Stop it please! I’m so fucking sick of it.”

But wouldn’t politicians just take advantage of being able to say I don’t know. Of course they would. They’re people and as each day is telling me more and more people are fucking stupid creatures who instead of doing something now and having a pain for one minute will put it off knowing full well sooner or later they’re going to get a kick in the teeth. 

The world is fucked, there is no saving it so let’s just watch it burn. 

I admit I need psychiatric help. I’m not schizophrenic or anything, just deeply depressed. I don’t see the point of anything anymore. I’m not suicidal but nothing seems to be worth anything. Every hurdle the human race jumps over seems to be another on the way to a massive brick wall. 

I’m self indulgent, trying to be the greatest writer ever, not seeing the point but keeping on going anyway. I really want this life to mean something. I want to love someone, feel happiness and purpose and meaning. People talk about the meaning of life but there doesn’t have to be one. It could all just be a fucking random mess of shite, cold and lonely with no great goal line at the end of it. Life is worthless but I can’t give up. Something tells me to keep going. Is it an idiot, a trickster or a saint? Is it just a chemical reaction in my head or a divine guide? 

I want to write but journalism? No. What I really want to do is confess. Listen to me world, listen to my drama. I am here I am yours and I want something to live for. I deserve it, I am human but I am smart and I know many humans get nothing but pain and live lives meaningless from the start to the very end.

My thoughts are jumbled and my mind is a puzzle but there is nothing which says I will ever figure it out. Happiness and peace are not our destinies. I wish I believed in fate but just seems impossible.

This post may seem like I hate the world. I don’t. I just wish it was better and my gut tells me it won’t ever be. I wish I didn’t care about this stuff and just live happily on Facebook looking at pictures of fucking cats but I do care. And that’s depressing because caring about the world’s problems only increase you own.

Introduction

There is good and bad in all of us. The idea that there are people who are just evil or good is wrong. I believe both exist inside of us, side by side, at the same time.The point of the blog is to explore this conflict and the other paradoxes of the human mind. I'm not a psychologist or anything like it but I believe I have insight.

I get some thoughts which are completely narcissistic and selfish. Whatever happens around me I think about how I can look good in the situation. On the other hand I care deeply about everyone in the world and am the kind of person who would never hurt someone to get ahead. You'll end up very lonely that way. I aim to explore the conflicting things going on in my head and why my brain gives me thoughts that do me absolutely no good.

It will take the form of a diary which I aim to update every day but may be every couple of days. I will now talk about something which just happened in my area to illustarte what I'm going to cover. Then there will be another couple of posts.

A young lad from round my way got kicked in the head by a horse. He is in an induced coma and is meant to be in a pretty bad way. While saying I want him to die is completely wrong, there is a part of me that does.

It's sick and selfish. I heard about it and after thinking of the consequences should he die; the sickening pain it will cause to the family and the whole community. Young people's death are always the worst. But after this I was thinking how it may provide an opportunity for me to give some wise words to those around and a chance to be a strong person, a hero.

I don't want the lad to die. That is certain but I get these weird thoughts and I think it's important to try understand them. They are a part of me, I don't like them, but they need to be understood. I don't know if other people think like this.

I suppose I'm searching for hardship, looking for a way to gain respect and for people to look up to me. I want the opporunity to comfort people. But I need to find a way to do this without wishing death on someone. I hope the kid pulls through but if he doesn't I'll do my best to help. Because it will make me look good? Yeah, but also because I care about his family and friends.The mind is strange.