[SorryShaped]

This will sound stupid and probably is. Something really made me think about listening to my conscience more. It seems like it should be simple to do, but I don't so often.
I'm a terrible human being? Yes. I have a lot to offer but none of it really matters. So what does that tell me? I need to listen to my conscience more. I do what's more for the greater good or someone else's good or even my own feelings of good. None of those are always right. I'm so rarely right that I can't trust myself. So who can I trust? So many people want me to trust them, and because so many before have used "trust me" as part of a lie including myself, I don't have a way to know whom to trust. I think love has been used as a weapon so often on me that it's not to be believed either. Love is a lie? Seems to be, based on all the people that tell me they love me. Now I'm left with me and my conscience, the only two people I've never trusted and the only two I cannot get away from. This is really smaller parts of the crisis I've been in my entire life and now I see that the best plan of action for me is to do nothing. But, lack of action is an action. I cannot therefore do nothing.
So is there a true point to existence?

So much to respond to here. This is like a spiral.

First of all, you aren’t awful or doomed or terrible. You are a good person, and I know this because I see you all over the place helping people.

Listen to your conscience? Not if you’re depressed because you’ll only think the worst.

My last therapist used to tell me that I was hurting myself with the words I used on myself. That’s what this reminds me of. Like the word awful. Describe a truly awful person. Someone who steals Christmas presents from homeless children. There’s an example of awful. That isn’t you.

All people have positive and negative aspects of their personality. Then there are people like us that aren’t always ourselves.. Don’t be so hard on yourself. You do the best you can. You take care of yourself. You’re trying.

As for love, I don’t know. I think there are different types of love. I don’t know what your referring to. Maybe think about love, trust, etc. when your feeling better.

How are you feeling? I know you’ve been struggling with meds and worrying about bad news.

[SorryShaped]

I feel forking awful, but stably so. Some of this is I'm possibly fighting the flu, which I know messes with everything and the rest is that I'm fighting my image of myself vs my true self. I do think we each have a moral compass and I'm sure mine is broken. I'm not going to argue about what good I do or don't do, because that seems like it would be stroking my ego or stoking my fires and that's not important here either. What I am doing is trying to figure out if my compass is repairable and if I should try to. Karma would put me fruit bat in the Antarctic a few million years. Yikes that sounds rough, but truthful.
I'm not in a spiral, down or up. I'm thinking. I know I'm changeable because we're all in constant change, but should I do it? Likely, yes.
Then the big question becomes, "to what?"

I don’t know if this is helpful. I don’t see myself as a bad person because I have struggled with impulse control. And I probably will again. I’ve done things I’m not proud of. Yes, people would question my morality if they knew.

I don’t think of impulse control as a character flaw. It’s just a problem I struggle with. This is an element of being bipolar. I don’t mean it as an excuse. It. Just. Is.

Is this possibility what you’re talking about?

[amicus_curiae]

Let me introduce the Poet of the Twentieth Century:

Life is sad
Life is a bust
All you can do is do what you must
You do what you must do, and you do it well
I'll do it for you, honey baby,
Can't you tell?

Not even close to trying to be funny.

I used to think that I was evil because of the collection of Evil Things that I had... accomplished in my life. I inflated these things (some, not even a minute in real time) until I became evil. Beyond more than a horrible human being.

But I wasn’t. Evil. Or horrible. Terribly flawed, yes.

It’s not your conscience telling you that you’re bad nor your conscience telling you that your desire to Do Good is going to be determined by others or it certain to fail, etc.

Someone fails basic logic (6 semester hours!) in naming an inaction as an action. That’s akin to hiring 68 Shabbas goy weekly in the event that a knot may need tying. It makes no sense.

Love? Best left to fluid exchange, really. Friction and the like.

Your ego-you and your conscience are not Two Persons in One Body (any more than... you know) and shouldn’t be used as an excuse for inaction.

The question isn’t “is there a true point to existence,” (that should be answered, “yes, just as there is a True North) but, rather, “is there a point of existence?”

And this is the ‘point’ where we begin immersing ourselves in Kierkegaard. Or we think for a minute, take one last drag, immerse the glowing butt into the nearest beer can, shrug, and admit, “no.”

And that should fill us with joy. It is the ultimate agency. We are free - deliriously free! - to determine the meaning of our lives.

I have known pathetic men (offering myself as an example).

I have known heroes who would never have determined that they would be so.

Somewhere, between Randism and strict altruism, we choose. Life sucks. We can suck completely or only suck a little. The meaning of our existence wavers between those sounds of sucking.

[leomama]

Originally Posted by SorryShaped

This will sound stupid and probably is. Something really made me think about listening to my conscience more. It seems like it should be simple to do, but I don't so often.
I'm a terrible human being? Yes. I have a lot to offer but none of it really matters. So what does that tell me? I need to listen to my conscience more. I do what's more for the greater good or someone else's good or even my own feelings of good. None of those are always right. I'm so rarely right that I can't trust myself. So who can I trust? So many people want me to trust them, and because so many before have used "trust me" as part of a lie including myself, I don't have a way to know whom to trust. I think love has been used as a weapon so often on me that it's not to be believed either. Love is a lie? Seems to be, based on all the people that tell me they love me. Now I'm left with me and my conscience, the only two people I've never trusted and the only two I cannot get away from. This is really smaller parts of the crisis I've been in my entire life and now I see that the best plan of action for me is to do nothing. But, lack of action is an action. I cannot therefore do nothing.
So is there a true point to existence?

Sounds like you’re in a depressive state?

[Cornucopia]

I have no direction on the outside, but I do have an inner compass.

I think you have as well, I found mine through years of therapy, meditation and mindfulness.

Of course, it did hurt when realizing I haven’t always acted according to my true inner compass. Forgiving myself for mistakes and wrong-doings, and trying to make a better tomorrow is really all I can do.


Except for my random thoughts about inner compasses- which was my main focus for a couple years, and concious and unconcious and stuff like that.

I find you very fascinating, and I like your way of expressing yourself. I like your humor and your point of view on life.
I see you as this charming masculine guy, with a warmer heart than one might think. (Lol, but I can be totally wrong)
In my mind you are an awesome human being

One of the reasons are you are reflecting on yourself and seem to be a philosopher regarding this life we are living.

Sorry if I am all over the place, too much coffee today.

Change to what? The awesome person you are. Integrate the true inner you with something that works on the outside. Less dissonance will enhance the mindful ‘happy’ state.

[Nola0250]

I don't know if I can add much to what others have already said here, but I wanted to say, "me too." I appreciate all your posts here, especially when you post about struggles. I tend to isolate when I'm down and not post as much if at all. But reading about others struggles makes me feel much less alone.

What IS the point of it all? Particularly if you don't believe in or are skeptical of an afterlife? I don't really know for sure but for me, at least right now, it's learning about me, how my mind and brain work, and to try to make some contribution to this world. I don't have kids to leave behind and when I eventually leave this world, I want someone to notice and care. If I'm only going to be dirt, why does that matter? I'm not sure, maybe it's just ego. But it does matter to me. You can search inside yourself and find what matters to you, then hold to it hard as you can in the down times, even when you don't really believe it in the down times...maybe that will help.

[Wild Coyote]

You do the work!
You will reap the rewards of doing the work.

WC

[SorryShaped]

Originally Posted by key tones

I don’t know if this is helpful. I don’t see myself as a bad person because I have struggled with impulse control. And I probably will again. I’ve done things I’m not proud of. Yes, people would question my morality if they knew.

I don’t think of impulse control as a character flaw. It’s just a problem I struggle with. This is an element of being bipolar. I don’t mean it as an excuse. It. Just. Is.

Is this possibility what you’re talking about?

Part of it.

[SorryShaped]

Originally Posted by leomama

Sounds like you’re in a depressive state?

No. I'm not really depressed nor manic. I'm in a thinking state.

[SorryShaped]

Originally Posted by Nola0250

I don't know if I can add much to what others have already said here, but I wanted to say, "me too." I appreciate all your posts here, especially when you post about struggles. I tend to isolate when I'm down and not post as much if at all. But reading about others struggles makes me feel much less alone.

What IS the point of it all? Particularly if you don't believe in or are skeptical of an afterlife? I don't really know for sure but for me, at least right now, it's learning about me, how my mind and brain work, and to try to make some contribution to this world. I don't have kids to leave behind and when I eventually leave this world, I want someone to notice and care. If I'm only going to be dirt, why does that matter? I'm not sure, maybe it's just ego. But it does matter to me. You can search inside yourself and find what matters to you, then hold to it hard as you can in the down times, even when you don't really believe it in the down times...maybe that will help.

When I look inside I find all the bad that lives in there lurking to bite my head off. I know there's good too. I have to be brave enough not to be afraid of me, the scariest thing I know. I have good reason to fear myself. I can change everything or little things and I don't always know which is needed or just wanted.

[Unrigged64072835]

Is what's lurking inside you all the things you've hated about yourself? Or what others hated about you?

[SorryShaped]

Originally Posted by Fharraige

Is what's lurking inside you all the things you've hated about yourself? Or what others hated about you?

It's both. I've grown to hate what's made others misery because that's important too. I just now looked at myself in the mirror and thought that I should know this person better than I do. I need to think more before I act, but it does seem that actions are required much faster than I can think. Inaction is still an action.
I'm upset with myself for my past choices. I never should have done so many things that I did so repeatedly.
I can't wait until I can feel well enough to get back in the gym. At least there I'm only bothering me. But that's not true. I do talk to others. Maybe I should leave them alone there too?

[Tucson]

Originally Posted by Nola0250

[snip]

What IS the point of it all? Particularly if you don't believe in or are skeptical of an afterlife? I don't really know for sure but for me, at least right now, it's learning about me, how my mind and brain work, and to try to make some contribution to this world. I don't have kids to leave behind and when I eventually leave this world, I want someone to notice and care. If I'm only going to be dirt, why does that matter? I'm not sure, maybe it's just ego. But it does matter to me. You can search inside yourself and find what matters to you, then hold to it hard as you can in the down times, even when you don't really believe it in the down times...maybe that will help.

I have the same problems, and I agree to what this poster said. I could not of said it better.