Jow Forums what makes you get up in the morning? I know it is a bit of a silly question, but it would be interesting to know. The thing is, I’ve tried to get my life in order and failed so many times that I’ve lost count. I know what I need to do to fix things but somewhere along the way I’ve lost the reason for even trying. Everything seems pointless, even if I put effort into improvement, the odds of it paying off seem very slim, offing myself almost feels like a rational decision.
I’d like to know, what drives you to keep living and trying to improve yourself?
Jow Forums what makes you get up in the morning? I know it is a bit of a silly question...
>I’d like to know, what drives you to keep living and trying to improve yourself?
I'm just a really magnificient bastard who thinks highly of himself
So, basically, a very high self worth? I doubt it would work for me, objectively I'm a very mediocre person. Not exceptionally smart, not very good looking, not rich either.
So is 95% of the world's population.
Do you need to be exceptional in order to feel good about yourself? I'd say yes and no. It's important to strive for greatness. But what if you are absolutely exceptional at something and end up 2nd best? Or 4th? Do these people deserve to be happy? Did they waste their lives? It depends on your perspective. If you judge yourself by how others perceive you, you won't be happy unless you are the very best, and even then there will be someone who is better than you in some other way.
The point is that the only person you have to compete with is yourself. What do _you_ want and who do you wish to be? It must be something that does NOT involve other people. So, instead of saying "I want to best the best at X", you should think "I want to be as good as I possibly can at X" Do NOT consider what others expect of you or say you should do. It's a selfish way to think, but it's the only way of finding happiness. If you can meet the standards and goals you set for yourself, you'll be happy.
Actually, from personal experience, I can say that you don't even have to reach the goals - you must be in a mindset that makes you feel your goals are the inevitable outcome. Failures then become not setbacks, but learning experiences. You'll get better and improve, and eventually won't make those mistakes again. In the end, you can only win and that's what motivates me every day.
I guess you have a point, no matter how good you get at something there will always be someone better. I'm just worried my best might not be good enough.
Good enough for who? Stop caring about what other people think. You get to decide what good enough is. All we do, all we are, all the things we built and the goals we set for ourselves, ... all of that only serves one purpose: to distract ourselves from the finiteness of our existence.
It seems like all you need is a passion of your own to divert yourself. It can be anything, really. Some people try to build careers. Others thirst for knowledge in all kinds of topics: music, philosophy, history, ... Some people just want to chill and do drugs. Others will find their solace in strong relationships.
The only people in this world who are to be truly pitied are the ones who fail to distract themselves from their existence. They're the ones who kill themselves without any particular reason.
Also for me it's music. The day I go deaf is the day I kill myself. Well, maybe I'll spend a couple of weeks wasting all my money on drugs and hookers first, but you get my drift.
I agree with you, but it's not "distracting yourself from your existence"... What you mean is simply living life. Not just existing, but living.
We "live" because we are too conscious as a species to merely exist. Living is just one big distraction. We build schools and houses and roads and empires and churches and families because just being alive, eating, sleeping and fucking is not enough. We're simply too aware.
I think it's the opposite: We are only conscious of our existence when we are not living life. Many people do not intellectualize their existence, they just go on their everyday lives and do what is on their mind - working, having fun, suffering, loving, whatever. It is only when we feel that something is missing that we think about our existence. So, the distraction you are speaking of is actually a distraction from not living life. It boils down to the question: Is living the default state or just existing?
In the end this universe will come to an end. Ergo everything is pointless.
>I think it's the opposite: We are only conscious of our existence when we are not living life.
Hence, life is a distraction. That doesn't mean it's good or bad, mind you. That's just how it is.
> It boils down to the question: Is living the default state or just existing?
Look at the animals around you. None of them is truly conscious of their own existence. They just live according to their nature, unaware of their own individuality - unaware of how alive they are. Only humans have been able to surpass their own biology to an extent.
Kill yourself narcissistfag
>Jow Forums what makes you get up in the morning?
The hate I feel for myself, which externalizes in hate for others. The only way to keep it down, is to keep on working, so that I can forget my failures, and be even better than yesterday, so that I can fake a sense of superiority.
>what makes you get up in the morning?
My alarm clock during the week, then having to piss and wanting to eat oats with yogurt and an apple cut to pieces and mixed in. That's it. I always wake up groggy and feeling like shit but when I think about food I get up
>Jow Forums what makes you get up in the morning?
1) Most of the time the need to take a piss.
2) My mother screaming.
3) The fatigue I feel in my face or head.
What is the difference between an animal living and just existing? For me, the animal that is living according to it's biology is living. If you strip an animal of everything it's supposed to do naturally, it is only existing. Like a zombie.
That's not what I meant. Let me put it like that: Being conscious of your existence is a distraction from living life.
listen here nigga: narcissm is the denial of the self. narcissts have a thousand for for who they are and how great they are. these people might say "i am a doctor...", "i have a lot of money..." or "i have big muscles..." "i am beautiful..."---- "... so i deserve this and that". they have so many layers of ego and their own self is buried so deep beneath them that it never shows. they have no sense of self. strip them of every title, every posession and their looks and they are nothing.
"being yourself", even being selfish, is not narcissm. it is simply being who you are and being judged for who you are, without compromise in form of titles, status and looks.
Literally me, food and take a piss are also among my mean reasons to wake up.
I also feel very tired many times when I wake up. I think it is because I have lucid and complex dreams that don't allow me to rest. Do you have these strong dreams too?
All feelings are based on perception. Look into CBT.
My body full of piss and poop. And lack of water and food.
i just get up every day to see where life takes me
or to shitpost on Jow Forums, really either or
I see what you mean but I was talking about something else entirely. I'm not talking about individual animals or humans, but the species as a whole.
Ants build colonies and carry huge ass leaves because that's what ants do. Lions hunt zebras because that's what they do. You can't convince a monkey to give you his banana by promising him eternal free bananas in monkey heaven. They don't think about life and they don't think about death. They just are.
Humans are different. Somewhere in history, we developed a sense of being, a self-awareness and everything you see today is the result of that.
People have dreams, ambitions, notions on what makes a successful life, ... and the purpose of all of that is only so we can stop thinking about how everything is pointless and we'll all die soon. Everything that has happened in the world since we have become aware is a direct result of this: politics, philosophy, society, war, peace, science, .... it's all just the result of centuries and centuries of different people's dreams and aspirations.
In the grand, universal scheme of things, what does it matter whether you go to school, pick a career, play a musical instrument, find true love, buy a fancy car, accomplish world peace, cure cancer, etc...? Nothing. We're all still alive and we're all still going to die.
We eat, drink, sleep and fuck because that's what we are programmed to do. But we do a bunch of other stuff both individually and as a society, because not doing that stuff would make our lives (existence) too painfully empty to bear. That is the price of our awareness.
Basically, what I'm trying to say is: "living life" is a social construct. It's not "real". No other species does it. We made it up as a distraction.
I think you still don't understand me. I think you are reversing cause and effect.
>People have dreams, ambitions, notions on what makes a successful life, ...
And that's natural for people.
>and the purpose of all of that is only so we can stop thinking about how everything is pointless and we'll all die soon
This is NOT natural for people and what I'm trying to tell the whole time. Think of children: They don't act like that. humans do not start out contemplating their existence and seeking distraction. Humans start out living life, wanting to explore, to learn, to have fun - wanting to live as much as they can.
>We eat, drink, sleep and fuck because that's what we are programmed to do. But we do a bunch of other stuff both individually and as a society, because not doing that stuff would make our lives (existence) too painfully empty to bear. That is the price of our awareness.
I agree. But I say it is not a distraction from our awareness. It does NOT stem from awareness. The 'other stuff' is also natural and we become painfully aware of our existence when it is missing NOT because it is a distraction, but because we lack what is so natural to us humans.
>And that's natural for people.
No it isn't. It's natural for people who are born in today's society, and yesterday's, or even society 5000 years ago, but it's not "natural" for Homo Sapiens. It's cultural, not natural.
>Think of children: They don't act like that.
Likewise, children are a product of the environment they're born in. The environment isn't natural, the humans around them aren't, how could they ever be?
>Humans start out living life, wanting to explore, to learn, to have fun - wanting to live as much as they can.
Puppies and cubs do that. Predators "learn"' to hunt. That is natural. Exploring and playing have evolutionary benefits. Assigning value to playing or exploring doesn't. People place value on "life as an explorer" as a social construct (lmao wanderlust, right?).
>I agree. But I say it is not a distraction from our awareness. It does NOT stem from awareness. The 'other stuff' is also natural and we become painfully aware of our existence when it is missing NOT because it is a distraction, but because we lack what is so natural to us humans.
There is nothing natural about being human. That's the point. We've cheated nature by becoming aware of it.
>No it isn't. It's natural for people who are born in today's society, and yesterday's, or even society 5000 years ago, but it's not "natural" for Homo Sapiens. It's cultural, not natural.
How do you know? Culture is a (somewhat) distinct feature of humans, so it's natural for them to be molded by it. Culture is only unnatural if it denies life and living. The greatest sign of an unnatural culture are depressed people.
>Assigning value to playing or exploring doesn't.
Children don't assign value to these things. They like it naturally and want to do it.
>There is nothing natural about being human. That's the point. We've cheated nature by becoming aware of it.
There is everything natural about being human. Not being human is unnatural for humans.
What are we really aware of? That we can change nature to our wantings. Many animals can't do this. Or can't they do it because they are not aware of it? Some animals are aware of what they can do (like beavers, crows, octopi for example). It's just that humans main strategy for survival is not to adapt to nature by evolution, but by adapting nature to our needs. We became so good at it that we have a great deal of understanding of nature and now we are not natural anymore? 'Cheating nature' is the most natural thing a human can do and our awareness is there to help us utilize our skills to the fullest.