Oh the tangled webs we weave and other unsavory things

I should start off by saying i was a tad inaccurate in my last post. The girlfriend i spoke of...well. There are (obviously) a few difficulties on that score. At this point we are not Boyfriend/Girlfriend, as tough as that is to admit to myself. But then that's what this is all about isn't it? Admitting tough things, being honest with myself and everyone else who reads this. We are - or rather i am - struggling mightily to just remain friends. I hope, i want there to be a continued relationship ending with a pastoral life of green things growing and little pink people growing and all that comes with a wonderful open life. However, i have a lot of growing up to do before that is possible - as she so eloquently put in an email to me yesterday. Which brings me around to the subject at hand:

My mostly dismally low self esteem.

For many years i thought my low self esteem was fodder for my own self deprecating jokes. I thought it was something that made my character interesting and pathetic in a way that was mostly innocuous. It harmed no one but myself, and hell - when you have low self esteem hurting yourself isn't such a big deal at all. It's like breathing and eating and sleeping. Of course you never realize that a dismally low self esteem kind of jams up every attempt at planning a fruitful life. Like pushing a cart uphill but where you are the guy pushing and the doofus on the side of the road laughing and throwing sticks in the way constantly. Eventually, if you have half a brain in your head, you will take greatly to the notion of tackling that doofus like a 250 pound strong saftey in an open field tackle. You no longer want to just put him down - you want to hurt that little bastard.

The little doofus, i am afraid, has been complicating my life (and hers) in the extreme. It's been years now, of sitting at the bottom of this hill with this cart listening to the little doofus snickering like a mind monkey in the bushes, hoping someone will come along and put an axe in this idiots head. Well. My friend has tried. But its a tricky thing. No one else can tackle that schmuck. Just me. She's been doing her best to point him out and get me off of my rock to go and get him but at times it just seems too damned hard. In the meantime life goes on without me participating.

And that sucks.

Alot.

So that and many other things are why i have decided to start this here Blog. Don't worry, gentle readers, ye shall not be regaled with tales of my failures nor a lingering, sighing chronicle of melancholia. It is time i move from this here vacation spot on the purple lake of desolation. Rather, i shall move on to greener pastures where i will munch yummy grass like a hindu cow. Not really.

So what am i up to to get moving? Good question. For starters i have started this blog. It's not much but its something. I figure i have to look inside of me for those things i have always thought about doing, for all of those dreams i've delayed, and all the other shit that makes life worth living and start doing them. One of them is publishing. Sure, this is hardly real publishing but it's something and it's mine and i made the choice to throw my voice into the ring even if no one wants to hear it sing. (Really you don't want to hear me sing. Seriously. It's not pretty. Just pull up next to my truck in the summer time and you'll know what i'm talking about.)

I've started a page on Facebook. Yeah yeah everybody has a page on facebook. So what. (Listen closely and ye shall hear the mating call of the mind monkey doofus) I have not had a page on facebook. It's pretty nice to see the connections and nothing beats throwing metaphorical sheep at people. I mean, sheep!!! All i wish for facebook is that they would let me launch llamas at my friends. Also i have decided to go in for some Zazen - actual instruction in sitting meditation. (Yeah, yeah. You and your wannabe enlightenment nonsense. You KNOW it will never work and you're stupid for even trying.)

Anyway. That starts tomorrow morning, bright and oh so very early. I'm sure i will be in at some point to let you all know how it goes. As though i am already prefiguring some result from it. Thats a bit ignorant too when you get right down to it. The point of doing things, ladies and gentlemen, is not so much for the result as for the doing of something itself. The next time your self esteem perks up with its nonsense and tries to nag you with its fears and so forth, just remember that. Stay in the present and just do it (as the unfortunate Nike ad so eloquently puts it)

Your Mind Monkey is stronger than you give it credit for. It's only through serious effort (and alot of genuine fun at yourself) that you can get a handle on it. Not that you ever will because it also just happens to be that faculty of us that prevents us from sticking our hands on the kitchen burner. Interesting that something that is in our brains to prevent us from being harmed quite frequently causes its own fair share of harm.

Adios till tomorrow