That Eternal Feeling of Overwhelm (Ulog No. 31)
I have not been around much, as of late.
This has nothing to do with "The State of Steem" and everything to do with the pervasive feeling of continuously falling off a very tall cliff in slow motion.
Life is filled with clever sayings and platitudes like "it is what it is" and "having control is just an illusion," but those don't really serve to make anything functionally better.
The thing I realize is that I simply have "too many irons in the fire," and I have had for quite some time... and all those irons in the fire are additionally not really doing me any good.
Familiar path... or the road to opportunity?
Perhaps we just get stuck in ruts because they become familiar. They aren't necessarily bad, but somehow they end up grinding us down.
Depression can be a strange creature, because it "sneaks up on you." At least, it can. It's easy enough to recognize when someone has some major life setback and slides into a state of depression... it's less obvious when it's just a daily grind that is wearing you down.
For me, it seems to be continuing to work at things that slowly keep fading away towards nothing. Same amount of work, fewer and fewer rewards. Eventually, I end up asking myself "why bother?"
No good answers, there.
Blue hyacinths
I read an article on a blog where a socio-political commentator was asserting that close to 50% of the US population have become what you might call the "Working poor." Meaning that in spite of having jobs, they cannot afford the basics of life... shelter, food, electricity, phone, health during any given month.
It's not "poor" in the sense of living penniless in a gutter... it's "The new poor" in the sense of eternally struggling without much likelihood that they will ever advance, or extract themselves from their debt burdens.
Our daughter has a good job, with a stable company. She makes $23 an hour, but can't afford her life... because the first $580 goes to make her student loan payment. She's pushing depression, too, because she sees no viable future, no hope.
Those feelings wear on everything: mood, finances, relationships... eventually, you tired of living with the idea that life is — and will forever be — nothing but struggle.
I shall ponder that, for a while.
Thanks for reading!
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Created at 190608 00:34 PST
1036
For me, the struggle has been a life of acceptance to make it through with the idea that while working toward the potential of something better, it is not going to be an easy life. I got very sick as a teen however and I think that it had an effect on my thinking as while friends were out living a young life of fun and pleasure, I was struggling to get out of bed.
Is this the way life should be? What is should? I have no idea, but this is the life I have.
It is scary just how close everyone is from falling over the edge with the deck stacked against them of ever recovering.
I know many who make what sounds decent and at the end of the day they have nothing to show for it. That high paying job in a large city that they grinded for years to get transfer too is not as they thought it would be. Add in a medical emergency or something major breaking down and there’s no recovering for what seems like an eternity. They were already on that edge from taking on massive student loan debt and unpaid internships. That dream job they wanted turned into a nightmare. One they openly walked into and sacrificed everything to get.
Best I think most can do these days is find something small that they can enjoy and it can be their own thing they shelter from letting the world in.
Dear @denmarkguy , I can understand you. My mood is like someone on a on a seesaw. Sometimes I feel myself an empty space, sometimes I ask to myself if there's something more I can do (and the answer is "no"), sometimes I don't find answer and the worst is when I feel Idon't have more questions too.
In my life I crossed some bad moments, some of them really horrible moments and the thing I learned to save my mind is to think just day by day. My daughter is in a similar situation of your daughter. I can understand you.
Seems to be increasing too--that not really being able to make despite having a job, home, education, it's definitely not the kind of life our parents had. Not sure if it helps to hear others are experiencing the same or not, but maybe to remember that the "American Dream" period of the 1950's was an anomaly in the grand scope of time.
Life can definitely be a struggle but the small gifts along the way help in the balance. I find I have to keep (or go find) my humor to stay in the game. I think nothing is as bad as it seems and nothing is as good as it seems. Reality is somewhere in between.
/ᐠ._.ᐟ\
I hear you so loud and clear @denmarkguy. It seems from all the responses here that many of us and our loved ones, and when we look around, entire communities are feeling the same: Not enough hours in the day, or the energy to earn the income we need, just to survive with a roof over our heads and the basic essentials.
So that if we can't find solutions and/or a way to emotionally cope ~ We can very easily get caught in the grind and slip into despondency and despair.
My 'solution' at the moment is to declutter and try to eliminate everything that's not essential in my life ~ Leaving space for joy and love. My aim to declutter was primarily to have my working space in order so that I could come to my work from a fresh starting point again ~ As I KNOW painting is my first love. But I feel there's so much more to living a life of order and (balanced) discipline. And being present to each and every moment.
A good movie to see at the moment is 2040. ♥︎♥︎⚖️♥︎♥︎