Notes to Myself

"Just when I think I have learned the wy to live, life changes and I am left the same as when I began. The more things change the more I stay the same. It appears that my life is a constant irony of maturity and regression, but my sense if progressis based on the illusion that things out there are going to remain the same and that, at last, I have gained a little control. But there will never be means to ends, only means. And I am means. I am what I started with, and when it is all over I will be all that is left of me.

Eloquence is sometimes lyrical, sometimes powerful, but always an overstatement and always a projection.

Dishonest people believe in words rather than reality.

Most words evolved as a description of the outside world, hence their inadequacy to describe what is going on inside of me.

It is not necessary to always think in words. Words often keep me from acting in a fully intuitive way. Fears, indecision and frustration feed on words. Without words they usually stop.

I don't need a 'reason' to be happy.

It seems I must get in touch with my desire to hurt before I can get in touch with my desire not to hurt.

I am noticing that when I am bored I think I am ired of my surroundings but I am really tired of my thoughts.

For me to try to classify something so complex as an individual human being merely demonstrates my own shallowness. A judgement of another person is an abstraction that adds qualities that are not there and leaves out what is unique about him. If I classify someone I turn him into a thing.

Profanity fixes the other person's attention on my words rather than my thoughts.

Sometimes my contacts with people are frustrating. Sometimes after I have been with someone I feel unsatisfied and slightly irritated, as if I have been wasting my time. This suggest that these feelings arise from a thwarting of my expectations. I go wanting something from a person and do not get it. Things I might want: approval, help, fun, entertainment (escape from boredom), recognition, love, sex, justification.

I talk because I feel, and I talk to you because I want you to know how I feel.
My statements are request.
My request are statements.
My trivia is an invitation to be friends.
My gossip is a plea: Please see me as incapable of that. Please respect me
My arguments insist: I want you to show respect for me by agreeing with me. This is the way I say it is.
And my criticism informs you: You hurt my feelings a minute ago.

Morbid self-doubt destroys anger.

If a man takes off his sunglasses I can hear him better.

I can get along with people a lot better if I realize that no one ever feels exactly the same about me or anyone else from one moment to the next. And, likewise, it is self-destructive to believe I must love anyone all of the time."



from the above titled work by
Hugh Prather. ¶ >11:11 AM .::.