Semi-depressed

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Day 1 of the rest of your life - July 22

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I would never give this for anything

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Keep fucking shit up until something fucks you up

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So I asked two people about how they deal with the guilt of having other people suffer for them by working for them, and they... They don't think they suffer. One of the people I asked said, if they do suffer, that's their fault basically, they should just get a new job.

So. People literally are incredibly dumb, it turns out. That's how they deal.

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Does being mentally healthy start with being selfish? You have to not give a shit about benefitting from people's suffering and then you can be "mentally healthy"?

I just can't fucking do it. I can't ever believe I'm a good person. I will have to live like this, if I want to live. I fear that what I'm trying to do is incompatible with human psychology though. I fear that eventually I will go crazy. Humans need their coping mechanisms and some of their silly beliefs, I think.

I don't know. It may take ten thousand years to properly think through this. I have to live without ever having the complete picture.

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I can't handle being selfish.

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I'm starting to think that the person I'm looking for doesn't exist.

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It's always wild to me how differently different humans experience life

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I have had a good few days where I just didn't care about how much suffering I cause to other people. I accepted I'm a bad person. I didn't care. I felt like how I assume most "mentally healthy" people feel like. I just wanted things.

I don't know what to do when I don't feel like that, and I don't know if I want to feel like that. It does still bother me that I'm a bad person, turns out.

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There are certain ideas that a lot of people really dislike hearing about, and one of them is our lack of free will. It seems to me that for certain people, a very core part of their identity depends on others' ability to be "bad", and for them to be able to be "good". I have accepted for many years now that the concept of "deserve", in a moral sense, makes absolutely no sense. Punishing someone for punishment's sake makes absolutely no sense. I have had this internalised for 3 or 4 years too - my feelings align with these thoughts. People who have not accepted this, much less internalised it, will call for others' suffering. To them, punishing someone who comitted something bad is a moral or morally neutral act: a free agent did this, it's entirely their fault, and we can judge these agents and blame everything on them, as opposed to viewing their act as something they had to go through and at no point they could have "chosen" otherwise. I would also argue - putting the question of free will aside for a moment - even if they did choose that way, making them suffer is bad. It doesn't matter if the suffering is endured by a "bad" person, suffering is suffering, and that is the only thing that matters, and it is a bad thing. So wanting others to suffer makes no sense for two different reasons, even. Another thing you will often hear people say who believe in free will is: "why are you doing anything then?", like the only reason they do things is because they can call themselves a good person for it. Or like recognizing you have no free will would do anything about the illusion of it. It kind of reminds me of when christians say that the only reason they don't go around murdering people is because of their beliefs in their book.

I feel like belief in free will is very ingrained in certain people. I have got into two arguments now where it just felt like the people will forever be incapable of accepting there is no free will - they defend it like their life depends on it, and it seems like it kinda does. I honestly am scared of these people - I love to argue and see people's worldview fall apart (which is kind of bad of me - I will internalise that this is mean, at some point), but these people get so angry when you try to take away the ability to blame other people, or the ability to feel themselves being morally superior to others, it scares me a lot and I will have to be very cautious if I try to argue about this in real life. I will definitely think and write about this more, I just wanted to write down these initial thoughts after my recent arguments with people.

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I was always frugal and felt like I don't deserve anything, but as of a few months ago I also keep thinking about how many people's constant work is necessary for me to live. People I interact with directly, like doctors and cashiers, and people I never see, like those supplying my electricity, water, Internet. I feel incredibely bad about this, and I honestly think the only logical thing for me is to not exist. Even if I could contribute useful things, I can never give enough back to justify me existing.

Problem is, I do plan on living, at least for a while still. Currently I guess I just live in constant congnitive dissonance - I feel that by existing and having needs I am doing something morally wrong, but I am still continuing doing it. I know that I am right and this is literally the way it is, I can not delude myself. There is no escaping from this, everyday I require resources and I think about this. I can't just not think about this, anytime I even think about not thinking about it I feel that I am a bad person, and I really don't want to be a bad person.

I don't think there's really anything I can do about this, but as this is literally cognitive dissonance (I think?) I'm gonna look up how people resolve that. Let's see the options.

Change the behavior or the cognition ("I'll eat no more of this doughnut.") - Well I still wanna live, and I know that I'm right.

Justify the behavior or the cognition, by changing the conflicting cognition ("I'm allowed to cheat my diet every once in a while.") - Try to tell myself that the hours people work for me is not that much, actually? But I know it is a lot.

Justify the behavior or the cognition by adding new behaviors or cognitions ("I'll spend thirty extra minutes at the gymnasium to work off the doughnut.") - Try to work more to justify my existence? I know I can't work enough.

Ignore or deny information that conflicts with existing beliefs ("This doughnut is not a high-sugar food.") - Just ignore that people suffer, I guess.

So, there is no way out of this. The only way really is to just accept I'm being a bad person by existing. I really don't want to be a bad person, but I just am. No amount of mental gymnastics is gonna make people not suffer for me to exist, that is just the truth. All my thinking about morals eventually led to me realizing I am a bad person for existing. I think this is somewhat humorous.

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No one likes you because of depression because no one likes you because

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I talked with someone yesterday about antinatalism, and after a lot of bad arguments and coping, it eventually got to the point where he seemed to accept every one of my arguments, but then he said: "we can't really know though, we don't know what consciousness is" and "we don't know what happens after life", and then after further arguing, he suggested that everything might be conscious. Meaning it doesn't matter if we create conscious beings or not. People will grasp at the tiniest of straws to not have to accept antinatalism.

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We used to have a thing with my friend who died. We respected eachother as humans infinitely. We were different people but we liked eachother in a way that started with respect. I am not sure how to best explain it. I want that again. It just so much how my "feelings" work. It's exactly what I want. Infinite respect, forever. Of course, forever is idealizing it. But that's what I want.

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This is too much right now. >.>

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I need to not lose hope, I have found people before I can do it again it's all gonna be alright. I just need to stay sane and maybe work on that depression that is creeping up on me.

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I am starting to think I have to get better fist before trying to find someone. It's weird because I feel like I'm just not quite as "happy" as most people, but I am definitely not a depressed pessimist like a lot of people seem to be. I will always have the knowledge that there's no meaning to life and consciousness is just an unfortunate consequence of physics, and these things are important to me, but I am also trying to have fun and be as mentally healthy as possible. So I just don't really know if there are other people out there who feel the same way: who accept reality, have empathy, and somehow not depressed as fuck.