Thursday, November 29, 2007

Gossip. Smalltalk. "Hanging around." Bonding.

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They say humans are social animals.
I do not doubt this.
Before we are intellectuals, tool-users, or whatever, we are social animals.
Often it is, therefore, the case where social things are rated of higher value than other, say more intellectual or technical things.
It stems from this fact that what is often more remembered in a person's life... are not those "technical" things, but rather, personal experiences, interpersonal relations... ultimately, the "social" aspect of our life; this is what is remembered by those close around us, and anyone who want to know us at least a little bit. Arguably, it is what we as people would remember the most when we reflect on our lives.
Whether good or bad, this is simply a fact of life.
These "little things", social things, contributes most significantly in defining our identity; THEY DEFINE WHO WE ARE.
For, one can get only so far in life with "achievements" per se; what is often more important is what surrounds that - the person, as a human, social being.
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Unfortunately, I have little skill at it
The art of smalltalk, chat, gossip bewilders me.
The sheer... I donno.... how can one "simply" meet to have dinner with others ?
The whole idea of "hanging out"; engaging in idle banter ... that is beyond me.
I am hardly a socially suave guy...
I just feel, oh i donno,
that it's not worth the time.
I always get this terrible feeling, that I would be wasting my time doing things like that. That I wouldn't be able to handle the sheer ... dullness. It's like fielding in a baseball game where the ball never comes to you. ....
Of course, I know, I know, ... those things are important... connections...bonding ...
Yet......
SIGH
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Guess what, people like me still have interpersonal relations, relationships, friends, emotions, love ... I am deeply hurt internally when I feel I have shown indifference or even hatred towards others, when on the inside the very opposite is true....
I simply cannot express the above things in "usual" ways... I donno, why people always go on about things being "cliched" or whatever when their social lives are the exact representation of such ideals. It's just that... I simply am not accustomed to the "usual" way of things, the predetermined, socially, culturally pre-approved ways.

Sunday, November 04, 2007

A Lonesome World

This world is so lonely .......

So many norms
So many expectations

We live in such a suffocating world full of expectations..

Everyone "expects" who we are meant to be ...

We are meant to be a "proper" human living along with others with no particular biological, sociological, psychological abnormalities;

Should we err, falter, ... digress ... from any of the above areas

We are immediately labelled an eccentric, an outcast, a weirdo, .... a loser.

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Is anyone human at all in this capitalistic, hypocritical, superficial, frivolous world ?

Where are all the original thinkers? Anyone who wants to live their life in earnest?

Why does everyone seem to be so content in merging themselves into commanlity... banality ...
Things that have existed for ever in the past, for ever in the present, for ever in the future...
What joy is there in being so "normal" ? Being so ... I donno... "expectable" ?

I hate it .....

Everything is done ... to the extreme... for display in this world

What amazes me, saddens me, is hardly anything is done in earnest ... from the heart ...

It's all fakery ... how could you lie so much; I mean, how could you lie so much ...
If one thing symbolises humanity it is deception and lies.
Life just seems to be all about how well one can keep a straight face while deceiving inside ... in multiple levels.

My simple question is : What joy is in that ? Why ?

Of course, I don't expect anyone to answer that .... my guess, from the fact that everyone around me is involved in such doublethink ... is that they themselves do not realise they're just subject to the great machinery that is humanity ... they're all just parts, cogs of that machine... they don't really have control over it ....

I don't know... but it just seems all the more worse in the 21st century.

Humanity is in shambles... the codes of honour, ethics, religion and culture are disintegrating...;
Increasingly our world is becoming an artifice; a world with no essence yet full of displays; where money... possession means everything... well because it helps us with such displays;

Every aspect of human life are hypocritical in nature ... Marketing at the extreme... to of course Politics... Art, Academia, Society, Human Relationships ...

No one means anything in this world
No actions mean anything
No words mean anything

They're all just displays, utterly predictable displays ...