In Contemplation of Dark Times and Moving Forward

I have always used blogging — and keeping a journal — as a way to dump the thoughts inside my head to clear up a little ”space” that would allow me to move forward with my day.

I started writing in paper journals when I was 13, shortly after my mother and I uprooted from a somewhat comfortable and established life in a typical neighborhood in my native Denmark to go live in a retirement area in the south of Spain, in a place where I knew no-one, didn’t speak the language and there were very few other kids for me to hang out with, because… well… it was a retirement area.

Strangely enough, even though I was a very straight-laced kid who always played by the rules, I engaged in the ”heinous crime” of stealing blank notebooks from the supplies closet at school so I could use them as journals.

I started writing about the experience of moving, and about the feelings of being so alone and out-of-place, and not really being able to see an alternative that could make things better. I already felt like I didn’t really belong on Planet Earth, and now I felt like I had been taken to a place on Planet Earth where I particularly didn’t belong and there was a snowball’s chance in Hell that I could fabricate an existence that bore even the vaguest resemblance to the kind of life I had at least hoped I would be able to have, as an adult.

Writing/journaling/blogging has been my catharsis — my personal therapy, in a sense — ever since those days… and it remains so, today.

I have often wondered why I bother to keep moving forward when there is ample and virtually constant evidence that Life On Planet Earth really doesn’t want me to walk the paths I envision, and I should just suck it up and be swept away by the enormous herd of sheep that is rampant consumerism, schlocky top-40 music, idiotic reality TV, getting drunk at happy hour on Friday while you do some kind of ”work” that seems utterly meaningless for an employer that might pay you just enough to keep you from actual destitution but not enough for you to ever feel comfortable, while you sit around and wonder why humans invariably seem to want to steal, kill, cheat and abuse each other… and justify doing so via a long stream of excuses and rationalizations that most people look at and declare ”Yeah, I can totally grok why you’d do that!”

Like the little kid in Hans Christian Andersen’s famous ”The Emperor’s New Clothes,” I don’t grok it, I don't tend to fall for the trance, and I tend to point out the obvious… which apparently makes me an "appalling human being."

In the end I feel a bit like that kid must have… because — cynic, as I am — we don’t hear about the ”after story” for that kid... who probably got a beating and was sent to bed without dinner for speaking up in public.

I don’t like being "beaten," so much of the time I don’t actually end up speaking up… instead I end up sighing at the futility of it all and asking myself the same fundamental questions I was asking when I was 13: Why am I even BOTHERING with living on Planet Earth?

Now, for anyone in the therapeutic field who might feel alarmed at reading these words, let me assure you that this is NOT “suicidal ideation,” it is simply an exploration of thought patterns.

In looking back across the years, I often think about that old metaphor of ”dangling a carrot in front of a donkey to make it go” and I laugh to myself as I realize that I am blessed (or cursed?) by the fact that I only need the tiniest of carrots to motivate myself to move forward; to believe that maybe something better is ahead.

It's a personality trait that has kept me alive, even when I felt there was very little hope ahead... and I am grateful for that, all in all. And I'm grateful for having this writing outlet to help me process.

Thanks for stopping by, and have a great remainder of your weekend!

Comments, feedback and other interaction is invited and welcomed! Because — after all — SOCIAL content is about interacting, right? Leave a comment — share your experiences — be part of the conversation! I do my best to answer comments, even if it sometimes takes a few days!

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Created at 2025.06.23 01:26 PDT
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