I hope you never have to go through such hard times again.
The implications of all of the truth I had learned over the years had finally all fully registered all at once due to other events also happening.
I find it fascinating, in a way, how irrational the psyche is sometimes. I mean say we feel good but then we discover something bad that was always there but we just didn't notice it. Suddenly we might feel worse, but why? The world didn't change, it is still the exact same. It is only our perception of it that has changed.
I appreciate your thoughts. Thank you. I am thankful that I have seen, done and experienced what I have. A lot of it sucked, but it has all led to me being who I am now and being aware of what I am now aware of and how it all relates to each other.
What you note about the psyche is something I had to start actively keeping in mind. Being aware of a truth about something -of a piece of information- is only one part of gaining understanding. The implications of that truth and how it relates to and affects every other truth and piece of information is just as important.
It might be lame, but G.I. Joe's "Knowing is only half the battle" really is spot on.
I believe that is why the truths that I knew hit me all at once. I knew information about the truth of the world, but I did not integrate what that information meant in relation to everything else I knew. All of the truths I was aware of were kind of held separately from my collated view of reality. I knew the information, but I had not integrated the implications of those truths.
At that time, events led me to finally start cross-referencing and comparing everything against everything to try to get a clear picture of my life, of life in general, and really everything. However, as I had such a 'backlog' of implications of truths to integrate, and as I was forced, in a way, to finally integrate them all at once, it overwhelmed me and shattered the running picture I held of reality.
Later, as I sought out all of the truths of reality, I found too much too fast and tried to integrate it all at once. I then sought ways to 'ease' the pain of that knowledge. What I found and used to ease it was the opposite of what I should have used. I still learned a lot of truth from making that mistake that I wouldn't have.
I found that I needed to learn to fully analyze and integrate each piece of information against every other piece of information to work out what was actual truth, what fit together and what didn't. It wasn't just to accumulate apparent truths, it was to determine what actually was truth.
Using my knowledge of programming, I found "IF, THEN" logic to be very useful for analyzing every new piece of information against all of the information I already had. If two truths conflicted, then there was an error that needed to be worked out. Was it that one of them must be wrong, or was only part of one wrong? Both needed to be fully re-analyzed. If no inconsistency in logic was found and both seemed sound, it pointed to there being a missing piece of information that linked the two together.
It then helped in determining what was more likely to be true based on how it related to other pieces of information. With such a sea of lies to swim in, determining what actually was a lie and what actually was a truth became difficult.
Studying Systems Thinking helped a lot with determining how pieces all related to each other. I see several who have discovered some big lies and immediately jump to everything being lies. I try to be thorough. For me, finding what is true and what is false isn't just a hobby; it is literally one of the reasons I am still living.
I have an incomplete essay I worked on a long time ago about about the various 'pills' (red, blue, black, white, clown, etc.) and the stages and evolution of some of those terms and how they relate to each other. I go into how some people can bog down and stagnate at certain pills. I also go into how many people do what I had done and just accumulate information and 'red pills', but do not analyze the implications of that information, and sometimes intentionally avoid doing so. I also mention about how stagnating and avoidance can turn into being Clownpilled and being indifferent to the insanity of reality and finding it to just be entertainment (Laughing Clown)...or even forming into desiring it to become more insane (Wicked Clown).
I'll look into revisiting it as I probably need to re-write it completely.
I saved your comment to read when I'd gotten home so I'd be able to give it the attention it deserved.
Damn man, you really have been at rock bottom. Complete respect for your resurrection despite it all - in addition to all the respect your posts typically garner here on Poal.
Thank you. I try to appreciate others and show respect to them with the presumption that they've seen, heard and experienced much as what I did or likely worse. Respecting others for what they know and what they've seen and experienced is important to me. It really isn't something I've ever gotten in return, until recently by a few on poal, that is. It is a bit new to me and I appreciate it from you. It does mean a lot to me.
Not downplaying how bad I had gotten as it really wasn't good, but I know that what my rock bottom was is still kind of an 'easy mode' rock bottom compared to many stories I've heard, and I know that this tiny snippet of my story was still not nearly as bad as the story of others on poal and elsewhere.
I see someone mention having an alcoholic father or going hungry as a child and, to me, they've already gone through worse than I did as I did not. I had and still have very loving and self-sacrificing parents. My siblings and I didn't go hungry growing up, but my parents often did. We were dirt -nearly living on the street- poor despite my father working multiple jobs, but I didn't notice. So much I wish I had known then that I know now. So much I didn't appreciate, or realize. Perhaps, after the world is righted, we'll all be able to freely share our stories with each other.
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