It's good bye, myself, you were a worthy adversary - Tilted Forum Project Discussion Community

MrFriendly · 04-02-2011, 01:33 AM

I'm going to be upfront, I originally posted this in another forum, but I just felt like sharing a part of myself with you all as well.

In recent months my life has taken off on a trajectory I really didn't think it would. In simple language, there's what I wanted to have happen, and there was the spanner that came from no where and planted itself firmly in the works. One thing is really clear, something I've always known, but in the last few months, just, really beaten into me. This passage of time, this journey of life, these mountains to climb, this shit to wade through, there is no end and no reprieve and that is life.

You know what, it's awesome, I love it, and the feeling of being alive is a pure mystery of the universe that should on occasion stop being questioned and simply enjoyed.

While sometimes life seems bleak if you want it to, it really isn't, right now I have a big ass goofy grin on my face because I know this thread is just one part in many of a marvelous tapestry of human experience and one person trying their best to tell others that is really all OK. Shit's hard, I know. A lot of the time things really don't go our way, I know. There's other things to consider and it's all very complicated, believe me, I know.

But it's OK, I mean there's a shared reality that will be waiting for you in the morning, but there's your perception of it that can change and be changed, there's always a new way to view those two same faces of that same coin. I've walked a long difficult path recently, and the man who took those first steps is dead now. Same name, same skin, same face, different man though, I don't think I'll be that man again, to be honest I don't think I care to be. Right at the moment I'm sitting on the summit looking around while others dear and close to me are climbing that same damn mountain. While I wish I could throw them a rope, I have no rope to throw. The most I can do is scream at the top of my lungs and tell them it's OK, they'll get there. But you know what, it's frustrating, because it just doesn't feel like I'm helping.

But if there's one little factoid about life I have learned: Only you can change your life. Only you can climb that mountain. And while I hate starting a sentence with the word and, you will one day notice that once you get your head above the mucky muck you'll notice something, that everyone else, everyone you give a shit about, anyone dear to you, they'll all have their own heads in the mucky muck too. That's when you'll understand that a lot of the things you've perceived from others is nothing to do with you at all, but, just the same as you, we've all got our heads in the mucky muck. So, wonder boy, what is the secret of your power, and staying high above the mucky muck?

Tenacious D references aside, this ramble has a point. Maybe some of you are at my point in life and get it, maybe others are curious, and I flat out know a lot of won't give a toss.

So my point is this, we can walk this journey alone, we can walk it in a group, and you know, we can do it any fucking way we want to. What you need to ask yourself, what you need to remember is, are you really true to yourself along the way? I mean, did you take this path for you or someone else? Are justifying your choices to someone else or to you? Because if you're justifying it either to yourself or to someone else than you haven't been honest with either.

Stand tall mother fuckers, know your ground, know when you need to concede it and most importantly, know when you really don't have to give it up. Fight for what you know is right but don't loose sleep when you're wrong. And get used to that, both me starting a sentence with the word and, and admitting when you're wrong, because you will be, often, just fucking roll with it man.

Know yourself, be yourself, love yourself. Live life, it's happening live and in 4D, and that 4th 'D' moves at a frightening fucking pace, don't get to the end of the 4D spectacular in HD human eyeball vision and ask yourself what the fuck just happened. If you can't die tomorrow with a grin on your face then you'd better start living your dreams now, because you're sure as shit ain't ready to die just yet.

Plan9 · 04-02-2011, 02:10 AM

Yeaah, I thought this was a suicide note at first. I'm glad it's not. I like your attitude, Mr. Friendly.

Anyway, is there a particular way you'd like to guide this Tony Robbins-style motivational speech?

As much as I enjoy your posts, this one seems better suited to a blog entry or something.

...

And as much as life is all Carpe Diem, it's also knowing your limitations and that cranky old bitch of compromise.

All this happy existential horseshit is a good speech for the middle of a Robin Williams movie, but it's not practical.

I'm not going to throw away my current relationship because my girl won't let me plunge her alternate love canal.

I'm not going to throw away my job because I'm not getting shitfaced on the weekends with my 9-to-5 buddies.

I'm not going to throw away all my credibility with Society's Current Rulebook to do whatever little thing I want.

I'm not going to vainly bitch and complain about my life because I'm "not living" it. I'm doing what I need to do.

I don't have to be happy about my smart choices, I just have to do them. Half of our reality is governed by money.

To all the spoiled children out there that disagree, I think y'all should examine your monthly bank statements again.

You're not going to get a car, a college degree, a wife or a house through the logic in this speech.

And fuck all these dipshit hedonists; they're the reason why I've got a job in the first place.

I am the voice of Reality. I am the voice that says, "Get a haircut and get a real job."

...

Maybe I don't believe in the magic in your post anymore. Maybe I've never seen what it is to be comfortably happy.

I don't believe in the human spirit. I don't see energy inside peoples' souls. I mostly just see meat and neural impulses.

So maybe I'm just a sellout.

...

I like to think if I'm ever in a situation where I know I'm going to die that I won't waste my time thinking about the last XX years.

No, I'll be trying to fuck the nearest woman and scrambling to crash an empty jumbo jet into the FreeVee corporate headquarters.

...

I've read enough of your stuff at TFP to question it, so I'll ask: Are you happy, Mr. Friendly? Do you actually believe what you wrote?

I'm all for motivatonal masturbation--gotta "fake it to make it"--but at least be honest with yourself.

Jetée · 04-02-2011, 02:28 AM

MrFriendy, I've got to be honest: you seem like my exact-other-side-of-the-world-counter-part-ed-soul... (save for the small differences in that I don't think I like to ramble-run-on-sentence as much, I don't seek to utilize metaphors all that often, and I really don't like to start new threads about my feelings on life, as much as I might like to) I mean, you are the realist, depressed-as-all-get-out guy, yet still you want to impart some brand of optimism upon others because, I don't know, maybe you think others problems' are not as big as they may think, or as big as yours, or mine?

-- (to note: today was pretty awful up until I stepped into the convenience store after work for 12 straight-hours, and bought meself some candy, a few tooth-cleaning implements, & topped it off with some static, scantily-clad ladies of SI, all with the sassistance of the homely clerk eafer to lend a hand.)

Kudos to you, MrFriendly, in being what I cannot: you are a proactive people-pleaser, as well as someone one isn't constantly bombarded by life's travails enough to not think that you are alone in your misery, or downtrodden enough to stop commiserating about it in a new thread. When I'm down (real down), I shut it down, in a way.

MrFriendly · 04-02-2011, 02:39 AM

Plan9, I like you man, cos you're brutally honest and you see things as they are.

I'm not going to justify my reasons for posting.

But as for being happy with myself? After a long long time for not being happy with myself, I am, at a point, where I am, genuinely.

I completely understand your cynicism man, I really do, I just like to leave a little room for hope is all.

Baraka_Guru · 04-02-2011, 02:56 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Plan9

I am the voice of Reality. I am the voice that says, "Get a haircut and get a real job."

I wish I did this years ago---around 10, to be exact. Now I don't know if I'll ever do it.

At the same time, the OP has a good point: being honest and finding your own way to success tends to work for those who do it, but only if you work hard at it.

You can play games, you can withstand the bullshit, but at in the end, you have to actually care about what you're doing as a part of the big picture.

I have seen this in people. I can sense this in myself. I just wish I would do something about it.

jewels · 04-02-2011, 05:32 AM

Why so bitter, P9 and Jet? Mr F's post doesn't reek of false optimism or people-pleasing or anything sugary. Maybe it's related to the places where one's values reside?

I hear him saying that if you're at a rock bottom or unhappy place, you're not alone and all the whining and bitching isn't going to change things, and each person has the capability to help only themselves? Not real enough? Enlighten me, please, if I'm missing something.

If he's found a way to get himself out of a dreary, muddled world, shouldn't we be happy for him? I don't see this as motivational masturbation at all. What makes y'all want to rain on his parade?

Maybe sometimes we're so damned busy griping about our own personal problems and don't take the time to reach for something good or a goal that's truly within reach.

Jetée · 04-02-2011, 09:18 AM

I'm not bitter, jewels. I was stating that MrFriendly is just like me (except I'm probably way more prone to procrastination and prolonged periods of silence, and less prone to uninstigated diatribes about faceless existentialist words of wisdom, even though I'm pretty good at long-winded realisations).

Does my above response seem to indicate something otherwise? (other than what was originally intended, being: heaping praise, for stating words I'd rather leave unspoken because I'm far too busy in my own mucky-muck life to stop and ponder why, exactly, I'm still down here?)

jewels · 04-02-2011, 12:23 PM

When you used "pro-active people pleaser", I interpreted the tone as sarcastic. But in re-reading the text that follows that phrase, I can see that I was clearly wrong. I hope you were not offended as I merely wanted to better understand what you were saying.

Perhaps my somewhat defensive stance on that one stems from my past crimes of people pleasing.

Jetée · 04-04-2011, 05:15 PM

Yeah. I think I may actually have Procrastinator-Perfectionist, Paranoid People-Pleaser written somewhere in my Profile.

I hope MrFriendly comes back and, perhaps, expands on what little-/BIG revelation he had recently to once again cite another example of how similar his and mine (online) personalities come to look more like the same persona. (I just might come to be crushed, tho, if we were to find out this was another monologue of imbibed inspiration.)

MrFriendly · 04-05-2011, 12:48 AM

I would like to expand on what lead me to write the OP. But the specifics are a bit... personal, and involve others.

I wrote it because if I was faced with the same things this time last year It would have pushed me over the edge, the real edge, but now I'm able to look at it all, deal with it as it happens, and be able to smile knowing that it's just life, and for once I really feel at peace with it.

Plan 9 is right to question me, I've made posts of this style a lot in the past, when I really wasn't happy or OK. Writing those posts was that small bit of hope trying to grow. Now I'm on the other side looking back.

Any how, I hope that sheds some light Jetee.

Ourcrazymodern? · 04-05-2011, 03:13 PM

Nice thread, MrFriendly! Good on ya.

DaveOrion · 04-05-2011, 06:07 PM

You go dude, you're right. Life is tuff, shit happens, you will be tested over & over. You will not be the same person you were when you were young, you'll change, evolve, grow, perhaps even become cynical. Thats Ok, that's what life does.

Who the fuck wants to stay the same young, naive, perfectly tanned heart breaker anyway?

With age comes wisdom................and who really gives a shit what some GI Joe thinks?

04-02-2011, 01:33 AM	#1 (permalink)
MrFriendly Psycho Location: Australia	It's good bye, myself, you were a worthy adversary I'm going to be upfront, I originally posted this in another forum, but I just felt like sharing a part of myself with you all as well. In recent months my life has taken off on a trajectory I really didn't think it would. In simple language, there's what I wanted to have happen, and there was the spanner that came from no where and planted itself firmly in the works. One thing is really clear, something I've always known, but in the last few months, just, really beaten into me. This passage of time, this journey of life, these mountains to climb, this shit to wade through, there is no end and no reprieve and that is life. You know what, it's awesome, I love it, and the feeling of being alive is a pure mystery of the universe that should on occasion stop being questioned and simply enjoyed. While sometimes life seems bleak if you want it to, it really isn't, right now I have a big ass goofy grin on my face because I know this thread is just one part in many of a marvelous tapestry of human experience and one person trying their best to tell others that is really all OK. Shit's hard, I know. A lot of the time things really don't go our way, I know. There's other things to consider and it's all very complicated, believe me, I know. But it's OK, I mean there's a shared reality that will be waiting for you in the morning, but there's your perception of it that can change and be changed, there's always a new way to view those two same faces of that same coin. I've walked a long difficult path recently, and the man who took those first steps is dead now. Same name, same skin, same face, different man though, I don't think I'll be that man again, to be honest I don't think I care to be. Right at the moment I'm sitting on the summit looking around while others dear and close to me are climbing that same damn mountain. While I wish I could throw them a rope, I have no rope to throw. The most I can do is scream at the top of my lungs and tell them it's OK, they'll get there. But you know what, it's frustrating, because it just doesn't feel like I'm helping. But if there's one little factoid about life I have learned: Only you can change your life. Only you can climb that mountain. And while I hate starting a sentence with the word and, you will one day notice that once you get your head above the mucky muck you'll notice something, that everyone else, everyone you give a shit about, anyone dear to you, they'll all have their own heads in the mucky muck too. That's when you'll understand that a lot of the things you've perceived from others is nothing to do with you at all, but, just the same as you, we've all got our heads in the mucky muck. So, wonder boy, what is the secret of your power, and staying high above the mucky muck? Tenacious D references aside, this ramble has a point. Maybe some of you are at my point in life and get it, maybe others are curious, and I flat out know a lot of won't give a toss. So my point is this, we can walk this journey alone, we can walk it in a group, and you know, we can do it any fucking way we want to. What you need to ask yourself, what you need to remember is, are you really true to yourself along the way? I mean, did you take this path for you or someone else? Are justifying your choices to someone else or to you? Because if you're justifying it either to yourself or to someone else than you haven't been honest with either. Stand tall mother fuckers, know your ground, know when you need to concede it and most importantly, know when you really don't have to give it up. Fight for what you know is right but don't loose sleep when you're wrong. And get used to that, both me starting a sentence with the word and, and admitting when you're wrong, because you will be, often, just fucking roll with it man. Know yourself, be yourself, love yourself. Live life, it's happening live and in 4D, and that 4th 'D' moves at a frightening fucking pace, don't get to the end of the 4D spectacular in HD human eyeball vision and ask yourself what the fuck just happened. If you can't die tomorrow with a grin on your face then you'd better start living your dreams now, because you're sure as shit ain't ready to die just yet. __________________ You are not a slave

04-02-2011, 02:10 AM	#2 (permalink)
Plan9 I Confess a Shiver	Yeaah, I thought this was a suicide note at first. I'm glad it's not. I like your attitude, Mr. Friendly. Anyway, is there a particular way you'd like to guide this Tony Robbins-style motivational speech? As much as I enjoy your posts, this one seems better suited to a blog entry or something. ... And as much as life is all Carpe Diem, it's also knowing your limitations and that cranky old bitch of compromise. All this happy existential horseshit is a good speech for the middle of a Robin Williams movie, but it's not practical. I'm not going to throw away my current relationship because my girl won't let me plunge her alternate love canal. I'm not going to throw away my job because I'm not getting shitfaced on the weekends with my 9-to-5 buddies. I'm not going to throw away all my credibility with Society's Current Rulebook to do whatever little thing I want. I'm not going to vainly bitch and complain about my life because I'm "not living" it. I'm doing what I need to do. I don't have to be happy about my smart choices, I just have to do them. Half of our reality is governed by money. To all the spoiled children out there that disagree, I think y'all should examine your monthly bank statements again. You're not going to get a car, a college degree, a wife or a house through the logic in this speech. And fuck all these dipshit hedonists; they're the reason why I've got a job in the first place. I am the voice of Reality. I am the voice that says, "Get a haircut and get a real job." ... Maybe I don't believe in the magic in your post anymore. Maybe I've never seen what it is to be comfortably happy. I don't believe in the human spirit. I don't see energy inside peoples' souls. I mostly just see meat and neural impulses. So maybe I'm just a sellout. ... I like to think if I'm ever in a situation where I know I'm going to die that I won't waste my time thinking about the last XX years. No, I'll be trying to fuck the nearest woman and scrambling to crash an empty jumbo jet into the FreeVee corporate headquarters. ... I've read enough of your stuff at TFP to question it, so I'll ask: Are you happy, Mr. Friendly? Do you actually believe what you wrote? I'm all for motivatonal masturbation--gotta "fake it to make it"--but at least be honest with yourself. __________________ *Whatever you can carry.* "You should not drink... and bake." Last edited by Plan9; 04-02-2011 at 06:15 AM..

04-02-2011, 02:28 AM	#3 (permalink)
Jetée The Reforms Location: Rarely, if ever, here or there, but always in transition	MrFriendy, I've got to be honest: you seem like my exact-other-side-of-the-world-counter-part-ed-soul... (save for the small differences in that I don't think I like to ramble-run-on-sentence as much, I don't seek to utilize metaphors all that often, and I really don't like to start new threads about my feelings on life, as much as I might like to) I mean, you are the realist, depressed-as-all-get-out guy, yet still you want to impart some brand of optimism upon others because, I don't know, maybe you think others problems' are not as big as they may think, or as big as yours, or mine? -- (to note: today was pretty awful up until I stepped into the convenience store after work for 12 straight-hours, and bought meself some candy, a few tooth-cleaning implements, & topped it off with some static, scantily-clad ladies of SI, all with the sassistance of the homely clerk eafer to lend a hand.) Kudos to you, MrFriendly, in being what I cannot: you are a proactive people-pleaser, as well as someone one isn't constantly bombarded by life's travails enough to not think that you are alone in your misery, or downtrodden enough to stop commiserating about it in a new thread. When I'm down (real down), I shut it down, in a way. __________________ As human beings, our greatness lies not so much in being able to remake the world (that is the myth of the Atomic Age) as in being able to remake ourselves. —Mohandas K. Gandhi

04-02-2011, 02:39 AM	#4 (permalink)
MrFriendly Psycho Location: Australia	Plan9, I like you man, cos you're brutally honest and you see things as they are. I'm not going to justify my reasons for posting. But as for being happy with myself? After a long long time for not being happy with myself, I am, at a point, where I am, genuinely. I completely understand your cynicism man, I really do, I just like to leave a little room for hope is all. __________________ You are not a slave

04-02-2011, 05:32 AM	#6 (permalink)
jewels Eponymous Location: Central Central Florida	Why so bitter, P9 and Jet? Mr F's post doesn't reek of false optimism or people-pleasing or anything sugary. Maybe it's related to the places where one's values reside? I hear him saying that if you're at a rock bottom or unhappy place, you're not alone and all the whining and bitching isn't going to change things, and each person has the capability to help only themselves? Not real enough? Enlighten me, please, if I'm missing something. If he's found a way to get himself out of a dreary, muddled world, shouldn't we be happy for him? I don't see this as motivational masturbation at all. What makes y'all want to rain on his parade? Maybe sometimes we're so damned busy griping about our own personal problems and don't take the time to reach for something good or a goal that's truly within reach. __________________ We are always more anxious to be distinguished for a talent which we do not possess, than to be praised for the fifteen which we do possess. Mark Twain

04-02-2011, 09:18 AM	#7 (permalink)
Jetée The Reforms Location: Rarely, if ever, here or there, but always in transition	I'm not bitter, jewels. I was stating that MrFriendly is just like me (except I'm probably way more prone to procrastination and prolonged periods of silence, and less prone to uninstigated diatribes about faceless existentialist words of wisdom, even though I'm pretty good at long-winded realisations). Does my above response seem to indicate something otherwise? (other than what was originally intended, being: heaping praise, for stating words I'd rather leave unspoken because I'm far too busy in my own mucky-muck life to stop and ponder why, exactly, I'm still down here?) __________________ As human beings, our greatness lies not so much in being able to remake the world (that is the myth of the Atomic Age) as in being able to remake ourselves. —Mohandas K. Gandhi

04-02-2011, 12:23 PM	#8 (permalink)
jewels Eponymous Location: Central Central Florida	When you used "pro-active people pleaser", I interpreted the tone as sarcastic. But in re-reading the text that follows that phrase, I can see that I was clearly wrong. I hope you were not offended as I merely wanted to better understand what you were saying. Perhaps my somewhat defensive stance on that one stems from my past crimes of people pleasing. __________________ We are always more anxious to be distinguished for a talent which we do not possess, than to be praised for the fifteen which we do possess. Mark Twain

04-04-2011, 05:15 PM	#9 (permalink)
Jetée The Reforms Location: Rarely, if ever, here or there, but always in transition	Yeah. I think I may actually have Procrastinator-Perfectionist, Paranoid People-Pleaser written somewhere in my Profile. I hope MrFriendly comes back and, perhaps, expands on what little-/BIG revelation he had recently to once again cite another example of how similar his and mine (online) personalities come to look more like the same persona. (I just might come to be crushed, tho, if we were to find out this was another monologue of imbibed inspiration.) __________________ As human beings, our greatness lies not so much in being able to remake the world (that is the myth of the Atomic Age) as in being able to remake ourselves. —Mohandas K. Gandhi

04-05-2011, 12:48 AM	#10 (permalink)
MrFriendly Psycho Location: Australia	I would like to expand on what lead me to write the OP. But the specifics are a bit... personal, and involve others. I wrote it because if I was faced with the same things this time last year It would have pushed me over the edge, the real edge, but now I'm able to look at it all, deal with it as it happens, and be able to smile knowing that it's just life, and for once I really feel at peace with it. Plan 9 is right to question me, I've made posts of this style a lot in the past, when I really wasn't happy or OK. Writing those posts was that small bit of hope trying to grow. Now I'm on the other side looking back. Any how, I hope that sheds some light Jetee. __________________ You are not a slave

04-05-2011, 03:13 PM	#11 (permalink)
Ourcrazymodern? still, wondering. Location: South Minneapolis, somewhere near the gorgeous gorge	Nice thread, MrFriendly! Good on ya. __________________ BE JUST AND FEAR NOT

04-05-2011, 06:07 PM	#12 (permalink)
DaveOrion Playing With Fire Location: Disaster Area	You go dude, you're right. Life is tuff, shit happens, you will be tested over & over. You will not be the same person you were when you were young, you'll change, evolve, grow, perhaps even become cynical. Thats Ok, that's what life does. Who the fuck wants to stay the same young, naive, perfectly tanned heart breaker anyway? With age comes wisdom................and who really gives a shit what some GI Joe thinks? __________________ *Syriana*...have you ever tried liquid MDMA?....Liquid MDMA? No....Arash, when you wanna do this?.....After prayer...