Life

[kickazz]

Sage advice but may I ask you......why should everything simply point to happiness as some secret to life?
Is there anything really wrong with knowledge, truth and acceptance of the world we reside in, even if that doesn't bring about joy?

The OP asks questions not usually attributed to such a young person and I applaud him/her for that.
Just maybe he/she has a jump on many that are simply craving happiness for the sake of happiness. Contrived happiness doesn't last.

Yeah I hear ya. There certainly is more to life than just being happy, and any amount of exploration and enrichment will often be accompanied with pain, but makes for a more complete life.

There's nothing worse (ok there is but anyway...) than people with self described "bubbly personalities". They are happy all of the time but completely dimensionless. I mean FMD you may as well be a dog that gets fed and walked every day and maybe a sausage or chop on the weekend. They are happy.

But overall, I think acknowledging the crap without ruminating on it is the way to go. And being happy is a good feeling.

 

[Richard Cranium]

2. Don’t badmouth: Assign responsibility, not blame. Say nothing of another you wouldn’t say to him.
5. Don’t trouble yourself with matters you truly cannot change.
6. Expect no more of anyone than you can deliver yourself.
10. Never forget that, no matter how certain, you might be wrong.
17. Praise at least as often as you disparage.

Luckily for Chief, the most stable genius, and his bank account most people don't concern themselves with behaving like an adult.

 

[Plugger35]

Life's like a road that you travel on
When there's one day here and the next day gone
Sometimes you bend and sometimes you stand
Sometimes you turn your back to the wind

There's a world outside every darkened door
Where blues won't haunt you anymore
Where the brave are free and lovers soar
Come ride with me to the distant shore

We won't hesitate
To break down the garden gate
There's not much time left today

Life is a highway
I wanna ride it all night long
If you're going my way
I wanna drive it all night long

 

[edgie]

Give up blood sports?

Ead

Sent from mTalk

 

[edgie]

Life's like a road that you travel on
When there's one day here and the next day gone
Sometimes you bend and sometimes you stand
Sometimes you turn your back to the wind

There's a world outside every darkened door
Where blues won't haunt you anymore
Where the brave are free and lovers soar
Come ride with me to the distant shore

We won't hesitate
To break down the garden gate
There's not much time left today

Life is a highway
I wanna ride it all night long
If you're going my way
I wanna drive it all night long

There ain't no load that I can't take

Sent from mTalk

 

[the_interloper]

There ain't no load that I can't take

Sent from mTalk

****.

 

[Jack Gun Cyril Stun]

I'm not being all 19-year old student here, but what is the point?

We worship hacks in Hollywood and aspire to be them and live our whole life tracking them.

We work for campaigner bosses, in corporations that have downward pressure, where everyone else above us has more pressure and tries to take more shortcuts, to help people who are millionaires.

These days we have to rent to live, adding to the above point.

We get home so tired, we drink shit and eat shit and don't exercise.

We get told to eat this food and drink this beer and then get told to be this thin because it's hot.

We are never ever ever happy.

We are always aiming for something else.

We're ****** over by the world, by money, we would do anything for cash, and we would do anything to keep our job, and yet we're all a second away from a redundancy and living on the streets. We all try and for what? To die at 78? We all work hard and slave away to what, buy a fridge? We get a job and pay $70 a week to get there?

Life is not made to get us ahead.

We are not made to succeed.

We are made to do as we say and feel pressure from everywhere, to be kept below.

It's ******.

I liked your post because of its honesty and frustration. We can all can find misery easily if we focus on the wrong stuff and let others set the agenda. It’s easy to eat and drink unhealthily too, who doesn’t do this!!!! Lol
And there’s plenty of good replies on here already but you don’t have to subscribe to all those pressures you list and there are a few generalisations in there.
Sure life isn’t perfect and work/ life balance is difficult but the fact that you recognise a lot of it’s frustrations is a great start. That in itself is a good motivator to not make/dwell all those negative things you highlight, as many of us don’t worship Hollywood hacks or even have turd bosses (sure I’ve had a couple of bad ones but I’ve had just as many good ones)

What passions or hobbies do / did you have? (That aren’t media based)

Next time perhaps instead of following the news, watching tv, reading social media replace it with one of those.

This redirected energy into something you enjoy can overflow into other things like starting to eat better or exercising more and you’ve started on a spiralling energy cycle upwards which can be quite empowering.

 

[edgie]

Fixed the number plate light on my car just now. Happy as Larry. Can drive it at night again.

Sent from mTalk

 

[Perth gal]

Fixed the number plate light on my car just now. Happy as Larry. Can drive it at night again.

Sent from mTalk

Good boy.

 

[Perth gal]

I once read a very simple quota for happiness.

Someone to love.
Something to do.

Something to look forward to.

 

[Jack Stevens]

Silent Alarm have a read of Mark Manson's The Subtle Art of Not Giving a ****. I was going through a similar rut at the end of last year, and it helped me out of it.

 

[Procrastinator35]

Sounds to me like you need to get out of the city Silent Alarm....Simplify your life by getting in touch with nature again I say....Best way to re-connect with our own soul is to re-connect to the earth.

Get a job as a live-in farm-hand out bush & get rid of TV, traffic, stress & too many people.....Space & horizon are very important for our spiritual health....You can always join a commune if you so desire to really escape the rat-race.

If you feel you are getting nowhere then it's time to go somewhere else.

 

[TheKanga]

Judging from ops posts he seems to be abit highly strung and status driven.
Maybe let go a bit
Don't give a toss what people think of you
And life will improve for you.

 

[edgie]

I take a few minutes to look at the stars every night. Just incredible. How people could live on the city and not miss it I'll never know.

Sent from mTalk

 

[edgie]

Then again if I stare too long I get miserable, knowing that I'll be long gone and forgotten before the human race makes any meaningful progress in the galaxy.

Sent from mTalk

 

[Silent Alarm]

The happiest you will be is when you do exactly what you want and not what people/society expect of you. Don't want kids? Don't have them. Don't want to get married? Don't. Want to go to a Taylor Swift concert instead of the footy? Do it. Want to work at a low stress job for a wage that will keep a roof over your head and your bills paid? Do it.

You reading my posts? I'm going to go see Taylor Swift again. I don't have an issue in liking things potentially 'lame' or sticking my neck out. Happy to no longer see friends I don't actually get along with that well, happy to move on, happy to take a risk.

This thread also isn't about 'drop everything and go travelling!' because that's not how the world works. You need money. It's a fact. Money can be a great thing and the comfort it brings via a house and food is important, but it's the shit that it creates that keeps us oppressed.

This thread isn't about 'work life balance' or some horseshit, it's about the sort of conspiracy that money has made most of us absolute peasants and slaves to trends and technology but unlike the classic peasants of ancient Greece and Egypt, we are peasants whore refuse to believe we are. Those people hurling bricks in the heat, but they had no illusions of joining royalty. We're told every day that we could be famous because an ugly ginger ****er shorter than us is selling out 20 stadium shows in our country. We're told we could be hot like a model if we just dropped all this weight. But we're also told every time we go out and drink a Becks, we'll stay out until 5am and climb out some blonde's bed and walk home. We're being teased by both sides of the fence and seduced completely... you can't be saying yes to ubereats and then saying yes to losing weight and being of clean mind and happiness. You're being teased constantly and fundamentally ****ed over.

And even if I thought the answer was to go travelling again, you can't just come back and expect it to solve the answer. It doesn't.

You can't abandon life either. The closest to that is living with your parents with a Centrelink pay so low, that you'd basically have to sit at home every single day, have no games to play on your playstation, no mobile phone to pay off, no nothing.

The other only option is sitting on a street somewhere, begging for money which people rightfully don't give to you because you know what – they work ****in hard for their money, and why should they give it to someone else? – and then you end up cold and sick and dead.

This world is designed to seduce it and **** us over with our own choices and desires, constrained and constricted by our own wants and greed.

 

[edgie]

That's a more sensible POV.

Again though, it's about acceptance. Acceptance that its a very big world full of billions of very small cogs.

Sent from mTalk

 

[Silent Alarm]

That's a more sensible POV.

Again though, it's about acceptance. Acceptance that its a very big world full of billions of very small cogs.

Sent from mTalk

It has nothing to do with accepting irrelevance, it's the fact that trying is so ****ing hard and almost futile.

We are all buying into this thing we just shouldn't.

 

[vanders]

You reading my posts? I'm going to go see Taylor Swift again.

Haha I was using her as an example.

My post wasn't directed at you, i didn't read most of the thread but saw a few that were based around happiness.

The most content and "zen" I've been recently was when I travelled for a month on my own. Had no wifi or phone most of the time and just sat near a beach listening to waves crash. It sounds boring but I felt more relaxed than I I ever have and enjoyed my own company more than I expected I ever would.

One of the biggest issues people have nowadays is being able to disconnect. A lot of what you mentioned originally is stuff that is forced down people's throats 24/7 coz you can't look at a phone or TV or paper without being force fed all that shit.

A lot of people treat life as a competition, not necessarily by choice but that's just what has become the norm. Whose marriage will last, who will get married first, who will have the smartest kid, who's better at sport, who's kid is better at footy, who will get the job, who will win that show, who makes more money, who has a bigger house, who went to a better schools, whose team won the last game. Social media has made it a million times worse. People are now competing to look happier.

If things weren't so competitive and people looked out for and helped and supported each other more, a lot of those things you mentioned would be less of a thing.

 

[edgie]

It has nothing to do with accepting irrelevance, it's the fact that trying is so ******* hard and almost futile.

We are all buying into this thing we just shouldn't.

But it's not and it doesn't have to be?

My existence means shit all to 99.999999999999999999999999.../% of the world, that doesn't stop me enjoying life.

Maybe it's just the way I was raised. I had a brother that only made ten months. Mum will never let me forget it. Everyday really is a gift. Every single one.

Sent from mTalk

 

[Silent Alarm]

But it's not and it doesn't have to be?

My existence means shit all to 99.999999999999999999999999.../% of the world, that doesn't stop me enjoying life.

Maybe it's just the way I was raised. I had a brother that only made ten months. Mum will never let me forget it. Everyday really is a gift. Every single one.

Sent from mTalk

Yes, take happiness from small things, don't let small things phase you, whatever.

I am happy. That isn't the issue.

This is about the bigger 'conspiracy' that life is not supporting you, that you can't ever really rise up, that everyone is designed to keep you down but keep you thinking you're just about to hit that point where everything falls into place.

 

[TheMightyEagles]

We're told every day that we could be famous because an ugly ginger ****** shorter than us is selling out 20 stadium shows in our country.

He's one of the best in the world at what he does (marketable pop music). To put it into perspective, its like deciding as a high school student that you want to be a banker and then expecting to be the next Ray Dalio making a billion dollars a year. Its possible but you're in with an almost statistically insignificant chance. And even then, he only got there in his 60s after a lifetime of hard work and achievement.

In terms of having money, leisure time, meeting women, being in shape and all that, it's all possible for the average man. But yeah status is a bit of a zero sum game unfortunately; plus even for those who get the high status, they then start comparing themselves to all of the other high flyers they are hanging around and still feel miserable.

 

[JackOutback]

I take a few minutes to look at the stars every night. Just incredible. How people could live on the city and not miss it I'll never know.

Sent from mTalk

Then again if I stare too long I get miserable, knowing that I'll be long gone and forgotten before the human race makes any meaningful progress in the galaxy.

Sent from mTalk

Life gives with one hand, takes with another

 

[TheKanga]

Life is amazing in so many ways.

 

[Gralin]

Yes, take happiness from small things, don't let small things phase you, whatever.

I am happy. That isn't the issue.

This is about the bigger 'conspiracy' that life is not supporting you, that you can't ever really rise up, that everyone is designed to keep you down but keep you thinking you're just about to hit that point where everything falls into place.

It's not a conspiracy it's capitalism

It works on the dream that anyone can, it also needs about 5% of the population to be unemployed and it funnels the money and power to the minority but that's not something that people aren't aware of.

This isn't a bee hive not everyone is a mindless worker drone.

Not everyone is part of the system or on the treadmill either. I don't think I'm going to be a pop star or rich or powerful but I'm ok with that.

I'd like more money sure but I'm not going to work longer hours for it because that's not my end goal.