What Is The Orthodox Way?

Lent is coming up, and we all know what that means: all the goody two shoe Christian pricks will start asking the one question that doesn’t actually matter, which atheists rightfully mock as ridiculous, especially because it’s such coming from such a sincere place, thus making said Christian sincerely ridiculous: what are the rules for fasting, so that way I can do the Christian thing? Eastern Christians will reference the Typikon and its silly intricacies and whether or not fasting from oil means olive oil or just all oil. Normal Catholics will just fast from chocolate. Traddy Catholics and Western Orthodox will put us all to sleep with an explanation on how to abstain and how to fast. It all eventually starts coming down to technicalities, as everyone figures out how to strain the gnat.

We’re going to tell a story I think pretty indicative of the saints, the people who actually stuck the landing, Saints Dorotheus and Dositheus. 

 Dositheus was a soft rich kid who sat around all day, eating and drinking. He wasn’t a bad kid, nor was he a particularly good one. He was just a soft rich kid. Had he lived today he probably would have had “Fur is murder” bumper stickers and would have drank free trade coffee with a paper straw and looked like a scruffy lumberjack (without being able to change a tire).

Three of those five apply to me. I’m not telling you which.

One day Dositheus happened upon an icon of the Last Judgment, and found he couldn’t look away. 

You’d figure someone as seemingly self-centered as Dositheus wouldn’t give such a thing a second glance. But he just kept staring at it, unable to move. A young woman came up to Dositheus and looked at the icon with him. Dositheus asked what the image was about. He’d never seen it and it was so striking! The young woman explained the icon to Dositheus. It’s not known exactly what she told him, but considering that the Scriptures openly say that one goes to Hell for not forgiving sins and taking care of your fellow man I’d imagine that’s at least part of what she talked about. Whatever she said, she made a huge impression. Dositheus, struck by the explanation, asked her how he specifically was to avoid Hell. The woman told him specifically to stop eating meat, something Dositheus was probably quite fond of, and to pray.

She then vanished; it is speculated that it was Mary, the Mother of God, who had appeared to Dositheus. I am inclined to believe such a thing.

Whoever it was Dositheus was convicted by the conversation, and began to fast from meat and to pray. A lot. Eventually his family and friends told him such actions were for a monastic, not a laymen. Dositheus, trusting in the woman who appeared to him, went to Palestine and asked to be a monk.

He looked so soft they thought he was a thief trying to get sanctuary from his pursuers. Nobody who looked like Dositheus could possibly want to be a monk. So the monastery tapped St. Dorotheus to figure out Dositheus’s angle.

St. Dorotheus was the no-nonsense head of the monastery’s infirmary. The abbot figured if anyone could crack Dositheus it was the cantankerous nurse. St. Dorotheus, after cross-examining Dositheus within an inch of his life, concluded the young man was the genuine article, appearances be damned. When St. Dorotheus  reported this to the abbot he was informed he was to be the Dositheus’s elder, the man to whom Dositheus reported. 

St. Dorotheus protested: he was a nurse in an infirmary ward, with what time did he have to attend with a young man who looked like he would be blown over like a leaf? But one of the monks was an acknowledged prophet, a man with genuine clairvoyance; he told St. Dorotheus that he was necessary for Dositheus's soul.

What happened next will hurt soft modern ears. Back in the day violence was not perceived as the horrific evil that it is today. If you can't get past that I do not recommend reading anything, or going outside, or especially going on a farm.

Now, keep the following in mind: nobody really liked St. Dositheus. He was this upper crust kid who just sorta bumbled around the infirmary, eating the fish heads that his elderly patients wouldn't touch. He barely showed up at church, and when he did he was late. Monasteries, being the pressure cookers that they are, take these small things and make them a big deal. Contrary to the popular Christian perception monks are usually very petty creatures, taking big offense at the smallest things. To be fair, it's hard not to when your around the same idiots day in and day out; I'd be a lot more petty about it if I was in their shoes, for sure! But the fact remains: St. Dositheus stuck out like a sore thumb in an environment where even the slightest differences breed deep resentments. Sometimes this would get the better of St. Dositheus and he would yell at his fellow monks. He usually didn't do anything too over the top, but the young man seemed to have a particularly fragile constitution about such things, because he'd go into a closet and ugly cry. As in, howling cries. For a sharp word to monks who were petty little things.

Sound ridiculous to you?

The monks agree with you!

They'd go to St. Dorotheus, y'know, a busy nurse, and tell him that his spiritual son was sobbing in a closet and nobody could get him to shut up. Imagine standing by the dead of a dying man and someone comes up and goes "So that soft idiot that you're taking care of? Yeah, he's sobbing in a closet and we can all hear him." Would you be nice to him?

Don't lie.

St. Dorotheus went in and mocked St. Dositheus for his absolutely ridiculous constitution, telling him he was a soft fool and that he was a bother, all of which was true. This would make Dositheus howl louder, of course, which made Dorotheus even madder, of course, until finally the elder's anger would turn to pity. "Get up. God forgives you, Dositheus" he would say. And Dositheus would dry his eyes and come out.

This was a regular occurrence, it went on for years. Dear God that  sounds annoying. But each time Dorotheus would mock his disciple's soft constitution until he'd run out of steam and then try to comfort him.

In all things Dositheus was obedient to Dorotheus. He remembered what the mysterious woman had told him, and fate had brought him to Dorotheus, so he accepted all this without complaint. Dorotheus, for his part, slowly and patiently accepted most of his charge's habits. He helped wean Dositheus off of most of his dependence on food.... although he never got through about stealing fish-heads off the plates of the elderly. That one never they never got around to. Dositheus had one job, far as Dorotheus was concerned: stop being a crybaby wuss. So when Dositheus took his hand to trying to interpret Scipture Dorotheus beat Dositheus, telling him understanding the Scriptures could wait until after he stopped being a crybaby and actually had something in his soul worth a damn. Dositheus accepted the beating.

I'll repeat it for our soft modern ears: he accepted the beating. 

He wasn't scared. He didn't cave in. Nothing like that. He accepted the beating as a continuance from the visitation from the mysterious woman. In fact he accepted everything like that, as a necessary part of what he was told to begin with. It is hard to imagine such a thing, but he did it. And in that was Dositheus's real virtue: he trusted in the truth given to him and trusted that the circumstances he was in flowed from that moment. And that's really the best anyone can do. He just held to it like iron.

So it continued like that, day in and day out. And then one day Dositheus began to spit up blood. His constiution began to fail out. Dositheus then made a decision that I'm not sure I understand, but I'm not here to judge it: he told Dorotheus that now was not the time to take it easy on him. Dositheus wanted Dorotheus to continue with his harsh treatment of him. He had intuited that somehow Dorotheus's rough but loving attitude was what he needed, sickness be damned. Dositheus figured that if he was going to die (and spitting up blood, with medicine at the time, certainly that was a reasonable thing to suppose) he was going to go out holding to what he had been told. Dorotheus, after questioning his disciple, promised he wouldn't take it easy.

It didn't last that long: Dositheus became bed-ridden as his illness became worse. He didn't want to quit, but he was wearing out. Dorotheus didn't leave his side. He asked the abbot for permission to stop fighting, to stop trying to live. The abbot told him to try to hold out for a little while longer. So Dositheus tried. And he failed. He couldn't pray, he couldn't focus, he was in agonizing pain. He begged for permission to stop trying to live; he couldn't fight anymore. The abbot gave his permission to Dositheus. He died a few days later.

And you know what? The monks said good riddance. The weakling thief was dead! Sad that he went out that way, but the place became a lot quieter, and thank goodness! Did I mention monks could be really petty creatures? Did I mention that they're not that different from anyone else? Well, one day a visiting elder from another monastery asked God to show him all the saints, the holy ones, from Dorsitheus's monastery. He saw a particularly young man that wasn't represented in any of the icons. He described the young man to the other monks and they realized he was talking about Dorsitheus... much to everyone's extreme surprise. He was a saint? What in the hell??? But Dorotheus agreed with the vision. Dositheus had a strenght he had hardly even showed to his elder, nevermind to anyone else at the monastery. The abbot, who Dorotheus had kept in the loop, agreed with him. They told the full story of Dositheus's vision, the efforts he went to stay true to the Theotokos, his unflinching acceptance of himself and the monks, and his unwavering resolve to do what was within his power. 

Dositheus did not become a saint by doing great things. He did not become a saint by being well-loved. He didn't even become a saint by really being good. He heard his call, trusted it, and followed it to the very best of his ability. He didn't understand much beyond what was right in front of him and after awhile he didn't even try to do that much. He tried to do what he could for those around him within the context of his call, even as he died. Nobody appreciated it. Hell, hardly anybody saw it. But he did it anyways. What he resolved to do was small. How he did it was worthy of the mightiest of warriors. He's been on our calendar ever since.

That is the way of the Church, of the saints, of the Fathers, and anyone who tells you otherwise is lying.

"Yeah, that's nice Nathan. He was visited by the Theotokos. I've not been, so what's this got to do with me?"

Okay, fine.

We'll go back to the monks, 'cause it's documented better and you can find it more easily. Specifically St. Joseph the Hesychast, a modern saint who lived on Mt. Athos. There was a monk who lived on Mt. Athos, the center of Orthodoxy, who was a raging drunk. He yelled at people, never showed up to services, and was such a pain in the ass that the monks actively rejoiced when he died. As in, openly. "Yay, the jerk is dead!" Are you seeing a pattern here? You should.

St. Joseph said he watched the angels take the drunk's soul to heaven.

That demanded an explanation. Turns out the man had been made a drunk by his parents; they had deliberately addicted him to alcohol. The man had no choice in this, he was actively screwed over by his parents. Seeking help he found his way to the Holy Mountain, begging to be made a monk. He had torched his own life and could not recover. The elder he was assigned to asked the man how many drinks he had to have in a day. The answer was in the thirties. "Subtract one drink from that, and when you're okay with that let me know" said the elder. The man was told he didn't have to go to church, nor did he have do anything else. Whatever happened, he had to just keep to the drinking rule.

In the decades that followed the poor man went from thirty-something drinks to two. Two in a day! That's incredible! But even one drink was enough to get him rip-roaring drunk. He never totally conquered it; he died first, his body probably worn out by the years of interior warfare. But every day he resolved to do the rule that he knew could cure him. He didn't have a kind word for anyone because he'd been so screwed up that kindness was impossible. But he wanted to be better and did everything he possibly could to be so. He trusted that God had given him what he needed and that was enough.

So what about you?

We all have something like that. I promise you that we all do. Maybe you know someone that fills your soul with light when you look at them and you've resolved to love that person the best you can. Maybe there's a project that you have to do, against all sanity against all reason against all hope it must be done. Maybe someone really screwed you over and it may take you the rest of your life to get over it; healing is a titanic effort. Trust me, I know how that one goes. You don't have to be visited by the Theotokos or see God 's light with your waking eyes or see the world where all go to dream but can't remember or anything like that. Every human being has something in their soul that vexes them, something that they must contend with, something that drives them forward. It is a deeply personal thing and others may find it to be madness, in fact it's my experience that everyone else finds it madness. But it is yours.

"What's that got to do with the Church? And fasting? And prayer?" Well, it turns out that, whatever it is that's on your heart, it's sent by God, somehow, some way. God sent these things to you, whatever they are. The Church guards the archives of what we have discovered so far when people chase the thing God gave them: the doctrines, the scriptures, all of it is there so you can keep the dialogue with God going as you do the thing He gave you. That dialogue looks different for everyone, from blind acceptance to blinding anger to perpetual mourning to joy to all the other emotions a human is capable of.

It's a toolbox. Not a straitjacket for your brain.

So, whatever it is, whatever it turns out to be, that's the Way. For you. There's a 4,000+ year old toolbox that's been compiled and is kept in a more or less coherent order. If you dig you'll find something.

So if you have to ask if, when the Typikon (a relatively recently compiled book -with multiple versions- in the life of the Church, and a recent edition of that book at that) forbidding oil means all oil or olive oil... well hopefully you can have a good laugh at the question. The question, the one you have to figure out with your priest, parish, and family, is "How can I use the fast to further the calling God gave me?" There is an answer to that. 

But it has very little to do with what's in the Typikon.

And probably even less to do with chocolate.

The TRUE Lesson of Love and Thunder

Within ten minutes I shut Love and Thunder off. I'd not expected to find it enjoyable, and so I walked in with lower expectations. Oh my dear Lord, it was so much worse than I expected, as an adaptation. Gorr's opening was so spiteful, so gross, so mean, that I almost shut it off on reflex. But I sat through a few minutes more, saw what I expected to see about Thor, which wasn't a bad thing per se, but it certainly didn't undo Gorr, so I shut it off to go to bed.

I woke up, trying to figure out what I wanted to do. Thor's set up was interesting, Gorr's scene had totally spat upon the source material in a way that's becoming more and more common these days... did I want to endure the idiocy so I could get an actually interesting story with Thor?

And then my comics came in

About twenty or so comics, for about thirty bucks, thanks to Alterna Comics. So I decided to read some.

God, Red Koi hasn't been bad for even one issue. Even ones that I like less, like the most recent #6, are at worst entertaining and interesting. Weland does some world-building, which I didn't want, but I'm sure the series will be more interesting down the road for the effort. The Swan King's an awesome character, I just wish I could have seen more of Eiko, that's all. Otherwise it's a solid story with good art.

You know what I didn't like? Void Walker.

This was a series that went too hard on in media res. They were trying to do emotional beats along with worldbuilding and twists.... pick two. No, you don't get all three. Just two. The series tried to bite way off more than it could chew. But isolation all the pieces were excellent! There was good backstory, fantastic worldbuilding... it just should have been eight issues, not four. Hell, you could have gotten away with a full twelve-issue run. I won't be keeping these comics. They're not worth rereading to me. But y'know what? I'm not particularly mad that I spent the money. It was an honest effort on the part of the team, and even an honest failure is something enjoyable, on some level.

And then I read Tinsel Town, and really liked it!

This sucker is a historical fiction about a token female cop in the early 20th century becoming a real one. This is not the sort of thing I'd normally read, but I figured "Why the heck not, it's ten bucks". And my goodness it was great! It's not some standard idiotic woman acting like a man in order to get what she wants, but a genuine feminine character who happens to be tough as nails and isn't going to back down on anything. It's a wonderful read, having a great balance of action, romance, darkness, and historical commentary. Not at all what I expected.

I've not read them all yet. I've now got all the issues of Downcast, which I've been enjoying, and I just threw some series in, just for a random lark. I later caught up. Wow. It’s a good science fantasy slow burn, with some really awesome worldbuilding and character work. The plotting is extremely well done and rewards rereading. I’m definitely hooked now. When’s the next issue???

So I went back to my novel, Interlibrary Loan, Gene Wolfe's last book! It wasn't really finished, but it's a powerful book about eugenics and hope and love and the ultimate rejection of the rotten bifurcation of modernity, with one of the most powerful and puzzling endings I've ever read. Flawed, but oh so beautiful.

And then I realized I had the original Redwall still checked out from the library. It's been years since I've read it, so I tucked in immediately. The prose is a bit clunkier than I remember, but it's Jacques's first novel, so y'know, it's gonna happen.

By the time I thought about that abortion of a movie it had been well over seven hours. I chuckled when I thought about it. I had no need for the movie. I've got the original run by Aaron, sitting in my short box. And that is an amazing run. I love it so very much. It's goofy and sincere and dangerous and menacing and campy and oh so very genuine, all at once. Sure, Aaron's a miserable leftist without a clue, but my God he wrote a good Thor arc here. I'm really blessed to have it. I mean it: the Gorr comic arc is absolutely amazing.

Oh, wait, I was talking about the movie, right? That's what this post was about, right? I think? I got distracted by having fun. It almost feels like that's what's missing from a lot of modern mainstream comics too, y'know? Man, not like Superior Spider-Man back in the day. Slott was firing on all cylinders back then. I got that back in my box too and...

Every Moment of You is a Copy

“If I were to meet a thousand copies of you, I might go mad for joy.”

Gene Wolfe, Interlibrary Loan

I was lying on my bed. It was 2006. Lyme’s disease had totally broken my grip on reality when the sun set. I would lie on my bed, wracked in pain to almost hallucinogenic levels. Lying there, I felt an exhaustion I couldn’t begin to tell a soul. My very core was tired. Exhausted. Spent. The woman I had forgotten I loved had been gone for years, and with it so had beauty and meaning.

It was 2023. I was making dinner with my wife, the woman I have loved since I was a child. I'm still scratching my head as to how I wound back up with her. Our kids were screaming at each other over some new invented conflict; The Second Gulf War would have been proud. It was pretty stressful, and I sarcastically thought about how all the pain and suffering I had brought me to this moment.

Wait, what is this? 

2023 stopped. He knew what this was. Or near enough. Hey, we probably don’t have much time. Take a look. 

That’s not her, 2006 balked. That can’t be. 

It is. 

Can I… can I watch? Please? You sure this is real?

If I told you would you believe me?

No.

Will you look anyways?

For the next thirty minutes 2006 looked, and 2023’s eyes watered. There were children! They were beautiful! They were noisy and a bit rude at the moment, but they were really there. 2006 reached out through 2023’s hands and touched them, marveling.

This happens, declared 2006. 

2023 said nothing. 

Is this real?

You touched them, did you not? Would you like to see the wife again?

There was a moment. And in she came back in, like a whirlwind. The children were driving her nuts. 2006 couldn’t handle it. There she was, and 2006 couldn’t handle the truth of it. It was too much. 2023’s body trembled. The link was beginning to break. 

Can I come back?

2023 smiled. Anytime you like. We’ll be here.

2006 trembled in the dark. Promise?

Promise.

2006 passed out in yet another Lyme’s funk. He woke up the next day, unable to remember the amazing dream he had. But he knew there had been one. Despite not feeling human, his step was lighter that day. Why couldn’t he remember that dream???

2023 turned to face the delightful chaos with a chuckle. He had asked for it, after all.

The Problem of Content

 

There is a lot wrong with how The Boys comment on society, and most of it is that they don't go nearly hard enough. Blinded by their progressivism they ascribe Disney's moves to Fox, which is just... manifestly wrong... but those are small quibbles on what is the most accurate take of the modern world I've seen in a popular format. Because otherwise The Boys is right on the money. See, we're not getting art from the modern age of streaming, by and large. I don't even know if I'd count The Boys as art, but it's definitely not content. 

What's content?

Let's go over what art itself is, first.

Art is nourishing to the soul. You interact with art and your soul wakes up a bit, becomes all the better for it, and is able to face the world in a better place. Art is not necessarily comfortable, but it is comforting. Art uses plot, technique, to communicate one genuine perspective to you. It is person packaged into an object.

So content? Content is just all the material stuff that art is, but without the soul: the plot hooks, paint strokes, all the stuff a soul would use to leave a bit of itself behind. Except there’s nothing really behind it. It may be well done, entertaining, and even moving… but that doesn’t make it art. And let’s be clear art can be really badly done. Art may even be harmful. But art is attempting to show something beyond itself. The object is commentary, is not an end in itself.

But content is soulless, no matter much you may like it. 

Sorry. 

Now, the issue I have isn’t about the existence of content. Comics and most popular culture is content, not art, almost by definition. Hell, that's what pulps really were to begin with: a ton of well-done content. Content streams themselves are not a problem either. One frequently needs to just be able to check out, even if it's for a moment, and content helps you do that. But the problem with too much content is that it numbs your brain and shuts it off. if you take in too much. The world has changed, and content has a reach that is getting much more pronounced than it ever has. And, since art has a pesky habit of actually changing people (which can dramatically change the type of content you consume) it behooves folks with influence to keep art as far away from people as possible.

If you doubt me and are reading this post on a phone I've got prime landscape in Florida to sell you. If you're not reading this on a phone the fact that the above sentence is thinkable is a problem.

Because, see, the problem is that art? Art needs needs interior space to grow. You need to be open to it. You have to seek it out. Content helps maintain a status quo, art always shakes it up. Whether for better or worse, art is problematic for those in power. And if you have a bunch of media giants having access to your eyeballs all the time, there's going to be a constant push to keep your eyes on their stuff.

Good graft, ain't it?

A Warrior Only Dies Once

 

I was eleven when I saw this cover the first time. And I knew. Immediately. Yes, absolutely immediately. That this book was important. It’s that moment when time stops and you realize you will be holding this book decades from now, and that I would never really let it go.

Well, I found that copy at my in-laws, 23 years later. I took it home. Funny how that works. I remember it being my favorite of the Redwall books (with Lord Brocktree a close second), and I think it's because of the following quote:

"A coward dies a thousand times, but a warrior dies only once."

At the time I had no idea the things that would come at me. I didn't know that life, which had already been filled with rapes, beatings, and manipulations, was about to get much harder. I did not know that I would have to figure out what all the evil I experienced meant to me, an act that would change me in ways that I am still trying to get ahold of, decades later. So was it providence that I ran acrost this quote one year before the questions about whether or not life was worth living in the wake of all that had happened? Before the battle became interior? I mean, I suppose? It certainly seems that way. All I knew was that my eleven year old self read that book and felt something very deep, primal, powerful, that I've not felt from anything else: dive in head first, giving up is far worse than dying.

And then over the next twenty years I more or less consciously forgot it. Thanks to the incredible amount of trauma I'd taken in, I couldn't (and still have a hard time) distinguish what was a threat and what wasn't, meaning that most of my day is spent wasting my energy on battles that didn't exist. Which meant that when the time came to actually face down the baggage I'd accumulated I'd be worn out... and fold before it, doing things that I didn't think myself capable of. And that was a death of cowardice. That's what the quote was referring to: giving up who you are because you are afraid. I have died many times.

But, holding that book, I realized that I had more or less forgotten what I had promised myself so long ago: failure was far scarier than dying.

Yeah, easier said than that. But I have to try again. I may not have died once, but I will not die again.

Oh, who'm I kidding? I’ll fail that. But failure was never an option. Forgiveness and trying again is. Nevertheless, one must aim for the impossible, even as one fails it.

Ultimate Spider-Man: Venom

Double Trouble was a nice surprise, a blast from the past that reminded me just how good Bendis really was, once upon a time. I didn’t need a reminder for the Venom arc. That was burned into my brain as a kid. Permanently. Well, at least I thought it was.

Turns out it was a hell of a lot better than I remember.

MJ’s broken up with Peter. Grieving, Peter finds childhood friend Eddie Brock… who’s working to finish their parents started: the Venom project. Peter tries to take some of “the suit”, only to find that it’s far more dangerous than could be expected. Peter wants to get rid of it. Eddie doesn’t.

Yup, that’s the seven issues. And it is beyond well done. Bendis patiently builds the slow burn, playing out Peter’s despair at MJ leaving, the heartwarming reunion with Eddie, and the inevitable whirlwind of discovery, joy, terror, betrayal, and the final awful conflict, with Peter having to confront the truth. 

There are few things I would call brilliant. This is one of those things. I hesitate to insult Bagley’s pencils by talking about them, because this is penciling about as good as it gets. I can hear the shouting, gunshots, the air pregnant with the silent screams of what could have been. It’s more than plot or art, but comics at the height of its power. 

This is seven issues of slow burn perfection. Period. 

The Point and Goal of Writing Dark Posts

 

I have been writing some dark stuff as of late. There have been two reactions to it, far as I can tell: very genuine concern for my welfare or "Oh, it's Nate being Nate". The genuineness of either is not in doubt, but one is accurate and the other is not, and it's the "Oh, it's Nate being Nate" camp that's closer to the mark. This is not meant to denigrate the former, however, but to explain one of the gradually evolving goals of this blog and the logic behind it. I am far more okay than most would like to think. The time to have worried about me would have been about six years ago, not now. I will explain that first.

Modern society has always felt very odd to me. The oddest part about it, however, is the insistence that people are completely conformitve creatures. This is patently false. People are inherently conflicted beings, who seek conflict and need it to help them process what they are. If you put people into a spot where there's not a lot of conflict it is a psychological fact that they will invent conflict. We have to have it. If a person wishes to stay sane that have to find a way to channel their need for conflict and they have to own up to this need. 

If you don't think that a fact of human nature you're not just wrong but you are a danger to yourself and  others. 

I am open and honest about it. I admit my need for conflict and therefore am actually at peace.

Yes, I said peace. Peace is not the same thing as calmness. Peace is about acceptance. I'm working on the calm part.

Six years ago? I wasn't ready to admit it. I was not at peace with my need for conflict, and that really messed me up. I blamed the darkness in my soul on the trauma and horror inflicted upon me, instead of seeing that experiencing such things merely increased my appetite for conflict. I took the need home and instead of channeling it properly I sat on the flashbacks and the rest of the horrors and sought conflict in my own house, where that sort of thing isn't helpful. I thought the flashbacks were the problem, but as I continued on in EMDR and therapy I realized three things:

1) Rage is frustrated energy

2) The flashbacks were not the source of my energy, but they made a handy scapegoat to not live up to my own potential.

3) If I didn't figure out what to do with all the energy I find in myself I would inevitably become frustrated, turning the energy to rage, as sure as damming a river leads to a water back up.

It's an ongoing process, but  the intent when facing myself has changed from merely nullifying rage to redirecting the energy to other things. And it has been marvelously freeing. I'm not terribly good at it yet, but it has been a breath of fresh air for me.

But sometimes that energy doesn't get handled properly. And so I write, and I make a conscious decision to publish what I write. It is extremely purposeful. I do it for one very simple reason: my experiences of reading Gene Wolfe have taught me that reading a frank confession of human nature as it is exists in an individual is healing for others to read. It is not a question of whether or not I am a good writer. That is not the point, although I do think I am getting better. The point is that the mere act of reading about someone else having trouble and trying to figure out what to do it with can be a good thing for people.

Now, if you've read my posts and you go "but I don't feel particularly helped", that's fine, you might not need what I've put up on the web yet. Maybe I just suck at writing. That's always an option. But someday you might. Someday your own nature may get the better of you and the lie that somehow you're anything like your sterile modern surroundings won't be enough anymore. This state of constant calmness, without death and illness and killing, does not calm you down, it makes you itchy, and if you don't deal with that itch you will go crazy. You need conflict. You need challenge. But few will tell you the truth.

And here is that ugly truth:

You need contention, and that contention starts right betwixt your own ears and in your chest. Different people will need different levels of conflict, but there is not a person alive who doesn't need it.

The calmness of a first-world environment will not help you channel your need for conflict, if anything it will frustrate you further. The privilege of a first world denizen isn't to stop suffering and conflict, but to choose a type of suffering and conflict that won't necessarily kill you or others. And that is better than 99% of all human beings who have ever lived. What a gift! You may need help learning how to channel that energy other places and you may need to grieve the bad shit that happened to you, but the end goal is not to eliminate the energy, but to just get it to where it needs to go.

I publish these posts because someone may feel relief from knowing they are not alone in facing the conflict from inside them. I publish these posts because I know others assume their inherent uniqueness in this fact, which is the type of lie that destroys families and nations. I do not publish these posts to ask for help. If I need help I would not ask on a blog. Or online.

But maybe you, the reader, will benefit from the meanderings and musings. I know I have benefited from such things myself. So I try, to the best of my ability, to pay it forward.

And if I can help someone face the real problem head on, no matter how slightly, that's not a life poorly spent.