Does anyone know the difference between the two? Because I bloody well don?t. Does understanding your actions and the way you feel, as a consequence, mean you know why you are the way you are? The person you are?
I?m asking this because recently I?ve dedicated quite a bit of time to try and understand what is wrong with me, which, tediously and with a sense of titanic predictability, culminated in a colossal panic attack yesterday. Where was I when it hit? Sweating away in an exam, stressing about money? Stuck in traffic, having an argument with my parents? No, I was in a field on a beautifully warm day, lying on my back eating a (perfectly ripe, I might add) peach and reading selected paragraphs from some of my favourite books. Nobody around, except some cows, no (conscious) thoughts of self-loathing or anxiety, and, oh yeah ? I just found out that I?ve successfully landed myself a great job (without hardly trying). I know (or understand?) that panic attacks come can out of the blue, sweet Jesus, after all these years I know, but why? Why? Why aren?t things simple and comprehensible? Does it take a lifetime to understand who you are? Are anxiety and DR/DP, and all the rest of the mental horrors that accompany it, just aspects of life that gives you time to learn these lessons?
I?m a reasonably intelligent guy, so I?m told, and I assumed that because I knew my faults (and there are quite a few of them) and reasons to be guilty (even more), and enough suffrage to hate myself, that with this knowledge would come understanding and, surely, peace, or at the very least my sub/unconscious could give me a break for five goddam minutes. So what the hell is roasting away beneath this thin veneer that is supposed to be me, charming his way through life, being outrageously generous, outrageously vindictive, good and bad, lucky and not so.
When I had this panic attack I could almost taste the hatred of myself, and, to a lesser degree, a completely unreasonable rage at everything and everyone. All of a sudden I literally felt physically sick with myself. At that moment even worms wouldn?t have ate my corruption I felt like I had grit or dirty socks in my mouth. I wanted to dive into an icy lake and wash my polluted self away, take great huge gulps of freezing water and spit away whatever makes me the person I am. I just don?t understand it. I would if I was a serial killer, or a thief, or an immense liar, but I?m not. I don?t even set myself high standards of morality - just enough so I do not intentionally hurt people and don?t burden myself with unreasonable guilt. The guilt I have is real, it is the consequence of my actions, so where, with this knowledge, is the understanding? Is the difference that simply knowing something does not require any action, but understanding does? And if so, what action do I have to take to stop this heaving sense that I am nothing more than a squalid sack of puke? Is it ?coming to terms with?, or ?dealing with?, or ?working through?. etc, etc, all the usual rot that over-paid psychologists trot out? I am guilty for, a, b, c, d, right the way through to z. I know this. But it seems I don?t understand it. Once exposed to rage, guilt, DR/DP, is it permanently chiselled into your personality, even if it?s not symptomatically tangible? (I don?t have DR or DP anymore). Does our capacity to punish ourselves ever end? Would ridding myself of??..whatever, be as difficult as smoothing out a bit of rough of gravel with a piece of silk? That?s what it feels like to me. Sometimes I make a deal with myself that it?s a fruitless task, that some things just don?t have an answer, but it seems it (whatever ?it? is) won?t settle for that.
But why do I HAVE to understand it? I?ve confronted a,b,c,d?.and thought I?d put them to bed, dealt with them, taken steps to make myself good. Why can?t I just throw a stick of proverbial dynamite into the rancid muck inside my skull and blow all the crap and nonsense to the surface, like a shoal of dead fish, and leave it like that? The fish will just rot away. Isn?t that the idea? Janine has written to me, at length, with explanations for my behaviour, and the way I feel, and as I read it I nod and accept the wisdom of it, so why don?t I understand? I don?t feel comfortable with the idea of just accepting who you are for the sake of a bit of quiet time. I mean, if I set fire to kittens you wouldn?t expect me to accept that with a shrug of the shoulders, would you. Where is the dividing line? Is there one?
Oh, tittybollocks to it all. Sorry for the moan. I just wish I understood. Or knew. Or either. Or both. Arse. :evil:
