perpetual-fool

[perpetual-fool]

-

Backlash. Feel a bit awful. Trend is about every time I feel a better, my brain dredges up something to feel worse about. Maybe, a problem solved reveals more problems.

I want to know. The pointless evil, why? Say, was watching a piece of fiction, and the characters are racist. Whatever. But then they lie about it, say the other people aren't as strong, useless. We the viewer know that's objectively incorrect, due to the main character's magic power. But there's no basis to that belief. They know it's not true, they know they just hate the other. But then what's the point of the whole facade? why the 'test' for the other to prove their ability? You don't care. You just want them dead, so just fucking kill them already. We know it, they know it, you know it. What's the fucking point of this lie?

The lying is not fiction. extremely common, and to no one's benefit.

But someone deliberately put this in their fiction. They wanted it there. It makes sense to them. They know. Others know. You know what this is, you know why they're doing it. You know why people deliberately misinterpret others, gaslight them about what they said. You know why people refuse to learn. You know why they insist on doing things badly. I know from experience that asking is futile. Maybe I should be convinced at this point that you obviously aren't acting in good faith, but the fact that you are your own victim makes me doubt.

Not that clarification helps, but I mean, you may not know what's going on exactly, but you'd have to know that something is off. Say, someone makes an "all X are Y" argument, you point out that that's absurd, then they "defend" they position saying that clearly some X are Y. Which means they changed what their position was. Which means they were never acting in good faith. Which means you should know that the exchange is a waste of time, or that something's not right with it. (Or there's context I don't know, but I'm fucking sick of people using that as a free pass to say I'm wrong with no justification.)

It's unsettling. There's no reasoning with it, no preparing for it, and it's absolutely everywhere. would probably wind me up into a panic attack if I let it.

Though they are a liar, someone did confirm that the deal is: I am just oh so clever that others' genuine well-intentioned behavior looks like blatant malice. That's one of my more likely guesses. Right up there with a Truman Show or Matrix type of scenario. I've also considered that maybe others really do not have the concept of 'truth'. Say, a primary function of the English language seems to be that it's vague enough for others to retroactively alter what you meant. Well, it's not fair to pin that on the language. The most egregious example, I was told "words mean things!" but the meaning in question having no correlation to the words used. But yeah, if the argument "technically, if I use a different definition for that word, then you're wrong" seems valid to you, then you don't know what truth is.

I dunno. I've explored the "maybe people really are just very stupid" idea before, but the problem is that they're not stupid enough to be as stupid as they are. Or, "I'm not saying X", "oh you mean X" can't be a mistake. So, malice. I had the conlang idea to force stating the context, but it wouldn't make a difference. If you wanted to be honest you could do it in English.

This isn't resolvable until someone stops giving me crooked answers.

S'yeah, it's Cat or it's no one.

[perpetual-fool]

-

This is premature, so, apologies for sharing in such a state. I suppose I want reassurance? I noticed a trend that seems to be significant.

First context: some of my activities are 'neutral', inciting no negative feelings. Say, when cooking, I am only considering my model of how the process works. But further, my understanding is informed almost exclusively by my own experiences. The claims of others have proven to be either wrong outright, or inadequate.

Second context: some of my activities are 'sensitive', about which I feel perpetually confused and 'sorry'. Usually some form of communication, I have no model of the process and depend entirely on the claims of others to inform my behavior, but since I cannot form any coherent patterns from said claims, I end up acting on impulse alone. Say, sharing unfiltered thoughts and feelings about a subject I am insecure about to someone I believe I can trust, hoping they will tell me what I'm supposed to do and feel and believe. However, while they will happily reinforce my belief that I am wrong and evil, they will never explain what 'right' and 'good' actually entail.

Third context: some activities sit partway between the previous two, wherein my own experience is in competition with the claims of others. Say, choosing what food to eat. Growing up a fat kid, it was instilled in me that virtually all eating is morally wrong. This does nothing to address the fact that I am hungry, but it does ensure I constantly feel bad. But as an adult who has previously been swindled into believing certain diets are the one true answer, I know that certain foods make me feel tired and more hungry, and other foods make me feel energetic and satiated. And those two ways of thinking are not compatible.

Rationale: others' claims put me in a 'right/wrong' mindset, my own experience puts me in a 'how does it work' mindset. The 'right/wrong' mindset does not work, unless its intended effect is to cause emotional distress. And these two paradigms are competitive, they cannot coexist.

Conclusion: others' claims are poison for my ability to understand?

I'm aware that asking for someone to tell me that I shouldn't let people tell me what to think would be counter-productive. But I don't know where the strength is supposed to come from. It's not like I know what I should do and just can't muster the energy for it, it's that I'm (more or less) convinced that what I should be doing is suffering. And what kind of argument can you make about what should or shouldn't form the basis of one's beliefs? I should do what makes me happy because it makes me happy? That's no better than "I should do what people tell me because they say so".

I suppose deceit destroys itself. When my beliefs have changed, it was because they failed on their own terms. I was not swayed by logic and reason, God disproved himself. Which I guess means that change happens by accident? The things which don't work get disregarded, eventually forgotten, their place getting taken by things which do.

And I suppose there's no reason to delay the inevitable, if I'm going to end up leaning on my own understanding regardless. And I don't currently have a compelling reason not to try and have a good time.

Does that sound like a resolution? I dunno.

[perpetual-fool]

Maybe other people don't get to overwrite my perception of reality. Even if they're really persistent or upset about it.

[perpetual-fool]

-

I've made some progress. I've reworked my whole thought process and I can talk myself down when I start having negative thoughts.

But the root problem remains. Understanding generally, if things don't add up then I must be wrong. But with people, they don't add up, and objectively I am not wrong. (where applicable.) I know they can be wrong, but there's also no version of how they could be wrong that adds up either. I'm not wrong, but I have to be wrong.

What do I do about that?

Hmm. The only time others' opinions have cease to matter, was when I have a firm enough grasp on the subject that could recognize that their claims were blatantly wrong or meaningless. Say, the parlor trick of using kitchen shears to cut a penny. (Zinc isn't that hard, kitchen shears are made to cut through bone, they can all do that.) And the subjects here are learning, communication, and connection? (The latter two may be the same.) So if I become competent at those things (how they ought to work at least) then this won't bother me anymore? Further, if others were doing those competently, then trying to follow what they're doing would have already worked. That's only marginally comforting.

Is this gonna work? I sure am tired. I'd like to be done with this and feel happy and secure and ideally, loved.

[perpetual-fool]

When I was eighteen, right after graduating high school, I went on a mission trip to Zambia. We were going to be there about a month. The preacher who was more or less our leader for this trip, advised us to take some Vaseline, "just in case". He would not specify in case of what.

Was the preacher advising us to take lube for jackin' off?

[perpetual-fool]

-

I'm sharing this for the pseudo-emotional support. It's probably nothing, but I opened up a sealed new pack of guitar strings today and there were some little white chunks of powdery stuff inside. It doesn't seem to fit the profile for some kind of attack, so I assume it's not dangerous. But it is weird, and it has freaked me out a little.

B'yeah, if I suddenly disappear, you'll know what happened.

The strings themselves are good though. Mostly I'm happy because they behave how I expected, proof I'm not stupid. They're nickel-wound and have weak bass, which is exactly what I wanted because *I* am the bass. They are actually of equal string tension, instead of having the usual floppy lowest string. That feels and sounds good. I'm mostly concerned about the intonation, but I need to let the strings stretch for a while before I can adjust the saddle and check fret by fret.

Anyway, thanks for listening. (hypothetically)

[perpetual-fool]

I am so smart, smert smurt smurp.

I successfully did and figured out a thing. So, I've been speculating about how bowed instruments work, trying to figure out a way to actually test it. And I've been needing to deal with the soundpost on my 'lil viola, the placement isn't good and the sound is a bit muffled. Was a bit muffled. I had an oh so simple idea. I put a toothpick under the bridge.

Context: how bowed instruments make sound. The bow itself works on the stick-slip phenomenon. The wood (or not-wood) is there to hold the hair (or not-hair), the hair is there to hold the rosin, and the rosin is sticky. It sticks to the strings, pulls a little, slips, starts pulling again. It all happens very fast and that's what gets the strings moving. BUT, the strings are moving left and right, and to get soundboard to make sound we need it to move up and down. So: the bridge. The bridge is tall and sits on two tiny feet. Because it's tall, when the strings strung on top start going left/right, the feet start levering up/down. But the soundboard it's sitting is going half up and half down, the sound isn't sound, it's out of phase. So: lastly, the soundpost. It's a wooden dowel (or not) that goes in the body of the instrument, wedged between the top plate (the soundboard) and the bottom plate (not the soundboard). But most importantly it's placed under one of the tiny feet of the bridge, arresting its jaunty wobble and making it the fulcrum. But it's not quite under the foot, because then the flat foot would be sitting on the flat top wedged against the flat end of the dowel. So it's a little bit behind the bridge instead, letting it wobble enough to pivot, but not wobble so much that you get the out-of-phase issue again.

Or, that's my guess. Which is correct, 'cause it fuckin' worked.

The other context: I've been cooking up this idea for a new design of viola*. Basic concept is two things. One, no soundpost, the bridge pivots on a bearing. Two, the wobble of the bridge is balanced against a spring, so the soundboard need not bear any load whatsoever, so I can make it act more efficiently as a speaker diaphragm instead of a structurally stable box. And having aspirations of making this extant, I've been considering what might be the most accessible approach to proofing the concept. Thought was (for the bearing) I could drill a hole in the top of the viola I have, fix a soundpost though the bottom with a screw, and put a tiny slice of brass rod on top for the bridge to rock on. And then I realized if the pivot works at all then I will have solved the non-fitted soundpost issue, so I could just stick a piece of hardwood on the top. And then, hey, it'd be real easy to use a toothpick. So here we are.

Immediate difference. It has that resonant 'fruity' sound now, and it's much louder. It sounds like a real viola now. Also, the bridge adjusted itself. I positioned the bridge only by eye, and I guess I got it a little off center. But the strings are all pulling towards the center, and I guess with the reduced friction of not standing on the whole foot, it just slipped into alignment when I tightened the strings up to pitch. Neat!

Although now I'm 'stuck' on trying to figure out the rest, and I have other things to do. So, bleh. But progress!

- *Aside, I'm not sure if I should refer to this general style of instrument as "violin". Argument for: people know what a violin is, so that's clear. Argument against: I don't like the violin and I want my chosen instrument of viola to be as recognized as cello or bass. So, mostly I'm still bitter about getting the filler parts in high school orchestra and feel like violin already gets more attention that it deserves. I don't understand those feelings, but the experience was like, say, in sixth grade orchestra I was one of only two violas because everyone else had switched to violin or cello. Cello is understandable, viola is sort of a bastard instrument and it really ought to be more like a 1/8 size cello to be acoustically optimal. But violin is just a shrill viola to me, why should there be more than twice as many violin players as viola? It doesn't seem right. Anyway, I'm gonna call it 'viola' because that's what I'm actually designing and if readers have to look up what that is then that's just more flavor for my character.

[perpetual-fool]

-

Trying to figure out 'feeling sorry'.

I found myself feeling 'sorry' over something very mundane. It was like: was struggling with some task, I thought "oh, I'm using the wrong tool for the job!", ???, "Imsorryimsorryimsorry".

What I think is happening, specifically, I thought I'd figured something out and felt good about it, but me feeling good is bad, so that's bad. And happening so fast that I don't even know what it was I'm feeling bad about. Generally, I think it's the conditioning that any independent thought or feeling I have is wrong. Going through my new procedure, the rationale for this is 'others are upset with me, so I must be wrong'. Then, what makes me think that's true? ..goes off the rails there, my model doesn't work. I mean, it's wrong by definition? So reevaluate:

What is 'wrong' about others being upset? Because I want to connect and if they're upset then I've clearly failed. And that led me on a bit of a tangent. Thing is, I've had loads of experiences where someone just asserted something which was blatantly invalid, and a handful where they've gotten upset about my getting upset about it. Like, the 'connection' others want is to destroy my ability to think and feel in its entirety, and replace everything I am with them. Basically, the thing I could've done that would make others happy is to have killed myself in college. That's the consequence of what they want. (And the girl I believed in more than god was as complicit in that as anyone else, really.) So, I don't know why my good is their evil, but I don't think it's wrong to have differing opinions or to have independent ideas which might be naive or mistaken. Nor do I think it's wrong to communicate or build understanding. Nor to have feelings. So yeah, the whole exercise was irreconcilable from the beginning.

That seems figured to me.

How to resolve? Be aware that we are working at cross purposes? Uh, that seems to work. At least, it's disrupting my usual thought patterns.

[perpetual-fool]

The eclipse was not particularly interesting.

It didn't get night-dark, just sort of super-overcast. Looking through the glasses, there was just a dull orange circle in various stages of obfuscation. In totality, it was a black circle with a ring of white around it. The transition from obscured to being a simple bright spot took about a second, not much to see even if could look with my bare eyes. It would've looked better on video. The most enjoyable thing was to be outside when it's not so bright and not so hot.

And the moment was ruined by family, a screaming child and and old man saying stupid things.

[perpetual-fool]

I need to learn how to enjoy things, I think.

How does that work?

[perpetual-fool]

-

(Sorry for rambling so much lately, I've been very not-good.)

I got a cheap hand plane for working wood. It's pretty terrible, and probably not actually for wood. I had some ideas about how I could improve it, and possible new designs in general. And most importantly I thought of a clever way to set the depth and tilt of the blade, the plane itself having no mechanisms to do so. And uh, I did so by laying the plane on a piece of glass, letting the blade slide forward until the glass stopped it. Except that leaves the blade exactly in line with the body. So I added a piece of paper, and set the blade to protrude exactly the width of one piece of paper. And that was way too much. hopes dashed. was kind of excited about it too. Then my improvements, tuning up the thing, doesn't work either. I don't have the room. The mouth, the little slot the blade protrudes through, at the angle the blade sits at I can't even fit a popsicle stick through it. Any work on that would have to be done with a milling machine. I don't have a meaningful amount of access to use a file or something until the angle is around 45°. And hey, that's probably why old wooden planes are built like that. New designs, my thoughts were to have one where the blade sits flush with the 'heel', and the depth of cut is adjusted by raising the 'toe', like an electric planer. In the interim, I could lap the toe a little shorter (higher?) than the heel. And the other thought was to make the blade the sole of the plane itself, so you get an actually low angle of ~25° rather than the usual "low angle" 12°-20° bed angle plus 25°+ sharpening angle which often ends up close to 45° anyway. But I don't think either of those things would be cost-effective. The problem is getting everything perfectly lined up. Like, blade-on-the-bottom would have to be perfectly parallel. I'd essentially need a modular design where every individual component could itself be adjusted. The traditional 'blade through a block' design is cheap and forgiving, and it'd be a whole lot easier to shape one exactly how I want it rather than try to make it adjustable.

So maybe I'm just stupid for thinking I can do better. That brings me to the other thing I wanted to ramble about.

I can't answer to others anymore. I keep getting trapped being 'sorry'. Like the above, I'm a stupid piece of shit for thinking I might be able to do something good, and I'm a stupid piece of shit for not understanding everything the moment I saw it. And if I try to reason with the voice in my head it just twists things around constantly, as it has learned from others. As I was saying before (I think), I have a hard time even having a position, because other people constantly shift the context of whatever it is we're discussing. And I pretty much always have some speculation as to what's happening, but it's never going to be confirmed. And even if Cat suddenly becomes reasonable, she doesn't have time for me. So, I have to find a solution in spite of it all. stop playing whatever game this is. A bit of a challenge, as I don't know what the game is or why I'm playing. I am constantly trying to figure out what's going on, so I guess that's part of it. That's my 'win' condition? and other people are antagonistic to that, for some reason? anyway. To understand generally, I'd have to start with observation, then hypothesize etc. And that (inversely) correlates, the worst responses I've gotten were when asking "What makes you think that that's true?" and "What have you actually observed?" So I should tell people to fuck off if they won't share their premises? Which brings me to 'why', which is that I want to connect, and my way is clearly getting further away from the connection I want. Intellectually I know it's a dead end, the final step is destroying whatever I am and accepting everything they tell me uncritically and unconditionally. especially if it's not logically valid. They tell me what to think, I think it, they tell me what to feel, I feel that. Except then I am not there to connect, and it just doesn't work, blah blah. I guess I still believe this is the path to connection.

How do I believe something else? Going by other subjects, results? Say, when I was wrong about what makes eggs stick to a frying pan. I had my reasons, and when it didn't work I assumed I must just be doing it wrong. The assumptions continued until I formed a new hypothesis, and I didn't change my mind until it worked. So, my inclination is to make another hypothesis about people, but that doesn't work. It has to be about connection instead? What about it? Gosh, what am I even thinking currently? That everything done makes sense in some perspective, and all I have to do is figure out what that perspective is? (Thanks for that, Discordianism.) Alternatively: a thing/idea is only able to be understood if the premises/context and argument/reasoning are known. Results, I'll need something I've done myself. understood myself. That's difficult, as uh, I've never really finished anything.

Okay, did a thing. The plane I was talking about, I did the interim thing. It worked exactly as I expected: setup is easy and it makes a perfectly flat surface. But also that's not necessarily a good thing? I learned some things. Not worth getting into. But in short, I think hand planes are less 'flat-makers' and more 'very well controlled chisels'. Aside, it's another instance of the way other people frame the issue seems completely off-base.

So, what about it? I observed some things, formed a model of how they work, made a guess based off that model, and verified that model by successfully implementing something based on my guess. (As opposed to someone telling me the 'correct' way to do the thing, which I just believe, and then I struggle and fail to find observations and rationale which correlate.) How would that relate to communication? On my end, I would (and I think I already do?) share: the conclusion, the observation itself, the reasoning, and to what extent I am certain of the conclusion. (In parentheses to mark where this example stops, 'cause it's kind of long and beside the point. But yeah, I'd go over all this if sharing. Like: I believe intonation of guitar is greatly improved by having a gradient of tension on the strings, because typical guitars sound slightly out of tune to me enough to give me a nails-on-a-chalkboard feeling, but multi-scale guitars sound acceptable, the slightly longer scale length on the lower strings would mean proportionally more tension on the lower strings, so I think tension is directly correlating factor, really I think it's due to flexibility and how much sharper a string goes when it's pressed down, and I'm pretty sure but I haven't successfully tested it yet.) But for others? Well, the mechanism can't be any different. I'll have to ask for what they've observed, the rationale about it, and what makes them think their idea is actually true. And if they won't answer then I know they're either lying or have no understanding of what they're saying. But most importantly, what they mean when they say things? Like, "why are you being such a scrumbus?" Yeah, still need the rationale and the observation. What pattern does the word/phrase refer to? what is a concrete instance of the pattern? and I will rephrase to confirm.

And if they won't share that? Then they're lying. They can't just not know what they themselves mean. They're blatantly lying or there's not a person in their head. And as a practical issue, I can't ask questions to a video or article, and in most situations the human in question would never be willing to clarify. What do I do, passively? The mechanisms are the same; premise/argument/conclusion or observation/hypothesis/testing. So if the pieces aren't all there, don't assume they must exist? Like, if expert man on the internet says 80/20 bronze guitar strings have scooped mids*, unless I have my own reasons to think so, just disregard it? Or if it's say, a doctor. The human I'm talking to might be insane or absent, but I'd either have to just trust that the system they are slave to is going to do me more good than harm, or find a new doctor. And most practically, a whole lot of the time people are telling others how they should feel. So like, (guitar strings again) I'm watching this one dude saying "X strings sound 'darker' and Y strings sound 'brighter'". Which is subjective, and also completely opposite of what it sounds like to me. So, subjective assertions should be ignored entirely all the time? Yeah, if it is just as assertion. And I suppose I shouldn't need to say that gaslighting should be disregarded.

Lastly, practical application: what do I do about feeling sorry? There's a couple way to reason at it, but my imaginary accuser will never be satisfied. I guess that would mean not 'plugging in' to understand anymore. As opposed to, analyzing? Starting with premises/observations? I don't think it could be anything else. It's annoying. It feels a bit like whenever I try to make something. I want to just grab the material, the one tool I need, and just make the thing real quick. But actually, I need a handful of tools for measuring and shaping and finishing, and I need a way to hold the piece securely while I work on it, and I have to clean up afterwards from the dust of what have you. So, making one little thing means going through the whole tedious process. It's tiring and disheartening. but necessary.

Does it work?

Say, I have this bad memory related to a Stratocaster. I said something stupid, in some sense I was trying to connect and failed helplessly. Analyzing, I was forbidden from thinking and feeling at the time. And no one ever gave me any feedback about anything; I was compliant enough that no one would yell at me. So I didn't know what I was doing, didn't know why I was doing it, and did so thoughtlessly. Because I was mocked, bullied, belittled, or berated for voicing any independent thought or showing even a hint of a possible expression. Because they put me in a double bind with no way out. And it was wrong of them to do that to me. And it was wrong of them to not be straight with me. I ought to be allowed to at least mention pretty much anything if no one's given me a reason not to, and it's wrong for others to gaslight me if I do.

That works.

I uh, don't feel better. I guess it's safer? to think I'm just doing something wrong. or to be so depressed I can't think about it. The essence of torture world is that no one runs on any kind of logic and almost all of them will try to hurt me if they think they can get away with it. I am stressed and afraid.

- *(Aside, I do have such reasons. I had noted before my guitar had very weak mids. But I recently changed the strings, and the mids are plenty strong now. The new strings are phosphor-bronze and have a red tint to them, and I don't know what the old strings are exactly but they're a dull brass-yellow. Incidentally, '80/20 bronze' is apparently 80% copper and 20% zinc, which is "low brass" according to Wikipedia. So yeah, that's probably what was happening.)

[perpetual-fool]

I've been playing video games for the 'approval'.

Was considering the 'correct' way to play. Context: made a new character, ran into a minor platforming challenge that was relatively difficult using a character with no points in Dex. (Dexterity adds jump height and increases air control.) If I increase Dex it trivializes the challenge, so that's 'wrong'. If I don't increase Dex, then it's unreasonably difficult, so that's 'wrong' too. So what am I 'supposed' to do?

After untangling a very crooked train of thought; 'right' is just what people have dictated? In the case of video games, I would try to deduce developer intent by what works in a moderately challenging and exactly logically appropriate way. So like, you have just enough time to dodge when the boss attacks: probably intended. You find a corner where the boss can't hit you and you just shoot it until it dies: probably not intended. But the sense of 'rightness' is a result of punishment. Often games will be designed in such a way to explicitly make certain tactics impossible. Like, the only weapons with a high enough DPS to kill the monster before it reaches you were deliberately given terrible accuracy to cancel out the firing rate. Sabotage. Punishment. You're playing wrong and you should fucking suffer for it.

I dunno if that's an extension of real life or if I (would have) learned it from games independently.

But yeah, I've been letting games string me along for the meager scraps that actually work, the reward. 'Cause in that moment, maybe I'm not just a complete piece of shit. And the stuff that doesn't work? My fault of course, since I'm a piece of shit that doesn't understand anything and can't do anything right. Really, it's been the same kind of effect as religion, stealing away your happiness and feeding it back to you in little tiny pieces, if you've been good. If you've been compliant. (Which implies that I have something to steal?)

But I'm right, actually? The things that don't work actually are bad. No it's not just a matter of preferences or compromises. No I'm not just failing to look at it in the right way or in the right context. I've had enough experiences of being objectively proven correct to know that. (Not that this is an objective issue.)

Dunno where this is going. Other than not wasting my time on media that takes more than it gives. Applied to not-games, the problem isn't accepting that I'm right. Like, people don't gaslight me with "no this isn't bad, it's good!" They don't convince me I'm wrong, they subvert my ability to come to a position at all. Can't give you a meaningful example, as not making sense seems to be the entire point. But, "I've noticed a bad thing about guitar" "Guitars have been made this way for hundreds of years!" Non sequitur, taking a sledgehammer to my framework. Overwriting what the subject is even about. (Hm. I was considering, people declare orphaned conclusions, and then twist everything else around to fit. So like, if they say "you're being an asshole", then you just are. Whatever you were doing, that was assholery, by definition. No reasons given, usually. And the reasons don't work, they'll just find new reasons. So maybe it's that I'm looking at the actual thing, creating an actual position. And they've declared something to be true by fiat. So when my observations clash with their truth they try to twist me around to fit. But then, why create truth by forcing others to pretend their reality is what you want it to be? Surely you're subject to the cause and effect of the real world yourself?)

But uh, I guess I ought to stop letting people convince me I'm wrong about what I've stated and what my position is? Why can they do that in the first place? I guess it's peer pressure, the empty promise of belonging. But it is empty. They never give even a little bit back. So, fuck 'em?

[perpetual-fool]

-

What is the point of being sorry? What benefit do others derive from my pain?

Eh, just sadism. Right? Others want people to feel sorry just because they like the idea that others are suffering?

[perpetual-fool]

-

Is there any solution to the violence problem? Like, pretty much anyone will just maim/torture/kill others if they think they can get away with it. And yeah I can carry a weapon, but I'm still just one person.

There is no real safety in the real world, is there?

(Maybe I should stop drinking. or be extremely selective about what information I take in. Just try and kind of forget that the world is pure evil.)

[perpetual-fool]

The wizard did it as a contrivance to justify the plot.

The reason to do anything in an artistic medium would be to create an experience, because you find the experience fun or engaging or whatever. So like, maybe I think swinging a sword feels cool. So I make a game with deep and immersive sword-swinging mechanics. Correspondingly, I need somewhere to go around swinging that sword, and the specifics don't really matter, because that's not the point. And I'm fumbling around grasping at diegetic reasons for the dungeon to exist because I can't figure out what experience I'm supposed to be having.

And maybe it's reasonable that I don't understand experiences which are foreign to me? Well, no one to ask but myself. Is that reasonable? Despite at least a solid decade of people berating me for not already understanding things, I think so, yeah. New feelings don't come with a magic instruction manual. And is that probably what's happening? Yeah, feels like it.

It's tremendously unpleasant to be working entirely in the dark. as usual.

[perpetual-fool]

I should probably stop hoping someone might help, huh?

[perpetual-fool]

-

Am I supposed to be having feelings all the time, about pretty much everything? I'm trying to work on my imaginary, substitute people/world. And I'm stuck on making things 'relatable'. So like, say there's a dungeon with skeletons wielding swords and shit. Why? a wizard did it. But why did the wizard do it? What does the wizard want? Like, the only purpose of a game-dungeon is to present a reasonable challenge to players. Is that what the wizard wants? why? Is the wizard training an army of adventurers but unethically and without their consent? Why would he need to do that? Did he use his mystical powers to peer into the cosmos and/or future and see a looming threat of an otherworldly invader? But no one will believe him because he is the only one with magical visions? Maybe? So then, the wizard just wants to be helpful generally?

That doesn't feel significant. I don't know what 'significant' would entail.

Anything that is significant, I don't know what about it. Like, there's two or three things that make me cry pretty reliably. Saving Zulf, We All Lift Together, I Hold You. And I have no idea why. I don't know what's even there to analyze. What was so significant about Atton's rant about how the Jedi and the Sith are the same? What was so significant about saying goodbye to Navi or Cortana? What's so significant about reading "Hiya!" every time I warp to the safe area? Why do I find it upsetting that I can't finish the game for technical reasons, and thus don't get to see her play her lute? And why is she so much more significant than the other characters? The skeleton at the bar and the ghost witch are perfectly serviceable characters too, why don't I care about them?

I think: when I was in second grade, relentlessly harassed for showing any expression at all, I realized that the most effective way to not show anything was to not feel anything. And I've been mostly numb since I was eight years old. And I don't know how to fix it.