Meaning in life.

[lykin005]

I hear all the time that a person who forms a petition (for sake of argument about mass effect 3's ending.) and thus they have no life and won't contribute to society. Two things 1: They mean that they are worthless and 2: Why is having a "life" and contributing to society the only legitimate life. I try to avoid society and life because I have always felt separate from both of them. I have never had a close friend, I've only felt close to myself. I've always felt utterly separate and blocked off from people and life. I've never felt I could confide in someone when I needed to and they would listen and understand and still be my friend. I've always felt like my life is about things which are irrelevant and meaningless in this world, like I have no place. Then people tell me to "contribute to society." or "Get a life." or stop being passionate about the thing's I am or "stop being a loner and come talk to us." I've talked to people before and they always reject me, particularly when I'm most like myself. We talk for a few days I finally let go and then they don't like me. Am I wrong for living my life this way? Am I wrong for not wanting to contribute when I get nothing?

[monk]

The message you wrote magically left wherever you are and appeared in front of me so I can comment. I have not had a pleasant day and so you will be getting a very blunt reply.
When you get up in the night to go to the restroom or get a glass and water, how do you figure the water got to your house? how about the electricity to light your way? how about the shoes & clothing you wear? the materials for the house you live in? the quasi protection you receive from those with much less than you grouping together and taking your stuff away? blankets on your bed? a group of people standing by to quench a possible fire of your belongings? also standing by is a medical facility & transport just in case you fall victim to accident & injury?

You may not fully engage in society but society is fully engaged for you and around you, and while it does not force your participation, parts of it in the form of individuals sometimes ask you to participate. So if you truly want to be separate from society I will gift you with a good knife and I suggest you drop your clothes, electronics and other societal trapping to head out into the countryside to see how well you do without society at all.

[cob]

The message you wrote magically left wherever you are and appeared in front of me so I can comment. I have not had a pleasant day and so you will be getting a very blunt reply.
When you get up in the night to go to the restroom or get a glass and water, how do you figure the water got to your house? how about the electricity to light your way? how about the shoes & clothing you wear? the materials for the house you live in? the quasi protection you receive from those with much less than you grouping together and taking your stuff away? blankets on your bed? a group of people standing by to quench a possible fire of your belongings? also standing by is a medical facility & transport just in case you fall victim to accident & injury?

You may not fully engage in society but society is fully engaged for you and around you, and while it does not force your participation, parts of it in the form of individuals sometimes ask you to participate. So if you truly want to be separate from society I will gift you with a good knife and I suggest you drop your clothes, electronics and other societal trapping to head out into the countryside to see how well you do without society at all.

Though blunt, this answer has some merit. Even if you never leave the home, you are engaging with society in hundreds if not thousands of ways.

[lykin005]

I wasn't even necessarily talking about those things, but if we want to go there I pay taxes and before that my parents did. I get the money to pay taxes by working. (I guess I should inform you all I've recently started working.) Society "gives" me nothing. Again I was mostly talking about personal relationships and emotional support. I'm sorry if you had a bad day, but I think you let your feelings get the best of you on this day.

Edit: What happens if you stop paying your electricity bill? It shut's off. What happens if you stop paying your mortgage, the bank takes your house. These things aren't given to you out of the kindness of society's all loving heart. It's about money. Do police officers work for free? No they get paid. Would they continue to fight crime if they weren't being paid? No, they would find another job.

[drunken dragon]

Just reiterating what monk said, yeah, you can take the Alexander Supertramp approach, or you can deal with the fact that some people are assholes. Life is tough. You've got to make your own meaning. If somebody wants to get upset about Mass Effect 3, let them. It's their life.

[Aum]

You may not fully engage in society but society is fully engaged for you and around you, and while it does not force your participation, parts of it in the form of individuals sometimes ask you to participate. So if you truly want to be separate from society I will gift you with a good knife and I suggest you drop your clothes, electronics and other societal trapping to head out into the countryside to see how well you do without society at all.

As soon as you stop paying money, you lose all of those things that society has "gifted" you. Let's get real. None of those things are gifts. They are services and they expect you to pay more and more with each passing year. It sucks to be poor in this society. You have the luxury of looking at it like society is doing you a favor when you have the privilege of never losing these things.

People aren't working on my behalf, they are working on behalf of themselves. Everyone is a slave to the monetary system. Most people who work or go to school to end up working do so because if they don't, they don't make money and they become poor or perhaps homeless. This system in inequitable and needs to fall.

If someone does not want to participate, they may not be entitled to anything gradios but the basic needs of life should always be provided. There should not be any involuntarily homeless in North America. We, along with Europe, are the most wealthy people per capita on earth. There is no excuse. And instead, America spends half a trillion dollars on the military each year to kill people with tax dollars. That money could have done so much for the People, but now it never will.

[monk]

I wasn't even necessarily talking about those things, but if we want to go there I pay taxes and before that my parents did.

Taxes had very little to do with cars, clothing, alarm clocks, and all the other material things that an individual would not be able to have without society to create them and sustain them. Electricity was a poor example, but a mortgage is society giving you the ability to acquire something and start using it 20 years before you could have saved up the money to get it.

It is related to personal relationships and emotional support in that just as you purchase a fine shirt that society has made available for money, you also could decide to receive money by giving emotional support to someone who calls out for it by choosing to be a therapist or counselor. Or you could master the techniques in some field and become a mentor to someone starting out or you could just put yourself in a position to provide emotional support to people in your social circle when they need it(even if they never use it). It's all a matter of give and take and bartering. Aum wishes we used some other system besides money to track and evaluate the bargaining but until our personal thirst for material things by the majority exists, so will money.

As soon as you stop paying money, you lose all of those things that society has "gifted" you.

even the homeless can call 911 and get the police to come or the fire department to come. Though taxes pay for it, the services are available to everyone.

If someone does not want to participate, they may not be entitled to anything gradios but the basic needs of life should always be provided. There should not be any involuntarily homeless in North America.

While I agree with you 100%, there are many who don't, and reconciling taking away wealth from someone against their will is exactly what you are griping about taxes isn't it?

[anonymousrabbit]

Am I wrong for living my life this way?

As long as you aren't violating anyone else's rights, you can live your life however you want! And no matter what you choose, you are going to find someone who tells you that you are doing it wrong and that you need to do things differently; however, if you are happy with how things are, and aren't violating anyone else's rights, ignore those haters! (I know, it's easier said than done!) This will be more of a problem if you prefer to live your life in ways that society considers "unusual" or deviate from what society considers "normal", but don't let that deter you from living your life the way you want to! In the end it's your life, and your opinions on how you live it are the most important, over anyone else's!

On the flipside though, I agree with with Monk when he says

You may not fully engage in society but society is fully engaged for you and around you,

Whether you like it or not, it is very difficult to disengage from society entirely. Although many of the services Monk mentioned are offered in exchange for money, many of those services still exist for you whether or not you are the one paying the money (through taxes or otherwise). Police services are a good example of that; police are enforcing laws whether or not you personally are paying the taxes that support them. Infrastructure is another example; roads, parks, public buildings, etc. all exist to your benefit, whether or not you actually paid taxes for them. There are many other examples, but my post is getting long, so I'll leave it at that for now. The point is, you are a part of society whether or not you like it, and you do benefit from being a part of society. You can limit your contact and participation with society, but it is difficult if not impossible eliminate it entirely.

[Aum]

As soon as you stop paying money, you lose all of those things that society has "gifted" you.

even the homeless can call 911 and get the police to come or the fire department to come. Though taxes pay for it, the services are available to everyone.

They come but they might not be useful, as I have learned every time I called the police. That fact aside, the police are the domestic army of the government. They ensure that the public is obedient. Without police to take away people's freedom, people would not pay the very taxes required to have the police, and the government would have no power to exert control.

If someone does not want to participate, they may not be entitled to anything gradios but the basic needs of life should always be provided. There should not be any involuntarily homeless in North America.

While I agree with you 100%, there are many who don't, and reconciling taking away wealth from someone against their will is exactly what you are griping about taxes isn't it?

[/quote]

I'm not necessarily against taxation, but I am against the current priorities of taxation: the biggest wealth transfers in history from the public to private business, endless wars against imaginary enemies that only profit a select few. Actually I think business and government must be separated as church and state have. This is my main reason for being against taxation. It is going to support private business that should be forced to sink or swim based on free market principles. I struggle while corporations get rich and get tax breaks, and are of no utility to society.

[Sonic#]

They come but they might not be useful, as I have learned every time I called the police. That fact aside, the police are the domestic army of the government. They ensure that the public is obedient. Without police to take away people's freedom, people would not pay the very taxes required to have the police, and the government would have no power to exert control.

Minor point - I thought that the IRS (in the US) had their own agents for enforcing taxation? Also, while the police deserve some criticism for what they do, they are also agents of the local government meant to ensure the safety of the people. That it even works imperfectly is a feat.

[edit the sad parts]

Being an engaged member of society is not a moral obligation. You can do whatever you like, but you can't stop other peoples' judgement of you doing whatever you like, which seems like your real problem.

[monk]

It's also noteworthy that most local law enforcement (in the U.S.) is either answerable to the people directly through election (county sherrifs) or in the cases of big cities the police chiefs are appointed by elected officials like city councils or mayors. So if your local law enforcement truly pisses off the public they can be replaced.

That fact aside, the police are the domestic army of the government. They ensure that the public is obedient.

No they don't. Threat of punishment/prison is what keeps most people obedient,because anything you want to do can almost always be accomplished long before any police show up. If the police were in anyway truly effective in keeping people obedient there would be much less lawbreaking going on.

[lykin005]

It seem's I gave the impression that I wanted nothing to do with society. That is not what I meant. I have every intention of being a kind decent person who helps when I can, I don't however plan on being tied to a job or responsibility's that prevent me from doing the things I enjoy/am passionate about. I have always felt separate and alienated from the people around me and felt like my life's passions and goals are irrelevant and meaningless and even looked down upon. I feel like if I did try to be a part of society I would just end up hurting myself or possibly others or otherwise being a nuisance. This is what socialization and contribution has wrought for me in the past so I see no reason to continue this behavior expecting it to suddenly work different. (Indeed this is one definition of insanity.)

[drunken dragon]

^ See, the last like, third of this paragraph basically states you don't want to be a part of society though.

[Rainbow Dolphins]

I think what he means is he doesn't feel he can be a member of society- that he has tried, and it has not worked, and he kind of feels like giving up. I can relate to that- there have been many times I've felt I was not made for this world, and that trying to fit into it was just too hard.

Since he's obviously talking about personal relationships, not monetary ones, let's try to stay on that topic, ok guys? If you want to talk about taxation and entitlement in society, I think it would make a good subject for a new thread.

I guess my only advice to you, lykin, is to keep trying. Try to find people with common passions, and have common experiences with them- that seems like the best way to create bonds and find people who grok with you, I find. I don't really know what your passions are, so it's hard for me to give you more specific advice than that. In my experience, not having that understanding of people made me... more sad. And finding like-minded people has been a source of happiness in my life. So I think it would be worth it for you to keep trying. I'm not saying they have to be JUST like you, just have some common ground. I know it's hard for you, but I mean, it took me 21 years to figure out how to function in society, to this extent (and that's a very limited extent). You still have time.

[Aum]

lykin, sorry if I hijacked your thread with previous debate. I'll address your OP more directly.

The lack of connection that you feel is something a lot of people experience, but it's almost socially taboo to talk about. I've gone through periods of feeling connected and then disconnected again. Right now is kind of a mixed bag for me.

To be honest, the only thing that seems to pull me through is spirituality and beauty. If you can't find connection in others, then placing your faith and connection in something greater than you is a potential answer. You don't have to be religious. For example, in my bedroom I have a statue of Guan Yin (the bodhisatva of limitless compassion), and I'll pray to her from time to time. If you're atheist, I'll say that the point is not to deify something as "real", but to take a benevolent image that is outside of yourself to give your pain, hopes and dreams to, so that it does not have to be internalized. It creates an intention within yourself that is relieving. By believing in prayer, it gives your life a certain motivational power that extends beyond the feeling that you and you alone must have control and power to shape your life. It releases that obligation of having to personally perform, and gives you permission to give yourself compassion and love when you feel you are not receiving it from the human world. It also releases the pressure for you to always have meaning in your life, so that you can just BE as you are, right now, as a perfect person. I know this is not what you want to hear, but connection starts within you, and then the outer world reflects it. When you feel plugged in, then others will be more likely to plug into your world and will stick around. If you want others to give you connection and meaning, well, that's not something they can really do.

Having a passion in life is also important, whether it's a hobby or a career pursuit. It gives you a tangible outlet to activate your sense of love and connection, expressed through an activity, that has real-world results. IMO this physical evidence of love is super important because it shows you that love and energy are not just concepts or feelings, they are forces that shape lives; and it shows you that you too are capable of generating them. Also, passions will connect you with other people who have similar interests. It gives you something to talk about, a channel to share your work with (if you want), and it opens the pathways to connection.

Please include beauty in your life. I mentioned in another thread that I have a regular ritual of buying flowers for my home. The ritual of going to the store, looking at all the beautiful flowers, and selecting my own, is an exercise that is both grounding and inspiring. Include beauty in your life in a way that has consistent, tangible, physical presence. Beauty connects. Whatever you perceive beauty to be, increase its presence in your world. This raises your consciousness, and puts you on the wavelength to recognize and receive beauty in your day to day world. Beauty attracts beauty, and I do believe in the saying that beauty holds truth. It can help you to understand what it is you feel is missing, but has actually been there all along.

And finally... this may be controversial to some, but I think you need to at least temporarily abandon the idea that life has to have meaning. The truth is that it doesn't. There is a power in simply being, without the obligation to have purpose. The pressure for there to be meaning and purpose forces people to take action all the time; but if the world spent more time being and less time taking action, we wouldn't have to act as much. So, I encourage you to explore life as a process of being present, in the now, in what is immediately around you and in front of you, instead of dwelling on "meaning" which puts you into a sort of cerebral level of being. It's that over-thinking that causes disconnect. It prevents you from seeing what is right in front of you, right now. Experiment with abandoning the meaning of life, and embracing the meaning of this very present, grounded moment. If it's hard for you to look at the present because it's not giving you what you want, then that's a sign more than ever that your presence is needed in the present, to make changes.

[monk]

I too apologize, I was letting my own issues color my response so I too will now address your original post more succinctly.

I hear all the time that a person who forms a petition (for sake of argument about mass effect 3's ending.) and thus they have no life and won't contribute to society. Two things 1: They mean that they are worthless

Online games and the communities around them are new, so people scoff and say they are not legitimate but this is false. Any interaction with other people (and organizing a petition is interaction) counts as a contribution to society.

and 2: Why is having a "life" and contributing to society the only legitimate life.

There is no "legitimate" life. No matter what you do someone will judge it badly, so don't look for outside approval.

I try to avoid society and life because I have always felt separate from both of them. I have never had a close friend, I've only felt close to myself. I've always felt utterly separate and blocked off from people and life. I've never felt I could confide in someone when I needed to and they would listen and understand and still be my friend. I've always felt like my life is about things which are irrelevant and meaningless in this world, like I have no place.

I think this is mostly because you're still pretty young. If you still feel this way when you're 30 you might have a problem.

Then people tell me to "contribute to society." or "Get a life." or stop being passionate about the thing's I am or "stop being a loner and come talk to us."

Yeah, well if the people do it nicely, feel free to tell them just as nicely to fuck off.

I've talked to people before and they always reject me, particularly when I'm most like myself. We talk for a few days I finally let go and then they don't like me. Am I wrong for living my life this way? Am I wrong for not wanting to contribute when I get nothing?

This is where my other discussion was mostly focused. You are receiving stuff from society, even if it's just freedom from having to work from dawn to dusk to provide the bare necessities of survival for yourself. You're living right now at the peak of several thousand years of social/technical advancement that is allowing you more free time than anyone has had ever before who was not extremely wealthy. You've mentioned before about going/joining some group, has that happened yet? Making connections with some meatspace people will solve many of your problems I think.

[lykin005]

To Rainbow Dolphins: You have it right. As for my passions, Hmm it's sorta difficult to say for sure what I am truly, wholly passionate about but I would say philosophy, understanding/developing myself into what I want to be, adventure, mentoring children or people who request my help, learning etc.

To Aum: Apology accepted! It's totally fine. I'm sorry your feeling the same thing, but it's good to hear you have some personal insight. In regards to "faith and connection in something greater than yourself." I do something kind of like that in that I try to identify my values and more recently from that I've discovered what I call my "value mentors." These being Belldandy from ah my goddess, JC Denton from deus ex, Khorne from the warhammer series, and Steven Heck from alpha protocol. If I combined these characters into myself I would have become the ultimate embodiment of my values. So everyday I try to live up to these various mentors in my life. As for passions which could connect me to others, I think my passions are sort of introspective or otherwise not overly popular, thus it's hard to find someone who could enjoy the same things as I do. Couple this with how I have a preference for only having a small group of friends (3-4 maximum.) and spending lots of quality time with them rather than spending lots of time with lots of people all over the place and I think it's just very hard for me to make that sort of deep connection I want. Would you say music would be a form of beauty or is that something only I can really say? As for meaning, I actually have thought that myself for some time, or at least thought that life's meaning is what you decide it is. I'm influenced by existentialism in this way.

To Monk: Again apology accepted! I agree that interaction, even interaction in an unusual way can be good and healthy. As for needing approval on my life, I would say I just don't want people to be disrespectful or otherwise destructive toward me and this happens to have happened several times. Is it really common for people my age to feel little to no closeness to anyone? Hah! I don't know if it's in me to tell someone to fuck off unless in a fairly serious situation. I talk a big talk but really I'm pretty much a pacifist/baby until you provoke me. As far as what society does for me. I view society as it is now (particularly in regards to what you speak of.) as being closer and closer to what the baseline should have been all along. As long as you don't hurt anyone and you do honest work to make a living you should be able to make enough money to at the very least exist. Those in power have tried to make this impossible in the past but we are getting closer and closer.

[cob]

Society "gives" me nothing.

What about the venues to purchase food and medicine?

[lykin005]

Society "gives" me nothing.

What about the venues to purchase food and medicine?

If they were unprofitable would they continue to provide that service? We will pay them for food, they know that so they supply it. Supply and demand it's what's for dinner.

[Sonic#]

Given the Hippocratic oath and ideas of civic and religious charity, what you say is true of for-profit businesses to a degree (economics is more than supply and demand), but not non-profits or services with governmental backing.

So if they were unprofitable, they would continue to provide the services through donations and other sources of revenue. Revenue that is garnered from society at large.

[cob]

Society "gives" me nothing.

What about the venues to purchase food and medicine?

If they were unprofitable would they continue to provide that service? We will pay them for food, they know that so they supply it. Supply and demand it's what's for dinner.

But that is just skirting the issue. I mean for you, personally. Because society is around you and everyone else is making those businesses profitable, they exist for you to use when you need them. Thus, society as a whole is giving you the places that you use to purchase food and medicine when you need it. You have to pay for the things they provide, but the fact that they exist at all is what society provides.

I just say this because this is the reason that we have any societies or that any humans have ever formed groups. We need each other. For food, protection, procreation, etc. These are the inherent benefits of society. If they were not beneficial, I don't think we would have had tribes, cities, nations, and now even groupings of nations that are connected.

You can of course say that you do not want to procreate, that you do not think that you need protection from others, and that you will hunt for your own food. These are possible things, but to say that living in that fashion is just as easy as living with a society that assists you is simply naive. In fact, I think that most people would die very quickly if they were suddenly thrust into a situation in which that is what they had to do.

Furthermore, society would still exist and it would still protect you to some extent even if you ignored it. Pretend you decided to go into the woods on some land that you could use. I am not sure where you would find this land because you could not trespass on grounds that were owned by others and the state would not take kindly to your living on government land, but let's say that you could find it. Let's say that you even became very proficient at hunting and gathering for your food. You learned to make medicines from herbs. You could survive on your own. The big question is this:

Why has no one killed you?

The answer is that the pressures of society and the laws that are established for everyone else dictate that killing someone to take their land, their food, or anything else that they have is illegal. If a bear finds you and wants your food, and you hit the bear with your fist to get it to leave, it will not feel any pressure from society not to kill you. Therefore, it may do so. Humans do not have this ability to simply act in any fashion that they desire. A person will be less likely to murder you than a wild animal because of morals and the way that the society that you are ignoring upholds, in a general sense, those standards. You are still being given this protection, even if you have removed yourself as much as possible. Whether or not you want it.

I realize that your point is probably slightly different than this, and I am not trying to be argumentative or to change the topic. I just thought I would address that aspect.

[lykin005]

As I've said before I don't want to be entirely seperate. I just find it hard to contribute. I find it hard to find a place where I'm accepted instead of pushed away. I find it hard to fit in anywhere or to feel like I have anything useful to give. The things my life is made up of aren't viewed as valuable or useful in this society. I have no place and no way to help or to contribute. Yet people tell me I'm worthless for not contributing when their the ones who push me away when I try to help or when I try to "Not be a loner." I'm weird, eccentric, crazy and people can't deal with it, they push me away. Also my knowledge and skillset's aren't very conducive to me being helpful.

[drunken dragon]

It really sounds like your only option is to continue contributing, and try to find a niche and other like-minded people in your life (like we're all doing, really). It's that or you reenact Into The Wild, preferably with a better knowledge of survival skills. E.g., don't eat berries if you're not 100% sure what berries they are.

Life is about a search for happiness and a place in the world. You're young; it's far too early to give up that search.

[A.K.A. Z]

The things my life is made up of aren't viewed as valuable or useful in this society.

Like what? This is way too generic, and it's a big world out there. It's hard to believe that the way you live your life runs perpendicular to society at every level.

Yet people tell me I'm worthless for not contributing when their the ones who push me away when I try to help or when I try to "Not be a loner."

Your problem is them. They've built up ideas about you (or people like you) and their social reaction is to view you in a similar way no matter what you do to break free of that social reaction and its expectations. Since your problem is them, you can do absolutely nothing about it. You can only change yourself in relation to them.

I'm weird, eccentric, crazy and people can't deal with it, they push me away.

Have you tried toning down the weird, eccentric, crazy parts? People like to spout off "Just be yourself!" like it's a panacea, but "yourself" is also composed in part by how other people treat you. So if you're too weird/eccentric/crazy, then they're going to withdraw, and that contributes to you and your self.

Also my knowledge and skillset's aren't very conducive to me being helpful.

Again, this is just too vague, and that makes it hard to believe. I've met people whose knowledge extended to Magic: The Gathering and their skillsets included how to avoid cleaning things and effective ways to end debates about superhero powers: they still had friends or some meaning/purpose that got them going in the morning.

The other obvious advice to give you is to just be a loner and ignore those people. Contribute at the basic level you are, like taxes and having a job, and continue on in your path. If they want to call you "worthless," that is, again, not your problem, your problem is how to react to that. And you can ignore them.