I think I'm the kind of person who might end up outsourcing her emotional needs to an LLM chatbot, and it's not even because I would admire the thing. I am just feeling too isolated, too much like a burden, and too different from my current friends.
On the one hand, I'm not even sure what I want, and on the other, I would absolutely hate it if someone else were to decide for me.
I don't even want to get into the chatbot thing too much. It is designed to mimic empathy, to make you want to talk to it, pay to talk to it more efficiently, maybe even mine your data, because who would admit it these days? I can't say I'm a saint in this regard, yes, I have talked with the robot, I have had it generate images for me, and even after I learned how it was trained. I'm not proud - but I am desperate. I need validation, I need direction, I want to do something good with my life but cannot decide on it.
Even now, I am thinking of going back to college, and of learning to drive. Is this something I want? Does this lead to something I want? Fuck knows. But I also cannot stand still anymore; I cannot keep working this job I have for the last year and a half; I crave change. Unfortunately, I have actually aged out of the college system and would not receive health insurance as a student. Which is highly unfortunate for someone with chronic illnesses such as myself - and they aren't even dangerous or painful, just inconvenient. I would also have to pay tuition, because 10 years ago I already tried, but chose a shit major. I don't even know how to write/talk about this, without putting myself into an enormous victim mindset.
I think there is a part of me that will always crave "failure", whatever that might mean. If I do want to accomplish anything in life, I will be fighting with this part. And I really do not like that, I always thought that one could just be in sync with oneself, that my entire being would crave A Goal and it would be simple to work towards it, even if not easy. I tried doing shadow work, but it is not progressing as I had imagined. And, of course, I tried using a commercial tool, which, while structured, it's not personalized so I do find myself struggling to relate to questions about, let's say, envy or jealousy, which I don't feel, or are outright positive for me.
Maybe I need to be more hands on with the shadow work. Maybe I need to "find" what is safe about failure?
What is safe about failure? It reinforces your choices up to the point before trying. If I try to lose weight and succeed - does that not mean I could have succeeded earlier? Does that not invalidate all my struggle when I gave up, when I regained weight? If I fail out of university - does that not mean that it's not for me? That the effort I had put in was not worth it?
In this sense, I don't think that my craving failure is so unique. But I am only able to see my own struggle.
But I don't want to sunk cost fallacy my entire life. I may have lived 30 years in less than ideal circumstances - but I do have at least 50 years left and I want them to be better. I just never imagined how much of a struggle it is to do something good for yourself. Sure, we talk about discipline, about motivation, about building good habits and about manifesting your higher self.
I do crave the motivation, discipline, routines that I had 4 years ago. I've tried and tried to rebuild it, to come back, or build upon, the person I was then. But I keep failing, personality-wise, routines-wise, fitness-wise.
I don't think one should use pain for motivation, as even the enormous pain of wasted potential, powerful as it is, does not in fact push me to do anything more productive than cry. Perhaps it's just one of those seasons, time to evaluate, to cry and to plan. I'm great at planning. I want for it to be time to move!
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