What do I like?

I was reading this woman's blog and she was saying that she wanted a man to make her feel safe, to control and guide her. I was already measuring myself up for the role. Which is curious because I don't really like the kind of person who needs to be told what to think.

Or do I? I don't think I've ever thought about what I do or don't like. I know it when I see it. Some guys will say, I like blondes, or I like petite women, or I like them big and bouncy. But I cannot make a picture of what I like. I never have been able to. There are elements in people that I nearly always respond to: there isn't an intelligent, forthright woman I've met that I haven't liked and I get particularly weak-kneed near women who are feminine and upper-class (without too much whiff of horse, iykwim).

I like knowing I've made an impression. That's a product of vanity, I suppose. But it means I want people to do what I want, not because I have an urge to control them, but because it's a token of my meaning enough to them for them to want to please me. I always wanted to be loved or hated but not ignored. I don't know why. I cannot reconcile it with being shy. Maybe I have a badly askew understanding of how I should relate to the world. Well, there's no maybe there, is there? I don't relate to the world at all. I just watch it pass by and hope it harms me less rather than more.

Which is curious. If you had a problem, you probably couldn't find anyone better to talk it through with. I understand relationships and people, just not my relationships and not my people. If I could stand back and look at myself as if I were someone else...

Some people can. They are able to think about themselves in the third person without effort. They are generally successful in life because when they think about themselves, they are able to be detached. In most things, detachment is key to clearheaded thought.

***

Because I am on the cusp of officially being old, I have been thinking some about not finding what you want. I have begun to fear that I will end my life without ever experiencing some of what I wanted. That I will not be published is obviously at the forefront of that thinking. I cannot imagine writing anything else, let alone being published, so I am pessimistic on that score. I feel that it has been my curse: to be good enough but not full enough to have made it. I will not be rich. Which is a pity, because I'd be good at it. I hate working for a living. I've never found anything I actually enjoyed doing, and I wouldn't know where to begin to look. I won't ever have sex that fulfils me. I don't even know what it would be or who it would be with. I don't know whether it even exists. I wonder how many of us that is true for? Our opportunities are limited, for some more so than others, and because we are not sure what it could be and whether we've exhausted the possibilities, we are not sure whether we've done the most satisfying thing for us, or whether there could have been more but we never got to it.

I will never be joyful. I do not know whether I can. Of course, I think I could, and, like anyone, I have moments of joy. But I can never look at my life and think, I am joyful. If I had a god, I could not thank it. If I knew how to fix that, I would. Above all else, I hope to become joyful before I die. Imagine how good I will be to know if I do! You will be so glad you encountered me.

But how do you find joy? I am not looking for resignation, so please don't prescribe it. I know how to become resigned but it's not the same thing. But maybe resignation is the first step? I'm going to think about it when I'm in China. It's apt because Eastern beliefs begin with resignation. Certainly they believe it's the door to joy, or at least to the nearest to joy a being can have.

When I say "being", I mean all beings, not just us. I don't think cats enjoy themselves as such. I don't think they distinguish joy from suffering. I think that is only possible if you can refer one event to another. Cats can't. They do not have memories in that sense. Cats are resigned to it though, by default.

Sometimes, sitting on the deck of a boat, I'll watch a dolphin leap from the water. It looks like joy, to be free to swim. It looks like he's loving it, every moment. But I know that the dolphin does not know how not to love it. He is not even resigned to it; he simply does not know any other way to be. Can we get there? I would if I could, maybe, but I do not even know where the path begins. And if I were there, would that be joy?

Probably not, but who is getting more out of his life? The dolphin, no question.

posted by Dr Zen @ 1:38 pm