On Life
What would one without a life have to do with life? What is life anyway? And even when one knows what it is, what’s it’s purpose? I’m asking myself these questions because now I’ve seen some of the tragedy life can bring. I’ve witnessed a man die before, but he was a complete stranger to me. Last week my grandpa died. This was different. He has been a mentor to me in my early years. I could even say he has brought secularism into my life without even knowing it himself. His views upon faith have helped me a lot to broaden my views and step aside, leaving it entirely at the end. My entire technical background comes from his teachings to me and his children. It’s hard to cope with a loss like this. Luckily I’ve been able to see it coming for several months and I was able to prepare myself mentally, I guess.
This is where the weird things began to happen. When I got the call he actually gave in I wasn’t shocked at all. No feeling of grief, no tears, no nothing. It was like watching the evening news. Yes, it was for the better he died. He was in pain after all. Even though it was clearly his time I expected myself to react like you see on TV. You know, totally losing myself in grief and sadness. It was even worse at the funeral. For a lot of people it was hard saying goodbye. Lots of my relatives were crying and sad. Even people I thought were strong broke down over the loss of my grandpa. Even there, I didn’t shed a tear. I tried to play along acting sad while I wasn’t. I’m afraid people have noticed.
I scare me. I do question; am I capable to feel? Am I turning all Vulcan? Now I think about it, it’s been a very long time since I actually cared about someone next to friends and family. And do I actually care about them? Or is it just a facade to keep the real me from showing? If you’ve read more on these pages you’ll notice I’ve analysed my psyche quite extensively. I’m getting more and more afraid of what I’m uncovering here. I feel like Dr Jekyll waiting for Mr Hyde to appear. I know he’s there. All the evidence points to the gruesome truth. I’m unable to participate in actions social in nature. I always have to fake some pleasure to some extend to fit in. I’m unable to feel emotions like affection, grief, anger, or any emotion for that matter. I do feel emotion when something happens in the egosphere, when it directly effects me. When I think something is funny, I laugh. When I lose a debate, I feel sad. But if someone in front of me commits suicide I wouldn’t even flinch. It seems the entire socially behavioral instinct has been taken out. What’s left is just plain logic. Maybe this loss of emotion is post traumatic. I hope it is. Although I wonder what the traumatic experience has been. If it isn’t this might be potentially dangerous.
I could just be harmful for society. If you look at serial killers and other harmful people they all suffer from the same condition. They don’t feel a thing. I know I’m capable of killing someone and walking away like nothing had happened. I know it isn’t wise and not logical. But what if it was, what if it becomes logical. With morbism, my self-entitled weird mental condition, logic isn’t always to be trusted. Until now I’ve been able to, with logic, keep myself in line and in touch with society. The what-if scenario is scary at least. What if Mr Hyde does show. I could just kill myself of worse, kill random people. I know the chances are low of this scenario unfolding into it’s full extend. But still, this can’t be right, right? I’m trying to find someone who can help me with this. There must be someone who has seen this before? Maybe I’m going to call an old friend again, he’s a psychiatrist. Also the guy explaining the importance of self reflection.
But anyway, back to the original question. What can life mean to me? What’s my purpose? After long consideration and seeking for answers I’ve found it right under my nose. For some people it’s their kids. I can’t have any kids of my own so that’s out of the question. I don’t care about getting rich. For a long time I thought my goal in life would be knowledge. I wanted to learn as much as possible about as much as possible. Until a short while back that was my belief. I discovered a nice theory I’ve read before but never actually understood. The theory of “Life After Death Through Fulfillment of the Ego”. Now I realise knowledge is only a tool to reach fulfillment. The theory basically states “make a difference to be remembered”. And that’s what I think we all should do. Try to make a difference for someone else. Although I can’t see if I do at the moment, I hope I’ve done so already. That means I can die now. I’m not planning to for quite a while but this gives me a reason to give my lack of fear of death a place. Maybe that’s also the reason I didn’t feel grief the moment my grandpa died. He has made a difference.