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A bit of an update on life
becomethesignal
Explorer
Life seems a little better at the moment, but I think it's only because of the prospect of things that may come. I am almost always pessimistic and I would like to be different. I have very little self-confidance when it comes to believing in myself and so forth. This inhibits me from making new decisions and doing anything spontaneous that could be profitable. Also, this makes it extremely difficult for me to start relationships (of the deeper, romantic sort).
Carrying that thought further I come to the subject that I mean to speak on.
In my free time, I have been attempting to set up a side-business for my father. He owns an agriculture company in which he uses gypsum to spread in orchards or to sell to farmers. Gypsum is used to reduce bitter pit in certain fruits and to help the trees grow by means of a healthier soil, among other things. I live in Seattle and he lives a couple hours away. Here, in Seattle, there is construction going on continiously and therefore there is always a lot of drywall being recycled. When drywall is broken down its main component is gypsum. So, intially I contacted some drywall companies to see if they would be interested in recycling through our (my father and I's) business. It turns out most of them seem interested. Then I called a bigger drywall company and they told me that there is one guy who does drywall removal for pretty much everyone in Seattle and surrounding areas. So I call up this 'drywall removal guy' and he says he recycles more drywall than anyone else in America (hard to believe, especially when he doesn't even have a website!) and that he'll just give us the gypsum for free! in it's broken down, powdered form and just charge us for shipping... So, I thought, "That's perfect for my dad. Now he can get gypsum for an incredibly cheap price." This guy has to pay to get rid of the gypsum. So, of course he will want to give it away for free to us. Though, I was dissapointed at first because I thought that my part in the business would be done since my father would be going directly to this guy. But my dad said I could still be paid to set up and maintain a website for our company and to just deal with the selling/distributing of the gypsum (and a few other tasks). That would mean I would be paid to do things that I enjoy doing...? Can this be so? It's hard to believe. The really hard part for me to accept is the simple fact of how much money I could potentially earn, especially since I haven't put a huge amount of time and effort into this whole thing. My dad usually sells around 3,000 tons of gypsum per year. If we went through Dan (the drywall removal guy) and all worked out well we could move about 3 times that much each year. My father said, depending on how everything turns out and how profitable it is, that I could be paid about $10/ton of gypsum sold, just to start out with. Eventually I might make $20 or $25/ton. I am excited to see if we can take a huge part of the gypsum industry in the Pacific Northwest. I would do my best to accomidate this idea/goal/dream. Apparently, last year, 22,000 tons of gypsum was used in Washington state alone. Anyways, the potential of selling about 10,000 of those tons (plus to Oregon/Idaho) is somewhat likely after we get developed. All this to say that would mean that if I got $10/ton I would make $100,000 a year!! and if I made $20/ton... I can't even imagine. Most of my friends who live in a smaller town make it by with as little as $9,000-$12,000 a year. Is this possible that such a good thing could happen to me? Will my doubting and pessimism affect the outcome? It all seems too good to be true. There are so many variables and things that have to work out just right. Doing a job I would enjoy, being my own boss (to an extent) and making six figures a year?! I'm 21 years old. 21! No college education or degree of any kind. Throughout my entire education experience I was told I'd never amount to anything or make much money if I didn't go to college. So, in my head I, of course, said, "Fuck you, I'll never go to college." I may do more schooling yet, but only for things that interest me like art and philosophy. So, for all the suffering I have endured is fate/life/god/something/nothing making it up to me? I just don't believe it. Is life ever this generous? I don't think I can over-emphasize how great this would be for me and yet how much I disbelieve it to work out. I feel like I need a serious psychoanalysis. Really, I feel lost and don't know what to think.
In the past I used to 'know' that things were going to turn out bad or negative in some way. I really felt that I could know that. That is a very bad thing. I remember in part of the book The Count of Monte Cristo it talked about all of the wonderful things happening for Edmund and Mercedes and how they were to be wed. Then it mentioned how things just don't work out that perfectly without suffering. That made me really angry, especially because deep down I felt it to be true. But logically I say it's bullshit. Which is it? I'll never forget that part of the book and how it scared me. I am scared. I grew up with my elders, school and church telling me that if I'm going through something difficult that "God wants to teach you something." Naturally I grew quite irritated of that statement and began thinking differently. And yet, since that was so engrained deeply within me, I can't help but think that it is true at times. I see difficult situations as something I need to go through to "learn something" and I think those times will just continue until I die. (Again, logically I say "Fuck that, that's bullshit.") When will I see peace? When will I feel good about life and be happy? (and have that much money!? ha, I know that money isn't important compared to contentment and people) Even now as I type this I think to myself, "Well, this whole thing probably came about just so I could learn something from these wonderful people." Does that mean this business won't work out for me and my father? Honestly I can't say I believe otherwise. I wish I did.
Most anyone else who had these things going for them would be excited about it and not give it a second thought. Since, I am, of course, not average or normal I feel a need to doubt. It sucks. This just proves that something is wrong with me. But what the fuck is it and how do I deal with it? good question.
Carrying that thought further I come to the subject that I mean to speak on.
In my free time, I have been attempting to set up a side-business for my father. He owns an agriculture company in which he uses gypsum to spread in orchards or to sell to farmers. Gypsum is used to reduce bitter pit in certain fruits and to help the trees grow by means of a healthier soil, among other things. I live in Seattle and he lives a couple hours away. Here, in Seattle, there is construction going on continiously and therefore there is always a lot of drywall being recycled. When drywall is broken down its main component is gypsum. So, intially I contacted some drywall companies to see if they would be interested in recycling through our (my father and I's) business. It turns out most of them seem interested. Then I called a bigger drywall company and they told me that there is one guy who does drywall removal for pretty much everyone in Seattle and surrounding areas. So I call up this 'drywall removal guy' and he says he recycles more drywall than anyone else in America (hard to believe, especially when he doesn't even have a website!) and that he'll just give us the gypsum for free! in it's broken down, powdered form and just charge us for shipping... So, I thought, "That's perfect for my dad. Now he can get gypsum for an incredibly cheap price." This guy has to pay to get rid of the gypsum. So, of course he will want to give it away for free to us. Though, I was dissapointed at first because I thought that my part in the business would be done since my father would be going directly to this guy. But my dad said I could still be paid to set up and maintain a website for our company and to just deal with the selling/distributing of the gypsum (and a few other tasks). That would mean I would be paid to do things that I enjoy doing...? Can this be so? It's hard to believe. The really hard part for me to accept is the simple fact of how much money I could potentially earn, especially since I haven't put a huge amount of time and effort into this whole thing. My dad usually sells around 3,000 tons of gypsum per year. If we went through Dan (the drywall removal guy) and all worked out well we could move about 3 times that much each year. My father said, depending on how everything turns out and how profitable it is, that I could be paid about $10/ton of gypsum sold, just to start out with. Eventually I might make $20 or $25/ton. I am excited to see if we can take a huge part of the gypsum industry in the Pacific Northwest. I would do my best to accomidate this idea/goal/dream. Apparently, last year, 22,000 tons of gypsum was used in Washington state alone. Anyways, the potential of selling about 10,000 of those tons (plus to Oregon/Idaho) is somewhat likely after we get developed. All this to say that would mean that if I got $10/ton I would make $100,000 a year!! and if I made $20/ton... I can't even imagine. Most of my friends who live in a smaller town make it by with as little as $9,000-$12,000 a year. Is this possible that such a good thing could happen to me? Will my doubting and pessimism affect the outcome? It all seems too good to be true. There are so many variables and things that have to work out just right. Doing a job I would enjoy, being my own boss (to an extent) and making six figures a year?! I'm 21 years old. 21! No college education or degree of any kind. Throughout my entire education experience I was told I'd never amount to anything or make much money if I didn't go to college. So, in my head I, of course, said, "Fuck you, I'll never go to college." I may do more schooling yet, but only for things that interest me like art and philosophy. So, for all the suffering I have endured is fate/life/god/something/nothing making it up to me? I just don't believe it. Is life ever this generous? I don't think I can over-emphasize how great this would be for me and yet how much I disbelieve it to work out. I feel like I need a serious psychoanalysis. Really, I feel lost and don't know what to think.
In the past I used to 'know' that things were going to turn out bad or negative in some way. I really felt that I could know that. That is a very bad thing. I remember in part of the book The Count of Monte Cristo it talked about all of the wonderful things happening for Edmund and Mercedes and how they were to be wed. Then it mentioned how things just don't work out that perfectly without suffering. That made me really angry, especially because deep down I felt it to be true. But logically I say it's bullshit. Which is it? I'll never forget that part of the book and how it scared me. I am scared. I grew up with my elders, school and church telling me that if I'm going through something difficult that "God wants to teach you something." Naturally I grew quite irritated of that statement and began thinking differently. And yet, since that was so engrained deeply within me, I can't help but think that it is true at times. I see difficult situations as something I need to go through to "learn something" and I think those times will just continue until I die. (Again, logically I say "Fuck that, that's bullshit.") When will I see peace? When will I feel good about life and be happy? (and have that much money!? ha, I know that money isn't important compared to contentment and people) Even now as I type this I think to myself, "Well, this whole thing probably came about just so I could learn something from these wonderful people." Does that mean this business won't work out for me and my father? Honestly I can't say I believe otherwise. I wish I did.
Most anyone else who had these things going for them would be excited about it and not give it a second thought. Since, I am, of course, not average or normal I feel a need to doubt. It sucks. This just proves that something is wrong with me. But what the fuck is it and how do I deal with it? good question.
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Comments
I was just thinking about my financial situation. It's quite dire at times. Even though I am not living with my parents they still help pay for my medication which is about $400/month. Also, it was my birthday recently and the money I received for my birthday had to be used to pay bills instead of buying gifts...
If you don't feel like responding or don't know what to say, don't feel guilty. I wouldn't know what to say either.
Thanks for your time.
-Travis
However, please don't think that I am any the less moved, impressed and caring...
You - and our fellow Sangha members - are always in my thoughts, and I daily practise a short meditation with Compassion and Love, for my extended family.
Hugs,
Fede
It is because it sucks that I find such comfort in the Four Noble Truths. I have written, elsewhere, the liberation that I experienced when I first truly heard the First Truth. Here, at last, was a teacher telling the truth. It enabled me to go back to the Jesus stories and read them in a new light. Jesus told his friends that his "yoke is easy" but never pretended that it wasn't a yoke. He told them to "take up their cross" (i.e. to accept the shit life dumps on them) and gives example by falling under the weight of his cross and then dying. A living story of the truth of suffering.
One of the most insiduous and nasty comments on the scriptures is that which interprets Paul's statement that we will be given a way out of any suffering (1 Cor. 10:13) as meaning that, if we fall, we are somehow weak or imperfect. Sometimes the only 'way out' is a lingering, agonising death or a life in constant pain. Some of my family managed to survive the camps but, for the rest of their lives, they never truly escaped them. Broken in spirit and in body, they bear witness to the tragedy of some human lives.
I have worked with, and 'buddied', people suffering from AIDS, M.E. and terminal cancer, as have others here. I have seen enormous courage, of course, and descent into despair, confusion and madness.
It is desperately hard when others - and society at large - marginalise those who do not "fit". One of the blessings of the town where I live is that we have a couple of residential "addiction recovery" units and a number of units for those with physical and emotional challenges. It means that, on any day, society's rejects are here, with us, on the High Street or in the cafe, beside you at the bus stop or in the aisles of the supermarket. No way for us to pretend that they are invisible or inaudible. And they have an environment where they no longer need to slink or lurk.
Elsewhere, on these boards, I have alluded to the notion that every life is a unique and uniquely valuable universe, complete in itself and irreplaceable. No academic qualification, bank account, blameless police record or blemish-free complexion adds or detracts from that unique value. None can compete with another unless they hallucinate hierarchy.
And yet, our culture requires us to strive and to compete. Even the 'spiritual' life is full of striving and 'steps' and hierarchy. The institutional spiritual life enshrines this notion that 'different' means 'better or worse' rather than, simply, 'different'. My pear trees and my apples are different. The apple tree is not required to bear pears in order to be itself and bear its proper fruit. I also have an ornamental quince which gives a wonderful show of blossom at least three times a year but which bears uneatable fruit - even the wasps won't touch it.
"Is there no balm in Gilead?" All too often the answer is "No". Whatever balm there may be is to be found in strange, often inner, places. My greatest fear is that I shall lose hope, because it is hope that keeps me going. Others might call it faith but that suggests some certainty to me. What I have is hope, which is a bit like a tuppenny candle: gives a good light when first lit, then gutters and flickers, threatening to go out over and again. Like a candle, it casts a small radius of light and makes shadows dance. Without it, I have no idea where I am, where I've been and where I am going. That's why I fear losing it and why, when the candle seems closest to going out, I focus all my efforts on its care.
There have been times when the candle has gone out, when I have lost the experience of hope. Those are the really hard times, times of doubt, confusion, hunger and thirst, death in the desert. Sometimes I get all the signs and symptoms that enables a clinical diagnosis, a label and 'Gilead balm' of Prozac or acupuncture or Reiki or whatever. Sometimes it all happens 'inside'. I find myself thinking round in circles and sitting practice flies south for the winter! Everything needs doing, paying, fixing all at the same time when I have least energy, least tolerance, least self-worth and least able to open yet another brown envelope or letter from the bank.
Just about the only thing that I have learned in my 63 years is that there is just the smallest chance that, once again, this will pass. It may leave me crippled or, even, dead but the pain is not for ever. So far in my life, the worst (whatever that might be) hasn't happened, although were I once again 21 and looking forward, I might not agree. At that age, I thought I would be dead by 30. I have also learned that it is only when we are, once again, in the shelter of an oasis that we have any chance of gathering fruit.
It sucks, my friend, it sucks! That is why we need to find our refuge.
Yes, there is suckiness in the world, no doubt about it. The Buddha set that expectation right away and made it the First Noble Truth. But there is also happiness to be had but because everything is always changing, that happiness has to be found inside, regardless of what's going on outside. If you start with the truth, the realistic expectation that things change and that there is suffering in this world, all happy external and impermanent situations are just that, impermanent and external. So enjoy them for what they are and for however long they last and keep in mind that everything changes, sometimes within a blink of an eye.
Once again, Simon, I am astonished at your response. I particularly appreciate the section quoted above. Thanks for your help/suggestions.
I hope you don't mind that I use a section of what you said on my personal webpage. This part-"every life is a unique and uniquely valuable universe, complete in itself and irreplaceable. No academic qualification, bank account, blameless police record or blemish-free complexion adds or detracts from that unique value. None can compete with another unless they hallucinate hierarchy."
I need to do some more reading. Reading of anything that I find to be inspiring is always helpful. Thank you for your comment. The last sentence is some very good advice/truth that I need to remember.
Sorry I didn't respond earlier, I have been keeping strange hours and am a bit 'out-of-it'. I value your response and it does mean a lot to me. So, thank you and you shall be in my thoughts as well. (whenever my brain starts functioning properly again)