Sometimes I’m so sick of brushing my teeth. Man, why do I gotta do this every day? Twice a day?? I did such a good job of drinking water yesterday, and here I am 12 hours later feeling dehydrated. There are times I’m just sick of regular life. All the little things that have to be accomplished every day just to keep up a comfortable existence. Everything that I do on autopilot feels strenuous. Driving to work. Cleaning the litterbox. I don’t want to be doing this anymore. The big things feel fine. Relationships. Job. Gym. But everything in between is exasperating.
I’ve had a quote from the mind of wise old Augustus McCrae rattling around in my head for the past few weeks that goes as such:
He had known several men who blew their heads off, and he had pondered it much. It seemed to him it was probably because they could not take enough happiness just from the sky and the moon to carry them over the low feelings that came to all men.
[Before I go any farther, I’d like to say that obviously I am not a therapist, and I’m not trying to speak on depression or other mental illnesses. This is simply commentary on moving through lulls in life.]
The Sky and the Moon
Life in the Hat Creek Cattle Company is a bleak one from an outside perspective. They wake up in a house with no roof, eat breakfast with the same people they’ve seen every day for half their lives (or more), and go to work in the blazing hot Texas sun. For entertainment they go down to the one saloon in town, play some cards (again, with people they see every day), and maybe get a poke. When I read this, in the back of my mind I understood that it should be a miserable existence. Their life is far more repetitive than mine. There are nothing but autopilot activities for them. And yet somehow the crew’s spirits stay high for ten years. Gus McCrae draws his happiness from the sky and moon and spreads it to the rest of the crew.
How can we draw happiness from the sky and the moon? I think the most important thing is to acknowledge that life is going to be repetitive at times. It has to be. No matter how much you stuff into each day, eventually your brain will set that as the new normal. I came across this idea in Viktor Frankl’s Man’s Search for Meaning. You always hear about the indomitable human spirit and its capacity to suffer and come out the other side. Part of that comes from the brain’s ability to transform its environment to normal. This is an amazing thing when the environment is suffering, but I believe it can become a curse in good times. Eventually the good times just become normal times. Luckily that is not a predetermined outcome, it is something that the brain drifts into. When I actively look for things to appreciate about daily life, the drift is staved off. Having cats has been a huge blessing in this respect because we love them so much and they do something random every day. They always do something silly, and it adds joy to my life. It’s like having a kid. Whenever they do something slightly different than they have in the past, it’s a new milestone. Even if we are used to them being a cat, a new wrinkle in their personality is always exciting. That is taking happiness from the sky and moon. When I notice those wrinkles in my life, I can appreciate them even amidst the repetition. I’ve eaten TJ’s frozen Lamb Vindaloo consistently for the past 5 years, and I still tell my fiancée how good it is all the time.
Embrace the Boredom
But what happens when that is just not enough? There aren’t enough wrinkles to be excited about? Well what do you know, our good friend Captain Woodrow Call may just have some answers for us. The first thing we can learn from Call is the value of being alone with yourself. It’s impossible to discern anything about life without allowing the boredom to encroach. When life is boring, it’s easy to try to fill it up with activities so the boredom never takes hold. If those activities aren’t necessarily fulfilling, but empty calories, then the restless feeling stays. This provides even more incentive to be doing something all the time. And nowadays, distraction is only as far away as my pocket. It’s an easy spiral that I’ve found myself in many a time. I’ve found the best way for me to reverse this spiral is to embrace the boredom. I’m trying to be more dedicated to sitting with myself.
What Fulfills Us
Call’s ruminations show the reader that he is incapable of being satisfied by appreciating the life in front of him. He needs to pursue something, to make something happen. Fulfillment is not always handed on a silver platter. He had every opportunity to settle down to live a normal life, but he sacrificed that to follow his dream.
Gus had an even stronger pull to settle down that he sacrificed. Cara did the opposite. She could have lived a rip-roaring life in the bush with the man she loved, but she turned away from that and pursued the stable life she knew she wanted. Deets, oh Deets, followed his leaders in opposition of what would truly fulfill him, and he slowly fell out of love with the cattle drive.
But how can we know what fulfills us? The only way to find out is to sit and think. I've started paying more attention to what my mind keeps returning to. What do I think about when I'm not performing an activity? What do I dream about? What feelings am I drawn to? Finding an answer to these questions has helped me actively pursue it, instead of stumbling across it in day to day life. And when I am actively pursuing it, all of a sudden life is full of meaningful instances. The things you find fulfilling don’t necessarily have to be what the world considers meaningful. They don’t even have to be obvious wins or successes, but can be emotions and mental states.
As an example from my life, I love to be in the thick of the action. I always have. And for a long time, I loved being in that position because it filled a need for validation. And I won't pretend that’s an honorable reason, I struggled for a long time thinking I shouldn’t want the attention. But it did teach me how to grab a group and drive excitement. Now, I’m trying to combine that skill with a more fervent desire to be connected within the web of humanity. If I’m near the center of a group, I can pull everybody in closer as long as I’m focused on the group and not my own glory. I know I’m not perfect in this respect, but when I get it right it is a fulfilling experience. Knowing this about myself allows me to seek out instances where I can bring a group together, but also cautions me against doing so for my own gain. I’m trying to find the experiences that fulfill me and pursue them. I’m not sitting and waiting for them to happen to me as much anymore.
Put Down Roots
It’s not easy to break out of a lull, and I’m trying to figure out when to be more like Gus and when to be more like Call. I’m learning to trust myself. Trust that the low feelings are temporary. But it can feel like the funk won’t relent, and I’m realizing now that sometimes I just have to grit my teeth and climb. And believe me, I know better than most how difficult climbing can be, but nobody else can do it for me. My community is a trellis to grow on, but only I can put down roots. My friends can point me towards the sun, but I have to draw the happiness from it.