3/29/21 - 12:08 PM

What actually matters?

Why am I always finding myself
just trying to get through the day,
lining up everything in my head?

This week's schedules,
the things I need to do,
that I should be doing,
the people I need to see,
the things I want to do?

Every time I pause,
it all just rushes in,
and I can't help but question,
does any of it matter?

The answer is, of course, yes.
. . .but should it be?

Does it actually matter?
Should it actually matter?
What does mattering entail?

It's just a bit too overwhelming.

Things that matter feel like the should be a little consuming, but this much?

Whenever it starts crashing down,
I end up in one of a few different places.

Scenario One: 

Shove it down.

Sit back,
let it crash in,
but only for
a second.

Gather up
the pieces
that matter
now,
write them
down,
so the wave
can't steal them,
leave the rest
to be washed away.

Get back to work,
hope it doesn't come again.

Shove it down.

Scenario Two:

Let it in.

Let the wave
take you under.

Let it leave
everything wet
and shivering,
let it sweep away
everything
that was once here
when it retreats.

Let it give you
its washed up
worries and tasks,
and leave you
empty
in the absence
of all that it took.

Then walk away

or

Let it in.

Scenario Three:

Fight it.

Tie down
things before they're
swept up,
keep everything
already here
safe.

Pick up everything
it left when it came,
write it down,
bring it to higher ground,
before the wave takes it back.

Look around at everything it left.

Try to sort everything that matters.
Try to discard what doesn't matter.
Try to move onto the things that do.

Try to ignore
the dank,
cold it left
to seep into
my everything.

Fight it.

• • •

The largest problem
with every scenario
is that it is so
all consuming,
but feels
entirely meaningless.

Why does the wave always take and give?
Why does its thefts and gifts matter?
Why does it matter at all.
Why does anyth—

I'm not a nihilist.
I refuse to finish
the final question
in that sequence.

I believe,
despite how
naïve or futile
it may be,
that this
constant,
progressive,
crescendo,
has some sort of
meaning or purpose.

Meaning and purpose
are too simple and pervasive
of concepts to have
escaped life itself.

I don't believe there is a
universal or monolithic
meaning,
moral or prescribed
purpose
to the human life.

Except, maybe
that the true beauty of the human life
is that it gives us the ability
to self-determine
meaning and purpose
in something so incredibly complex,
as a life given for that very life to choose its
meaning and purpose,
and that that alone may be enough to give
the human life all the
meaning and purpose
it requires to justify hope in its existence.

That is why I am not a nihilist.

Because the
meaning and purpose
of the human life does not have to be
large or destined or religious or moral
because it's very existence can justify itself.

And that is enough.

So what actually matters?

Can this be something
I alone
determine for myself?

Or would that neglect
the many interlocking
and overlapping connections
my life shares with those around me?

Would some determinations of mattering harm  others?

Or is pointless to try avoiding uncoordinated matterings because they are impossible to avoid and often easy to realign?

• • •

I have said
I refuse to state things in absolutes
past a current moment in time;
I refuse to make lies
for my future self to reckon with.

So I won't.
(Except maybe on the belief that humanity has intrinsic meaning and purpose).

So I will
try to only focus
on the criteria used to
determine what matters for me.

Maybe try to theorize
degrees of mattering,
how they may ebb and flow.

But no absolutes.
No lies.

• • •

I have decided that
there are too many
tangible things,
morals,
people,
and legacies
to cover when it comes to
looking at different criteria for mattering,
and I have no desire to become
a self-help preacher
who only adds to the list
of stuff to consider the value of.

There's too much stuff
and that's part of the problem.

It's also too easy to say
you should just schedule
and plan out everything carefully,
that is is something that can be
so easily boxed and put on a shelf.

It not easy and there's too much,
and it is too easy to get sucked into
a endless tunnel
where everything from
the existential to the internal
and the distant past to the far future
is brought into the throw.

A eternal vortex.
That's a good name for it.

My brain always has one waiting for me—several even,
prepackaged and in a variety of flavors,
though they all taste the same after a while—
should a big enough wave knock it off it's shelf.

Sometimes
when I'm standing on the edge
between the wave and vortex,
it's easy to question the value,
the matter,
of it all.

So what is so easy to ask when everything grows claws and surrounds you.

So what? Just get up and leave it all.

It's like the rational part of my brain decided to forget it's connected to the rest of my brain and has function as a single, whole human being.

I can't. It's everything.

This is the part that truly sets it off.
If I were on the edge between wave and vortex, I just pushed myself in.

Is it? Does any of it actually matter?

The everything starts moving faster.
I hardly get the chance
to think
through
a
thought
before the next one comes.

Of course it does. It's. . .it's everything.

Then the internal existentialism starts.
It matters, but why?
So if there's no explanation,
does that mean my everything is meaningless,
my life purposeless?

Sure, it's "everything," but why should I care?

Even this
metaphorically-separated-rational-
part-of-my-brain
has to admit that it's starting to
toe the line
I have firmly drawn.
I believe life intrinsically means something.

Because if you don't care then this falls through, then this dream never happens, then it does truly become meaningless, purposeless.

And then they are one.
I am in the vortex,
lost in the if then's and so what's.
Stirring up the completely
rational and irrational
panicking
because this needs to be done, but then
panicking
over the panic stopping me from doing it.

Umm. . .what about happiness?

There it is,
the tiny part of me
that always chooses to advocate
for the emotional enjoyment of life
over any dreams and plans
that will hopefully lead to
future happiness.

That's not even near the top of the To Do list, now is not the time to think about that.

This is a deeply ingrained fear of mine.
What if I'm always chasing,
so I never stop
to see where I've been running,
to enjoy it.

Sometimes
I think I could be happy
with a fairly simple sort of existence.

That a life
near all of my family,
in a career that's more normal
but still an interest of mine,
with a partner and kids.

Sometimes
I think that would be enough,
it does almost guarantee
some of my dreams
with a lot more certainty that those
dreams will happen.

Except,
would I be fulfilled
having passed up my biggest dreams,
my biggest chance to do something,
even if I got everything else?

And the answer for me is,
I don't know,
but it's too big a risk
not to take the riskier path.

I think following
my bigger dreams has the chance of
mattering more
than achieving everything smaller.

And there is a important distinction to highlight there.

I just valued the existential over the internal,
and I don't know if that's right.

It feels a little idealistic,
but is it wrong to be idealistic?

Is determining what
the mattering of everything is,
not also a little idealistic of a notion?

A little too simplified,
maybe a tad too ignorant of the larger world?

This is where
what actually matters?
always takes me.

To questions of what would
bring me more fulfillment,
to if I'd be willing to be less fulfilled
if it meant I did
something that mattered.

To questions about if
continuously pushing happiness
to the bottom of list,
will lead to me reaching the end
without ever really having
embraced happiness,
because I was too focused
on getting the things that were
supposed to make me happy.

To a place where I still have no answers.

I don't know what actually matters.
I just know this does.

Too much philosophy for today,
Eliza Bright