christinejones
11-05-2004, 03:39 PM
Hello
I kinda know that I am just suffering the usual symptons of depression but having said all that, I really am curious about failure and what it is? I am, without doubt, utterly useless and hopeless with zero drive, ambition or desire and probably the only reason I would try to be successful is to release my parents from worrying about me - but I seem to be a complete success only at being an utter failure in everything I try to do and I was wondering how that came about.
How does one stop being a failure and what makes one become one in the first place?* Is it psychological/physical?* Is it that everyone's expectations (including my own?) were too high and unrealistic in proportion to my meagre talents or is it a question of laziness (but I don't consider myself lazy - unmotivated maybe)?* Could it be lack of self-confidence?* Or is it the simple fact that I am just about financially secure without having to work - my uncle died and I can pretty much live off the capital he left to me - if I live really modestly and as I am not at all materialistic (I rarely buy anything but the basics - food etc.) that could be possible.
If I didn't have a supportive family I think I might well have ended up a homeless person not because I embrace hardship (I like comfort) but more because my temperament cannot get itself to care enough.* If I live on my own I tend to stop bothering cooking or washing clothes etc. I just kind of wander in the parks or read all day and go dreamy - eating or what I am wearing seems trivial not worth worrying too much about.* As long as I am warm, safe and have time to think - a good coat and a secure place to sleep... I could waste my entire life away. Although I love the few friends I have I am not good at being sociable on a big scale - I hate the sort of parties where you have to stand around and talk all the time, somehow that kind of conversation gives me a terrible, dry headache - my brain just kind of shrivels into a tight, aching ball.*
Although - I do like quiet socialising like eating at a table with four or five others (or something of that sort) where there is a general conversation going on - and you can contribute if you want or just listen.* Someone once said to me that I 'lived life by the lowest common denominator' which they explained as living with the minimum amount of effort just enough to get by without either dying or killing yourself - 'oblomovism' i think they called it - after a Russian novel by Goncharov.
Anyway, I seem to be wandering off the topic.* What constitutes a failure?* Is Prince Charles a failure?* Who is a failure?* Is a homeless person a failure?* What exactly does it mean?* How important is it to be a success?* Why is success so much better than failure?* Can you change from being a failure to being a success or vice versa?* Is it relevant?* Or should people just be concerned with doing their best and/or helping others?*
How is failure judged?* Is it all about bettering oneself - so that you can been seen to have gone up in the world rather than down (and ending up poorer and with less status than you were born into). Do people commit suicide over being a failure? Or do they just carry on feeling despondent and useless? Is success sometimes down to luck or is it always talent/hard work/ambition coming through? Why is it valued so highly? Is it such a great feeling to be successful - is it fantastic/addictive? Is it all about acheivement or competition and beating others? Is it all about the money? Are some people just simply better than others? What do you do if you are one of those who are worse, less intelligent, less capable, less charming, less beautiful, less motivated etc.? Is your life therefore less valuable than another? Surely that can't be right every life is equally valid, isn't it? Should you care about your failure? Should you accept it - should everyone around you accept it or should you try to change it? Does it automatically make you unhappy, or is it that it is people's perceptions of you as a loser makes one unhappy (a bit like being fat - are people happy or unhappy being fat or are they reacting more to others perceptions of them? surely if fat people would like to be thin equally a failure should want to be successful - why? to get others admiration? is your life automatically better, do you feel better about yourself?) Why do we waste time trying to be successful, working in hateful, schleppy jobs for that chance of a promotion to a more hateful, schleppy job....... Does failure change people as much as success - what is inbetween? Stasis? Is that bad? Is this a media phenomenon (failure seems to have been around forever so seems unlikely). Was Christ initially perceived as a failure? Materially, it seems he never managed to hold down a job or get promoted etc. - and many artists have failed to make any money it seems whether they were noted within their own lifetimes or not - they all seem to die penniless regardless of the esteem/fame (mozart/van gogh/wilde) they achieved both while alive and after their death.*
Does success equal happiness - not according to many those biographies of famous stars etc. who turn to drink and drugs bla bla bla but perhaps that has more to do with fame than success. Does failure then equal misery? It isn't nice to fail, to be the last in the class, the only one who can't do it etc. - it's awful and people are adept at covering it up, acting nonchanlantly like they never cared anyway (the fox and the sour grapes) while bleeding inside. The worst bit being that it limits you - you get stuck and whatever little potential you have (even that) you are somehow not given the space to fulfil it, you are forced to underperform by your own lack of success, that's a weird paradox! and you lose a sense of control of your own destiny.
Nowadays success seems to work well (perhaps it always did) - Kate Moss, Julia Roberts, Gwyneth Paltrow all did jobs they loved, were paid well, enjoyed a lot of success within their careers and now are happy to be able to enjoy starting a family with security and wealth and having proved themselves, they can turn away from the trappings of fame etc. it seems the perfect way to have lived your life - a template for the right sort of life, one which everyone ought to aspire to. Is that right? Not just 'celebs' either any sort of success - financial, scientific, J K Rowling or whatever to have got to the top of your own field that seems to be the goal. If you don't make that will you always feel that you have let yourself/others down? But can we all be at the top?
Are we dishonest with ourselves when we submit to failure with a smile and couldn't care less attitude - or is it fair to not have the same goals and values as whichever society one is living in. Why the struggle - can we not be happy with what we have and accept our lot? Do we constantly need to prove/to achieve?
Or is it all internal? As long as we feel that we are on the right path - then we have no doubts but when we are unsure of our direction etc. then we feel a failure? It is more concrete though isn't it --- we expect to be able to do something and then can't or don't get that promotion/make a success of that business/pass those exams and the failure is seen and obvious to everyone - you have to face it and admit it. Pride (ego) and comparison and success of others... all cause you to feel the shame of your lack of success and the pointlessness, irrelevance and limitations of ones life. To be allowed to excel to ones fullest - what a gift! Not for the fame or the money but for the excelling in and of itself --- to sleep, like Mrs Thatcher, only four hours a night - what use one is making of ones life, time and opportunities rather than sitting down to watch EastEnders again because, somehow, one hasn't anything better to do.
I read somewhere about David Lean and when he was ill/dying said to someone (i forget who) something along the lines of "we were so fortunate - they let us make movies" --- and i agree! To be allowed to work, to love, to learn, to expand is a privilege that somehow when you are a failure is taken away from you and you have to pretend not to care and be happy with your infernal time-wasting.
Success seems good - I don't want to be a failure any more but I am at a complete loss as how to get out of it and life seems so complex rather than straightforward (the only time it seemed straightforward and simple was when I was on Percocet - an opiate - and it seemed to remove all that existential angst and misery just like that!). I notice that some people who seemingly find life easy are also very bored by it on one level - I have never suffered from 'ennui' so that is a positive side of being useless but I have always been a failure - it is a habit! Can anyone help me? If only for my parents' sake - they would be so happy and relieved to see me a success!
I kinda know that I am just suffering the usual symptons of depression but having said all that, I really am curious about failure and what it is? I am, without doubt, utterly useless and hopeless with zero drive, ambition or desire and probably the only reason I would try to be successful is to release my parents from worrying about me - but I seem to be a complete success only at being an utter failure in everything I try to do and I was wondering how that came about.
How does one stop being a failure and what makes one become one in the first place?* Is it psychological/physical?* Is it that everyone's expectations (including my own?) were too high and unrealistic in proportion to my meagre talents or is it a question of laziness (but I don't consider myself lazy - unmotivated maybe)?* Could it be lack of self-confidence?* Or is it the simple fact that I am just about financially secure without having to work - my uncle died and I can pretty much live off the capital he left to me - if I live really modestly and as I am not at all materialistic (I rarely buy anything but the basics - food etc.) that could be possible.
If I didn't have a supportive family I think I might well have ended up a homeless person not because I embrace hardship (I like comfort) but more because my temperament cannot get itself to care enough.* If I live on my own I tend to stop bothering cooking or washing clothes etc. I just kind of wander in the parks or read all day and go dreamy - eating or what I am wearing seems trivial not worth worrying too much about.* As long as I am warm, safe and have time to think - a good coat and a secure place to sleep... I could waste my entire life away. Although I love the few friends I have I am not good at being sociable on a big scale - I hate the sort of parties where you have to stand around and talk all the time, somehow that kind of conversation gives me a terrible, dry headache - my brain just kind of shrivels into a tight, aching ball.*
Although - I do like quiet socialising like eating at a table with four or five others (or something of that sort) where there is a general conversation going on - and you can contribute if you want or just listen.* Someone once said to me that I 'lived life by the lowest common denominator' which they explained as living with the minimum amount of effort just enough to get by without either dying or killing yourself - 'oblomovism' i think they called it - after a Russian novel by Goncharov.
Anyway, I seem to be wandering off the topic.* What constitutes a failure?* Is Prince Charles a failure?* Who is a failure?* Is a homeless person a failure?* What exactly does it mean?* How important is it to be a success?* Why is success so much better than failure?* Can you change from being a failure to being a success or vice versa?* Is it relevant?* Or should people just be concerned with doing their best and/or helping others?*
How is failure judged?* Is it all about bettering oneself - so that you can been seen to have gone up in the world rather than down (and ending up poorer and with less status than you were born into). Do people commit suicide over being a failure? Or do they just carry on feeling despondent and useless? Is success sometimes down to luck or is it always talent/hard work/ambition coming through? Why is it valued so highly? Is it such a great feeling to be successful - is it fantastic/addictive? Is it all about acheivement or competition and beating others? Is it all about the money? Are some people just simply better than others? What do you do if you are one of those who are worse, less intelligent, less capable, less charming, less beautiful, less motivated etc.? Is your life therefore less valuable than another? Surely that can't be right every life is equally valid, isn't it? Should you care about your failure? Should you accept it - should everyone around you accept it or should you try to change it? Does it automatically make you unhappy, or is it that it is people's perceptions of you as a loser makes one unhappy (a bit like being fat - are people happy or unhappy being fat or are they reacting more to others perceptions of them? surely if fat people would like to be thin equally a failure should want to be successful - why? to get others admiration? is your life automatically better, do you feel better about yourself?) Why do we waste time trying to be successful, working in hateful, schleppy jobs for that chance of a promotion to a more hateful, schleppy job....... Does failure change people as much as success - what is inbetween? Stasis? Is that bad? Is this a media phenomenon (failure seems to have been around forever so seems unlikely). Was Christ initially perceived as a failure? Materially, it seems he never managed to hold down a job or get promoted etc. - and many artists have failed to make any money it seems whether they were noted within their own lifetimes or not - they all seem to die penniless regardless of the esteem/fame (mozart/van gogh/wilde) they achieved both while alive and after their death.*
Does success equal happiness - not according to many those biographies of famous stars etc. who turn to drink and drugs bla bla bla but perhaps that has more to do with fame than success. Does failure then equal misery? It isn't nice to fail, to be the last in the class, the only one who can't do it etc. - it's awful and people are adept at covering it up, acting nonchanlantly like they never cared anyway (the fox and the sour grapes) while bleeding inside. The worst bit being that it limits you - you get stuck and whatever little potential you have (even that) you are somehow not given the space to fulfil it, you are forced to underperform by your own lack of success, that's a weird paradox! and you lose a sense of control of your own destiny.
Nowadays success seems to work well (perhaps it always did) - Kate Moss, Julia Roberts, Gwyneth Paltrow all did jobs they loved, were paid well, enjoyed a lot of success within their careers and now are happy to be able to enjoy starting a family with security and wealth and having proved themselves, they can turn away from the trappings of fame etc. it seems the perfect way to have lived your life - a template for the right sort of life, one which everyone ought to aspire to. Is that right? Not just 'celebs' either any sort of success - financial, scientific, J K Rowling or whatever to have got to the top of your own field that seems to be the goal. If you don't make that will you always feel that you have let yourself/others down? But can we all be at the top?
Are we dishonest with ourselves when we submit to failure with a smile and couldn't care less attitude - or is it fair to not have the same goals and values as whichever society one is living in. Why the struggle - can we not be happy with what we have and accept our lot? Do we constantly need to prove/to achieve?
Or is it all internal? As long as we feel that we are on the right path - then we have no doubts but when we are unsure of our direction etc. then we feel a failure? It is more concrete though isn't it --- we expect to be able to do something and then can't or don't get that promotion/make a success of that business/pass those exams and the failure is seen and obvious to everyone - you have to face it and admit it. Pride (ego) and comparison and success of others... all cause you to feel the shame of your lack of success and the pointlessness, irrelevance and limitations of ones life. To be allowed to excel to ones fullest - what a gift! Not for the fame or the money but for the excelling in and of itself --- to sleep, like Mrs Thatcher, only four hours a night - what use one is making of ones life, time and opportunities rather than sitting down to watch EastEnders again because, somehow, one hasn't anything better to do.
I read somewhere about David Lean and when he was ill/dying said to someone (i forget who) something along the lines of "we were so fortunate - they let us make movies" --- and i agree! To be allowed to work, to love, to learn, to expand is a privilege that somehow when you are a failure is taken away from you and you have to pretend not to care and be happy with your infernal time-wasting.
Success seems good - I don't want to be a failure any more but I am at a complete loss as how to get out of it and life seems so complex rather than straightforward (the only time it seemed straightforward and simple was when I was on Percocet - an opiate - and it seemed to remove all that existential angst and misery just like that!). I notice that some people who seemingly find life easy are also very bored by it on one level - I have never suffered from 'ennui' so that is a positive side of being useless but I have always been a failure - it is a habit! Can anyone help me? If only for my parents' sake - they would be so happy and relieved to see me a success!