06 May 2009

Taking Hold. Warning: Slight Whine Alert

Why can't I seem to get obsessed with something and have it take hold permanently in my life? Take exercise, for instance. I can go for a while and be really good on a daily basis, showing up at the gym, but one day I can be injured, or not have time, or be tired, and not go, and -- BOOM! I can be done. No jonesing for that next exercise fix. It could be weeks. Months.

It happens with a lot of things in my life. Guitar Hero. Crossword Puzzles. Writing this blog. Some tv shows. The enneagram thing (previous post). Is it laziness? Apathy? Genuine loss of interest? Short attention span? It's not that I'm not an addictive personality. I was addicted to smoking for years; in fact, I could pick it up again at any moment.

I am gearing up to go on Facebook and I know that when I am first on it, I will be on it constantly. But then I know it will be a few months or so, and I'll disappear. I joined twitter only to tweet half a dozen times and realized it was kind of pointless. Or maybe I just don't get it?

Maybe I'm a slave to fads. Maybe it has nothing to do with me and these things are just transient anyway? I don't know. But I'll try not to let that happen with this blog. I just need something exciting to write about.

3 comments:

buzz said...

Definitely do FaceBook - just 'cause I'm on it and I want to have at least a few "friends" that I don't work with....if you would "Friend" me.....just hoping. I don't post very often, or really at all, don't really think that anyone wants to hear that I'm working/doing laundry/buying groceries or cleaning the litter boxes....a quiet life of desperation? Do let me know if you join Facebook - would be fun to see your posts.

Big G said...

I think your answer is a lot more simple (and quite possibly, a lot more disheartening!!!).

You do have interests, but like me (and by no means am I insinuating you are like me! ;)), those interests are not "cool" so you don't think they really are interests. But you like them. And the other things that you try to like, you eventually cease liking not because of a flaw in your personality, but because you don't REALLY like them.

My interests are sitting, watching TV, drinking beers, going out for chocolate chip pancakes, playing video games, watching more TV, sitting some more, watching a movie ON TV, eating sundaes, eating cheeseburgers, making playlists, shopping, watching the Celtics ON TV, reading Entertainment Weekly, blowing hot air on blogs, buying CDs, entering chat rooms on iMDB, tracking my fatasy baseball team (ideally, while drinking AND watching TV), drinking martinis, and then sitting some more.

But none of these things SOUND cool (imagine those things on a match.com profile?!? You'd avoid that guy like Chernobyl!) so they don't seem like an interest.

So then you try something else and you don't like it. And so you go back to.... Watching TV!

I swear, 90% of people who like hiking, kayaking, and French Cinema don't even like it. They just try to make it happen and are too stubborn to admit that in fact, watching The Real World/Road Rules Challenge is way more fun.

Damn, I wish i invented stuffwhitepeoplelike...

TwinGrins said...

That's such a funny and interesting thing to start off with, "Why can't I seem to get obsessed with something...?" Are you really looking for an obsession (definition: a compulsion, an irrational motive for performing trivial or repetitive actions, even against your will...)???? or a commitment to something [definition: # the trait of sincere and steadfast fixity of purpose; the act of binding yourself (intellectually or emotionally) to a course of action;]???

An obsession is something that controls us and a commitment is something that we choose and decide every day to re-commit to through our actions. Maybe it is because we sometimes obsess about things that we feel like we're committed but because we're not fundamentally committed to them, we don't make them a daily choice and make them last???? Just my own psycho-babbling ;P lol .. love ya!