On Picking Battles

I already know this entry won’t be nearly as interesting as the title suggests, but I’ll do my best to make some interesting points regardless. I completed today, a long plane journey, travelling halfway around the globe, making one transfer a little over halfway through. The first battle, one I almost let myself lose, was sleep. I don’t normally consider going to sleep a loss, more often I think the opposite, but this example came as a result of a particularly challenging state of thinking I inadvertently employ with frustrating regularity. That is, my obsession with longevity. This, in action, takes shape as me wanting my future self to have better bragging rights. For example, ‘I did a hundred push-ups today’ sounds, to me, nowhere near as impressive as ‘ I did a hundred push-ups every day for two months’. Drawing it back to sleep, though, that same voice piped up to mention how much cooler it would be if I had been up for 30 hours straight, as opposed to the comparative luxury of actually getting some sleep on the flight. And so, for that first eight-hour flight I did as my subconscious told. It wasn’t at all as bad as I’m making it out to be – I watched movies and TV shows and enjoyed them all – all of course in the pursuit of understanding the mediums better as a creator, so that I can broaden my own artistic horizons. Of course.

I relented, and slept on the second flight, but only to be greeted by another, smaller ‘longevity of superiority decision’. That’s what I’ve decided to call them. Because ‘bragging rights’ may have been misrepresenting the concept. It’s not so much that I imagine a future in which people surround me and swoon at the tales of my not-so-heroic heroism, but more for an internal, purer (I think) sense of superiority. All this complex thinking to capture what went through my mind as I, walking to passport control, decided not to go on the travellator, but instead attempt often unsuccessfully, to keep up with those with weaker minds than I on unpowered foot.

Clearly, I’m being a tad melodramatic with this whole account. But that is, genuinely, what it feels like in my head, in the moment. This kind of inane decision is given just as much credence as the thought process that dictates whether I carry out the vital act of sleeping. And my superiority complex is just as real. To misquote a meme I vaguely remember reading: ‘I both hate myself and think I’m better than everyone around me’. This self-esteem dichotomy is frustrating, and not one unique to me, it seems. I have been living with it long enough to know, though, what tends to work or not work for me. I can sus out when listening to that voice might help, when it’s harmless, or when it would be detrimental to myself. Trusting that there is a reason behind all of this, even the more nebulous ravings of my subconscious, was an invaluable first step – there are rules that can be learned and we can adapt around them; it starts by paying attention to yourself.