Mania never lay your head down

[j4]

I need to cut down on the caffeine, or something. Since last night my brain has been rattling around like a pea in a piggybank; all I can do is make crap puns and free-associate off everything people say.

I wondered the other day whether I'm trying to do too much. The last two days have managed to include: one karate lesson; one singing rehearsal; one orchestra rehearsal; reading two and a half novels; writing a long 'creative' LJ post and a link-saturated blog-style LJ post; one supermarket shopping trip; and enough work (including one edition of the Reporter) that my employers aren't complaining. The problem is then I write it all down and look at it and think "Not ENOUGH! I'm NOT DOING ENOUGH!"

I resent having to sleep. I stay up till 2am reading and wake up at 8am. (There'll be time enough for sleeping when we're dead.) I read while I'm brushing my teeth so the time isn't totally wasted on tedious bits of life-maintenance. I'm trying to live nine lives in one. (It's about being able to fly; it's about dying nine times.) And I'm still not achieving anything. Why can't I put all this effort and energy into something worthwhile rather than endless, pointless middle-class hobbies? What the hell is worthwhile anyway?

This post brought to you by Janet's Teenage Brain.

I need a holiday.

Comments

[hoiho.livejournal.com]

Many years ago, I tried activism - both conventional politics & pressure groups. After a while, I came to feel even more impotent that before I started. Possibly because I knew more, or maybe I had started off with unrealistic expectations.

Iin the end, I abandoned it all in frustration, and embraced cynical nihilistic hedonism as my salvation.

[rmc28]

Raised by (fairly) conventional politicians, I think I've retained enough idealism to think it is worth trying to change things, with enough realism about how long it will take and how hard it is.

I never ever do everything I want to do. Trying appears to be making me ill. So does dwelling on all the things I don't get done each day.

[hoiho.livejournal.com]

I think I was slightly older than you are now when I finally threw the towel in, after about 10 years of late nights, long meetings, conferences, mail shots, demonstrations, parliamentary lobbying, fund raisers, internecine squables, and the rest. We probably achieved something, but I really can't point to what. Maybe I was just burned-out. Whatever it was, I'm not inclined to go back to it, even though I have regained some of my idealism.

I never ever do everything I want to do

I'm not even sure I know everything I want to do...