Nope. Don't Give a Perfectionist an Objective

Last post I wrote about how I thought life was about spending each breath, every moment. You spend things to get things in return. If you expect to get things in return, you want to optimise so you get the best things possible.

I was progressing on my music writing journey these past almost-two-week period, staying afloat if not swimmingly. Then, I hit a roadblock. I wrote a theme I and a theme II for a sonata. I wrote the exposition. Then, I had to write a transition, but no matter what I try and how, no matter which motif I choose and how I try to invert, augment, diminish, or convolute it, absolutely everything has started sounding trash garbage.

This happens to me all the time. Explore a new interest with no expectations. Reach approx. day 10, feel good about yourself. Expect. Then, be utterly and shockingly dissatisfied with everything and give up before the third week rolls around. I'm tired of this. What's the point....

I know it's a made-up judgement in my mind. As soon as I attach any degree of "worth" to anything, suddenly it becomes "not good enough". I don't even think what I wrote sounds bad; it's just not good enough. What even is good enough in music, which is highly subjective and infinite? And in life?

My mind is stuck in a reference frame of max(f(x, y, z, t)), and so every direction I look in—comparing this reference to f(x,y,z,t)—is downhill. Everything I see is just ... worse. Everywhere I see is worse. The grass is never greener; it was greener, and I cannot imagine it even being green.

Debilitating perfectionism and attaching a 'value' to breathing are a terrible combination.

Further, more.

Spend vs Consume

    Mattresses in the US make little sense to me. They are very thick and inflexible. Above all, they're needlessly expensive, and not really durable. A firm mattress would cost you close to $300; that is, a mattress that is a foot thick, has stiff springs added into it to make it firm, and which will eventually start sagging in the middle since humans tend to be human-shaped, not 6'×3' rectangles). Instead, I just use a thick comforter and ✨the floor✨—the thing that's there by default, is firm, doesn't sag, and needs no additional bedframe. I find it more comfortable. I tell myself it keeps me more grounded.

    As I was laying on the floor yesternight, wondering why it was 1 am on a Monday instead of Friday afternoon as it was about an hour ago, I got a bit of insight about which I felt like writing. Usually I write to get things off my mind, but I hope this is something I come back to when necessary. Now, I know what happened this weekend, and why it happened, and I have the memory of it happening. It was a whole lot of trying to compose a sonatina, and sharpening a knife for unrelated reasons. I was doing things that I think I like to do, indulging my hobbies and whatnot, taking a break from work and work-related things for the weekend, and so on... EXCEPT I still very much felt cheated out of my weekend!

    The thing with hyperfixations is that they snatch time away from you. Sure, you can get a lot of things done in a short time very efficiently, but the nature of hyperfixations is such that they don't really give you an option to do much else. "But isn't fixating on something you like 'good'?" I asked myself, to which I replied that that was what I had thought to be the case. My unsleeping horizontalness was clear evidence that it was not. I sharpened my knife because the annoyance of it slipping off a shallot drove me to do so. I don't quite know yet why I dove this hard into music, though I do like it. Clearly, I don't have full control over that spirit of exploration. This weekend was consumed by activities like these. "'Spending' time vs 'consuming' time" was the insightful phrase that popped into my head at that moment.

    To spend a resource, you must acknowledge your agency in using that resource. A resource can get consumed in any way. It reminded me of the following excerpt from the Gītā (BG4.29–30):

अपाने जुह्वति प्राणं प्राणेऽपानं तथापरे ।

...

सर्वेऽप्येते यज्ञविदो यज्ञक्षपितकल्मषाः।

यज्ञशिष्टामृतभुजो यान्ति ब्रह्म सनातनम्॥ ४.३०

It talks about the different ways of 'sacrifice', stating that some people offer their inhales to their exhales, or the other way around, and so on. All these knowers of sacrifice, cleansed of flaws by sacrifice, having experienced the fruits of the sacrifice go to the timeless Absolute [or however you choose to translate it]. I think 'sacrifice' has become too tangled with religiosity or "spirituality" (in quotations, because spirituality itself has a funky connotation (though I think spirituality is a good connotation in this case)) for it to be relatable in one's day-to-day (or, at least, my day-to-day). What is the difference between sacrificing something and spending something? Apart from the connotations, that is. Sacrifice sounds grand, heroic, sometimes sad. 'Spend' is blasé.  Inhales and exhales—breathing air isn't something typically thought of as a resource, though. With all that connotation, 'sacrificing' inhales and exhales leads to a weird juxtaposition. I mean, if you think about it enough, I think it leads to a similar conclusion; so, it's not a big deal, but still, the connotation adds (in my opinion) unnecessary things into the mix. 'Sacrifice' perhaps makes it sound too important, and that hinders people like me with anxious traps of overthinking. If you want to think about how every breath is a priceless gift bestowed upon you by divine grace, go ahead; that, I think, is a valid interpretation—just one that is not helpful to me; otherworldliness itself is a cozy escape from reality.

    Spending, on the other hand, is more accessible. You spend money to buy groceries, spend  time cooking, and so on. Isn't that essentially the same as 'sacrificing'? Doing anything means you're not doing something else. Doing is also sacrifice. So, a more accessible way is to spend time and effort, you know, making it worth it. I think this is the same as phrases like "write to kill" (from Ikoku Nikki) or "attack with killer intent"—trying your best to make it worth it. Thinking of 'spending inhales and exhales', then, forces one to answer why they are worth the oxygen they breathe. It forces deliberate conscious existence.

    As usual, this is a "first draft" with no editing. I know I'm rambling, and I want to ramble more (but at a later time). I think the BG Chapter 4 has many nuggets and specs of wisdom, and unlocking them apparently requires life-experience or insight. I have another interpretation of the second half of the famous karmaṇy'evā'dhikāraste verse which I have written elsewhere about. Perhaps, I'll post that here some day.

    Further, more.

Edit: wanted to add the clarification that I know 4.29–30 is often linked mainly to Prāṇāyāma, but my focus in this interpretation is on treating it as an intention-setting exercise (yajña) on top of the breathing.