The mass of men live lives of quiet desperation ?

The famous quote by Thoreau.

As a long time contributer on STW forums (since 05?) and lifelong neurotic/ dysthymic / overthinker I spend a lot of time pondering life .. its meaning , purpose , and all the effort involved on a daily basis simply to get through the day for ..in my case very little reward . That’s supposedly because my condition includes long periods of anhedonia where nothing is pleasurable or seemingly worthwhile .

Much of the time these days I simply exist rather than live as I have no dreams, ambitions, purpose ,pension,house ( I rent) little money etc and the future looks bleak . I have a loving wife though and have had many opportunities and came from a fairly privileged background .

I live in Devon ..where many would love to be but it means nothing . I have no real friends ( although when younger had many.. but they were conditional I now realize ..conditional on me being the party animal ,joker lad not the sad anxious depressive)

I had a good education and have travelled extensively round the world ..searching for something ..I know not what but I didn’t find it ! As Bob Marley sang .. you’re running your r…but you can’t run away from yourself .

I never socialize and have lived a very isolated and withdrawn existence for the past 2 decades. I ride my bike alone and enjoy the peace and solitude ..away from everyone and everything.

It wasn’t always this way .. I was a crazy alcoholic eccentric for a long time .. I knew everyone and everywhere . Was always out and about and every weekend was off on an adventure .

Back to the point .. underneath it all .. (I guess unless you’re lucky) , we all know we act a lot of the time ..pretending life is so great and distracting ourselves at every opportunity by buying and doing things.
Being seduced by the promise that acquiring this or that will finally make us happy complete and a success…but it never ends ..until we do .

It has been said that life is rather like jumping off a cliff and knowing you’ll hit the bottom eventually so how can you relax in the meantime ?
For me the answer was a regular high dosage of alcohol or similar …otherwise the inner tension remained. That all had to end 5 years ago ..otherwise I would have !

I know I am an extreme case and unwell but underneath it all is there some truth in Thoreau quote ?

I guess if you have a great career, loving family , good health , etc ( like it would appear that many on here have ( and many don’t )) it may not be so, but when I was younger and looked ahead ..all I wanted was freedom .
I didn’t know what that was or how to achieve it . It seemed that to be free you needed plenty of money so I then realized that unless I was exceptional I would only achieve that by working long hours at a shitty job which to me was the opposite of freedom and rather like a lifelong prison sentence.

I didn’t do the prison sentence in the end .. hence no money and all the insecurity at 58 . I probably would have done it like most people but recurrent illness took it’s toll and I couldn’t hold down a regular job despite being quite capable .

I have taken numerous antidepressants , anxiolytics, for over 20 yrs now and my chaotic mind was recently diagnosed as being attention deficient on top so have a ritalin equivalent as well …which does actually help a bit .I’ve also tried all sorts of therapies etc

Despite all these issues over so many years I still try and carry on in the search for mental peace. I can’t be sure whether the way I see the world is distorted as I’m told or actually a bit more realistic than your average man in the street .( Depressive realism )… Perhaps a mixture of the two.

I care and think too much and wish I was thick, Insensitive and ignorant ( I probably am! ) Life seems easier for people with those qualities!

Sorry to bore anyone who made it this far . When I write like this it’s often a little personal therapy and sharing often helps . Cheers, Bill.

Quiet desperation is my default. I relate to a lot of what you just said but I can’t type up a lengthy reply right now. I’m having a pretty hard time mentally at the minute. Just desperate for the sun to come out and have a break from work. I’m painfully aware that I’ve got at least 35 years of this shit left and my only escape is dropping dead.

This is why I often think evolution has gone down a blind alleyway with human consciousness. We would be much more successful as a reproducing organism if we weren’t prone to existential angst. Can’t do much about it though, just crack on and get on your bike.

I think your basic thesis is right because we are taught from an early age ( many of us) to measure yourself by how much you have rather than how happy you are.  I believe a lot of the mental health difficulties we have as a society come from this.  Peiople reach middle age and have all the toys and think ” why am I not happy”

I have earned far less than the national average wage half of my working life and even my best years only a little above.  My missus despite a law degree never earned above the national average.

But we were both fulfilled in our work and only worked to live.  Our happiness came from things money cannot buy.  Listening to birds sing, watching sunsets and sunrises, spending a lot of time outdoors. riding bikes and wild camping.  Our best holidays came from walking in Scotland and wild camping – a very cheap pastime

yes you do need money to do this and poverty is awful  but concentrating on what makes you happy rather than earning as much as you can and buying lots of toys only to realise in your middle years that you have missed so much IMO leads to a happier life.

Yes im a bloody hippy at heart 🙂

Quiet desperation is my default. I relate to a lot of what you just said but I can’t type up a lengthy reply right now.

Same here 😐

I suspect there is much truth in the quote, sadly…

I hope my post did not sound preachy or holier than tho

I was trying to explain how I have found happiness without a lot of money ( although more than many)

Its because I find my happiness in things that are intangible and acheiveable at little cost and that I rarely compare my lives to others.

Kaiser – I see a lot of myself in what you write. Mildly privileged background, well travelled, life and soul of the parties, specialist in going one step beyond, well paid, great job, lovely wife and family, nice house etc. Also, the other side with times of deep introspection, blank and bleak lack of any reason for existence etc. Also dry since last August.

The thing that changed for me was during a particularly slow-mo near death experience when stuck on loose shale sliding towards a cliff edge with every movement for a couple of hours before being rescued. I had some amazing clarity of mind and could really think things through.

Using your example of falling off a cliff and waiting to hit the bottom – quite glad I didn’t think of that example at the time – you get some clear focus.

1) You cannot stop the fall.
2) You cannot avoid the impact.
3) Anything you decisions or actions between where you are now and the impact are fundamentally pointless.
4) Doing nothing is a decision and action so see previous point

Once I established and really understood that everything I said, did or didn’t do was fundamentally pointless I felt like a massive burden was lifted. I was free to do anything or nothing. I could be as nice or unpleasant to people as I liked. I could be as active or as lazy as I wanted. Total freedom from all stress and anxiety.

I discovered being nice to people made my life nicer and easier. Nice people were nice back and it magnified the effect. Horrible people got confused by my niceness and were either nice or wandered off shaking their heads. People I liked seemed to want to spend more time with me and people I didn’t like seemed to gravitate away.

I am not sure if this helps you, or anyone else, but it was my experience and only came after about 6 years of unhappiness in my early/mid 40s

I sacked off all that “he who dies with the most toys, wins” shit at around 26, and have spent most of the rest of my life working in the charity sector. For whatever reason, I’ve always managed to avoid being pigeon-holed, so have managed to switch the focus of my work 3 or 4 times over the course of my working life (60 this year).
While I’d not want to pretend that my life is free of any periods of anxiety, self-doubt or anomie, I’d say that overall, I was pretty satisfied with the way things have panned out most of the time; I’m involved in work that I find meaningful, I have a reasonable level of control over the bits of life we can reasonably expect to control, and at the core of it all, married to a lovely lady who I regard as my soul mate and best friend.
There are circumstances that cause me ongoing frustration though – the persistence of the British electorate to shoot itself in the foot being one of them. I guess one of the concepts that keeps me sane is the conviction/delusion that, as MLK put it “the moral arc of the universe is long, but it tends towards justice”, but I’d really appreciate it if that was a bit more apparent – maybe if Putin could explode in a shower of maggots on live TV or something.

I might make more of a contribution later but for now.
Not just me then.

I expected to find Pink Floyd’s “Time” in this thread… in many ways I suppose I have.

I am satisfied with my life. I do very little compared to a lot of people, gave up materialism in my 20s, and just enjoy being with wife and animals, riding my bike, playing guitar and so on.

I think I always had low expectations and just flowed through life with no plan or aspirations which means I don’t ever stop to think what it could have been, whether others are doing a better job of life than me etc,. as not something I am bothered about.

This is why I often think evolution has gone down a blind alleyway with human consciousness. We would be much more successful as a reproducing organism if we weren’t prone to existential angst.

I often look at my dog and think how nice it must be, to just exist. I’m quite jealous of her.

I care and think too much and wish I was thick, Insensitive and ignorant Life seems easier for people with those qualities!

I doubt it, I don’t think those guys are having a ball, My view is that I care as much as I can afford to.

 Our best holidays came from walking in Scotland and wild camping – a very cheap pastime

Could I gently suggest that you watch the wee video on the front page about the really talented wheelie kids from inner city London taking their first trip out of London to Scotland, and perhaps reflect on your assumptions a bit?

I often look at my dog and think how nice it must be, to just exist. I’m quite jealous of her.

Isn’t that why people reproduce?

It took me far too long to realise that buying shit doesn’t make you happy, its reward is fleeting. No-one ever laid on their death bed thinking “man, I wish I’d bought more video cassettes.” I had a huge purge when I moved house and not gonna lie, it was painful. But do I miss it? Eh, a little but not as much as I thought. This [thing] has a [value] but is that value worth more to me than the space it’s taking up?

Yeah, why do we keep on reproducing? My son is a third my age and already I can see the signs of an over-thinker. But he’s got a lovely girlfriend and no doubt, somewhere down the line, another child… what a weird species we are.

I didn’t expect to get many replies and certainly not so quickly. Thanks to all so far ..at least getting the feeling out in the open makes you feel less alone when it seems that everyone else ..everywhere are having such wonderful lives !
I never wanted children , a career or much really ..just wanted to escape all the expectation . I knew that the things that people claimed made their lives so fantastic wouldn’t work for me . I just wanted to look deeper as I felt their must be more to life than the default Job, house, kids , holidays etc. I think the answer lies in Buddhist and such like philosophies .. At least they were decent and honest enough to tell you that you weren’t a freak because you suffered despite having it all . As TJ says ..we are told from an early age that the route to happiness is money and acquisition ..despite everybody knowing that underneath it all that’s bullxxxx. Certainly having what you need makes life less stressful but look around at all the mega wealthy who are never satisfied and never will be.
Our societies are force fed promises of happiness if only you would buy or do something that’s for sale .We keep swallowing it over and over and get the dopamine hit but little more. This rampant greed has made everything for sale and many things unnafordable for those lower in the social classes.
Thank you TJ for replying ..I had hoped you would as you have talked a fair bit of sense over the years from what I read and I know you have had a taste of the “unsatisfactory” nature of life recently. You spend your whole life building up things and in a moment it can and will eventually all come down . I know you work in the mental health department so no doubt gain wisdom and strength from that .
Seems daft .. I lost my beloved cat which was pretty much the only thing I derived pleasure from from recently ..( don’t tell the wife ) since then life has been even more empty and everyday the process of getting through another round of monotony makes me ask why ..what do we do it for … I guess our genes could tell you that.
Also things do generally get better sometimes despite my ramblings . I hope that will happen for you Sharkattack and all others..it’s just when you are depressed or struggling for an extended period you feel like it has been like that forever.
I have done more in my life experience/travel wise than the majority and in my younger years enjoyed much of it so it seems madness to feel like I’ve failed in life . I think it’s because I was a successful hedonist rather than achieving much substantial but then again that is all subjective ..I mean people tell you what is important in life but that’s purely subjective and much of what we think is just what someone else has told us and we regurgitate it too others. Nothing is really important is it?
I often say the most worthwhile thing you can do in life is to reduce suffering as there’s a lot about ..hidden behind false smiles and sham behaviour. People seem afraid to tell the truth . How are you they ask … Very well you reply despite feeling like you are dying rather than living.
Sorry ..rambling again …you can tell I spent a lot of time thinking about such things.

As well as Thoreau I love the Philip Larkin poem : They **** you up ( or whatever it’s called ) ..so true and people don’t realize it . A benchmark book on PTSD .. the body never forgets or a similar title is also based on the fact that trauma is passed down through generations subconsciously . My Mother handed on her GAD to me as a baby without knowing and certainly not wanting too. People bring up children with their own ideas and values which were told to them by their parents and influences and often produce suffering as a result.

It’s funny how a day after being born most people are given a name and religion ..(not of their own choosing ) and spend the whole of their lives defending it !

I’ll shut up now as I’m off tangent ..forgive me for that ..I’m a fallible human being with a washing machine mind that rarely gets emptied ! Or maybe is a Rubbish bin !

I can relate to a lot of what you say OP. Don’t know what else to say. Don’t know that there’s any point saying anything. So I’ll just say I’m sorry to hear that it’s not just me.

Nickc – the things that make me happy can be done by anyone anywhere for little money.  watching sunrise and sunset, walking in the park, hearing birds sing.  I didn’t leave the city for 2 years and still found those moments of happiness.  finding a badger set onsome urban waste ground, just walking round th ecity looking at the buildings

its about attitude not access

I know I have got under your skin but how about easing off the personal attacks?  Its a fair few over the last few weeks

I think about purpose a lot. Is our purpose here to simply breed and then die off? Have we artificially prolonged our lives long past the point they can usefully serve this purpose.

OR is it about making yourself ‘happy’ or maybe just content? But what for, simply to consume more of this planets resources? How does me being happy help.

I think maybe the key is to focus on what we will leave behind when we do exit this place. What interactions, what legacy will be left you. Can you improve this can you somehow improve the existence on others so they in turn can improve the existence of others? I like to think when I check out I will have benefitted others. Have been lucky enough to have 3 wonderful kids including a paediatric nurse and paramedic who change lives daily. I have ‘saved’ a woman trying to take her own life – I’m not trying to brag here but offer examples which I take something from where I feel I have had had some purpose beyond simply existing. But those events were in the past.

So what is my future purpose/ Do I have reason to be here now. I don’t know and in the past there have been times I was totally convinced I had no further purpose and the world would be better off without me in it.

That was in the past. I now hope I still do have more purpose to come. I just must content I don’t know what it is yet.

thought provoking post – thank you for posting

Took me so long to write that last piece I hadn’t noticed many more wonderful contributions . I have to go out now but will reply later . Keep them coming ..uncovering this conspiracy of silence feels most refreshing. Appreciate the honesty . XXX

The mass of men live lives of quiet desperation

It could be worse, you could have moments of hope.

I know that’s very flippant but I imagine many can probably relate to it. I often think the problem is an innate need for a sense of purpose, after the basics to keep you alive and reasonably comfortable, I think that is the most important thing we need. Why would I like to be in a relationship again? Not for what it gives me directly but for what it is to be something to someone else again

I know you work in the mental health department

I worked in care of the older adult ie old folk and am now retired on an income most on here would find laughable.  My choice to retire at 60 despite the low income that give me – because there is more to life than work

The ( pretentious? 😉  ) philosophy I have lived my life by is:

1) do as much good as you can
2) do as little harm as you can
3) have as much fun as you can

In that order.  its informed my entire life

I’m painfully aware that I’ve got at least 35 years of this shit left and my only escape is dropping dead

Please talk to someone, bottling that up really isn’t good.

But yes, I’m in the quiet desperation camp. Actually not that quiet – just started on the Citalopram and been signed off for a fortnight. Was hoping to be signed off for my remaining 15 years, but a fortnight at a time will do. Work commitments, family commitments, caring commitments can all, quite frankly, do one.

Hoping that this forecast warm/dry spell actually materialises.

Out of curiosity OP, how old are you? Although I’ve been aware of some of this kind of stuff for a while, it’s only really in the last couple of years that it’s really started to hit me more, in classic midlife crisis way.

As you guys have touched on, much of it comes back to defining ourselves by what we do / have done/ will do/ achieved. Particularly for men there’s an expectation that we reinforce that our lives are about doing, will do, did. The stereotypical ‘female’ self-definition may be based more around being, will be, was – although I know several really driven and ‘do’-oriented women.
One of the challenges we face is as we get older, a bunch of the stuff we focused on doing we’ve either done, or realise doesn’t count for much – and/ or we feel less able to do them in the future. Really immersive travel is tougher when you’re older and have family, so no more 3 months in the Himalayas for me. If having family is an achievement, when the kids grow up it can feel like you’ve “done” a fair chunk of that (or at least the fun parts!). And when it comes to work, as we get older and promoted about as far as we’re likely to, it really becomes apparent how pointless it all is, at least in terms of defining your achievements by it.
So the whole framework of our self-definition is just eroded away, and we feel fairly lost and uncertain of what we’re even doing any more (in a where is my life going kinda way).

Layer on that the well-researched difficulties men have in making or finding friends past the age of about 30 and it’s certainly not uncommon, I’d suggest!

I think that this existential angst is the reward for anyone who stops long enough to think about things. I also agree with WCA that accepting that it is all essentially pointless can be very liberating – it’s not depressing, it just means that you don’t have to worry about whether you’re getting it right.

Have you ever read Siddhartha? He tries asceticism, hedonism, wealth and poverty but in the end finds peace as a ferryman, listening to the river, watching it flow, and helping people across it.

its about attitude not access

For you it is. Like I said watch the video. For you to access to all these things is a given, you have the education, knowledge, expectations, priviledge that make all these things available to you. Wild camping for instance…tents food, time off work, the knowledge that your flat will still be there while you’re away the knowledge that your presence won’t be questioned and on and on, stuff you don’t have to think about For inner city kids in Bradford or London or even Glasgow, or Edinburgh, not so much eh?

I’m not aiming for personal attacks TJ, but this is the same of the fuel thread, you tend towards the idea that “This is what I have, so it must be the same for everyone else” Stop doing that, it isn’t fair.

accepting that it is all essentially pointless can be very liberating – it’s not depressing, it just means that you don’t have to worry about whether you’re getting it right.

That sums it up well for me but again I had no aspirations/expectations so anything that does happen in a positive way is a bonus.

Nickc – how about you open your mind and listen?  That is not what I am doing at all.  Now please stop attacking me all the time because you do not understand the points I make because they are outside your experience.

I could have pulled you up on many statements you have made that are provably wrong but haven’t because I do not want to get into more bickering but its very tiresome to have you following me around the forum making baseless attacks on my character.

Edit – I will leave this thread because its not about me even tho Nickc wants to use it to attack me

Quiet desperation turning to noisy desperation already, I see.

anhedonia

I’m glad I learned this word from this thread. I’ve been feeling it for years and it’s sent me off into some good reading material.

I’m not aiming for personal attacks TJ, but this is the same of the fuel thread, you tend towards the idea that “This is what I have, so it must be the same for everyone else” Stop doing that, it isn’t fair.

I fully agree with this but can we please not destroy another potentially useful thread by turning it into TJ VS. The World.

@TJ

Not everyone likes or even responds to the same things. Just a gentle warning that you are at risk of sounding smug. You have been fortunate to find things you enjoy in the first place, and been in a position to gain access to them. People often have problems even finding joy in the first place never mind holding onto it.

I think about purpose a lot. Is our purpose here to simply breed and then die off?

We don’t have a purpose. This doesn’t necessarily have to be a bad thing though. You are free of obligation other than those you choose. The trick is to find a way to get enough money to live without being too miserable, that’s all you have to do 🙂

I think a lot of it comes down to figuring out who you actually are and what that means.

Oh and I’ll provide a counterpoint to those advocating simplicity. I couldn’t handle a menial job no matter how simple. I need a challenge. I am only happy at work when I’ve got some really difficult problem to solve or to manage. The idea of having to do menial work fills me with horror.

I think a lot of it comes down to figuring out who you actually are and what that means.

Indeed Moly.
We are all wired slightly different,so try to avoid too many short circuits.
I think happiness is overrated,contentment is where it’s at 🙂

anhedonia

I’m with you, I recently spoke to someone about losing my sense of enjoyment, about going through the motion of things because I should be “Enjoying” them….. but not feeling anything.

You do have a purpose – you’re a DNA replicating machine whether you like it or not.

Sounds to me like what you need is a kitten or two.

Do not try and bend the spoon, that’s impossible. Instead, only try to realize the truth… there is no spoon. Then you’ll see that it is not the spoon that bends, it is only yourself

Hokey movie wisdom, but the allegory that there is no point to the infinite permutations of creation and you decide upon your own purpose is surely not lost?

Of course, the difficulty of deciding ones ‘point’ for oneself is the hard bit.

This is where, rightly or wrongly, belief systems can be brought in as a salve for the soul.

The alternative is nihilism, which ends in the obliteration of the self when nothing matters.

Ho hum.

I think I have struggled in a similar way to the OP for much of my life but, thankfully, to a lesser degree. If it’s of any help, I have been practising mindfulness and meditation for a good few years now and it has massively improved my mental state and my outlook on life. Just hoping I’m not about to be flamed for that comment though!

The alternative is nihilism, which ends in the obliteration of the self when nothing matters

Or the other conclusion is hedonism.

Interesting thread, i thought i was driven by money, property, business etc turns out i was actually building security and control – as a kid we got hoofed out of two houses (tied cottages) and this had a big impact on me.

I dont like anyone having control of me or my life choices…. i have got that security at the age of 58.

I am not “object” orientated, i could drive a Range Rover but i dont want one and even i am not that big of a ****.

However money is not important until there is none…