Achromalia wrote:
i vaguely remember that i tended to fixate on "apathy" when i'd met you, you and some others-- i think i believed i really couldnt feel emotion with any meaningful depth, or something. which isn't true, but it does seem to be true that different senses were dulled, emotively and relationally and also physiologically
i wonder why my sense of smell sucks so bad. why i dont hold onto anything anymore. why there isn't much [determination] in this [soul] with which i could ever hope to [act]
im not quite sure how i have or haven't changed...
im not quite sure what i want to cherish and what i want to forget
in a sense, these memories are to be both cherished And forgotten
i want to disown them, or maybe just a part of me wants to... but the remainder holds on, adoring what it meant to others and what it mustve meant to me at the time... not that i can really speak for a past self i barely remember
I do remember this as well. I’m curious how the theme of apathy was brought up, whether it was primarily through me or you or maybe a combination of us both. Conversations are a two way street, a song and dance in a sense. So maybe it was built up naturally between us two conversing about our emotions at the time, each inspiring the other to think deeper about certain themes we would otherwise not inherently speak of.
Typically, we as humans connect with others based on things that we are able to relate with each other on. We were probably going through similar mental journeys and naturally shared some of our common shared experiences together, which happened to be the broad theme of apathy and empathy.
Apathy, empathy and sympathy were all concepts that I was trying to “solve” / understand in my life at the time. I think it revolved around one of my biggest issues at the time, which I failed to comprehend often. Expressing myself and feeling understood, or in a lot of cases back then, MISunderstood.
My memory of my past self will never be fully intact, but I'm tempted to say that my apathetic mindset at the time was pretty directly related to my depression. The more depressed I got, the harder it was to relate, empathize, and connect with people. The more it made me tear away from my friends, family, and society. I was uncomfortable and scared of how I was feeling, so I started down the dangerous path of self-isolation and reclusiveness. At the time though, I didn’t understand how all of my emotions and all of my isolating behaviors affected each other.
It’s all fuel for the flame. A terrible, terrible cycle. Depression made me isolate. Isolation made me depressed. Being more depressed made me isolate even more. I didn’t have the awareness at the time to catch myself in the cycle and lift myself out of it.
I’m tempted to go back and reread our discussions we had about “apathy” all those years ago, and I probably will, but once I have the time and energy to do so. For now, I am too exhausted. Exhausted in a good way.
I hope you can potentially gain a better understanding of your own situation through reading and relating your experiences to my own. I think it’s very healthy to express, connect, and relate with others, so that you are given a sense of not feeling alone and not feeling isolated in your emotions. I don’t know exactly what you are going through, but hopefully my thoughts can inspires something.
Side tangent - I always had a similar issue with a poor sense of smell. After moving away from my home to an entirely new environment, I noticed a better sense of smell. I think my lack of smell stemmed from the fact that I was fairly sedentary with what I did and what I interacted with, so I just got used to the same things. The more you smell something, the less potent it smells. You get used to things.
Moving to Texas made my sense of smell better because I was experiencing brand new smells. Now, coming back to California after a few years, I feel like I can smell all these familiar smells again and stronger than ever because I have been away for so long. I took a tolerance break from everything.
I guess what I’m trying to say is that if you experience the same things over and over again, you gain a tolerance to said things. Also, I think depression is known to dull certain senses as well.