Lines

It's fine to look with your eyes. Then it's just looking. But if you pull out your phone and use it to look, then that is suspicious. It's fine if you remember it after, that's just your memory. But if you record it and look at it later, that is just strange. It's fine if you squint your eyes to see because you're distant, but if you pull out your binoculars to look, well that's just psychotic.

On Types

She's looking through my books for certain types of books while I'm looking through other types of books. She laughs and praises God as she points to the type of books she's looking through, which she thinks of as praiseworthy, in contrast to the type I'm looking through, forgetting that all these books (the ones she's looking through and the ones I'm looking through) are mine. She borrows a book from me; she would like to read this book; she would like to be the type of person who would read this book, and she thinks I'm the type of person who wouldn't read this book, again forgetting it's from me that she's borrowing this book. When she tries to read it, she finds it not to her liking; she had expected much more from the book. Years go by, and I ask for my book back. She's forgotten that she borrowed it from me; she's forgotten her impression of the book when she did try to read it, she remembers though, that she wants to be the type to have read this book (and liked it), and she remembers that she thinks I'm the type to not like this book, again forgetting the book is mine, and she says: "That book is pure gold."

Edited: 14-11-2022

Neurosis

While one man, feeling physically ill, spends his time recuperating and concentrating on becoming better, looking forward to the return of his good health, another man, neurotic and plagued with malicious thoughts, when suffering from the same physical illness, spends his time consumed with his rage against everyone who isn't expressing compassion towards him, relishing the idea of a future conversation in which he'll be able to bring up this moment of neglect on their part, to add to his list of imagined grievances.

(Written in 2014. Posted now on Instagram.)

On Losing Selves

They lost themselves to each other. "No, they

lost parts of themselves to each other. They lost

parts of themselves, but they found other parts of

themselves. They gave parts of themselves to

parts of each other, but they mistook their partial

selves as whole selves, thus thinking they gave

themselves to each other." They lost parts of

themselves to other parts of themselves, but they

gave what they found to each other, so they lost

their whole selves, to each other. They lost the

selves they had previously known, and they lost

the selves they had found.

Edited: 21-7-2022

Posted on Instagram. 

Before I Forget

I almost forgot this thought I wanted to write about forgetting thoughts I want to write. I wondered, before I forgot, how many thoughts have occurred to me in my life that were (and still are) worth writing but which I never wrote down so I've completely forgotten. 

What a loss these thoughts are, if they ever existed. 

[Edited 7-12-2022. Now on Instagram, where you can like it.]

The Liars

A liar will lie to protect another liar's lie. This, the liar will do, not for an affinity felt between liars but because the liar wants you to believe his own lies if he ever uses a similar lie. If you doubt the other liar's lies, the liar will throw doubts at your doubts, to make you question yourself if it is ever his own lies that draw your suspicions. If you are good at discerning the truth this puts the liar at risk, so the liar tries to damage your truth-detection skills, or failing that, to make you doubt yourself. For his own deceptions to work on you, the liar needs your views of reality to be distorted. For his own lies to work on you, the liar needs you to believe all the other lies. 

Edited: 24-8-2022

On Rules

Rules between rule-makers, rule-keepers, and rule-breakers. Between rule-makers who break the rules, and rule-breakers zealous about the rules, and rule-keepers who don't believe in the rules. Between rule-keepers who would like less rules or no rules, and rule-breakers who want more rules. Between rule-makers who make rules they like and rules they hate, all the rules that benefit them if followed (by others), and rule-breakers who hate rule-makers for not making the rules they believe should be set (for others) even if they themselves would break the rules. Between rule-keepers who are punctual about the rules they keep but believe it is fine not to be so rigid with the rules, and rule-breakers who rage fanatically against rule-keepers for not being as zealous about said rules which rule-breakers lazily break. Rules, say the righteous rule-breakers to the unrighteous rule-keepers, are meant to be made and kept. 

[Edited on 14-10-2022]

Consequences

It was Ramadhan, the fasting man had no patience left. He got out of his car and beat the laborer who had angered him. He looked very official as he beat the laborer. Another man filmed the event, and posted it online. There was an uproar, and a law came out because of this. You were not allowed anymore to post a person's photo or personal data online without their consent.

(Not) Selling dogs can be a dangerous business…

A dog-owner wanted to sell his dog. A dog-buyer came to his house to buy the dog. The dog-owner's little girl told her dad she didn't want him to sell the dog. The dog-owner accepted his daughter's wish and told the dog-buyer he wouldn't be selling the dog. The dog-buyer got up in a rage, went to his car, brought back a sword, hit the dog-owner on the head, and chopped off his hand. The dog-buyer didn't get the dog and went to jail, the dog-owner lost his hand but kept the dog, and the dog lives on, freely, limbs intact.

True story.

Edited: 29-07-2022

Fears and non-fears

Afraid of making a mistake, I avoid doing something, while wondering if it's a mistake to avoid doing it. 

Although I'm worried that doing it may not be a mistake, still I avoid doing it, because what if others think doing it would be a mistake?

And though it would be a useful fear to have, I don't wonder if others would think avoiding it is the mistake.

I wonder why I don't wonder this. 

My Ego

He hurts my ego, and my instinct is to ascribe some moral flaw to him for hurting me. But since I know it's my ego that is hurt, I tell myself I should not react in defense of my ego. This makes me feel better, since I get to tell myself, "Look how noble you are, allowing him to say what hurts you because you don't want to defend your ego." Being aware of this self-deception though, disarms my defense, and I am left again with my offended ego. I am now very conscious of my ego, and my self-deception as a defense mechanism; I am also aware that these are subtle incidents in one's soul that others may not notice in themselves. This last bit is also a defense mechanism in which I am telling myself not how noble I am, but how everyone else must be just as bad, (although I'm also praising myself for noticing).

Edited: 14-09-2022

How



We're hurt by what others say and don't mean, and what they mean and don't say, and what we imagine them to mean, and madly enough, what we imagine them saying and meaning because it makes sense that they would, or that they could, the possibility exists and that is enough to hurt. 

Posted on Instagram. 

A New Nose

Her wedding was coming up and she wanted a new nose. Her old nose was fine, but oh the photos she could post of her honeymoon with her new nose! So she took her old nose to the doctor and asked for a replacement. Her new nose brought her headaches at first, then swelling, then bleeding eventually, finally landing her in the emergency unit in the hospital, and the courts soon after. Her fiancé had left her new nose, she told the courts, and though it wasn't clear why, her job also quit on her new nose. She sometimes dreamed of her old nose laughing at her, mocking her new nose.

[Edited on 04-10-2022]

The Cat

The cat ran out. The man ran after the cat. The man who ran after the cat passed a boy walking his dog who said the dog had scared the cat that ran away. The man who ran beat the boy walking his dog who said the dog had scared the cat that ran away; this upset the dog that scared the cat and pushed the dog to run away. The dog returned, but would not eat nor drink, and slept all day. The court fined the man who beat the boy who walked his dog that ran away and then returned: 5,000 for beating the boy, 40,000 for the dog that ran away and then returned, and 1,000 in legal fees; the court wasn’t told what happened to the cat that ran away. 

(Short story in six sentences. I posted this on Instagram. It was inspired by this article.)

This Blog

My idea for this blog is for it to be like a notebook. This is where I’ll post drafts, notes, thoughts, incomplete writings, and writing exercises like short stories in six sentences and so on. This way there is less pressure to only post what is good. If I post something, it doesn’t have to be the final version, and I can keep editing it as I see fit. I’ll add in the dates every time I edit. 

I suppose I’ll find out more about what I’ll do with it, if anything at all, as I go along.