Or as Spinoza writes, as quoted in Viktor Frankl's Man's Search for Meaning:
What does Spinoza say in his Ethics? -’Affectus, qui passio est, desinit esse passio simulatque eius claram et distinctam formamus ideam. Emotion, which is suffering, ceases to be suffering as soon as we form a clear and precise picture of it.
I love my watches, but deciding which one to wear, like my wife deciding on an outfit, drives me crazy. I'm taking my daughters out to lunch for fish tacos. Do I really need to torment myself between the Seiko Sumo, the Orient M-Force, and the Seiko Black Monster?
Because I'm a compulsive, emotional eater, I've decided to follow Phil Hendrie's lead (he lost over 100 pounds) and see if I can keep my calories below 2000.
Breakfast: So far, I've had Grape Nuts, coffee, tangerine, and strawberries for about 450 calories.
My wife Carrie throws away berries and apples when they're infested with mold and worms. For her, it's the spreading of disease. But if she isn't looking, I eat them because for me rotten fruit is an opportunity to build my immune system.
Even with grueling kettlebell workouts I'm 30 pounds overweight. I need to be 195. I didn't see this clearly until I saw Slater Kenny, ripped of course, on HBO Real Sports. It's very clear to me now: Weighing 225 is not natural, healthy, or desirable in any way, shape or form.
Sometimes you need a vision before you can achieve your goal. After vacation, I plan on getting my daily calorie count down to 2,200 with drastic reducation in sugars and starches.
This morning, a pleasantly gloomy, humid morning in Torrance, I walked my dog Gretchen and when I returned my wife Carrie asked me if we should dress our twins in shorts or long pants for preschool. I said it was hot out.
She said, "I don't trust your sense of the weather. You run hotter than everyone else."
Comedy is salvation. It’s the magic that converts your
pain, neediness, and loneliness into a triumph over your melancholy
disposition. And sometimes, like all people, you are funny. And usually when
you’re funny, you’re just being you. You’re not even trying to be funny. And
the dilemma is that as soon as you try to chronicle your funniness, you’re
“playing to the camera,” as it were and the charm and the humor is gone.
Another thing to consider is that the good comedians, the
ones that you like—Louis C.K. Dave Attell, Patton Owalt—to name a few, sit down
and craft jokes and observations and they create enough material to compel
thousands of people to show up to their performances.
Can you do that? No, you cannot. So you’re not funny for
two reasons. You’re too self-conscious, trying to capture your funny moments,
which is just self-centered and obnoxious, and you don’t have the talent and
intelligence to sit down and craft a comedy routine that commands an audience.
We can add one more thing into the mix. You’re fifty-one
now. What? Considering a new career in standup? Think about it. If you’re not
funny by now, you will never be. And now I know you’re hearing that song by
Harold Melvin & The Blue Notes. Just change the lyrics so that the word is
“funny,” not “know” and you’ll be fine.
Don’t cry. I know it’s not fair. You’re saying, “I share
the comedian’s misery and neurosis but I don’t have any of the talent and
intelligence to console me the way do.”
I can't stand it when I write something funny, evidencing my high intelligence and wit, on Facebook and NO ONE comments or likes it. And then I see someone write something stupid, like bragging about doing 50 push ups and they get all sorts of comments and "likes."
No one appreciates me. It's really time I delete my account. Who needs Facebook anyway?
In my messenger bag is a protein bar, as it’s called, a
disgusting, noxious mix of processed ingredients, sugar, corn syrup, various
proteins isolated through the use of solvents, most likely cancer-causing. It’s
doubtful I’ll ever eat it, but it comforts me to know it’s there in case that
while I’m waiting to see my doctor that if I get stuck in the waiting room for
a longer period that I can handle (anything more than 10 minutes), I can
comfort my hunger pains with something to avoid passing out, which is how I
feel when I’m waiting beyond what I planned for an appointment.
The most common scenario for the doctor, or therapist,
being late is that the patient before me takes too much time. But there are
other scenarios. There might be an electric blackout, or a lockdown due to a
prison escapee on the loose; or a hostage situation, or an earthquake, with me
trapped beneath chunks of concrete for several days before being rescued,
surviving the ordeal only because I brought my messenger bag with my
water-filled CamelBak and the aforementioned protein bar.
When I think of the possibility of surviving an earthquake
while waiting for my doctor in the waiting room, I am presented with many moral
challenges. What if a dozen patients, including myself, are trapped beneath the
rubble? Am I supposed to share my protein bar with them? One bar for twelve
people? Isn’t that too meager to do anyone any good? What about three people?
Would I be big enough to share with two others?
What if it was just me and a woman? Would her degree of
attractiveness determine my generosity so that if I found her pretty I would
share my protein bar with her, but if I found her not attractive in the
slightest, I might eat the bar behind her back?
What kind of person am I? I don’t know because all these
scenarios are mere speculation. But I fear that if tested with these moral
challenges, I would fall short, and this thought fills me with self-loathing.
These pessimistic thoughts are giving me anxieties as I
wait for my late doctor. I reach into my messenger bag, pick up the protein
bar, and notice my hands are shaking, a condition made worse as I read the long
list of chemical ingredients and feel the walls begin to shake . . .
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