Do you ever get the feeling that there just aren’t enough hours in the day?
Do you ever get the feeling that there is never enough money?
Do you ever get the feeling that there is more to life?
Years ago, I read a story called Shadows of the Empire that revolved around a story that took place between the Star Wars movies The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi. In the story, we see Darth Vader in the confines of a hyperbaric chamber where he can live outside of his mechanical suit. When in the chamber, Vader uses his mastery of the Force to heal his injured body. Upon doing so, he gets happy. But since his connection to the Force is fueled by his rage and the dark side, once he gets happy, he loses his connection, his body crashes again, and it fuels his rage even more. It is a perpetual cycle of self-destruction.
I feel like Vader at times.
Struggling against the problems that life throws at you seems like a constant and unending battle. I’ve always said that I can handle big problems. Those you can see coming and you can face them head on. But it’s usually not the big problems that get you. In keeping with the Star Wars metaphors, you can bring your lightsaber up in defense against that single big problem. It seems like in my life, it is the myriad of small problems that chip away at my armor. By themselves, the problems are easily handled and dispatched but when they pile up and assault you all at once, there just aren’t enough parries and ripostes in your arsenal. Your laser sword can only block and battle away so many of these problems.
And when you flail in the dark with no hope in sight, you begin to lose your sense of direction. You can’t find which way is up and the weight of the world seems to crash down on your shoulders. And it seems even worse when you are fighting the battle alone. I often feel like I am screaming in the void with no one to even hear my shouts of frustration.
When I start to experience these struggles, I often take solace in that my life has certain pillars of stability. I can look around at other’s people’s lives and tell myself, “Hey, at least I’m not that guy.”
No massive addictions. No prison sentences. Hey, it could be a lot worse!
Still, it is times like this when I look around and wonder how my life got to this level. As always, it is times like this when I retreat into my writing to help me get through the days. I know it sounds strange but retreating into the lives of fictional characters and seeing them fight their way through their problems is almost therapeutic for me.
But it is hard when you delve into this realm of fantasy that becomes your obsession… when you have no one to share the obsession with. I think maybe this is the reason I chose to write a story about a character that is living on an isolated ice ball of a planet. Perhaps it brings more depth to my writing.
Still it seems like a perpetual cycle of grief.
The things that I care most about in life, I have no one to talk with about these joys. So I retreat into my writing, write an outstanding passage that I love, and I look around for someone to share this joy with… and there is no one. So my grasp of the Force disappears and I come crashing down again.
I know that in the grand scheme of things, it seems like a fairly insignificant problem. And if that were the only problem in my life, I would meet it head on but when I have to tack on problems at work, problems at home, problems with my family, problems with money… it just seems like I’m screaming into the void…Hey, I often said that this blog is used to help me sort out problems. Maybe voicing it is the first step…
Do you ever get the feeling that there is never enough money?
Do you ever get the feeling that there is more to life?
Years ago, I read a story called Shadows of the Empire that revolved around a story that took place between the Star Wars movies The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi. In the story, we see Darth Vader in the confines of a hyperbaric chamber where he can live outside of his mechanical suit. When in the chamber, Vader uses his mastery of the Force to heal his injured body. Upon doing so, he gets happy. But since his connection to the Force is fueled by his rage and the dark side, once he gets happy, he loses his connection, his body crashes again, and it fuels his rage even more. It is a perpetual cycle of self-destruction.
I feel like Vader at times.
Struggling against the problems that life throws at you seems like a constant and unending battle. I’ve always said that I can handle big problems. Those you can see coming and you can face them head on. But it’s usually not the big problems that get you. In keeping with the Star Wars metaphors, you can bring your lightsaber up in defense against that single big problem. It seems like in my life, it is the myriad of small problems that chip away at my armor. By themselves, the problems are easily handled and dispatched but when they pile up and assault you all at once, there just aren’t enough parries and ripostes in your arsenal. Your laser sword can only block and battle away so many of these problems.
And when you flail in the dark with no hope in sight, you begin to lose your sense of direction. You can’t find which way is up and the weight of the world seems to crash down on your shoulders. And it seems even worse when you are fighting the battle alone. I often feel like I am screaming in the void with no one to even hear my shouts of frustration.
When I start to experience these struggles, I often take solace in that my life has certain pillars of stability. I can look around at other’s people’s lives and tell myself, “Hey, at least I’m not that guy.”
No massive addictions. No prison sentences. Hey, it could be a lot worse!
Still, it is times like this when I look around and wonder how my life got to this level. As always, it is times like this when I retreat into my writing to help me get through the days. I know it sounds strange but retreating into the lives of fictional characters and seeing them fight their way through their problems is almost therapeutic for me.
But it is hard when you delve into this realm of fantasy that becomes your obsession… when you have no one to share the obsession with. I think maybe this is the reason I chose to write a story about a character that is living on an isolated ice ball of a planet. Perhaps it brings more depth to my writing.
Still it seems like a perpetual cycle of grief.
The things that I care most about in life, I have no one to talk with about these joys. So I retreat into my writing, write an outstanding passage that I love, and I look around for someone to share this joy with… and there is no one. So my grasp of the Force disappears and I come crashing down again.
I know that in the grand scheme of things, it seems like a fairly insignificant problem. And if that were the only problem in my life, I would meet it head on but when I have to tack on problems at work, problems at home, problems with my family, problems with money… it just seems like I’m screaming into the void…Hey, I often said that this blog is used to help me sort out problems. Maybe voicing it is the first step…
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