peace in a world where everyone gets heaven / just trying not to die like a dog

[intertribal]

A dedication to "Lost!", currently my favorite song off Viva La Vida. 

For some reason whenever Coldplay says "lost!" and I wouldn't frighten other people, I throw up my hands with this huge smile and shout "lost!" with them. I'm very attracted to the idea of being lost, I think it's one of the great secrets of life. I think it stems from that whole looking-into-the-chaos-and-liking-it thing from Zorba the Greek. I feel like what "lost!" speaks to is the uncertainty and randomness of life, the inability to plan, the failure of realism, #1 teams losing to small insignificant teams at the end of the season, the U.S. losing in Vietnam (hell, if the U.S. hasn't been dead lost in all its wars following World War II...), change, catastrophe, system malfunction. The fact that we spend our lives pushing boulders up a hill like Sisyphus, and that we must find joy in pushing up that boulder - "the rock is my thing", to paraphrase Camus, is my life philosophy. I told this to my boss in Surabaya when she was complaining about the constant bureaucratic bullshit coming from Jakarta - "embrace the rock," I told her, "love the rock".

Just because I'm losing doesn't mean I'm lost, doesn't mean I'll stop, doesn't mean I'm in a cross (?)
just because I'm hurting doesn't mean I'm hurt, doesn't mean I didn't get what I deserved, no better and no worse
I just got lost!
Every river that I've tried to cross... every door I ever tried was locked
oh and I'm just waiting 'til the shine wears off
You might be in a big fish in a little pond - doesn't mean you've won, cuz along may come a bigger one -
And you'll be lost!
Every river that you tried to cross... every gun you ever have went off...
oh and I'm just waiting 'til the firing's stopped
oh and I'm just waiting 'til the shine wears off

Comments

[royinpink.livejournal.com]

i dunno if i'd want to love the rock.

[intertribal.livejournal.com]

Sure you do!

[royinpink.livejournal.com]

why? or maybe i just don't get the rock. i think of that as everything i can't do, all the tedious things i just break under. and the only thing that saves me is knowing that i'm really here to do what i most want to do, what i love doing, what 'comes naturally' to me, and I have to jump through a few hoops to do it, but I do so grudgingly, hoping every minute that they might someday be able to change to something more sensible, more free.

[intertribal.livejournal.com]

Hmm... I think of the rock as the essence of all that is struggled against, all difficulty in the world, and loving the rock means finding joy in the struggle - sort of similar to "I love the whole world", and very similar to the idea that the journey is more important than the destination. I mean, the point of Camus' piece is that for Sisyphus, the rock is his thing, even though it rolls back down on him. I used to have that written on a piece of paper, "the rock is my thing" and I'd tape it to the wall behind my desk, and whenever I felt bogged down I would just think, love the rock, love the struggle, love how hard it is - not because it makes you stronger or anything, but because it is struggle, and to me struggle is like a clean burn, and even the tedious stuff keeps me alert. Generally it makes me a lot less stressed out to think of it that way. But that's how I interpret it.

Camus would say, however, that it is an acceptance that it is a tedious (and eternal) struggle and doing it anyway, because in that acceptance of the meaninglessness of life you're freeing yourself.