Nightly Nietzsche

“True, we love life, not because we are used to living but because we are used to loving. There is always some madness in love. But there is always some reason in madness….I would believe only in a god who can dance. And when I saw my devil I found him serious, thorough, profound, and solemn: it was the spirit of gravity– through him all things fail. Not by wrath does one kill but by laughter. Come, let us kill the spirit of gravity!” – Friedrich Nietzsche Thus Spoke Zarathustra

Give me more madness! Love is madness as, for me, love is feeling out of control and making giddy choices that will only haunt me when I settle back down from the contact high. I understand Nietzsche here. How can you not? Laughter and Love are the good things in life. We crave happiness so very much don’t we? That is the first truth of Buddhism: all beings desire happiness. Love and Laughter. I crave that so much it drives me to acts of pure madness. Like what? You tell me. What is the craziest thing you have done for love? I’d lay my life down, I’d spend myself into a mountain of debt, I’d be humiliated, I’d give up on myself…I’ve given up on myself – at the hands of love’s madness.

I let love overwhelm and frighten me. Once, love lost its true nature and my addiction strangled the life out of it.

My love was swallowed in madness…fear, loss, regret, anger, despair. I saw my devil and never looked back. I gave up on myself and sank away into isolation, cutting away the very lifelines I needed to remind me of my own worth. I stopped laughing and I never even tapped my own toe to dance. I became my devil.

This makes for bad company. And, tucked away into my own little loneliness zone, I began to slowly die. Wracked with both physical and emotional pain, I gave up on life – I gave up on me.

This was nearly a year ago, and did not develop out of nowhere. It was so many things all at once seizing me in my struggles to survive. It was truly the most terrified I’ve ever been in my life. I could taste death it was that close and ever-present.

So, what now? I’m better. Not better off. I’m sick – very sick – and really that is what it is…so what? Everyone has their struggles. I can manage this even though I hate it. I have found hope enough to start believing in myself again – that is key.

I can’t say where, how, or when that happened – it was so gradual. All I know is that I want something more. “This is your life, are you who you want to be? This is your life, is it everything you dreamed that it would be.” -Switchfoot. Answer: no! But I’m starting to remember some of my dreams and that means that I can feel those hopes and beliefs again. What a breath of fresh air that is.

My physical strife has been gravity. Luckily, I’m laughing now. And laughter truly is the best medicine.

~ by the10sdoc on July 11, 2008.