Building an Ego

     There is a lack of time for stillness and contemplation in our culture. Even Sunday, the nationally adopted Christian day of rest, is rarely observed as such anymore. Many of us work lest there be a gap of one whole day (gasp) in customer service. Many others use their days off, whichever those may be, as time to take care of chores and social networking/obligations that their week leaves inadequate time for. Any truly free time we may have is generally filled with various media distractions desperately distracting ourselves from our own thoughts.
     I have notices that a lack of contemplation, especially introspection, leads me to a lack of firm opinions and a weakening of my usually strong sense of self-identity. I need time in which to observe my own motives and evolution in order to maintain a unique and dynamic personality. Without this I find myself with little of substance to contribute to social interactions. I am forced to fall back on pre-fabricated labels and group identity: fast-food for the psyche. In uncertainty I am more prone to get sucked into the advertisement fueled consumer mindset, attempting to make myself happy by buying new things, always dissatisfied and searching for the product I can purchase that will make me feel fulfilled. A vague sense of purposelessness and of dangling over and undefined void stokes panic attacks. Food, alcohol, caffeine, and more exotic chemicals all start to seem more of a crutch than a recreational enhancement or aesthetic enjoyment. I have to wonder if a part of the consumption mad, over eating, drug addicted, attention deficit herd mentality of our culture is the result of a simple lack of taking time for self contemplation and the building of a strong and defined self-identity.
     I wonder how much we suffer for lack of boredom?

Greetings

     In my beginning there was me, and I pronounced myself good. For those of you who have not yet had the dubious pleasure of reading my various pseudo-literary endeavors, allow me to introduce myself: I am Ms Myriad, and I have neither wealth nor taste but am possessed of an overabundance of perspectives and a drive towards psychological exhibitionist. This site is the forum where I expose my mind (such as it is) for the perusal of all you concupiscent little kumquats out there. My endowments may not be great, but they are arranged in an interesting and unusual configuration that some seem to have developed a taste for over the years of my various journals, blogs, and random publications. Stick around, you'll get the idea. 

Herein I have made a case-study of myself and my own internal processes. Practically speaking this is a site full of mere sketches of contemplations, kvetching, hypotheses, flights of fantasy, and random purgative rants that, in themselves, may offer a different perspective and food for thought but are hardly revolutionary. However, when viewed as a gestalt, the picture that I hope to create is the autobiography not of a person (which typically involve mostly life events, dates, occurrences, etc) but of a consciousness, written as it happens, so that one may observe the evolution of its structural concepts and have the rare opportunity of witnessing the intimate workings of a psyche not your own. I also heartily encourage you, my readers, to do the same. How interesting the world would be if we could readily research the cognitive history and emotional development of those we wished to better understand. 

My exposure does have a purpose beyond simple ego-flaunting (though I admit to a double helping of vanity). I believe heartily that our tendency to create normative personas through which we interact with each other is the basis for much of our neurosis and insecurities. By only presenting acceptable facades to each other we also only observe the similarly streamlined presentations of others, and so perpetuate the illusion of humanity's normalcy. One comes to believe one's self to be freakish and perverse because we never are permitted to see all the bizarre desires, eccentricities of behavior, and abnormalities of temperament that our neighbors so assiduously hide for the sake of appearances and their own fears of freakishness. The end result being a mass delusion that there is something wrong with us as individuals and that we somehow deviant from our species' norm. We confuse deviance with dysfunction and have a warped and foreshortened concept of our species' natural range of behaviors. We visit therapists in droves striving to "fix" our unacceptable differences. I do not believe that shame was ever bred from the knowledge of good and evil. Shame's genesis lies in not knowing that everybody else is also naked beneath their clothes, and hence being ashamed of our own nudity. 

So as you subject yourself to my little psychological travelogue I encourage you to consider the origins of your own perspectives in hopes of one day being better able to write out directions so that others may see your point of view. Consider my own exposure and self-analysis and whether your own life might benefit from more public introspections. It is my firm belief that the study of our fellow humans is the most crucial science for us to develop, though it is a distressingly recent addition to the field. Until we understand each other and ourselves how can we ever hope to intelligently and responsibly utilize the fruits other sciences yield for our own best benefit? It is time for our humanity to surpass our technology, and I haven't a clue as to where to start such an enormous project, so I'm starting right here.