Don’t Go Off On Tangents

I see the future.

I make that sound so easy. Of course, it isn’t. I work at it diligently. I carefully study everything interacting about me, consider the movements and patterns, number the relations evolving and name their paths. Then, in a burst of creative, insightful synthesis, I see how things are at just that moment, and extrapolate perfectly where all the energy patterns in the universe must flow and with what result with regard to, say, getting the money together to get to Orycon this year.

Inspires awe, doesn’t it?

Here’s an example of how it works.

Travelling through the bathroom, I note the seat on the toilet is up. I remember the number of times I’ve seen Bridgette stumble blindly through the morning. I consider how frequently she rises just in time to hurry to leave for work. With a flash of understanding, I see that there is some moderate chance that she will seat herself seatlessly, thrash about wetly and swear, and unpleasant things will then transpire, centering largely on any male household members who might be responsible for her quick backside baptism.

Careful; don’t step in that puddle of grandeur. I trust you are all suitably inspired and perfectly awed. I predicted that. ::nodding, pursed lips, solemn look:: Insight. Perhaps not all that amazing, but.

I assign me schedules, numerical goals, and keep records because I know that, in the past, I have slighted me. I have put my needs behind all others. And I have been a flake. It doesn’t matter why, I tell myself, it only matters that that is how I have been. That in mind, when I determine to exercise or write, I first look at the likelihood that I will fail for reasons of being a spineless flake. I set daily or weekly goals, require open-book record keeping, and then move forward with an eye on my progress.

When I fail to achieve those goals, I immediately hold tribunal, call myself to the stand, declare nolo contendre (as I feel that self-defensive rationalization is undignified and not useful), try me, convict me on the basis of past offenses, and sentence me to death by self-flagellation.

I’m a harsh courtroom. Tolérance nulle, c’est moi.

Then I put those two things together, along with some habits I have of assuming that I come from Krypton when I assign me tasks.

It goes like this.

I decide to do amazing numbers of amazing things.
I immediately realize I will stall out, being an irresolute git.
I watch me closely.
I work until exhaustion degrades my performance or emergency precludes my performing.
Gathering all my unearthly powers to me, I see what will transpire if things continue just exactly the same way they are at that moment of my failing.
Tribunal is called and I am put to death for the failure that Will Happen.
The press is notified that I am being held pending execution for being a flake.

Er….

I believe, if someone came to me and leaned heavily, weeping for the world’s weight bowing their shoulders, and sobbed out this story, I would have uplifting, supportive things to tell them, things that would open their eyes and gladden their souls, and bring forth a bright new day with the quickening of their cliche. I would say, “Idiot.”

I might add, warming to my subject, “You’re an ass. Grow up.”

I must stop this behavior of mine. Not the over-reaching and then self-flagellating. The “looking at my behaviors”. That one. Regarding oneself can only end in…well, embarassment, in my case.

I can see the future.

If NOTHING changes, if NO ONE exercises any free will, if I NEVER change from who I have been when I had wildly different circumstances for my behaviors.

The tangent at any point of a curve perfectly describes that curve … at that point, and only at that point.

Beyond that … knowledge is a form of control. It’s what stalkers get off on; if I know everything that is happening, I, in some fashion, control what is happening. I am reality’s stalker. But the control I have is illusory. I may see a future, but that does not give me one iota of power of any future but that one.

Feh! The abilities I imply are mine by my assumptions and behaviors … well, they just aren’t. I should probably stop beating myself as if they were.

Crossposted from Epinepherine & Sophistry