SOC

I don't know where to begin with this one. I'm trying to get back to consistent blogging by having regularly recurring features. I have a blogging schedule, and Monday is my SOC day. I've learned from the example of Ian Fleming and other writers to be workmanlike. You have to treat writing like a job or else you won't get any writing done. Waiting for inspiration is dumb because you will find it is more fun to read other writers than to do your own writing.

One of the things that has been on my mind recently has been the salutary effect of apathy. Many who know me will have heard my canned lecture on the Greeks and happiness. I don't think all of the schools had it completely right or wrong but had some small piece of the larger puzzle. In the case of apathy, this would be the realm of the Stoics and the Skeptics. Philosophers dedicated to precision will take issue with me at this point and split some hairs, so I will simply make a general point about apathy and how it helps sometimes.

There is a great deal in life we don't control and can't control. What makes it worse is that we often know what is going to happen, and there's nothing we can do to change the outcome. As a friend once told me, wisdom is the truest form of pain. How can you remain in the backseat and watch the idiots at the wheel?

The biggest example I can give is the looming Tea Party Betrayal. I don't believe for a minute that the GOP takeover in Congress will amount to anything except to hamstring Obama for the next two years. Tea Partiers are just rubes who will get suckered again like they did with the Contract with America back in the 90's.

You have to stop caring. This doesn't mean that you stop working. I am always amazed at the patience of Ron Paul. He has been at this for close to 40 years now. You learn patience over a time period like that. It isn't the patience that comes from believing in some sort of inevitable victory. The fact is that there is no guarantee of that whatsoever. It is simply the patience of knowing you are right and will always be right.

Imagine being in attendance at a meeting of the Flat Earth Society. You can spend time trying to change these people. Or you can become stupid like them. Or you can do the only sensible thing which is to not give a shit.

Apathy is an escape. You have to reserve the right to not give a shit. It is disappointing to watch things unfold in the way you predict, but there is an upside to it all. You will have the opportunity to gloat. There is a perverse pleasure in that. You will get to laugh at idiots. Right now, I have spent the last two years laughing at the leftards for their support of Obama. I will get to spend the next two years mocking John Boehner. This GOP revolution will be no different than the last one.

I think change happens, but it happens in spite of what happens at the ballot box and not because of it. Clever idiots believe they wield some sort of power over things, but they don't. This is what makes them idiots. The thing to do is speak the truth and let the reality echo what you said.

I am routinely lumped in with crackpots and bullshitters because of my unconventional viewpoints. But I usually end up with the last laugh as my viewpoints are vindicated. And that's the whole point. Apathy allows you to laugh.

Apathy also allows you to be at peace, and that is the ultimate benefit. I used to stress over a lot of shit, but I have learned to not care. I have a friend of mine who is supremely laid back, and I suspect that this is his secret. He just doesn't think it is worth the toll to get worked up over shit.

Achieving this mindset is a matter of Eastern style meditation. I think of Zen masters and all that shit. When I am at work, I have found that the best stress reliever isn't to fret and worry but to work really hard. I don't do this so much because it results in getting a bunch of shit done. It results in the immediate sensation of flow and the endorphin rush that comes from exertion. I lose myself in doing. This is the supreme way to go. We associate apathy with passivity and inactivity, but it is better to think of it as indifference. It's like the athlete who is so zoned in that he loses track of the score and doesn't realize that he is winning the game.

The bottom line is that you simply have to do the right things. Whether you succeed or not doesn't matter. It doesn't change what you are supposed to do. It's like when I was in college, and I changed my focus from graduating to learning. The result was that I graduated and was surprised at how fast those four years went. It is a strange and wonderful feeling.

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