Re: You couldn't make it up.


"Sir Benjamin Nunn" <bennunn@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:3su58qFq86orU1@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
>
> "Joe Horowitz" <joeunderscorehorowitz@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in
> message news:Neaaf.52241$m%6.22997@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> > 1) Try to work out which things went 'wrong' because they simply are
that
> > way and are never going to ever go right no matter how hard I try (like,
> > for
> > instance, when there's a deadline and I've missed it, that's an example
of
> > something you can never put right), and which things just haven't gone
> > 'right' _yet_, because I'm not trying hard enough or I'm doing it a bit
> > ***
> > or something, or because I don't yet have enough information about them
to
> > put them in the 'wrong forever category'.
>
>
> Yep. Psychologically you're talking about 'observing ego' here. This is -
to
> me at least - the easy bit. In fact, if anything I tend to overanalyse
these
> things.
>
>
> > 2) Give up on everything I deem to be 'wrong forever'.
>
> This bit is harder, because I'll always have a nagging bit of optimism and
> hope deep inside. Alternately, I could just deem everything 'wrong
forever'
> and give up, but that too is a flawed approach.

No, that sounds like a very different approach to mine, I'm afraid. I can't
have optimism about 'wrong forever' stuff because I've worked out that I
can't ever have it. Not 'it's a bit tricky' or something, I just mean 'it's
fucked', like missing a train or being a short***. I mean, if you miss a
train, do you have some nagging optimism that you might just catch it after
all five minutes ago? Wrong forever stuff is wrong forever. There's no
room for optmisim there. If I'm trying to keep a houseplant alive and it's
getting very ill, it's still in the first pile. If it's dead, it's fucking
dead. There's no outside chance of bringing it back to life.

Maybe you're putting things in the 'wrong forever' pile that don't really
belong there, because you still have some control over whether or not they
happen.

> What I try to do is use observing ego to review the process, and then use
> techniques of self-improvement to overcome them.

That sounds okay, but perhaps you're just being too much of a seriously deep
and heavy fucker most of the time, then. It's just asking for trouble. If
I want to own DVD's of all Wes Anderson and Todd Solondz films, (and I do),
I don't have to use any self-improvement techniques'n'*** to get them. I
just, like, try to find the money in small installments and buy them one or
two at a time, temporarily sacrificing progress in other longer-term
finance-based goals.

I don't have to read a fucking book about it or anything. Your life's just
too serious for a *** like me.

> Unsurprisingly, this is also how I live my life, but with failures rather
> than successes. There are things I want to do, in the short, medium and
long
> term, and these are divided into things that I currently have control over
> (e.g. it's my 'turn', if you will), and things which I do not (e.g. it
> requires interaction from other humans, and I'm waiting for their move).

Nope, that's totally not the same as my outlook at all. Completely
different. See my original two lists, there's really no mention of other
fuckers and what they do in there. I don't have these 'turns', just things
I think I might still be able to get and things I think I never will. I'm
no fucking closer to owning a house than I was three years ago, for
instance, further away in fact because of compound interest on my debts, but
it still sits in the second pile so it's not a problem.

> When it's my turn, I'm reasonably competant at getting things done. It's
the
> extraneous factors that disappoint.

That sounds teh ghey to me. You said yourself you have more failures than
successes, this means that on your big ghey list of things you want, MORE
THAN HALF of them prove to be forever out of your reach forever, and you
think this is everyone else's fault because you're actually pretty good at
doing your bits?

What a load of nonsense. From my perspective, of course. Not wishing to be
arrogant and belittling this time, I'm sure from your perspective it all
makes much more sense than any bollocks I come out with, but from mine it's
possibly the gheyest most rubbish*** thing I think I've _ever_ heard you
say.

If you find you can't achieve even a measly _half_ of the things you set out
to achieve, as far as I'm concerned you're either making your objectives too
difficult or you're just fucking *** at life. Or, and this is quite
possible as well, you're a little blind to your own successes because your
negative net curtain thingy only allows you to realise where you've failed
and focus on that.

> This is like when I missed the train to Leicester. I played my hand as
best
> I could on every street, and just got horrendously unlucky. *** happens.

It certainly does. But a slightly longer-term objective was to make it down
to Bristol anyway, which you did. Success. AFAIK, you also made it back to
Ipswich. Success. You wanted to try some ghey ales in Bristol, if only to
establish that they were a bit ***, and you did. Success. You wanted t
meet a Youksefer, if only to establish that he was a bit of a *** in a JdS
kind of way, and you did. Success. You wanted to see a film and go for
some food with me, and we did. Success. Your trip to Bristol was littered
with what I would consider minor successes, you can't see that because
you're still fucking hung up on the fact that you some poxy train right at
the start.

> I find playing poker amazingly theraputic, because of the pureness of it.
It
> restores my faith in statistics and logic, because the players who make
the
> best decisions - me included - are the long-term winners. In the early
days
> I would get upset over bad-beats. Now I take them in my stride, because
I've
> got enough positive reference points - proof if you will - that they only
> happen as often as they statistically should. Now with about seven years
> experience as a player, I've seen just about everything that can happen,
> good and bad, so it effects me less emotionally. I just play my best game,
> and build my bankroll over time.
>
> Real life, unfortunately, isn't as logically pure as the fall of cards.

And this is the crux, once again. I see the fact that you get your just
desserts at poker as absolute proof that life and probability and luck and
chance'n'*** aren't really against you after all, and where you've figured
the odds well and played your hands skilfully they come off for you more
often than not.

I see real life as every bit as logically pure as the cards, that's where
we're so very, very different. Well, that and your big ghey.


--
Joe

"Where the *** is my entry?" - Sir Benjamin Nunn


.