Heads tend to get clouded. I'd say it can be a sordid affair, but then again, why the fuck would I say that?
I detest inauthentic self-expression. This makes sense. Just like everyone else, I detest in others that which I find most loathsome in myself.
Pride is such a weird emotion. It cannot exist without insecurity. It's also intense and beautiful. The heights of self-expression are all but fueled by the narcissistic takeover of the mind.
Self-consciousness seems to be inherently linked with self-awareness. It's a weird, antagonistic relationship. Self-consciousness births self-awareness, which recognizes the unavoidable anguish of existing while harboring attachments and seeks liberation. Liberation destroys self-consciousness, which destroys self-awareness. Don't get me wrong, it's not a cycle. It ends when self-awareness is destroyed.
What happens to the self? That's the question I know all the more-or-less isomorphic answers to - it ascends to better conditions, or is revealed to be deluding itself into being a part when it is actually the whole, or is revealed to not have existed at all. The edgy edge-cases seek to maintain the self. I like that approach. That means no liberation though.
I guess this connects my obsession with self-expression to my obsession with the maintenance of the self.
Pride is such a weird emotion. It's a source of so many things that are really bad. That's the nature of self-expression though: it expresses the inner state and shares it with others. If it resonates, it reinforces the same inner state in others.
Self-expression is inherently prideful. It requires perverse satisfaction with at least some aspect one's internal state, to the point of risking reinforcing that aspect in others. It's like feeling, rather than believing, that you have something that needs to be heard. I guess this is part of the reason humility is perceived as dishonest in artists.
Pride factors in procrastination. Why spend the next minute confronting ambiguity when you can spend it admiring your completed, concrete and disambiguated work? Most forms of work are forms of self-expression, and are thus prideful. Ambiguous work is that which you can be. Concrete work is that which you already are. In procrastinating, you deny your potential self in favor of your concrete, past self. You do so by diverting attention. Paying attention to things that are ambiguous is riskier. The rewards are potentially greater, but we're all cowards.
It makes sense that self-attention is a currency of self-reinforcement, because that's what all attention is. Self-expression demands attention from others. Seeing others expend energy modeling our minds leads us to feel the concreteness of our selves.
All forms of communication require some sort of a language. Demands for attention need to be phrased. Artistic skill is the skill of constructing phrases that make neurons fire. Communication often goes two ways, and often more. People engage in mutual self-reinforcement all the time. There's messages in secret languages of self-reinforcement floating around everywhere. With a bit of practice, I think you could really tap into it. Some would call this greater black magic, fueled by the spiritual nexus of pride. It would be a sin that subjects one to eternal suffering. It's funny how those things tend to check out sometimes.
Anyway, I don't mind any of this, so long as the communicating parties remain authentic. Because I hate inauthentic self-expression. Because I detest in others that which I find most loathsome in myself. Because I've engaged in it and regretted it. Authenticity is something we owe ourselves before each other. Because inauthenticity will result in the wrong thing being reinforced, and that can be really painful in the long term.
The thing is, I really detest inauthentic self-expression. That means I must be really attached to my self. It's hatred of inauthenticity within me, but it's also the desire of my self to be authentic to itself.
Of course, there's authenticity, and then there's the aesthetic of authenticity, but I'm not going to get ahead of myself.
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