The Mind From a Small Room Pt. 1

I could write this the way “writers” write. Do you want proof? I am equipped with enough facts about myself to understand that I am something of a weak man, insofar as the inside of me shrieks at confrontation, I do not have the conviction required to “close” with the women I desperately desire, although saying that I do not obtain the disrespect necessary to do so, at least in today’s climate, is a plausible reframe which would allow me to keep the truth at a distance, but that is not why I have sat before a keyboard, reader, to keep the truth at bay in attempt to spare how I feel about myself. Conversely, I am something of an intellectually strong man, I think I am anyway, in the sense that in today’s climate, as you all pontificate amongst yourselves in a competition to see who can blow the hottest air, grandstanding about how you will not comply to overbearing authority or outrageous rules, mandates rather, I listen in silence and do, or not do, the things you say you will or will not do. How noble of me! Of course, this is not directed at you personally, reader; however, it may be, if you happen to be a weak man-of-action as I have just described. Do you see? I can write the way writers write, but I elect not to because that is not the way I fucking speak. That is how I write, how I speak, and I do not speak like an asshole, even though I may have just come across as one. How quickly you forget, reader! Did I not just admit to you that I am a pussy? Surely, the humiliating manner in which I described myself before I described what a nobleman I am has balanced itself out.  

A summation of the above is very simple. Sometimes, I am a pussy; other times, I am not. An illustration of myself, indeed, but also an illustration that most writers choose to write in an effort to show off some type of intellectual superiority, typing hot air rather than breathing it, almost tricking us into thinking what we read was something, when in reality, ’twas nothing. Now, reader, you must be accusing me of insinuating that I am better than most writers at writing. Hm. A fair accusation, given what you have read, but do you know, reader, that in the age in which we live, seemingly consisting of mostly self-loathing narcissists, that it is okay to boast about something you are good at doing? A tangent, that, but allow me to tell you what I know this is, because I have not yet decided if it also means that I am a better writer than most writers. What it is – is an attack on my own impressionability. Most anything I read, listen to, or watch, seeps into my being, whether I like what I have ingested or not, and becomes a part of me. I do not want somebody else’s thoughts to become my thoughts. Remember, I try to write how I speak. Fuck what they think. I am not a pussy who needs to be told what to think or how to think. Oh, dear reader. Is my impressionability because I do not have thoughts of my own, because I lack the intellectual capability to generate them on my own accord, because I lack the personal experience it takes to credit or discredit them, because I am not a man-of-action, but an intellectually inferior intellectual? Such a pussy, me! 

I know a man, whom I respect, envy, and could mock simultaneously, who when after listening to an extended diatribe of mine, can provide a synopsis of what I tried to say in a single sentence. This man is no intellectual, far from it, but the most beautiful, profound messages or lessons I have heard in my time on this Earth have been simple ones from this simpleton. Reader, what is intellect? Tell me, if an esteemed intellectual authors a book, let us say 500 pages in length, about a particular topic, but it takes a man with no formal education to summarize the book in a sentence, who then, is the man of supreme intellect? An extreme example, the reader says, stating that a scenario in which that occurs could never be, but did I not just do that myself? Did I not type to you the way an intellectual would, while in practicality with the very next keystroke, render the manner in which he would useless with a simple sentence: “Sometimes, I am a pussy; other times, I am not?” “If you cannot articulate something in a way that everybody can understand, then you do not understand it yet.” 

It appears that in the midst of all this that I am pitting the men-of-action, or working men (and women – because if I do not add women to that, even though it is already understood that I mean both, which has now opened a new can of worms, the vindictive yet privileged youth of America will pressure WordPress to delete this page and/or post, claiming that a Nazi has written it), against more intellectual, introverted types. They are not necessarily at odds with one another, as you hardly ever see these opposing lifestyles engaging in physical confrontation, if at all, not least because the introvert would be on the receiving end of a thrashing due to their often-sickly demeanor, juxtaposed with the action-man’s burly stature. This, we all know. It is not new information. What may not be common knowledge is that when the two do manage to cross paths, in a business setting, a romantic triangle, or however they do, the war is silently waged, with the one who suffered defeat becoming resentful toward the other. Generally speaking, what happens when the smart man loses out is he is reduced to isolation, tears, nihilism, and questioning his own being. Does this not seem to be the life an intellectual leads, one of destitution, loneliness, and sadness, while even on their death bed trying to offer one last profound statement that would validate their existence? On the contrary, when the action man loses out, he slams doors, screams, yells, becomes violent, and drives himself to the brink of insanity, proving to the world what a fool he really is. Men of genius suffer for lack of courage; men of action suffer for lack of smarts. A life without suffering exists not. “We only get to choose which poison we are going to take.” One would only come to know this if they experienced it, as I have, having suffered defeat at the hands of both competitors in the “romantic ring,” the mentally underdeveloped man-of-action and the man of a larger brain. While I have considered that in either scenario, I was a victim, or volunteer as there are no victims, of an unfortunate circumstance of taste, while true to some degree, I do not believe it is the whole truth. The whole truth is that sometimes, I am a pussy; other times, I am not, but a failure to choose a lane has done me in on those occasions.  

Pardon me; my ego has kicked in. There is only so much self-deprecation I can take before offering myself push-back. Fuck you, me. Have you not had successes? Have you not managed to woo, in your own estimation, the finest of women, even if in a few cases by luck, but surely not by all? As a matter of fact, have you not managed to do so in a far worse state than you are now, and are you not in a far better shape today? Is there not something else in play? My sincerest apologies, reader. You must be thinking I am writing this in vain, taking the stage to speak only of myself, and have become quite annoyed with the pendulum swinging from submissiveness to confidence. One may conclude over-confidence, even arrogance, after I tell you that, today, I find it almost comical that weaker and dumber men than I, most definitely weaker and dumber than I, are finding success in droves! How has this become possible, that when I was weaker and dumber, I found more success than I have now, the same success that the weak and dumb of have seen today? Undeniably, it is the women to blame! Why, yes! A lack of quality! Sarcasm, reader. I hope you understood. Let me tell you, for all the misogyny that was within me prior to the version of myself that I am today, a spite that has been lifted out of me by many great women, particularly women of ‘advanced age,’ I shall never blame my dear ladies – for anything. No, for if it is a lack of quality, and that theory has only entered the cosmos partly to take the focus off of myself, it is my fault, men’s fault, for that being the case, which it is likely not. Reader, you now ask, “Are you suggesting that women are responsible for nothing?” If in the context of interactions between men and women we subscribe to the James Brown philosophy that this is a man’s world, that would not be anything if not for a woman or a girl, and many of us do, then is it not our duty as men, to accept responsibility for that world we claim to be ours and the environment which we have created? 

Accepting this as accurate, it may or may not be, I forbid any man to place the blame upon my lovely ladies, citing that they are at fault for any lack of quality amongst them. Now, if men are to accept this responsibility, removing blame from women and taking it upon ourselves, that would suggest that there is no shortage of quality women but a shortage of quality men. It has not always been this way, has it? Do we agree, assuming that we agree so far, likely not, that there once was and now there is not? In that case, where have they gone? As far as I can tell, there are only three types of men in this world. Men of action, men of intellect, and men who have not chosen between the two. Ah. I hear you, male reader. You are both, you are! I hereby congratulate you on unlocking the balance we all desire; however, are you not presented with a new problem? A competition amongst the most elite of men, striving for the most elite of women? Oh, my silly male reader! The more we change, the more we remain the same. That is the phrase, anyway. Why you are now jockeying for status with Elon Musk and Conor McGregor! You are still one of us, Sir. One of us, one of us! All this talk of picking lanes. Reader, are you now perturbed that I speak not of myself but of the world around me, when mere paragraphs have passed and we both admitted that I was caught in a bit of a soliloquy? Soliloquy – nobody fucking talks like that. Were we both not frustrated with myself for talking about myself? As you wish, reader. 

Does the question now become which of the two is more productive, the man of action or the intelligent man? An obvious answer is that the two polar opposites need to coexist with one another, as tends to be the case in all opposite ends of a spectrum, but I, for one, am not a fan of pity-pat, fence-playing, unassuming answers like that. It is my belief that there is no such thing as a fifty-fifty split. You may think this is splitting hairs, but the closest we shall ever get to reaching fifty-fifty is a fifty-one-forty-nine split. Something is always, if even very slightly, better than something else. Earlier, we have described a man with hardly any education, who could hypothetically be more intelligent than that of a man who has authored books. . . To be continued.