It’s a Tuesday and I spent some time trying to work with this new jobs background checking software this morning. I did feel like leaving it a few more days, but the new job is supposed to start next week and since it wasn’t complete, I actually wanted to start the job on time. I still felt tired this morning when I work up around 9 so I tried to sleep a little bit longer. Want to be on the ball for the driving lesson, which went well.
Nick is a tank of a man and has a bit of an ego. He believes his level of instruction is better then the UK driving schools. I do my best to listen to his instructions and avoid his displeasure. Being an asshole and giving Sass is a useless exercise, so I can only be humble there. In the 2 lessons he’s taken me from 0 back to a position where I can drive adequately without ramming the vehicle through the many stone walls of this area. The many stops and starts at junctions today really helped me start to lose the fear I’d gained of stopping and starting the vehicle. The relaxed teaching style is deliberate, and has really helped me to avoid fucking shit up.
Something I’ll always remember from my College Law class is that when you step into a vehicle, regardless of your ability the law seems you responsible for anything that occurs. So if I top 2 grandmas and the family dog, best believe I’m going to Jail. Imagine if they told a 16 year old that when they started learning. Fairly sure they’d shit a brick.
After the lesson it took a while of vegetating in my room before I felt the need to do anything. I felt the mild rumbling in my stomach of hunger when I ran out the house for the bus that was 20 minutes late. The wind was cold whilst I stood out on the stop wondering if the bus would even come. The road is partially closed, and the uncertainty irritated me. This is the moment usually when I get annoyed with myself for not learning to drive, so today I was still annoyed, but I recognised I’d finally started making an effort. I got off in the cycle lane in town, and everyone else did. The kid who thought he could cycle around everyone was forced into a corner of a lamppost when the 5 other people that got off behind me weren’t paying attention and cut up the whole path. I kind of hate people for that sometimes. I stayed in the cycle lane because there was loads of space beside me to cycle around. And I like being where I want to be. Everyone else clearly wanted to be a Z shape, so the 14 year old, wearing a weird yellow bowl helmet stopped. I felt bad for the cunt. Then I crossed the road and headed up the hill towards the gym.
I felt very unmotivated by the time I was at the top of the hill, but felt much better when I got changed and started on the step machine. The calories burned on that thing seem to clock so fast I’ve not found a better substitute in the gym so far. I pushed 20 minutes and sweated out, past the cold sweats that displayed a certain lack of energy. Patrice O’neil blasting out his wisdom while I walk up the equivalent of the Shard, or whatever the distance is.
Mostly the same people populate the gym at the same time of the day. I do my exercise bike, knowing I can burn calories. Sometimes the rowing machine but my back muscles are kind of fucked. The elliptical trainer is a last minute decision and I do it for 20 minutes to top off the session before I leave. The men’s changing room isn’t too bad. Some old guys like wondering around naked and shrivelled. I assume I was raised at the turn of the 20th century as I choose not to wack my dick out in people’s faces. Maybe it’s just polite. A cross section of society presents themselves here. I get changed and shower, the hot water washing over me, and washing away my gym induced pains. And maybe some spiritual ones.
I’m in the gym to lose weight and get back to a level of better options in my life and a little bit of control. I have a mindset that I am high value, but without a corresponding response it’s a waste. I’m fighting my way back to the possibility of receiving what I want on tap instead of working so hard for it. First Cardio and weight loss. Then weight training. The I’ll fix my clothes in my wardrobe so I actually look half decent. The years of travel over self investment have taken their toll, and now I have to take a step back from the many countries and give myself the time to catch up to the real world.
The scales in the changing room say I’ve lost a lot more weight then I thought I had, and I don’t believe it, so I try it again and it gives me the same answer. I decide to try it again tomorrow and see if it changes. What a body weighs one day doesn’t mean it will be the same the next. I look down at my belly and wish it would be smaller, but another 10kg down I should be able to see the ground again, and realistically that’s a good target to start the year too.
When I was bored at home earlier, I watched some videos on YouTube and came across some from the Incel community. The long name of it is involuntary celibate, and some of the videos are quite dark. These guys are not coming from a good place, but I watch a lot of things on there anyway, so I can have a good perspective on many things. It also allows me to give an opinion and understand the lives of others. My youthful exploration of the the great plethora of conspiracy theories and claims in the world led me back to a more stable view of reality. And allowed me to understand those that do genuinely think that every terrorist incident is deliberate or orchestrated, that families control countries or that big business control industries. Some of this is true, but having the ability to filter and assess the truth is the important distinction.
As it was pointed out in a recent episode of London real, the human race has never had access to more information at this point. Knowledge is a click away and it’s changing the way humanity learns and deals with challenges. But it’s also filtering us down to a certain level, and at some point something has to give. We must have the ability to understand what we’ve seen or read, and not accept it at face value or things will begin to go wrong.
People begin to believe in personalities, cults and ideas without decent validity. Always question. As I will be.
Goodnight and God bless
(You can question God too, he doesn’t usually respond though in person haha)
The Journey 