Trauma and Loneliness are Interlinked
A personal dive into how isolating life can be if you don't conform to society.
For this post I am going to take a break from esoteric and occult topics for a little self-reflection. Be warned, you are about to dive into the thought processes of a madman.
One thing I have learned in my journey as a writer, you need to pace chapters and flow to not overwhelm the audience. This will be a moment to pause and let the reader process the deluge of heterodox information that I have been dumping on you in the past few posts.
Consider this a palette cleanser before I dive into demons, angels, gods, and religions. While I know that the small number of people who read these ramblings know me in real life, this will be written for a broad readership as if none of you know me. Don’t fear, I will be opening up myself in a way that I am sure everyone will discover something about me they were unaware of, even those who think they know me the best.
We are living through societal trauma, but rather than pontificating on how we can deal with that I feel a personal reflection on my own individual trauma is more apt. Understand, if you hurt inside you are not alone. We are just not allowed to admit that our society is sick and being healthy in it is a red flag and not the contrary.
Please understand that anything I write here about my struggles does not reflect a call for help or an indirect slight/plea to anyone in particular. I am happy and comfortable in my isolation. In discussing my plight, I hope to help others find ways to cope with the oppressions of modern society.
Society is Sick, Not Fitting in is Healthy
No need to bury the lede. Society is diseased, the only question is will it be fatal for the human species or not. I don’t believe so, but this disease will eat away a vast majority of the host (the majority of humans will be sacrificed to the powers that be).
As I say in almost every post, where you ascribe the blame for the degradation of society — capitalism, lack of belief in God, natural process of evolution, climate change, human nature, cyclical nature of the universe, entropy, etc — is up to you. It is not one simple answer.
Anyone who tries to tell you one thing is responsible for all the ills in the world is lying to you (and probably trying to sell you something as well). Life is complex. No one solution can right the ship of this experiment called homo sapiens.
Yes, I do consider us an alien species on this planet. If you want an explanation of that, you will have to wait for the release of my fictional novel, “The Devil’s Blackmail.”
Our worship of the disease of hoarding (it is okay if you hoard money) is a major factor in the destruction of this planet we live on. Our collective disregard for the mystical realm is also a major factor. A myriad of other calamities, some natural and some self-inflicted, are also contributing to our mental and physical sickness as a society.
If you are not depressed, anxious, or lonely in our modern society then you are ignoring reality. Ignorance is not bliss in perpetuity. Sure, running towards the cliff edge without fear or worry is fine, but eventually you will run yourself off the ledge and tumble to your death on the rocks below.
Caution about an impending disaster is healthy, not toxic, provided you don’t let fear consume you.
We are living against the natural order of the ecological system on this planet, and we are also disconnected from our spiritual purpose. Why we are spiritually discordant with ourselves will be further expounded upon in later writings.
The best way to describe modernity is winner takes all. This goes for all aspects of life. Winner takes all is a simplification, but it is how most things operate. Safety nets and collective action have been replaced with selfishness as a virtue. We justify the cutthroat nature of life and leave those who fail to wither and die.
Empathy has been codified as weakness. This permeates all aspects of life, not just the economy. We glorify psychopaths and sociopaths, and we are ruled by them. This will not end well.
If you can’t find a way to swallow the gaslighting and bullshit that is fed to you by all aspects of our society — the media, politicians, the educational system, your boss, or anyone else who tries to convince you to just suck it up and be a good cog in the machine — don’t fret. Our better nature is warning us about where we are headed to if we continue on this path of self-immolation.
Not swallowing the poison that will lead to a terminal outcome is healthy. Just because everyone else is drinking the poison is not a reason to join in the ritual suicide.
My Alienation Always Existed
Ever since I was a young boy, I’ve been alienated from the bulk of humanity. I was picked on as a child and became very insular due to this. I grew up in a Christian home and went to a Christian private school until high school where I was abused, both physically and mentally, for my entire youth.
I was ridiculed for being a crybaby because I couldn’t control my tears and would cry like a girl. I also was ridiculed for reading the Bible (yes, at a Christian school I was ridiculed for being a Christian), sweating too much, writing poetry, liking girls, and anything and everything I did. I was the kid it was okay for everyone to denigrate in order to elevate their social position.
The abuse I endured as a child was not just by my peer group, as I was also bullied by some of the adults in the school system (teachers and administrators alike). People who are my friends and relatives that question why I rebelled against the Christian church are simply ignorant to the fact that my abuse was from the hands and mouths of those who called themselves Christians.
Of course I can’t stand Christianity, it is the fulcrum of my abuse as a child. Get the fuck out of here with your self-righteous bullshit. It wasn’t simply kids that engaged in social peer-pressure against me because I was the person that had been chosen as a pariah, the adults who should have known better also engaged in the abuse.
It has taken me a long time in my life, over forty years, to not blame Christianity itself. I still know that it is a not the truth about divinity, it is a religion of subjugation and conformity, but I can’t hate people for wanting to believe in something. (Even if the Bible warped the teachings of Buddhism and reformed them to control the subjects of the Greater Roman Empire under the boot of an authoritarian leader.)
Part of this alienation that I felt from a young age was due to the fact that I had an emotionally absent father. He was physically there, but he was too self-focused to provide me with any guidance (other than discipline).
While most people would still harbor ill-will against their father in my situation, I have made peace with his lack of love and affection. It molded me into the hardened rock of a man that I am today. Without his inattention, I might just be another spoiled white guy who doesn’t understand their inherent position of privilege in society.
Don’t take the wrong message from the last few paragraphs, abuse is not healthy. I am not telling you to ignore and ridicule your children to turn them into stronger people. I barely survived my childhood, and miraculously I survived my early adulthood. I was and am broken inside in ways that will never fully heal.
The first choice I was given as an adolescent was where I wanted to attend high school. I was offered two prestigious Christian high schools or public high school. This was not a choice. I chose public high school without a second of thought or deliberation. I knew that I would never escape the public persecution if I went to either of the two Christian high schools that my peers would be split amongst.
Public high school was a chance for me to reset who I was and let people judge me for who I am, not the reputation I had from when I was ten years old. Needless to say, I made the right choice. Public high school allowed me to develop as an individual and find my way in the world without the baggage assigned to me by others to weigh me down into submission.
It is not a coincidence that I have zero friends in my life from prior to high school. I did not turn out to be the good God-fearing Evangelical Christian that the vast majority of my peers in elementary and junior high became. My best friend throughout elementary school turned into an anti-abortion crusader, the others I don’t know and frankly don’t give a shit about.
I was an outcast from a young age, but in high school I found common cause with a bunch of different groups, all outcasts in their own different ways. I was a skater (skateboarder), I hung out with the band nerds even though I wasn’t in the band, and I found common cause with the other uncool groups of people like the Goths, the metalheads, and the stoners.
The social dynamics were still the same at the public high school, but being at a much larger school (1,100 people in my class versus 20) allowed me to find like-minded losers and outcasts. At my private Christian school there was only one other kid in my grade who was picked on as much or more than me. (Ironically, he was the only person who I ever spoke with in adulthood from my private Christian school.)
Forced into being a loner at a young age, I felt comfortable creating my own world to occupy. Growing up in an isolated community outside the sprawl of suburbia meant that I spent my free time running around the untamed hills of Southern California searching out trap-door spiders, lizards, and hiking through hills populated by rattlesnakes and other critters.
I have one brother, but he spent most of the time in his room reading or down at the neighbors playing while I ran around solo most of the time. We were good friends when we were younger, but now we don’t speak. The drama surrounding that will be kept private. We were never close, but we shared our belongings, hobbies, and passions with each other in mutual respect.
I have always been happiest when left alone to my own devices to explore, contemplate, and simply inhale the complexities of life.
Trauma Is Forever, How You Cope is the Key
If anyone ever tells you that you can get over your trauma, they’re lying to you. Scars heal, but they never go away. Trauma is a mental scar. You will never forget about the things that cause you anguish, but you can learn to use them for empowerment or cowardice.
Those are your options.
Sadly, I had to learn this on my own through trial and error throughout the majority of my teenage years and early adulthood. The main reason why was that I was unaware that I had trauma. This is one of the defining features in those who can’t cope with their past: denial.
I was raised in a two-parent home, in an era where divorce became the newest phenomenon. My upbringing was middle class. My family did not struggling to put food on the table. I was raised in a Christian home that instilled good morals and an ethic code onto me from a young age.
All of those ancillary details didn’t matter. I suffered abuse and neglect despite the on paper details appearing idyllic. Just like in sports, what appears to be perfection on paper doesn’t always play out that way in the real world.
In high school I became aware that my reality had been hidden from me and quickly turned to drugs and alcohol as a coping method. I spent the vast majority of my life since the age of sixteen in a daze. Since those substances couldn’t cure the underlying pain, my abuse increased over the years until it almost consumed me completely.
I can happily say that I have walked out the other side of multiple addictions, but sadly so many did not escape like myself. While I consider myself lucky to have found myself in my early forties and turned my life around, too many do not find their raft to save them from the seas of misery.
Before you judge, I am not condemning anyone who drinks alcohol or has a recreational drug habit. Not everyone who enjoys getting high is an addict, and not everyone who consumes substances has a problem they are trying to mask or escape. But the vast majority of people I encountered along the way through the dredges of addiction had some sort of trauma, whether acknowledged or not.
There are many ways that people cope with their trauma, some more healthier than others, but you cannot cure the pains that you endured. You can only learn to live with the scars, and if you are lucky, you can turn the scars into motivation.
Frankly, people who recognize their trauma tend to be able to control their destructive behavior more than others. While I thought that I had a grip on mine, in reality I was a freight train going full steam ahead hoping that I could escape the storm that had followed me since childhood or run off the tracks and crash. Either outcome seemed equally desirable.
Despite the fact that I have found inner peace and no longer contemplate suicide on a daily basis, the trauma remains. You cannot escape that which defines you. As I alluded to in my last post about ghosts being scars on time, trauma is a scar on your soul that is embedded deep within and will carry over with you into your next life as well.
Still, you can use the trauma you endured as a motivation to fulfill your purpose and be the best you can be. Without trauma I doubt I would have ever actually written my first novel, or started this Substack, or tried to be a musician, or had the courage to sell all my belongings and flee the United States to find myself.
I did not go on a tour of Europe as a twenty-something, I had a mid-life crisis and gave up. It took a lot to get to that point, but I will not sugar-coat the fact that my trauma broke me to the point where I ran away from everything and everyone.
But here is the rub: you can’t run away from yourself. Trust me, I’ve tried.
The worst thing you can do with your trauma is ignore it. Bottling up your emotions, hiding from your fears, or denying reality will only provide you with a short term reprieve. Trauma will not go away over time on its own, you must process it methodically and intentionally.
If you refuse to deal with your trauma, it will consume you or destroy you. People try to bury the pain for a reason. Sometimes, addressing your tragic past will destroy you or consume you as well.
Trauma is forever and it will follow your soul into the next life. Make things easier on the future you, in whatever dystopia awaits humanity, and address it head on.
Eventually, Trauma Will Break You
Let me be clear, I had a dual purpose when I left the United States. I told everyone that I had to leave America and find a place where I felt comfortable. My biggest culprit was consumerism, and I said that I needed to go somewhere that people valued the things in life that really mattered.
This was not a lie. It was a large part of my motivation to flee the country of my birth. My mid-life genesis happened after a suicide attempt (which ended with the police breaking into my apartment while I was asleep and assaulting me). Yes, the police were doing a wellness check on me (whether called in by a friend off of my fatalistic post on Facebook or government surveillance overreach is immaterial).
After I tried to drown myself in the Atlantic Ocean I got sober for the first time as an adult. Not only did I quit drinking alcohol, which had become a one pint of Crown Royal a week habit, but I also quit my true drug of choice in marijuana. I had never quit both at the same time before. There were times when I didn’t smoke weed, and times when I didn’t drink, but prior to that day after my thirty-ninth birthday, I had never been completely sober.
Being sober had given me a new perspective on life. What it made me realize was that I had continually tried to find my way to fit into the world, but each time it had been unsuccessful. I needed to take a drastic step and pursue my dream of being a writer, but I also felt like there was no future for me in this world so I might as well go out in a blaze of glory.
I had moved away from where I was born and raised further and further and further each time, but the trauma still remained. Los Angeles to Mammoth, then Las Vegas, then Rhode Island, but even 3,300 miles from where I was born the trauma still haunted me.
I tried to physically flee my mental anguish by putting the most amount of distance between where the trauma had occurred. This I know now, but at the time I thought I just needed to put more distance to get a fresh perspective. Why not go to the opposite side of the world?
Asia and Australia would be my destination, because there would be no safety net there. I would either sink or swim. Either option would be fine with me, as resolution was what I desired more than anything.
Absolution was not my quest, acceptance of my place in the world was.
When I left Rhode Island I went on a tour of friends and family to say my goodbyes. I never intended on returning to the consumerist hellscape of the United States. I took two months driving throughout the states and stayed with friends and family along the way before I left.
I didn’t have a destination until a few weeks before my time was up. I enjoyed seeing how others lived and found comradery before I left the country of my birth. Part of me still hoped I would find some girl and settle down instead, but destiny did not provide me an easy way out.
Besides, I had already tried that way. The “settle down and be a good citizen” lifestyle had turned me into the miserable cunt that I had become. I left a good job, a comfortable lifestyle, and a near decade relationship to reboot myself, same as I had done when I chose to go to a public high school as a child.
What I didn’t tell anyone and kept a secret was that I planned on committing suicide on my fortieth birthday. Go out with a bang, on my own terms.
My trauma had caught up with me, and the trappings that society had offered me to deal with it — consumerism, relationships, alcohol, drugs, success, and escapism through video games — only pacified my burning pain for so long. I would either become my greatest self or would no longer exist.
Either option seemed better than just being another cog in the machine who drank and smoked his way through the morass of existence.
Capitalism hadn’t broken me. Christianity hadn’t broken me. Alcoholism hadn’t broken me. The false hopes of careerism hadn’t broken me. My untreated trauma that I let fester in the recesses of my soul had metastasized and broken me.
I could no longer bite the bullet and put one foot in front of the other, as if it mattered. Lucky for me, I had already broken bad and had enough money to go out in a blaze of glory on my own terms without anyone around to stop me from living up to my goal — killing myself.
Find a Home or Suicide, Either One Works
When I left the United States I ended up in Melbourne, Australia first. I love that city. Melbourne is an amazing city and I enjoyed it so much that I tried to find a way to emigrate there, at least for a brief moment. I spent two months in the Melbourne area and did tourist things, but I mostly lived there like a local.
I started drinking not soon after I was there. Isolation had reared its ugly head and I went back to what I knew. It was a strange country, so I wasn’t about to try and score a bag of weed as a foreigner. If marijuana had been legal, I probably would not have started drinking again.
It was not easy to try and be social as a stranger in a strange land, but I did have a few amazing experiences with locals and made a few temporary friends. I went on several dates through Tinder, but the best experience I had was when I met a group of guys at the local pup who showed me a night on the town.
Looking back, I now realize that I am not someone who is as bold and adventurous per se but more likely to go along with a crazy idea as long as someone else is steering the ship. I do have more courage than most, but when left in isolation, I tend to curl into my comfortable bubble.
I spent time in Sydney and Cairns (to see the Great Barrier Reef) before I left Australia. From Australia I went to Manila, Philippians. I traveled around a little while in Manila (go to Palawan), but mostly just lived a normal lifestyle after I met someone. It was never destined to last, but company helped me pretend that there was a future for me as a normal citizen of the global society.
I saw Hong Kong before I left the Philippians, but went to Bangkok, Thailand from there. Thailand was where I become most isolated and ratified my plans to commit suicide on my fortieth birthday. Even meeting someone and having a full-time girlfriend didn’t dissuade me from my mission.
On my fortieth birthday, I planned to jump off of the twenty-third floor balcony onto the concrete below. The biggest challenge for me was trying to figure out the right trajectory to ensure that I didn’t land in the pool and possibly survive. I was resolute in this as my destiny.
But fate did not comply. On my fortieth birthday I was sick as a dog. I could not get out of my bed and my girlfriend attended to me with tea and noodles to nurse me. The next day I woke up completely fine with zero symptoms left. I am convinced it was a spiritual sickness to keep me alive, not a physical one.
The novelty of killing myself on my fortieth birthday had passed, so I went for the second best option: recreating one of my favorite movies of all time, Leaving Las Vegas, and drinking myself to death. I began in earnest and spent most of my free time drunk.
One of the good things about this non-suicide is that I started to write my first novel, or my second one, since I had left the United States. I would eventually abandon this project and move onto another one before I abandoned that before I ended up writing the one that I have actually completed, but those words are lost to a melted down hard drive. The stories remain in my notes and my head, but I have moved on since then.
From Thailand I spent a month in Bali, Indonesia with my Thai girlfriend prior to my planned suicide and explored almost the entire island. I wanted to sit inside and write all day, she wanted to explore every last temple and tourist spot. She won out, because part of me wanted to experience it all as well. I must thank her for pushing me so during that trip, may she rest in peace.
Yes, she is dead now. So is my best friend in Cambodia who I haven’t even got to. Most of the people close to me die. It is who I am. You cannot be close to a necromancer and not touch death. It is also why I like to keep myself isolated. The duality of things exists, as I am a healer and a destroyer.
I found my way to Cambodia for a visa run to get a two month visa to Thailand and I knew it was my home immediately. I spent two month in Thailand, then one in Cambodia to ensure I was not just elated from finally meeting a group of ex-pats and finding a community, and then one month in Malaysia (entire trip with Dengue Fever stuck on a bed) before I moved to Cambodia where I would live for over three years.
The entirety of my four years outside the United States I was on a destructive path with no desire to ever redeem myself or contribute to society. I did everything that you shouldn’t as a middle finger to the rules. Life was hard, but I was too intoxicated at all times to notice. I wanted to die, even though I found girlfriend after girlfriend and went through bouts of positivity.
In the end, I had a large group of friends including my best friend Parker Jones, opened a bar and made more friends, and felt part of a community. Yet, I was a hollow shell inside that did not want to live. My trauma stayed with me throughout it all, and I was stupid enough to continue to court more and more trauma along the way.
You can’t escape your trauma, and if you do, you are likely to incur more trauma like I did. How I saved myself from my cycle of self-immolation is my own personal journey. Some secrets must be maintained.
Know this, it wasn’t by following all the rules or breaking all the rules that I found my purpose and clarity in the madness of existence. It was through an honest assessment of who I was, what I had been, what I was capable of, what I wanted, and the lies that I had told myself my entire life.
Until I was honest with myself, and stopped blaming myself for all my shortcomings, I was a wreck. Now I am just a pieced together former wreck. Those scars are still there, but I they now define who I am and what I am capable of not what is my path.
Summary
My path is not your path. I do not tell you all about my personal trauma to curry sympathy or lecture you about how to survive. The world is a cesspool. All I hope is that my honesty and ability to confront the demons of my past will give you the courage to do the same.
You cannot heal from your trauma if you keep feeding it. The most common ways to feed your trauma are denial, anger, pity, despair, and the pursuit of indulgences. There is no vice that can cure you, no hill you can climb that will absolve you, and no god to worship that can make the pain go away.
The best you can hope for is learning how to live with your pain, your trauma, and use it to your advantage.
I wish I had better advice, but survival is a best-case scenario. Stop believing in utopia. Arthur Schopenhauer was correct, the pain is the only thing that is real.
Embrace the pain, learn from the trauma, and stand on your own two feet. Nobody else can live your life and no one can save you but yourself.
“Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the law.”
Alister Crowley from The Book of the Law