```yaml title: RE: 30 questions for me and for you link: re-30questions published_date: 2025-03-23 05:03 tags: restored make_discoverable: true ``` --- Stumbled upon this gem on the **Discover** page and decided to give it a go, albeit a slightly different format. These are my answers to the 🍄 [212. 30 questions for me and for you](https://marblethoughts.bearblog.dev/30-questions-for-me-and-for-you/) list by [K](https://marblethoughts.bearblog.dev/about/) <span class="fieldmark"></span> ## Existential *Questions about identity, purpose, and the nature of life* 1. **What if all of this is just a dream?** - Depending on how you view the world, it is. The way we saw the world growing up was *"All matter is merely energy condensed to a slow vibration. That we are all one consciousness experiencing itself subjectively. There is no such thing as death, life is only a dream, and we are the imagination of ourselves."* 2. **Is there an underlying order amidst all the chaos?** - If you stare at anything long enough, you will start to notice a pattern. I think this is the crutch many of our most celebrated institutions rely on to exist. 3. **Where is the boundary between my own thoughts and what society has imposed on me?** - This is where my generation and the those after me forked in the road. When my generation goes on about "being raised right" what we broadly mean by saying that is you do take great influence from the world growing up and those influences in combination with your growing moral compass (whatever direction those morals point) were the dynamic duo that gently pushed you in one direction or another in regards to who you are as a person. It was those in their 20s and 30s all pissed off at life and everything in our wonderful world, because they outright refused to believe that and didn't participate. This will only ever result in you going in whatever direction the world pushes you — and it is **never** a good place. 4. **When will I find my place in this world? Does it truly exist?** - We all have a role to play in this world and part of growing into that role is one of the core tenets of life itself. Strange urges and problem dealing with obsession will send people wildly in the wrong directions for years or even decades if they refuse to take their heads out of the clouds. I am no exception here, spending the better part of two decades convinced I was going to be a *Chef*. 5. **Will I ever know myself?** - This does not end in life. You will always change. Good people, the best people in the world turn to so many different versions of themselves over the course of their lifetime, it's crazy to assume that will ever stop. Never put stakes too deeply in the ground in any one part of the world, because everything you know in this world to be honest, true and self-evident is going implode into a fiery ball of laughable nonsense in a decade. 6. **Will anyone ever really know me?** - This is entirely on you. Play the social mask game with people you're claiming to be genuine and watch the suffering come your way at the most uninviting time. The world has a great way of getting back at those who put strange energies into the world, be in the form of lies of violence. Nature always wins, Karma — call it what you like. You will get back what you give to the world. If you want to have someone other than your immediate family "really know you" you need to be open to extreme levels of vulnerability that you can't go back on when it's convenient for you. Life is full of regret and you will be heavy on it if you violate the elegance and beauty of vulnerability. 7. **Years from now, how will I remember this time of my life?** - **Who cares.** I will not spend much time dwelling on now then. Historically speaking, this time will be reflected as exciting due to the fact that I will be proposing to Christina and that event in and of itself will introduce a very welcomed fork in the road, and who knows where that fork in the road will lead us, but the only true as the sun rising tomorrow is that wherever life does take me, that journey only makes sense with her by my side, and mine at hers. --- ## Self-Reflection & Personal Growth *Questions about self-improvement and inner struggles* 8. **~~How can I be more gentle with myself?~~** - Discipline and being gentle do not coincide with one another. We must quote Marcus Aurelius' Meditations here: *"Or is this what I was created for—to lie under the blankets and keep myself warm?’ — ‘But it’s nicer here…’ — ‘So you were born to feel nice? Instead of doing things and experiencing them? Don’t you see the plants, the birds, the ants and spiders and bees going about their individual tasks, putting the world in order, as best they can? And you’re not willing to do your job as a human being? Why aren’t you running to do what your nature demands?’"* 9. **What are the deepest life-giving desires I need to pay attention to?** - Capturing life with my camera. 10. **Why am I so afraid of being my true self?** - Because it is impossible for me to answer the last question on this list (the way it is worded), this answer too is tarnished as a result of my age. Caring about being your true-self naturally comes to light, the same way night turns to day around the time your thirties hit. You spent a year or two wondering who all remembered the stupid shit you swore to the old gods and the new where the truth. You suffer from embarrassment but only silently and this internal dealing of this emotion helps shape who you become later on in life as well. Those super mature people you knew growing up, the ones who may have annoyingly mature, they may have been some of the fine souls who found this hidden chapter of lifes rule book years before the rest of us. This is why it is so alarming to us to see the kids of today out there in the world, true internet babies, making some life-altering decisions about their lives that they will have no way of going back on when they get older. I sit here typing these words, the personification of everything I stood against growing up. In a lot of ways, this Today Version of myself is perfect contrast to what I was even when was turning 30. 11. **How can I stop feeling like I constantly need to prove myself?** - This does not go away entirely, but one blaring obvious thing you can do right now to lower its intensity is: **Less Social Media.** 12. **Why am I the only one sabotaging myself?** - The real sabotage here is thinking you're the only one sabotaging yourself. 13. **How to deal with uncertainty?** - By welcoming it. Four Thousand Weeks by Oliver Burkman articulated into words things I could feel on the back of my neck but couldn't put upstairs to formulate into my own words. You're loosing a lot of time, effort, energy and even money by thinking you can have any sort of certainty about absolutely anything in this world. Nothing is static. Everyone is winging it. Everything is a Scam. The only thing you can do in this world is control how you react to these truths. The rest is pure Cruise Control. --- ## Emotional & Psychological Struggles *Questions about emotions, fears, and insecurities* 14. **What is the difference between the feeling of peace and the feeling of numbness?** - Numbness is pushing shit under the rug. The residual energy seeps out over time and leaks itself out onto things like decisions you make a work or talking to your friends. Peace is dealing with it and using that same energy for whatever you would like to apply it to. It is mostly about accepting that you have no control over anything except how you deal with that. Yearn for control and suffer the wrath of the universe. 15. ~~Am I letting my fears take control of my life?~~ 16. **Why am I not as brave as I used to be?** - The complete opposite. The polar opposite. This being true is self-explanatory as to why I would have hated this version of me and if I had known Today Me when I was younger. 17. **Is being sensitive a gift or a burden?** - It's the Natural Default Setting. If you deny this, you deserve exactly what the world gives you. --- ## Life Transitions & Aging Questions about growing up, changing paths, and time passing 18. **Why does going down a different path feel like I'm giving up on my dreams?** - Never had dreams. Told everyone I knew growing up I would be dead by the time I was thirty. That was almost fifteen years ago. I guess that should make me extremely grateful for exceeding my expectations but I was really just dodging the bigger question of answering more long-term questions to people who were genuinely curious; because I had no fucking idea — and was mostly just trying to get thru that day. 19. ~~Am I ever going to feel like an adult?~~ 20. **When will everything fall into place?** - When you stop trying to put things in place. 21. **Years from now, how will I remember this time of my life?** - See the answer to Question 7 😏 22. **Will any place ever feel like home again?** - This again goes back to you and being vulnerable. The inability to establish the idea of "home" lands completely on you. Your energy builds a home and if you carry with you darkness expect nothing short of a home that breeds more for yourself and others to endure. --- ## Love & Relationships Questions about love, connection, and social bonds 23. **How do I love with all of my heart?** - This is the same as being totally present with whatever subject you 'love'. Presence is a choice, and we put so much of the people, time and things that matter the most on auto-pilot. What's strange is that the auto-pilot seems to get put on those you are closest to first and they are somehow expected to accept that and be alright with it. It's not. Don't do it. I am talking to myself. 24. **Am I over-analyzing this or is it a red flag?** - I saw myself answering this question two different ways earlier. This is the one I decided to type out. 25. **How do people maintain large social circles?** - By wearing a lot of different social masks, and loosing little authentic shreds of their true self with each new version of one they have to put on. 26. **Why do I feel lonely around some people?** - I feel lonely in a crowd of people, so I can't answer this. --- ## Success & Achievement *Questions about ambition, potential, and self-worth* 27. **Where would I be now if I believed in myself?** - Far away from here. Far, far away from here. You can play shoulda coulda woulda all day long tho. I fucked things up long before I stopped believing in myself. 28. **Why am I unsuccessful at something I love?** - Focus issues. It's my fault tho, so I don't try and get too upset about all of that. 29. **Did I reach my fullest potential before I turned 30?** - Singlehandedly have I raised the bar on Underachievement. An embarrassment to both of my parents for sure. Someone should have told me that wanting be a Chef was a stupid fucking idea. I did make the best out of everything, and sure did fuck a lot of shit up along the way. "Let the bridges I burn light my path", boy, I never had an issue with not having any light in my world. - --- <div class="afterword"> <p>✉️ <em><a href="mailto:[email protected]?subject={{ post_title }}">Reply by Email</a></em></p> </div>