On not giving a F**K: A Personal Post

Coarse language warning.

I do not usually bore my readers with many internal anecdotes. Usually, to get a personal update, fans of The Cameron Cowan Show have to listen to the Weekly Podcast where I will ruminate for a few moments on what is going on in my life with my writing and my work. However, this summer I had some major breakthroughs. I’ve already written about my depression that sunk me at the beginning of my break this summer but one of the interesting things I picked was that most people simply don’t give a fuck.

I’ve learned a lot about not giving a fuck. I’ve learned that most people don’t give any and that I’ve been working far too hard and caring far too much about far too many things and that generally speaking, people do the minimum required to get through life.

When you look at it this way many of the problems we see around us begin to make sense.

Why don’t more people lose weight? Too much effort

Why don’t people make more money? Too much effort

Why don’t people optimize their life, their workflow, and follow the endless amount of life hacks? Too much effort

Humans are fundamentally lazy and this inescapable fact is fairly well the crux of most of our problems. It takes a lot to get humans moving. Opportunity for success, money, resources, and primal needs as well as self preservation are all things that get humans moving. A human at rest tends to stay that way.

So I was faced with an interesting question, “What moves me?”

I can’t deny the fact that I am moved by primal urges like the ability to eat and stay alive (most of the time) but what moved me the most is that I always thought that there was some great future, some great life waiting for me out there (wherever there was) and that all I had to do was work really hard and I could get there. But the pathway to success, however you define that, is far more complicated that.

But here’s the secret that no one told me: it doesn’t exist. It is an illusion of the highest order. It’s more insidious than the Matrix and more complicated than a mirage. I have been always running towards something that I desired and working night and day for it. I’ve written about my 16 hour days and how unbalanced my life has been. I always wondered what it was about me that was different than other people and I’ve realized that it has to do with the fact that I care about myself and my life and that I want to be very successful and I’m in no mood to settle for anything less than the fullness of what I desire. However, I’ve realized that what I care about and what people care about can be quite divergent.

Many people fill their minds with expectations from a variety of sources. Society has no shortage of ideas of what kind of people we should be and how we should live. Many of us, myself included, end up carrying parental and familial baggage. This baggage can have wide-ranging effects on our lives.

I was a bit resentful because I cared. I cared about my life and my success and what I thought I wanted to do and where I wanted to go. I thought that one day I would arrive and simply be above reproach because the the success that I had was far too important for petty comments and people’s ideas about me. I realized that hard work does not make a life complete. Sometimes not giving a fuck is exactly what is required.

Is there life after your motivation is gone? Is there life after it seems like nothing matters and you’re just floating through to the darkness that is death?

That’s what I don’t know yet.