The Many Layers of Struggle

“The Struggle is Real…”

A common phrase in modern vernacular. This is particularly true within the context of a culture where nearly everything has the potential to turn into “cringe.” This judgmentalistic perspective hampers the full range of the meaning of Struggle.

I am going to discuss this in terms of an individual, and as I only am an expert on a single individual, my observations are going to remain focused on the given that I have. I do believe that much of what I am prepared to say is applicable across a broad spectrum of thinking entities.

Goals and Objectives are Meaningless

No that is not a hot take. That is only half of the context. Goals and Objectives are indeed meaningless if there is no challenge at all to complete them. If my life goal is to get out of bed everyday, I predict that the success rate for an able bodied and healthy human such as myself to get out of the bed and go use the bathroom will be completed and that box will be checked off by natural bodily functions. Simple, easy, and meaningless. They are also meaningless if their are well beyond the realm of possible completion. If my life goal is to win the Super Bowl five times, get three Oscars for Best Actor, and win the Nobel Prize in Physics four years in a row and without completing this bullet list, my life has no value, then I have set some pretty meaningless goals, not matter how much effort I out into these. I am not going to achieve these, especially not while the sidequest of winning the Tour de France seven years in a row is on my list.

In short, without a realistic grasp on what is actually challenging and achievable, setting goals and objectives has no meaning, and does not give us purpose.

Purpose - its not just a thematic motif

Repeatedly throughout my life, I have asked myself, “What is my purpose here?” Sometimes the scope of that question was just scenario specific; like what am I doing in the awful situation. Other times is was the beginning of a deep introspective search for meaning. This context is often associated with a realm of knowledge and information which is reserved for religious or spiritual results. An answer which does not present itself in the form of a single tool or simple response. Rather this question, in the broadest and deepest introspective context possible is the First Struggle.

There is no easy answer

It’s not like knowing that 1+1=2. It’s not even like having read and understood the mathematical proofs that 1+1=2. This answer is consistently squishy and as difficult to hold in your hand as a gallon of cherry flavored gelatin. Without the proper container, it just flows away.

For myself, as a Creative, I find that my purpose is most simply boiled down to a constant expression of the experience of life. I consider myself well gifted in that there are multiple disciplines which I can participate in order to satisfy this purpose. These writings are just an iceberg’s visible portion.

Other Struggles

These get progressively more personal and do in fact relate to the first one. For instance, I struggle with finances. No big surprise. I am a creative, and to be more succinct, I am a wildling version where much of my creative force, technique, and energy is self-derived and created. Therefore, I often do not fit within a neat little box which can be easily packaged and promoted as a product within the context of a hyper-capitalistic society. Nor are my methods readily plugged into the big machine processes of a massive enterprise which sucks lots of creative energies into it to produce the easily marketed, promoted, readily sold products which exist within the consumeristic engines of modern economies. Thus, finding my niche has been a lifelong Second Struggle. One which I do believe has been magnificent in shaping the way I approach nearly everything I tackle.

Self Generated Struggles

As for myself, this is where these philosophical concepts meet the road of practicality.

The past couple of days, I have been writing about big conceptual elements:

• an pseudo branch of academics called Interdimensional Semiotics
• the development and usage of AI Tools
• creation of an entire new planet for a TTRPG setting called Orbis.

In the past couple years, these self-generated struggles have included a weekly podcast of half an hour of new music every week. Occasionally, working with digital art tools, and other sorts of What’s my Fancy Today? items.

These are self-generated struggles which I use to entertain my busy and active mind. They all have results, many of times far below what I thought they would be, and thus Yet Another Struggle. Acceptance of the Real.

As a creative, my imagination runs really wildly in all directions simultaneously. With a strong mathematical side, leaps of exponential degree are possible in this wildness. So I can imagine just about anything. And often do.

I can get lost in a myriad of details. To the detriment of the bigger picture.

I can and have cut off elements which essentially I have given up as unreasonable. Like commercial success. Like a large, strong community. Like outside acceptance.

Instead, I find my satisfaction is derived from completing the little goal posts along the way for realizing my self-generated goals and objectives.

I was going somewhere with this

But originally it was not where we have ended up, so this segue is going to be harsh and ridiculous. Philosophically, Table Top Role Playing Games are based upon a pretty well documented set of rules and mechanics, so that the group of people gathered around the table playing an involved set of “I imagine this…” can enjoy some stable comfort from there being a means to sort out conflicts, disagreements and overlapping ideas which may or may not contradict themselves. Some of these rules are subject to interpretation, and depending on how much effort is put into these interpretations, that can greatly enhance the experience of everyone involved in the party’s narrative.

That being said, I have spend a long time consumed with the nature of Alignment within TTRPG. You know Protagonist versus Antagonist type dynamics. You can even say that this is a very specific struggle I have been pushing up a hill.

Within my knowledge vault there are no less than 94 different documents which I have put information about these concepts. It is highly likely that there are much more than 94, as nuance and subtlety is one of the methods of transmitting this narrative that I have been struggling with developing.

So with that all being said, it is because of this, that I had to turn to one of my Executives at Eckenrode Muziekopname to come up with a crystallized expression of my thoughts on this set of issues. It is a lovely summary and I gained several insights from it - it inspired this thought piece, and the final struggle I have is how to share the results which I have discussed here today with a wider and more accepting audience.