Diary Of The Unappreciated

Escape

Today I want to talk about something that all of us have and only a handful of us use consciously, escapes.

Now to those of you poor saps who for some unthinkable reason don't know what an escape is; it is a sort of failsafe mechanism that is written in your code that allows you to 'escape' your current upsetting situation - whatever it may be - and take you to what has been crudely named, YOUR HAPPY PLACE. It is sometimes switched on by you, your oppressor, your lover - if you have one - or sometimes when you are just in a bad mood it will come without warning and instantly drop your volatile emotions down a few levels.

Now there is a whole variety of different kinds of escapes, each telling a brief summarization of you and your personality.
Example:
My first example would be the most common escape, music. Now I'm sure that a large amount of you wil disagree with me about music being an escape but that is only because you have not properly felt its calming vice around and inside your body, mind and soul. And to the equal number that will agree with me about music being an escape will only have felt its power but not its pull into delusion. An escape is not like an anti-depression pill that calms down your tidal wave of emotions and works only temporarily, no. an escape is like a drug, addictive and equally as dangerous because what happens when you find life too difficult? You escape and never return. Sound preposterous, I know but don't a lot of things? It's a little condition I like to call a self-induced coma.

But I'm getting of track. Now everyone has bad days, some more than others of course but still. Now music becomes an escape the moment you decide to sit - or stand - with your instrument - or microphone if you have the voice for it unlike someone I know - and start to play. Slowly the world outside starts to fade, your problems start to melt and the only thing you know is your music. You fall into a deep sleep and fully immerse yourself into the harmonic composition. Feeling every string, rocking every chord and playing every note. Dissecting the whole song to its most basic compilation and merging each and every aspect of the song with yourself or sending them outside to enchant and compel - unknowingly - those around you to do what you want them to do. That is the power of music, that is the potential of the escape.

Another escape would be the study of martial arts, or if that don't work for you, the owning and beating of a solid object. Sane people usually have a punching bag but to those of you who prefer a wall or a tree or something of that sort... Anyway, this escape focuses more on brute force, the workings of this escape is very simple. You rage out all your anger onto the object of choice, tire out your body until and sometimes past its limitations. Once you are tired you either relax and restart the very short cycle or you just collapse from exhaustion and wake up in a slightly better mood. Personally not an escape that I would prefer and or recommend but if it works for you then great.

One escape that I never understood is knitting/sowing. I mean intellectually I understand it because all you do is you focus so much at the task at hand that you either forget the problem or le it fade out in the background. Now emotionally and psychologically is where it throws me totally of because it reminds me of a Graec myth; the Three Fates.

Clotho ( youngest ) spun the thread while Lachesis dispensed it and Athropos ( oldest ) cut it. In short Clotho caused birth, Lachesis life and Athropos death. Now is that why people love knitting? Because psychologically they believe themselves to be like Lachesis, the controller of life? I don't know and I guess I'll never know but yeah...

Then there's reading and writing. Readings philosophy is pretty easy, you hate the life that you are currently in so you read to live yourself in someone else's life. Pretty successful and handy escape except that it is unnervingly temporary. The moment you put down your book, reality hits you like a frater truck skidding in your direction. Writing is a little bit more complex but only a little, it's the same basics as reading except instead of living yourself in someone else's life you create a better life for yourself and live in there. Pretty simple.

Now although there are countless types of escapes I am only going to talk about the few that I have mentioned above. I did say that these escapes are dangerous and addictive and now I shall explain how:
Music and reading is pretty simple, you lose yourself in the medium and get addicted to the feeling so in the end you become what is apparently called a hermit.

Writing and knitting can have dangerous effects because controlling your medium isn't enough anymore so you start controlling the people around you. Really nasty business doesn't end well. Trust me!

Release of anger through boxing not only becomes dangerous but deadly too because the feeling that is produced while you destroy your selected medium gets addictive and like a drug, it becomes normal and you want a higher does. This is when one starts to fight other people who can actually fight back. This increases the drug and the user just goes deeper into the underworld which could verily easily cause his death. Like I said, would not recommend it but if it works for you then I hope that when you are placed in front of the multiple forked road, that you choose to go down the right one because if you don't, we'll be drinking tea with the devil himself.

---Wolf