My thoughts recently can only be described as an existential crisis, and, according to my friend, shows that I've swung more heavily back into the low depressive episode than I had thought.  So much so that he said, basically, he would be afraid for me if I went into the next semester with nothing to do, due to my history and my current thought patterns.

Basically, I've been hit really hard with this idea that my life is a boring sludge of an existence, and that I will never have grand adventures, and for some reason lately, it has made me feel...empty.  Originally I typed 'overwhelmingly sad,' but that's not entirely true.  I feel like I have no purpose, and I'm just aimlessly drifting through life with no willpower to do something else because I know deep down I will just end up resenting it, just how I end up either resenting or feeling nothing towards most things I start doing.

I joke that I get so sucked into my video games and books and such and really...it is because that is where adventures happen, and - especially with video games - I actually feel like I do have a purpose, strangely enough.  When I'm playing as Noctis - for example, since I've mostly been in ffxv lately still - I'm a chosen king with a deeper purpose.  It sounds silly, I know.  And I'm not deluding myself; I know I'm not.  I know the characters in these games are not real and I will never have the epic stories that they have and I'm just reduced to mediocrity, but...when I'm playing I get lost in them because it feels nice to have something to fight for, even if it is just a fictional world. 

People look at me funny when I tell them I can and have sat and played games for 10+ hours at a time (on many many occasions), and that to me, it feels like nothing.  I guess to other gamers, that's not entirely abnormal, but for me, it is really just...I get so absorbed that my brain doesn't register how long it has been.  I get swept up in other things too, but for games where I am super invested in the story and the characters...I lose myself, if that makes sense.  I won't eat because I don't think to, and on the off chance I do think 'oh I should probably eat,' I get something that requires no time to prepare and/or eat it super quickly so that I could get back to what I was doing.

But I know that its not me.  I'm not really off on some grand adventure with a higher purpose; I'm just sitting in my room, ignoring the other responsibilities in my life because I can't seem to focus enough on them to get them done. 

Right now, I just feel like...everything snaps back to this feeling of emptiness.  It is the status quo, and knowing and believing that just...makes me suspicious of every single time I'm happy about something.  Because I know it won't last.  I know it is fleeting, and the cost of that happiness will eventually be either debilitating sadness, or just this empty nothingness.  Which is worse?  I don't know, but realizing it is my status quo...it makes me wonder why I stick around.  (So...yeah, I guess friend has every reason to be afraid for me.)  Why stay when nothing can make me happy for long?  Is it fair to force my friends and family to have to deal with my episodes of depression and empty cryptic messages?  If I can't focus on anything, is it fair of me to make them pick me up every few weeks and tell me how much potential I have when I am just going to slink back into the mode where I feel useless and like I'll never have a purpose or be a productive member of society?

Friend told me that I should just try and go on these adventures I want but...weirdly, I don't know how to make that happen.  Like I'm trapped in a box that is suffocating me and I'm not sure how to get out.

I can't function or focus.  And its making me have trouble with this whole 'learning mathematica' thing and I feel like a damned idiot.  Like the only thing I'm good at lately is playing my games and that's about it. 

Classes have started so maybe...idk...maybe I can get something back.  If I want to get on the market this year I need to get back into mental shape.  Which has been proving...difficult. 

I have a craving for something but I'm not sure what that is.  Sigh.

It's strange that all of my motivation disappears as soon as I return to Binghamton.

...though that's saying a lot, since I do not have a lot of motivation elsewhere anymore, unless it is in an entirely new spot. I had wanted to see if I could rent a cabin or something in Vermont to try and focus on work and writing but...my financial situation has not been great since I have not been doing anything over the summer.

I was looking up job postings and my...I wouldn't say apathy but something like it, was a bit disconcerting. Like everything I saw I was like "well I can't get that," and moved on. Even for a position that specifically talked about teaching quant methods (which I assume means stats and game theory, both things I am somewhat well versed in), I was like "nope, wouldnt get it."

Maybe it is my mind subtly telling me to go a different route, but where would I go? Nothing excites me. Everything I could do just seems like I would enjoy for a year or two before I would get bored and want to move on. It is tedious. And can I keep up the pace needed for an untenured academic? My track record says no.

Even now my article is awaiting reviewer scores and I am terrified of it coming back as a rejection or seeing feedback that tells me how terrible it is. I need it to get in somewhere if I want to be on the market; I will have no chance otherwise.

At least my mathematica learning is coming along...albeit slowly, because I just am not good with programming. But today I learned about the manipulate command, which should help me in figuring out a solution to this game of mine for the second chapter. I just need to somehow combine it with integral calculations...which I still am not sure how to do.

Luckily I'll be able to put semi proficient in mathematica now on my CV once this is done. And it will be good; I have a feeling I will need this program a lot of I continue down the formal theory path...which is likely.

Unrelated but cruise was nice even though I was feeling emotionally strange the first few days...like I couldn't get into it. I did read and write a lot for fun though (got 5 requests written from tumblr and read an entire trilogy - the Tamir triad, which I highly recommend), so that was nice! I did spend a lot of time not in the sun though; my intolerance of the heat and humidity has skyrocketed, it seems.