Incipient Vagabond--Verily

It is for my garden, at least. Not so much for my lifestyle. I have taken to swimming again, and started a rock climbing class that I paid for with leftover scholarship money. Yet, my schoolwork suffers. I've noted before (to myself, to others, in my journals, perhaps to you) that I cannot study anything prescribed to me by others for that merit alone; there must be something otherwise compelling about the material or I feel that it is the last thing I shall do to get done what they prescribe. Perhaps there is some underlying psychological disorder in that. That I take the world as secondary to my own internal being. Yet, on the other hand, I am intensely lonely so often, only to be reintroduced to this world with ephemerals of light. How doth one fit in with the outside world when they are so consumed with developing themself that they neglect even their studies? That is ironic, I know. Just suck it up and do the damn work. But it is not so easy.
I search for signs that I am not the only one in this boat, that it is more deeply-rooted in a sociological problem. The rationale is there; video games are more addicting and more intense and more involving every day, the internet provides 24 hour entertainment for any individual, I am in college and am American and have not been raised with discipline or respect for work before play. But it takes one of such poorly-threaded moral fiber as myself to succumb to it all in such a pathetic way. I live in an abandoned school, that I may avoid a job. I stay up all night, that I may procrastinate and accomplish all my work without compromise. I succumb to my nearly every indulgence and pressure from the outside world.
I have recently read two works which support my sense of self, and another which revolts against it. The first are the book Steppenwolf by Herman Hesse, and an article on Thomas Jefferson by some guy who wrote a book about him (source). It is known that Jefferson had an agile mind, one of the powerful intellects that collided to set the foundation for this most wonderful country (as far as you believe the textbooks... I guess I do). Yet he is commonly criticized for having held slaves to the day he died, was a womanizer and has various other moral blemishes on his profile. He was no master of self-discipline, though he was pragmatic and tried to distance himself from emotion. This verberates in harmony with my own dyscordian rhythms. Same with Steppenwolf, I am incapable of reconciling the wolf and the man within me. I become anima, and loathe myself for the dirty scary uncivilized thing I become; I become human and loathe myself for losing touch with nature and adventure and sensation. i haven't finished the book yet so hopefully it will give me some insight on how to reconcile this.

Finally, after so much deliberation on how pathetic I am and incapable and paralyzed and incorrigibly burnt out, I begin to read Siddhartha. Hesse is the master of young male psyche struggles. I feel so predictable and silly for going through these crises that others have worked through, and have been universal themes of the passage of life since thought.
Now what really stood out to me in Siddhartha was the passage

"He already knew to feel Atman in the depths of his being, indestructible, one with the universe."

So beautiful. This became my new mantra immediately, and within moments I was reciting it to invoke the sense of capacity it offers. I CAN DO WHAT I WANT. I AM INDESTRUCTIBLE! I called out the day after I read this, from the dunes of fort funston after meditating at the midpoint of my run.

And to say all that, in the end, at least I feel. I cannot regret anything I do if it leads me to a deeper empathy with the universe, or a sensation or emotion on which to hold for the future when (godhelpme) I become trapped. Hopefully my writing will simply improve and I will be able to find a niche expressing my experiences (less in such an abstract and superficial way and more in a compelling and universal-truth-discovering journey-way).

So, more tangible posts to come. In the meantime, I'm going to create a mandala