Tyler Abbott

Because No One Is

Despite how obviously negative that title seems, this really will be a pretty chipper post.

The past year, of which I’ve documented a bit here and there—on this blog and other locales—has been a transformative time in my life, a period upon which the rest of it will hinge.

I lost a job and found a new career. Mel and I dealt with the grief of a miscarriage and then the joy of a successful (thus-far) pregnancy. I’ve made many new friends and acquaintances, learned new skills, developed new passions and interests, and overall feel that my experience of life has grown in both richness and depth.

And key in all of that has been the slowly-burgeoning realizing that neither I nor anyone else is special; that despite our best efforts to appear unique, individualized, uncommon, or out-of-the-ordinary, we are all, fundamentally, electrically-powered, divinely-sparked (I believe), heaps of flesh and blood; tabernacles of clay that are here but for a brief moment before fading away.

And this is liberating.

So, in that vein, this will be the last of my naval-gazing and introspection on this blog.

No more will I plumb my own depths (at least not here, for all to see).

To be honest, outside of therapy—and even there I have doubts—there is little to be gained through rumination and self-examination.

Because, what’s inside isn’t unique. We’ve all got the same mechanics, perhaps wired a bit differently, but, generally, the same.

And these insides are not worth shining a light on, at least not in the deeply confessional and autofictional style that is currently in vogue.

To put it another way, extracting the gasoline from a car doesn’t get it anywhere. Actually, quite the opposite. And just like a car, if you empty out the spiritual, mental, and emotional fuel that makes us all weird, wonky, and a little off, then you’re left with empty husks that will go nowhere.

Basically, I want to get out of my own head. Nothing good comes from thinking about oneself all the time.

I’m saying all of this as a way to announce (as if you were all waiting with bated breath) that the focus of this blog will be shifting towards my own professional development, along with personal interests.

This will most likely take the form of marketing/advertising-cum-literary/philosophical pieces.

I may find somewhere else to write more broadly—and more acerbicly—but that will mostly likely be under a a sort of Kierkegaardian pseudonym. So, good look finding it.

Thanks for reading this past year. I hope you’ve enjoyed it. And I hope you like what’s coming.

Let me leave you with this poem I recently read, by T.S. Elliot. There’s no point explaining why I liked it. It may appeal to you for entirely different reasons.

Webster was much possessed by death 

And saw the skull beneath the skin; 

And breastless creatures under ground 

Leaned backward with a lipless grin. 

Daffodil bulbs instead of balls 

Stared from the sockets of the eyes! 

He knew that thought clings round dead limbs 

Tightening its lusts and luxuries. 

 

Donne, I suppose, was such another 

Who found no substitute for sense, 

To seize and clutch and penetrate; 

Expert beyond experience, 

 

He knew the anguish of the marrow 

The ague of the skeleton; 

No contact possible to flesh 

Allayed the fever of the bone.