On Stagnation

Stagation.

The third state. The one we fall into without a thought, trapped in our railroads and empty routines. The worst state, where where growth is stunted and our fire goes out. Stagnation is what kills us in the end. We may try to improve ourselves to death, but that blaze is never in reach. We stop improving, we stagnate, and then we die.

I used to think that stagnation was an anomalous state, an aberration caused by... something. I don't know. Trying to write it out just emphasizes how pervasive it is. Nothing causes stagnation. After we've grown enough it simply happens. It's the normal state, I think. Only serious external events really knock us out of complacency and back into growth. Otherwise we're stuck. We can temporarily force ourselves to fight, but not for long. We grow tired and our will fails us.

As you can tell, I want to improve. So stagnation is a biiiiiiit of a problem.

Solving it is essential. Unfortunately, I have no idea how to do this. It seems almost impossible. The entire point of stagnation is that if you aren't doing your damnest every single day to avoid it, you succumb to it. And it's really hard to do your damnest.

Case in point: last night I got badly drenched by the storm. Really badly, "shoes are soaked completely through" badly. There was no way for me to get to campus today, so I stayed home. My plan was to get ahead on all of my work. Over the past ten hours I have... done my reading for one class, read five pages for my research job, and did the dishes. I spent the rest of it vegging out in front of the computer and playing with the rabbit. Hell, I just managed to force myself to do my laundry. The place isn't cleaned, I haven't made tomorrow's lunch, I haven't graded a single homework... you get the idea. Writing this post is taking a huge amount of effort. Today I stagnated.

So stagnation is something we have to use every ounce of will to beat, for a short time, and without much gain. To stop stagnating we have to gain infinite willpower or be physically addicted to improvement or something. It's a shadow under which we live with our whole lives. It has always has the upper hand, and the rules say it always wins.

But what if we cheat?

Is there a way to beat stagnation without inhuman willpower? Maybe. Could we set things up so there's always external events kicking us out of the rut? I have no idea. But it's an idea worth pursuing.

The most important part in self improvement is also the hardest to do. How do we beat stagnation? I've been trying to figure this out for years and have gotten nowhere. But maybe this is the year. If not, next year. If not, the year after that...