Fluid Fountain

Writing with life and water

Tag: life (page 1 of 1)

lonely bench
June 5, 2022 / 0 Comments

Being introverted should not mean loneliness

Being introverted is not the same as being lonely. Despite living most of my adult life alone, withdrawn from all social settings, I now realise this is not healthy. The digital age has been a gift to introverts like me. There are more ways than ever to tune out from the world and enjoy our presence. Yet by relying on more escapes, does disconnecting from people go further than just being introverted? Introverts may already be overlooking their loneliness. The condition reaches points deeper than mere social isolation- disconnection from people and reality. This article hopes to open the discussion about loneliness and make serial introverts question if a solitary life is really what they want. I do not mean to toxify the desire for alone time but to remind everyone about the need for human love and companionship in a fast-moving world. Loneliness is a deep issue, transcending personality types. The duty falls on us to help each other discover meaning through friends, family, neighbours, colleagues, social groups and more.

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September 27, 2021 / 1 Comment

Anxiety and Uncertainty

Anxiety wrote this article. The culmination of stress, worry and doubt has always been difficult to encapsulate and express. The feeling is often too melancholy. I refuse to give in and remember writing remains the strongest outlet for the feelings and thoughts buried inside me. Today’s movement for mental health encourages me to share my experience. Anxiety is a normal response; humans naturally feel worried and doubt when faced with uncertainty. The modern age, however, brings new pressures, an overabundance of expectations, interactions and information that are all too difficult to restrain. I describe my experience, conversing through the first anxious responses to the deeper-seated anxiety found in social interactions. I then explore some means to managing anxiety. A paradoxical truth remains, more exposure to uncomfortable situations forms the primary means to overcoming fears and doubts. One may still desire an immediate prognosis which Action Commitment Learning offers through brief practical steps. The battle with anxiety may not be about eliminating such feelings entirely but managing how it affects us.

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April 18, 2021 / 3 Comments

How ‘Positive Thinking’ Causes Destruction

Happy: Why More or Less Everything is Absolutely Fine by Derren Brown throws the towel on today’s age of positive thinking. Like with his enigmatic charisma, he guides readers on a different path to ‘happiness’. One that halts the pelting, positive treadmill and focuses on finding acceptance in the reality of disappointment and joy. His graceful writing stretches 446 pages and makes clear readers do not need yet another ‘quick rich scheme’ or a book jammed with positive quotes. After finding myself binging on plentiful ‘inspiring’ messages, I appreciate his view that positivity guides have paradoxically caused discontent in needing continued positivity. Brown introduces Stoicism as the old age thinking to rediscover an approach to finding resilience, acceptance, and happiness in precarious human life. He carves open the stoic perspective by taking the reader through a phenomenal breadth of knowledge, history, philosophy, and psychology. The book offers lots to contemplate, from angles of life to acceptance of death. Ultimately, this book provides a framework to discover and take greater happiness from ordinary life. This article will not be a book review and instead focus on Brown’s interesting contempt of today’s ‘positive thinking’ mantra. Why has the positive thinking movement become such a toxic barrier to happiness? How can positive thinking become suddenly negative and destructive? 

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March 6, 2021 / 0 Comments

How to make the most out of university

After leaving university, my precarious existence has made me question whether a stronger mindset could have carved a stronger path. Thoughts about job security, money, housing, relationships and more have come flooding into mind for someone who only thought about learning. Now, perhaps like others, I find myself as a lone fish wandering the seabed. Learning can no longer be the sole focus. The need for survival and building a future turns a period of curious abstraction and rationalisation futile. The market comes with a price and demands its character and practice. After years stuck in the academic hole as a naïve youngster, the leap into the competitive economy been a difficult and awkward one. Graduation soon brings with it a stretch of adulthood, entering spiralling questions about one’s role, purpose and prospects. If you are like me, still wandering this lush planet, life looks all but ominous amidst continuous job applications and anxiety over what the future holds for you. Estimates suggest more than 2.3 million graduates are searching for a job while only around 30,000 graduate job vacancies are advertised per month. University is life-changing, it can be the proudest feeling for not just students but also their family. However, despite the many successes’ university can bring, my time after graduation was a descent into the abyss. I suddenly felt lonely and worthless.  The paradox being a university degree never felt so worthless. While I do not regret the enlightening experiencing of going to university, the purpose of this article is to remind students there is great value in thinking practically about their future. Gaining knowledge and intelligence is great but it is not the same thing as experience and wisdom; a degree is not everything, work is not everything.

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