Crying is wonderful

I'm not sure I can even call it crying, my eyes water, there is an unmistakable ache in my heart, but like a roller coaster there is no danger, the adrenaline produced artificially. On the few occasions -when my mom had to pick me up from jail, when my friend's dad died, the many times I've loved people at the wrong time- I've actually cried it has been a horrible experience. I had no control over the tears, I didn't want to cry more, I wanted to stop crying. My heart hurt so much I thought I would die. Whoever said that words couldn't hurt them had never been hurt by words. Emotions hurt, physically. Emotions heal, physically too, sometimes the same ones that hurt. Everything in moderation, a lesson I know but never quite learned.

I blame my lack of will power on addiction, but I think I actually am addicted to cigarettes, one of my many "addictions." How does this life lesson continue to escape me? It seems to be that people can know things, know for a certain truth, and ignore them. Patients with lung cancer that still smoke, people that know about the horrors of the meat industry but continue to eat fast food, obese people that continue eating desserts and living a sedentary life. While I've quit smoking and haven't had lung cancer yet, I am/was all of these people. One hundred pounds overweight, and I still have dessert more days than I go to the gym. I hate myself but that's not new, makes it hard to find a job or a girlfriend, and I know that too. Self-confidence would probably yield both in short order. I'm not a terrible person, I'm just a person. Educated well enough to be a fine engineer and have enough sense to be pleasant conversationalist. I know this, yet somehow lack confidence.

I've often thought about the disparities between knowing and believing. It's what makes humans great, it's what makes humans human. To take in information, know it, and then check that against all the other information you have for validity. It's odd how that mechanism breaks. I know I'm not terrible but I can't stop believing it even when friends tell me how great I am, but the same mechanism lets me know evolution is a fact, no matter how hard ignorant people try to argue against it. Maybe debating abortion is a better example. Pro-life and pro-choice arguments both have valid points, while I am pro-choice and will fiercely defend that right, I can understand the logic behind the pro-life position, and even agree with many pro-life ideas. None of which changes where I come down on the issue, which isn't to say that debate couldn't change my mind. I was pro-life many years ago, did a lot of research, had a lot of debates and finally arrived where I am now, but I can know, understand, and agree with pro-life sentiments and still believe that pro-choice is the correct approach to abortion. This is where the knowing/believing mechanism works wonders, to be able to see and respect both sides of the coin, while knowing which way you want to see it land.