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work release AU
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His eyes linger on the spot Haru was standing earlier, before teleporting out. Circling back further, to "unwanted emotional reactions"...

Well, Haru's dealt with those, himself, hasn't he? Finding Jaeha attractive was an unwanted reaction, and Haru didn't need therapy or Fugimura Hana. All he needed to do was to write his feelings down and stare at them.

That sounds absurd, on the face of it. But maybe Jaeha should give it a go.

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Haru said he writes longform, but Jaeha hasn't written anything longform in actual years, and his handwriting would probably be an illegible scrawl. His preferred interface would've been a commscreen but he doesn't have one of those anymore, so the laptop he eventually got will have to do.

He sits in front of it, turns it on, opens a blank text document, and stares at it.

What... does he do now.

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I don't want to get therapy

, he writes at the top of the document, then stares at it some more.

That's not a feeling. Haru said it wasn't just feelings, why is Jaeha getting hung up on that.

But, like, what else does he write?

I don't want to get therapy because

Because... why?

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He spends five whole minutes staring at that, and then another five looking at his phone and thinking about other stuff and not staring at it, and he still doesn't have anything.

This isn't working. Haru was probably right, this just doesn't work for people who aren't him.

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...

I feel pissed off at the idea that I can't get this to work for me even though it works for Haru

There, that's a feeling. Can he go anywhere with that?

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I feel pissed off at the idea that I can't get this to work for me even though it works for Haru because it's yet another way I'm failing and obviously inferior as a human being. Haru said that other people have tried it and failed, too, but that's different, because they weren't as motivated as I am to try. except, am I even motivated to try? is spite really a good motivator? but it's what i've got, so what else am i gonna do, ignore it to try to find some more "pure" motivation?

...well, i kind of want to, because it's

He looks at it for a few more seconds. He knows what comes next, and it's very silly that he's hesitating. No one else's going to read it.

He now understands why Haru feels private about it.

embarrassing to use spite as a motivation for this. the point of this is meant to be being able to better process and understand my emotions and to have superpowers like Haru does of being able to not feel attracted to someone i feel attracted to. i'm not sure how he does that by just writing his feelings down or whatever and that annoys me and he looks so smug about it and that annoys me even more except since i apparently like him that makes me want to kiss him and those things aren't contradictory because wanting to kiss someone i want to punch isn't like news or anything

i lost the plot

it feels so embarrassing to need spite to motivate my self-improvement, like, holyu shit, kang jaeha, way to go on that being a good person bullshit, yo ucan't even have a good person reason to want to improve? like, say, wanting to improve. that'd be a good person reason to want to improve. itself. it's a good thing.

but fine. i am going to borrow one of those dumb tumblrite words from when i was a teenager and say that i am practising radical self-acceptance here. i will accept that i fucking suck as a human being and i need spite to motivate me.

so

i spitefully want to make this work, and it pisses me off that i need that, but i'll use that

Hmm. He highlights the "it pisses me off that i need that" so that he'll come back to it later.

i don't want to get therapy because it's fucking embarrassing to need therapy for the shit i did. i wasn't the one who got fucking abused for a year and stalked for five, lee tae-gun was. he probably needs therapy. i was fine! i was twirling my fucking mustache and being evil and shit, watching from the sidelines, planning, plotting, and waiting until he was almost dead. that's fucking evil. and like sure i wa sbacklashed by why was i that backlashed in the first place? that's right becausde i was a fucking idiot who couldn't be happy with him being in love with me like a normal person and wanted to possess him completely and isolate him from the rest of his life so that he'd never ever leave me

see where that got you, jackass?

so it was all me. like yeah backlash but it was me, i got backlashed because of me, i abused him because of me, so what fuckjing right do i even have to need therapy? what right do i have to feel fucked up by it, to feel bad about it? or like, i deserve to feel bad about it, because i! was! bad! i was evil! it is my fitting judgment!

typing this out like this is making the shoulder Haru i apparently have make very unhappy noises so fine. whatr. what is it, shoulder Haru. why are you making unhappy noises at me about.

"People don't deserve to suffer. There is nothing you could possibly do to, as you said, stop being a moral patient. No matter how horrible you were, you are still a person, and no one gains anything from your suffering."

okay but what about justice? how is it fair for me to be happy, to not suffer, when i made other people suffer so much?

"Justice is fake and desert is fake. The only things that matter are people, and you're a person. Sure, your suffering might bring some closure and comfort to Kim Hye-jin and Lee Tae-gun—but does it? have you checked? have you thought about it?—but even so, that would be doing something harmful and bad to you because it was outweighed by the positive feelings it caused in others, not because it was a good thing in itself."

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Jaeha stares at that some more.

i'm really fucking pissed off that this is working

"Oh?" wonders Haru, or at least Jaeha's version of Haru, who is just a pale imitation of the real thing.

well i can't very well fucking argue with that, can I? and honestly, tae-gun

He goes back with the cursor to add the family name.

lee tae-gun would not actually be happy with my suffering. i guess i don't know kim hye-jin that well after all but lee tae-gun, at least, once he got over his anger, would prefer that i not suffer, even after everything, because he is a good person. and you're also a good person. and i'm pretty sure kim hye-jin is also a good person. and if the three of you are like, no, actually, we don't particularly want you to suffer, then what's the point? is it even justice? who is it serving?

me. obviously. my own fucking feelings of just deserts. it feels wrong for me to be happy after everything i did. it feels like the universe is just fundamentally broken and unfair, if someone can do all the shit i did and then be okay at the other end of it

"Would you actually say you're okay? Because you don't look very okay from where I'm standing."

well, no, but that'd be the point of getting therapy and shit, right, would be being okay

"So, you want it to be the case that people who cause as much suffering as you did suffer in return. How much suffering will be enough, then, until the cosmic balance is restored?"

...i don't know. at least five years of it? that's how long i stalked my ex for

"Uh huh. So if you suffer for another five years, you think you'll be happy to be happy afterwards?"

...not really

"Why not?"

i don't know

"Is it perhaps because you don't actually mean any of what you're saying and you're not really tracking the cosmic balance and are instead just self-flagellating?" asks something that i am pretty sure isn't even Haru anymore it's just some idk voice of reasonableness or some shit and, i don't know, man

i don't know. maybe? that does kind of sound like me, doesn't it? at least unbacklashed me. i'm so very good at hating myself, i do it without even thinking

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He start rereading what he wrote, feels extremely cringe about it, and resumes writing.

i tried to reread what i just wrote and felt really cringe. which probably says something. it probably says that i recognise all of this thinking is fucking stupid maybe? only maybe not all of it, but i'm clearly embarrassed by some of the things i'm thinking, and i don't want to read them because i know i'll be embarrassed to read them like that, after i wrote them, to know that these are thoughts and feelings that are really there, inside my head, and i just wrote them.

maybe that's one of the ways it works for haru? he writes shit down that's embarrassing and then rereads it and goes oh god that's so embarrassing and then doesn't think them again? ...probably not, that sounds like magic and also not like haru at all. but it might work for me? i don't know, and i won't know until i try it, which i don't want to, yet, because it's embarrassing etc

where do i go from here, though? what did i learn? what did i reach?

well it seems like i think that my suffering is pointless and unnecessary and will benefit no one least of all myself and there just isn't a good reason to do it

i'm not sure i trust that yet. i might need to reread it to trust it

let's go back to that argument though

it would be pretty unfair if people could do horrible things and then suffer no consequences for it? because, because, why, what is this justice thing, what is it doing in my head, what does it mean, i'm not even religious for god's sake, is there some confucian ideal that got stuck in my head somehow, is it buddhist, am i looking at the wheel of destiny and karmic balance, i literally just decided that i'm not, that i'm just self-flagellating

no, wait

those are two separate things

one: i am self-flagellating

two: it feels unfair if people can be as horrible as i did and face no consequences for it

they feel like the same thing but they aren't and i shouldn't try to think about both of them at the same time. i'll think about number one later

He highlights it to make sure he'll remember to get back to it.

i think i won't be able to make any good progress on this until i resolve number two. it's weighing on me.

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so, number two. i need to think about it, but i don't know how. since it seems like the name of the game at least for me is to write shit as it occurs to me in some kind of stream of consciousness way i'll just do that

unfair. that's the word i used. unfair. fair. fairness. justice. what's that mean? like, for me, i know you think it's fake, and i think i probably think it's kind of fake? but i don't know for sure because i never thought about it, i certainly never wrote about it, and i need to figure out what exactly it is that i think, here

like it just feels bad you know? like even if, idk, think about some guy who murdered his whole family? imagine if he got muzzled somehow so that he'd never hurt a soul anymore, and even that he terribly regretted it and stuff. it would still feel hm

hm ok so if i remove the "terribly regretted it" part it's a lot more straightforward. imagine theg uy doesn't regret it at all, then it feels wrong for him to walk free even if he'll never hurt anyone ever again. but if he did regret it and really understand why it was wrong and, and took steps to make reparations to the extent that that's possible, then it doesn't feel that unfair anymore...? maybe?

like if the guy did that and then you shot him with Regret Ray so that he could viscerally understand how awful everything he did was, and also make sure he wouldn't ever hurt anyone again, does it still feel unfair if he gets to walk free?

not... really...

i don't get it

let me write more about it

if he were unrepentant, a wicked sinner, and just got muzzled, then i feel outraged. i feel like it's wrong and bad for him to be free, for him to not be punished. i can't really muster the feeling that he doesn't deserve to hurt, that people suffering is bad. he should suffer for what he did.

but if he regrets it, genuinely, truly, from the depths of his heart, i don't feel that way anymore? if he's contrite? and makes amends, as much as possible?

and i don't want him to suffer then. i don't want him to keep beating himself up, denying himself happiness abnd YES I GET IT I CAN SEE HOW THE FUCKING ANALOGY APPLIES CAN YOU SHUT THE FUCK UP

who am i even talking to

myself, duh

CAN I SHUT THE FUCK UP god.

why do i think that doesn't apply to me? why do i still feel like the analogy doesn't apply? what's missing? oh god fucking damnit

i want lee tae-gun and kim hye-jin to forgive me.

fuck.

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well i'm obviously not getting that so i need to figure out a way to live without it

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well, in the murderer guy case i'm not thinking about that, am i, and i guess i did kinda get hit with Regret Ray, and i'm not totally muzzled except for the Regret Ray, but if i'm forced to be internally consistent and shit about morality then yeah i want kim hye-jin and lee tae-gun to forgive me but probably maybe it's kind of okay if perhaps i could in some remote hypothetical be some shape or form of not in terrible agony all the time

why am i so fucking stupid

i hate this. i hate this. i hae this. i hate this hate this hate it hate it hate it hate it haaaaaaate it

what do i hate

this

this fucking

this is ugh

i hate it. this is so embarrassing. i feel so cringe. i feel like a fucking teenager or some shit for having this kind of issue. i'm over thirty why am i so emo, god.

rereading this is going to be so painful

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He needs a break. He's been at this for an hour and it's been really painful and he doesn't want to reread all that shit now so he's gonna go, he doesn't know, exercise or something, probably. Clear his mind. And then take a nice, long shower. And then get something quick to eat. And then start making dinner. So that he can continue procrastinating.

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