How often do you properly realise you are surviving?

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I've come to realise this may actually be the issue i've been facing for a long time.

Often I have not fully realised I am trying to survive until I've faced it very obviously.

I am talking about obvious (but not directly "visible") things like:

(1) - If I don't have enough money, I cannot pay my rent, so I'll be thrown out on the streets, becoming homeless. Also, I won't be able to provide food and other things for myself.

(2)- If I don't educate myself or take on a job, number (1) will end up coming true, I'll become homeless.

(3) - If I don't make sure to keep a circle of acquaintances, I might end up having noone to talk to.

(4) - If I don't get a girlfriend, I won't ever have kids.

(5) - If I don't ... etc. etc.


It's as if I have to consciously realise how serious life actually is. Very weird when I study complex topics in university achieving high grades. I "should" know better.

Has this got to do with asperger people not properly realising consequenes of their actions, or has it got nothing to do with aspergers?

Not as often as I should sometimes, and too often at others.

I think a big part of this is having an anxious depressed scarcity mindset - always trying to get enough to scrape by, thinking in terms of consequences, worrying about money to pay for basic necessities of life etc vs. being positive, optimistic, and living a worry free life of abundance. (of health, wealth, love etc) Having previously worked jobs where I earned a decent amount of money, I can say life is very different when you have a bit of money vs. none and are constantly trying to survive vs. thrive because your needs are taken care of and your mind is clear and happy and you can do what you want with your time. Gotta get back to a job that pays better again for many of those reasons and more, myself.

Regardless, I'm glad self serving survival thoughts enter my mind at some specific times.. prevents me from doing something I'd regret like quitting a job because I'm having a momentary disagreement with a boss. Can't do that (again lol) since I have bills to pay.

I'm good at making sure I have enough money to live on and making sure bills get paid

I've worked most of my adult life so know the importance of the 'work = money to pay for somewhere decent to live'
equation

Having earned my mortgaged house and decided the world of work is not somewhere I want to be any more, I feel I can manage on benefits so I'm more or less secure in that respect

I don't have much I want to ever spend my money on - mainly books and sometimes clothes but I always get them in online sales to save money.

I'm good with money and this is due to having had a good example set by my parents who were never in debt

I know the importance of having people to talk to but I am not good at maintaining harmonious relations with others
I do try and make new friends though and have had some good success with this recently

I don't want children so a relationship isn't a necessity from that point of view, just from an affection and sex point of view but I can live without one. The companionship I get from the friend I live with is far more important to me than a physical relationship and I know it is very important for my mental health

So I feel I am well aware of these 'survival' factors and put effort in to monitor them on an ongoing basis

I'm good on practicalities, not good on frivolity

I don't see all these things as being linked to survival, I see them as things I need to do if I don't want to lose my house and end up living in a horrible place with horrible people who might do God knows what to me or my accommodation.
Fear of the consequences of not ensuring I'm financially secure is a very good motivator and love of home comforts.

There has been a lot of previous input from my Mother (who is no longer alive) regarding this though ie she ensured I remained in work as much as possible and encouraged me to buy my house with my partner at the time and my parents gave us the deposit for the house. So I have had a lot of parental guidance in these things and a lot to be grateful for to them for looking after my best interests in this way.

I don't know whether I would have been able to work for most of my adult life without the support of my Mother. She would make clear the importance of finding another job when one ended and was a strong motivating influence to get back on track when things went wrong in jobs and I'd leave and have periods of bad depression.

Thinking about my ongoing survival needs in terms of not losing my temper at work when people are bullying me is not something I'm good at. I'm not very good at all at controlling my emotions - the thought 'If I lose my temper I might lose my job and this will impact on my long-term survival' would never come into my head in a million years! I don't tend to hold my needs constantly in my head like that or continually strategise about how things will benefit me or not.
I tend to just drift through life observing it all and responding to it emotionally a lot of the time.

I do not have my 'eye on the main chance' as the majority of people seem to do most of the time.

Last edited by nessa238 on 16 Mar 2013, 6:59 am, edited 2 times in total.

That is a big reason why I handle most of the family finances. I need income vs outgoing bills in my head so I keep things on the frugal side. I tend not to worry about other things as much, because they seem more quality of life issues vs basic survival needs.

In the end, I don't think there really is a difference between the two.

Quality of life really just ensures better survival opportunities.

If you have food and shelther, you'll survive. But if you don't have a partner, you won't survive in the long run through having kids. It all comes back to survival. It's difficult for me to make a distinction the way you do because I just see it as a spectrum where "basic survival needs" are of higher priority than "quality of life", but they both point to the same thing.

I should probably try to adopt your view. It's more positive.

Almost never, really. I don't even think of my life as some kind of commodity to be saved or anything like that, and I'm not too bothered about whether I die or not. I tend to be more concerned by my overall quality of life, interests and knowledge than trying to survive, most likely because at my age, in my family's stable financial condition, I don't have to. In a more dangerous position, I probably would.

Why do you think of reproduction as an aspect of survival?

When I talk about survival in this thread I think about it in very broad terms. If you don't reproduce for instance you are in some sense going to die, because your genes "vanish". If you have kids, you live on through them even when you die. It's not simply in the "I need food, water and sleep" to survive kind of way.

I realise my personal opinion is also involved in this. In my eyes, reproducing is just as much a matter of survival as drinking water is. The only difference is that drinking water is typically of higher priority at the very moment.

That comes disturbingly close to linking one's merit and value as a human being to one's ability and willingness to have children. I don't think you have specifically said that, but I hesitate to label not having children as a form of failure.

The thing is, whether you have children or not, when you're dead, you're dead, so you won't be there to see your gene line continue so it makes no difference to the individual either way

Or you could die having parented 10 children but the day after your death they all die in a freak accident

It's all pretty meaningless at the end of the day but people can't tolerate this so have to continually make things more meaningful to themselves than they really are

This.

Our existence truly is meaningless.

The only way to give it meaning is to say that our existence means everything. Therefore survival means everything. All actions stem from motivation which stem from the desire to survive. Life does everything possible to survive. Also making us think our lives are the most important thing ever. It's just an illusion you should be convinced about.

It's only in that "fake illusional" sense you can even talk about not having kids could be a failure. If people didn't think it mattered everything the survival of the species would nowhere be ensured to the degree it is today. It's only if you yourself are convinced life is about survival that you can take offense at someone claiming not having kids is a failure. In the end it does not mean anything. It's only our survival instincts that say it does mean something. So it does.

Most people do not think about this. They cannot see there could possibly be anything more important than survival. But well, is there really? Without survival, nothing is left.

It's really weird for me. After I've realised how simple the world is it's as if I'm living a completely new life. Now I know the rules of the game I'm a part of. Everyone think their lives are extremely important, when in fact they are not. But of course, they are important, you know

Last edited by qawer on 16 Mar 2013, 7:20 pm, edited 14 times in total.

I realise I'm surviving when I'm not in imminent danger of dying.
Which has been all my life so far.
I live in a country with plentiful food, clean water, a temperate climate, good access to medicine, and I have a good immune system so I almost never need that last one. My survival is hardly threatened.

I haven't been able to get past these worries my entire life and I feel sad because of it.

I'm very sorry to hear that.

Thanks. I'm working hard to change that.

Appearantly, giving meaning to life is meaningful. Man needs a meaning.