Either I am not as smart as I used to be or I used to think that I was smarter than I really was

I've no one to blame but myself, but I'm stuck in a similar rut. No, I don't think either of us is "less smart" than we used to be, although I can only say with conviction that I believe I'm no less smart than I used to be. What I can say for sure about myself is that I'm temporarily sabotaging my intelligence with self-medication - not for purposes of enlightenment or even occasional recreation, but to sublimate my bitterness and boredom at the paying job that I have kept for 11 years - from the time I was your age until today, at 44. That time has disappeared in the blink of an eye, swallowed by the funnel of corporate existence into the gurgling acidic stomach that, for now, makes ends meet.

Oddly enough, I came to this realisation after watching House the other night (Mondays, FOX). House is the only TV program I watch regularly. House reminds me in many ways of myself - a strong critical thinker; spurred to life (or simply to live) by his epiphanies; dependent on painkillers. He quit painkillers this season (the 2-hour season premiere is worth watching as well); I quit almost 2 years ago after 10 years of dependency on opiates and barbiturates. I started on the painkillers due to occasional bodily pain, but based on the "la-la-la" feeling I got from them, I quickly found that the occasional pain had become a recurrent "rebound" pain, and that the opiates and barbiturates became a necessary part of my everyday routine - to numb the pain that it had itself created - that being the pain of withdrawal. (How I quit the painkillers cold-turkey is an entirely different story...but if anyone reading this has a painkiller dependency, I'd be happy to share my remedy. Just write to me privately.)

Okay, enough about my prior painkiller dependency (you'll see I've replaced it with other substances much easier to obtain). You should try to watch the House episode that aired on the 23rd if you haven't already; it should be available for free online next Monday or Tuesday. Synopsis of program: genius physicist is so isolated from normal relationships/reality by his high IQ (172 or so, not quite high enough for the storyline if you ask me, but everybody's different) that he dumbs himself down by self-medicating with common cough syrup in order to enjoy a relatively-normal lifestyle where he can interact with people of average intelligence without extreme frustration and depression.

So I got to thinking, dammit, this job I've had for 11 years is a ball and chain, and until I can find metaphorical steel-cutters strong enough to free myself (doubly difficult since I tend to be a procrastinator...but that's another story stemming back to the late 1960s) what I've done to deal with the psychologically painful, brain-numbing, repetitive, bill-paying "work" is to self-medicate...no longer with barbs and opiates, but with other readily available detractors, including anti-anxiety medications called benzodiazepenes. I've gotten in this habit over time, I figure, to lull myself through the otherwise hair-pulling frustration of what is, relatively speaking, mindless work....

And though the benzo dose is relatively low (when taken as prescribed), I'm aware that, over time, these pharmaceuticals make the brain less creative and less active. I can only hope it's temporary and concurrent with the concentration of benzos in my body. So I'm in a win-lose situation: I win by easing the pain (yes, pain) of boredom of my dangling-carrot paycheck work, and I lose by generally being too tired and synaptically obliterated to do my real work - that is, my thinking and writing - after I put in my requisite 8 hours each workday.

Like I said at the beginning, I have no one to blame but myself. I could walk away from the job, and ultimately I will, and then my task will be to get out of the habit of numbing the numbness and back to the excitement and epiphany and discovery that comprise, to a large degree, my life's true purpose. My true gift is not to set more appointments and be more detail-oriented than my coworkers; my true gift is to think and make connections and write and share.

Although it's not easy to admit my poor habits, I felt especially compelled to post this comment after looking at your evolver profile. Are you satisfied being a "cog in the wheel" at Volkswagen? Somehow the wording of your position there makes me think not...and that perhaps we're rowing the same boat, or at least we're in the same river.

Stace Tussel

The more you know, the more you know you don't know! The mark of true wisdom.

I think Quanta hit the nail on the head. You're just so damned smart that you have to numb yourself down to match frequencies with your environment. This is a thread of a problem I was having with alcohol until about a month ago. I'm at bio-age 43, and 33 was one of the most challenging years of my life. My wife kept saying "Oh 33! Age of Christ!" (I can still hear her). My successful business partnership imploded just before Christmas, and then my wife and I got divorced the next Spring. Later that year I had to move in with my parents because I was bankrupt and I lost a huge commission because my hard drive failed catastrophically w/o a backup. It was a time of a great depression for me, and I felt pretty damn stupid.

Shortly afterwards, I had my first experience with Kundalini awakening. So I came to see that time before as a hard purging by life's inherent mystery. I've been through a hell of a lot of other scenarios and emotional spaces since then, of many flavors. And as my Dad always says when things massively suck, "This too shall pass." So abandon all self judgment and watch our family's favorite self-help video on youtube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T1g3ENYxg9k

Then change your routines up pronto.