The Philosophical Hack

This morning my mind was crossed by this situation in my foot where gangrene has taken hold. I didn’t know it was gangrene for a long time. It was just as black spot in the center of the top of my foot about 2 cm in diameter. Still, I’m not really sure if it actually is gangrene because I’ve never gone to the doctor for it, and I never really thought that I should until it crossed my mind that it might be a dead area in my body. But then I pondered it for a little bit and decided not to…

And I’m gonna tell you why.

*

The area around the top of my foot around that black area of gangrene has been a very bad area of skin that’s been that way for a long time from an extremely bad case of athletes foot that got severely infected when I was probably 25 years old. For a long time the skin was just basically a thin and very light and white with speckled red area of scar tissue, and I got very used to it. It’s been 20 some years now. I figured it was just his massive scar from the really bad case of athletes foot.

Some months ago, a piece in the middle of that skin cracked. And it kind of stung a little bit, but I just put some lotion on it and just didn’t really pay attention to it. I figured it was just some dry skin of my scar tissue that cracked. No big deal, seemed very natural.

So over the next couple weeks this scabbed crack turned into a black area. And then I just noticed that there’s this centimeter and a half black area in the middle of this white speckled scar tissue. And that area was feeling kind of strange, not very comfortable; when I would walk I would feel a burning in my foot is it kind of like bad athletes foot in a way, a stinging and an odd pain. But it wasn’t a fungus, it’s not athletes foot again; I actually did get some antifungal stuff and put it all over the area like you’re supposed to and nothing really changed.

What really happened, I figured, was the skin is scar tissue and there’s no circulation flowing through it. Very bad circulation in that area on the top of my foot of the skin. So finally when it cracked, there was not enough blood flow to heal the area, let alone bring any sort of life-giving value to the area and so the tissue started dying. And it spread and kept dying until it got to that area where there was enough life-support in the body, and then it stopped growing.

This black spot became a curiosity for me, namely because it was a black spot of skin. Like, what the fuck is this? But it was also somewhat uncomfortable because it just felt like the foot was constantly chafing and off and on small pain while I walked every day. Hence, I thought I might go to the doctor. 

But I hate going to the doctor. For one it’s a severe inconvenience in my very full life. And two, they’re probably gonna tell me something I already know. Three; there’s a good possibility they’re going to say they’re gonna have to cut it out. Four, I might have to go see a specialist and spend more money; five, the never ending bullshit of seeking remedy for my own problem with someone else’s expertise.

That last bit was really the main reason why I didn’t go to the doctor.

*

I am not old but I am getting old. And part of this getting old, when one realizes that they are getting old beyond just the fact that the number 30 appears in the reckoning of age, The body starts to do all sorts of strange stuff. It is my personal experience, and others with whom I’ve discussed this strange and somewhat annoying feature of life, That the mind doesn’t change very much. The idea I have that is Lance, this creature or this entity or this being that’s been myself and accompanying me in this journey hasn’t really changed much in 20 something years. For sure I have different experiences and I have different thoughts about things that I think about differently things may be, but the person that is me hasn’t changed much since I was probably in my late 20s. What has changed is my body. And the most significant thing that has changed about the body is it starts to get screwed up in various random ways. It’s very Hari Krishna: no matter what we do the body is going to deteriorate, things are going to fail, various random pains are going to occur, we’re going to get hair in weird places, we’re going to start smelling strange, farting, different foods aren’t gonna do the same thing for us, we have to start to do some sort of exercise even though we don’t really want to… no matter what we do the body is going to crumble and it’s going to re-enter the earth. There’s nothing we can do about it , at least right now.

But the mind, or even more than the mind, the sense of self and the power of thinking or whatever we wanna call it, doesn’t really change very much. It’s the same thing, the same functioning.

*

Ok. Enough of that kind of philosophical nonsense. 

My point is that I just expect that I’m going to be uncomfortable at times, more or less. Mostly uncomfortable but I don’t notice the things, but if I’m uncomfortable with something physical that’s going on with me, I just figure that it’s kind of normal. I don’t freak out too much about it, and I don’t obsess about being pain-free or about being totally comfortable. I think that is a very westernized, colonized, privileged, white oriented version of what life is supposed to be: That we have been “God ordained” to live in comfort, and due to the fusion of God and the mind’s intellect, we have a right to be utterly comfortable at all times. I would even go so far to say that the problems of mental health in our modern day probably stem much from that self righteousness. Namely, that we obsess over what might be wrong if we’re feeling uncomfortable, and this obsession turns into some sort of mental issue and extreme case becomes some sort of mental disorder. Indeed, I could even go so far as to say that the problems of society and our world stem from the fact that I deserve to be comfortable, and despite anyone else. 

*

Anyways again, there’s a black spot on my foot and it’s really –I started thinking about it– it really is a part of me that is dead.

Literally. There is a part of me that is actually dead.

I thought that was very interesting and very curious, and kind of funny.

There is a part of me that is actually dead. It died. A part of me actually died. And yet, it’s sitting there attached to me. And not only this, but the interface between the dead part of me and the living part of me actually hurts, it’s uncomfortable. And it stays with me most of the day. It’s not terribly annoyingly uncomfortable, but sometimes during the day I do get a sudden sting that makes me remember it’s there.

*

I have a concoction of oils. Vitamin E, hemp, coconut oil, olive oil. These are mixed together in a concoction that is my personal salve. I use it for everything. And for those who might suggest CBD : I think I wrote three posts maybe about a year ago about my interactions and encounters with CBD. Indeed CBD for a moment was part of this concoction, but I realized that it makes me depressed. It just does. There’s no argument to make about it. Go read my other posts about it.

Actually, this post is kind of a link or is linked to those other posts about CBD, because one part of the point that I make in those CBD posts is that it would’ve been very easily for me to think that something was wrong with me and go to a psychiatrist or my doctor and start telling them about all the symptoms That I’m having. At the time– again you can go read the other posts– I might have been thinking that CBD is so good for me. So I would have been excluding it from the possibility of affecting me negatively. I just would’ve thought that something was wrong with me and looked to other people to tell me what it is and what I need to do.

I didn’t do that. And the same with my gangrene. I didn’t look to someone else to tell me what was wrong with me nor for a solution to the problem.

— Of course, I am aware of infection and must be cognizant of when I indeed might need extra help 😁.

I started rubbing my salve on the area. And it’s not very comfortable. The area is generally sore, like I’ve been talking about. — and yet for 20 years it was utterly pain free! It kind of chafes, it is slightly sore to the touch. And the area is just uncomfortable to touch. Nevertheless, I just started a regimen of putting my salve on my foot and rubbing it on my ankle and leg and just kind of helping the circulation to the area a few times a day.

It is time to let go the dead part of me. That is what my body told me — is telling me. And it is not comfortable!

My idea was that the reason why this area of my body died was because it was getting no circulation. And that the idea of cutting off gangrene is really getting rid of the dead part of myself from the life part. Now, I figure this gangrene hasn’t been spreading so there’s an interface in my body that’s preventing that dead area from spreading to the rest of my body like gangrene might typically otherwise cause complications. Instead, I try to give the area circulation so my body can process out the dead part of myself.

I figured that the oils themselves are helpful to the skin and the nerves and the body, and then my massaging the area routinely helps life circulate into that part of the body that is dead.

🌹

And coming back to the title of my post.

It is really the pain that motivated me to assert life. Life. To help the dead part of myself move on. To help that living part of me to grow in itself, itself. Not to negate what is painful, not to shun or deny or cut out what has died, but rather to help what is dead to move on. As well as for life, my life. Life.

In fact, what is happened is that the gangrene is starting to flake off. My body is literally pushing it out, helping it. And it is getting smaller. And the area, instead of white speckled scar tissue, is red with the blood of new life and circulation as it helps that dead part of me to move onto its next adventure. 

*

GROSS!!



but…life and healing does not always conform to our sense of the righteousness of beauty. Sometimes it has its own beauty. 



…and what of our world? x