I'm biking idly around Palo Alto, California, under the trees, thinking about all the income from writing I expect to start getting soon. I project about $70,000 a year on average, and I figure I can support myself and about ten friends on that--I live cheaply after all, and already have a baseline income from all the savings I invested. I'm cheap. I can afford to support, yes, about ten. Make a list...

Funny, all those on my list are Psychodrama actors, old friends I haven't seen much in recent years. Nor have I missed them much. Not old friends: EX-friends!

Slowly I start thinking "Why would I want to support these people I hardly know any more? They already feel like drama queens, most of them... free money will just make that worse."

I don't enjoy them any more. I want to dump them all! But can I? I'm such a soft touch for money... and they're such good actors. They can always manufacture a crisis...

Maybe I'm better off staying poor.

WAKING NOTES

Psychodrama "friends" = sides of me who are into drama (and trauma). They drain my attention away from the present!

Ten parts for others, one for me = yeah, that's about my ratio. I was trained by dedicated leftist parents to share the wealth...

This is a recurring dream-motif. Whenever I become successful and prosperous, inner parasites (or outer parasites who resemble them) drain all the rewards away anyway. I'm NOT anhedonic ("numb to pleasure"--common in depression), I'm not afraid of success, and I ENJOY the rewards--but I feel compelled to give the rewards away! So... I won't put forth any effort! On strike till I can enjoy what I've earned.

I wonder how many other apparent failures and slackers are neither lazy nor afraid of success... just afraid of what they'll feel compelled to do with the money. If you KNOW you'll hand it to the first leech with a sad story...

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