After a pretty intense weekend, I feel a low drop. The physical exhaustion is expected (and I have some minor injuries to heal), but the emotional rebound is harder. It's like the day after Disneyland. I'm so bored!

One of the things I've been mulling over lately is just what it takes to get me excited these days. There are several threads to this introspection, so I'll try to tease them out with some kind of order.

Inhibition
I'm coming to realize that in certain important and meaningful ways, I've developed a range of inhibitions, in the form of insular routines, reflexive skepticism, and internal checks. This is kind of a contrast to my life age 18 to present, which was largely about the shedding of inhibition, tapping into self, going a Dragonball-Z with my chi and that kind of shit.

Maybe it's a weird thing to say as the proprietor of a website that's blocked by many major parental-control (or workplace-control) filters, but there it is. This has been a theme in my writing for the past several months, but I didn't hit on the specific word "inhibited" until someone used it -- or rather, the inverse, "uninhibited" -- the other day to describe an ideal way to be.

That's something I agree with, deeply, being uninhibited. It's in some of my favorite hip-hop lyrics and it stands at the center of what I construe to be personal liberation. Emancipate yrself from mental slavery and all that jazz. The point is, it's a bummer and a wake-up call to realize that's part of what's been going on.

Diminishing Returns
Partly because of my birthday, I've been looking back retrospective-like and appreciating all the cramazing things I've done with my life. Not to toot my own horn (I ain't making a list or asking for kudos or saying Joshey knows best), but I've done and seen more than your average monkey.

There's a decline in novelty that naturally accompanies a broad life, and also I think some diminishing returns with exposure to peak experiences. There are many things you can do to get high in this world, but the really good ones require a kind of innocence, or at least they work better that way.

These days I'm honestly less interested in the doors of perception that chemistry can open, and more about the enthusiasm and excitation one can get from being involved in cool stuff, working on interesting things, interacting with lively and stimulating people, and generally getting -- as they say -- high on life. But the same dynamic applies. There are qualities to things like first love, best friends, and breaking into the big-time that are transcendent. They're amazing, but sometimes they take some of the pep out of a return trip to the well.

It seems to take more than ever to pique my interest, to get my mojo working, to get me up and open and off to the races. I accept that this is part of adulthood, but I feel unnaturally numb of late.

Burning Ambition
Another theme that's hardly new is wrestling with ambition. I have a strong and I think mostly inexhaustible internal drive, but it's a non-specific one. I want to win, to (in the words of the Big Lebowski) "achieve." This is a good thing overall, but I also think that when my ambition suffers from a lack of objectives I can spin my wheels a lot. Smell that burning rubber.

It's a frustrating feeling, being hungry but not wanting to eat anything in the fridge. It's a condition that I think of as afflicting children, but here I am singing the same old song. I would call it ennui if it didn't have an edge of urgency to it. It's not just that I want, it's that I want to want, and desperately.

Which is a tricky position to be in. The engine may rev, but is there really anything hooked up? Breaks? Steering? Gearing? Is now a good time to pop the clutch? Take sexual frustration: Always a popular topic, and another common theme here. There are all sorts of pitfalls to "getting back into the game," and ginning up desire or pushing to make something happen (that you may or may not really want) are things I'm much more cautious of now than in times past.

Caution, though, can be a nice looking sheet you drape over that ratty-ass old couch stuffed with inhibitions. I mean, out on this Kinetic Sculpture race there were definitely some babes, and some of them even smiled at me. And did I introduce myself? Of course not. Inhibitions. We're back again. Full-circle.

Bringing It All Back Home
There are a few things that I think are true:

• My life is too generally placid for my liking. I need to be more stimulated.
• Lacking a sense of direction -- "feeling lost" -- has a debilitating affect on my self-confidence.
• Without some kind of conscious focus or daily practice, I'll slide into my shell just like any mortal person.
• Fuck the shell.

The worst part about this is that I can feel the toll my own lack of enthusiasm can take on those around me. One of the things I love most in life is being able to energize people, to bring a crowd, or just one person, to great precipices of excitement. It's a double-bummer to see your gray cloud soak up other people's light, and it makes you unpopular too.

You try to get over, you're going to go under. Literally. Get open. Like the ocean...