Comfort is a prison

When I came back to Berlin on Saturday, I didn't want to be here. The flat I'm living in was always meant as a temporary solution. I had a difficult time making plans during the pandemic, so my idea was to just wait it out. What I actually want to do is travel, and meet as many people as possible. Coming back to my flat after two weeks of vacation made me painfully aware that I didn't make progress on either of these goals. Now, only a few days later, it doesn't feel so bad.

I don't know where I picked it up, but let's assume it to be a fact. Prisoners get used to their prison. I've never been in one, but I imagine they aren't places designed to be luxurious spa hotels. For most inmates, anyway. The company isn't that great either. Murderers, rapists, and totally normal people who decided to drink alcohol. That's on you, mate! Oh, wait – they're in jail for using another, less harmful drug. Anyway, just remember to not drop the soap.

Prisoners get used to their prison. That's impressive. It shows that no matter how hard the circumstances are, you can adapt. So if you set yourself a challenge and make it unavoidable, you will get it done. Or at least you'll grow in the attempt of doing it. It's possible to do things you didn't know were possible. All it takes is some self-imposed hardship.

But let's be honest, I'm not deferring to meet people because of Covid. Covid is just a nice excuse. Working towards any goal that you hold dear threatens your identity. For if you work on it and fail, your identity is destroyed. You didn't accomplish whatever it was that was so important to you. But even worse, what if you succeed and realise that it didn't give you the things you hoped for? In either case, it's easier to just dream of your goal, but never start to work towards it.

Prisoners get used to their prison. That's scary. It shows that no matter how bad it gets, you'll get used to it. It's possible to accept your current, mediocre life and to ignore all your dreams. They'll only bother you in those few, dark moments. For the rest of the time, you are making yourself busy, work towards a lesser goal, or numb yourself otherwise. You know that you can't keep this up, and that it will fall down sooner or later. But you hope that it will hold for another minute, another day, another month. Because your pain isn't strong enough yet.

It's easy to get used to that, to your prison of comfort. To accept these moments of dread, when you remember that everything you're dreaming of is moving away from you. But someday, the pain becomes unbearable. And when you finally start working towards it, you'll find that all the things you dreaded were much worse in your imagination then they are in real life.