the art of knowing better and doing it anyway
i like to think of myself as a reasonably intelligent person. i know how to analyse a situation, weigh pros and cons, and predict consequences with unsettling accuracy. and yet, i have an uncanny talent for making absolutely terrible decisions. it’s almost like a tragic superpower—except there’s no cape, just the sinking realization that i knew better but did it anyway.
i am aware of my mistakes even before i make them. i can see them forming, unravelling in real-time, like a car crash in slow motion. and yet, i let them happen. it’s funny how i convince myself i’m above certain failures, only to trip into them with full awareness. intelligence should be a safeguard, a failsafe, but somehow, it’s just a front-row seat to my own disasters.
it’s not always about the big, life-altering choices. i’m not out here gambling away my future or making catastrophically self-destructive moves. it’s the small, insidious ones—the ones that pile up and make me wonder if i’m sabotaging myself just for the thrill of it. staying up too late even though i have an early morning? check. taking on too many commitments when i already don’t have time to breathe? absolutely. texting back when i swore i wouldn’t? every. single. time.
it’s infuriating because i see it coming. i know when i’m about to do something i’ll regret. i can feel the mental warning bells, hear the rational part of my brain advising against it. and yet, i walk right into the mess like i’m narrating my own horror movie; “don’t go in there,” i whisper to myself, before proceeding to do exactly that.
and it’s also not about ignorance. i don’t stumble blindly into bad decisions—i walk in with my eyes wide open, cataloguing every potential consequence, every way it could go wrong. and then i do it anyway. maybe i think i’ll be the exception, that i’ll navigate my way out of the mess this time. or maybe i just don’t care enough to stop myself.
the worst part isn’t even the regret; it’s the predictability of it all. the way i can trace the cycle before it even begins. i make a bad choice, i acknowledge it, i dissect it down to its most logical parts, and then—given the same set of circumstances—i’ll do it again. there is no learning, no grand moment of realization where i vow to be better. just the dull acceptance that i will keep making mistakes, no matter how much i understand them.
i sometimes wonder if intelligence makes bad decisions worse. if i were blissfully unaware, if i genuinely didn’t know better, maybe i’d have an excuse. but when you’re smart enough to predict the train wreck and still buy a first-class ticket, it’s a special kind of frustrating. it means living with the knowledge that every mistake was avoidable, every regret self-inflicted.
maybe intelligence doesn’t make a difference. maybe knowing better is just an illusion, a false sense of control over something as inherently human as self-sabotage. or maybe some part of me enjoys the chaos, the small comfort of familiarity in making the same wrong turn over and over again. because at least then, i know what to expect.
I relate to this. I think there’s a very human part of us that deeply revels in the torment of suffering. It makes us feel. It reminds us just how human and alive we are. But surely there must be healthier ways to cultivate that. Because this cycle of suffering keeps us in a prison of our own making. I’m still in the process of “figuring it out”.
this truly might be what gets me to stop because i've noticed this in myself for so long, but ive never seen or heard it vocalized. I have really never stopped to think about the consequences of my actions besides the fact that I know what I'm doing is "bad" so I think i'll start doing that. Thank you! This is revolutionary for me.