Several days ago, while I was looking for a notepad in which to write, I stumbled across an entry that I had written on a day in a June of over six years ago. For no particular reason that I can remember I read that I was feeling especially down. It occurred to me, as I was reading my observations, that, while now I very rarely sink to such depths, now instead I feel permanently low but without however recognising that I feel persistently misreable. And as I write this I am reminded of a very brief exchange I had with someone when I attempted to explain what it was - and, implicitly, why -I was intending to study by pursuing a PhD: the only answer I could give at the time was that I was intending to study Hegel's Unhappy Consciousness. As for 'why', I can only say that I had no choice. The answer was perhaps just as imcomprehensible to my inquisitor as the question was to me but not at all ironically it was noted that I had said this with a smile on my face: not a smug, knowing smile but a smile that arises out of pure happiness. The prospect of studying Hegel's Unhappy Consciousness filled me with a joy not unlike the joy I felt when I was first introduced to the psychological concept of cognitive dissonance - or the joy that I feel when I listen to a musical note that somehow sounds out of tune.
TBC
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