no control but i have math

I feel like I don’t have much control in my life anymore. The reason I stay awake at night, the reason I got myself a desk and chair, the reason I’m reading a math textbook, even the reason I love lighting candles so much, it’s all related. It’s my way of exercising some level of control, to remind myself that the “I” that I consider my identity still exists, and that I’m still able to choose things by me for me

I am sad because I feel like I don’t have much control in my life anymore. The reason I stay awake at night, the reason I got myself a desk and chair, the reason I’m reading a math textbook, even the reason I love lighting candles so much, it’s all related. It’s my way of exercising some level of control, to remind myself that I still exist and that I’m still able to choose things, and those choices having some result that I am personally interested in. I don’t know why it’s like this right now or if it’ll ever change for the better, but I know that I find comfort in studying math because I’m choosing to do it despite everything, and I’m personally interested in the result of feeling like I understand abstract things. It has no value to anyone other than me, and nobody would care if I started, continued or stopped. That’s what I like about it. Even the process of doing math, it’s not like anything else where there is an outcome I’m required to deliver to the outside world (everything is an outcome meant to be useful to some entity other than oneself). Nothing happens when you write down math, there’s no chore behind it, there’s no run button to use to gain some outcome, it’s not like cooking where the outcome is meant to be some food, it’s not like a date or special occasion where the anticipated outcome is some emotional appeasement,