You can find yourself meticulously drifting towards one, knowing it's an inexorable journey that is going to be wrought with a dismal numbness, that almost seems to have stemmed from depression, but without the melancholy. It's like a murky valley of purgatory, knowing it can clear, but unsure if it will. One way to tell:
It's disappointment when the achievements you've waited, and worked for, no longer carry the merit of worth,
Turned apathy when you see, and pragmatically acknowledge the this disappointment coming forth
Turned numbness when you no longer feel t the disappointment of your hard-earned achievements, is fast approaching
It's only when numbness is attained, that the true phrase of "I would rather feel pain, than nothing at all" imparts its obscured yet obvious lessons to oneself.