Stumbling in the Dark

One of my secret thoughts, which is not so secret, is that I should try to write a book. I am among thousands upon thousands of people who have had a similar idea, but unlike many of those, I am largely afraid that I can't really do it. I reinforce my negative feelings regarding writing a book with negative thoughts about why I can't and why it would probably be impossible.

First, among the bad thoughts and feelings, I doubt that I am up to it. Having been an English Major, learning about the dramatic curve, remembering some of the mechanics of a novel, and having read the stories of the authors who have gone before, the worries all pile up before me and congeal into a big black ball of fear.

A fear of failure. Which, frankly, is a sticky nebulous fear that never seems to go away, and often shows up in many places in my life that has nothing to do with writing. Most of the time that fear is not entirely rational, but some places, it actually is warranted. Fear is healthy when it prevents you from injuries, emotional or otherwise. Fear, on the plus side, can be an internal safeguard against danger. However, I have also heard that some people in the health professions will develop a compulsive habit of washing their hands all of the time, beyond what is healthy or normal. Since they know all the horror stories of infections, germs, bacteria, and diseases, they wash their hands all of the time, all to avoid suffering from an illness that was very likely all too rare to begin with. I think this fear of writing is something like that. Maybe I know too much about literature in general to feel safe with the possibility of success, which then freezes my motivation to even try. Of course, the answer to "what if I fail?," is "what if I succeed?" I know that. However, emotions are not rational creatures. They take hold of your heart even while your brain is shouting at you to ignore them.

The second problem is time and regularity. Speaking in specific terms now, I personally find it hard to develop of the habit of doing what I want in a given day or week, and then moving in a direction that I feel I should. There is only so much time in one's life, and no one knows how much time is left. Perhaps everyone dies having a plan or two for the future, even if it is as mundane as having breakfast the next morning. I still struggle with developing a routine for self-care. I need to wash my clothes, cook myself healthy meals, find time for regular exercise to become fit, without slacking on the time for my job and other pressing obligations. Even now, in my middle forties, that is a challenge I have yet to overcome. My family has some demands on my time. And, when my health is not 100%, I find it hard to even do the basics.

I think to myself that what I need to do is work out a schedule on paper and then try to follow it as close as possible. Making a plan, even if you don't end up sticking to it, is a good place to start. For some reason though, I haven't made any plans. Most mornings, I wake up knowing that I need to go to work, but not knowing when or where I will have breakfast, eat lunch, or go home for the day. Will I go into to town and do some art? Is that self-indulgent? Should I have a better plan? A plan for making the world a better place, for teaching, for doing something really sacrificial? Most of my art plans, writing or otherwise, seems to be a form of narcissism. Am I trying to puff up my self-conception by trying to make my indulgences seem virtuous? Am I trying to use virtue to snare my vanity?

This is where my thoughts usually end up. I come up with a conception or a plan of action, which upon some reflection, seems vain in some way, and then I wind up not doing anything.

Is self-improvement vanity? Is working on things that I am interested in vain? Admittedly, some of my early life and earlier desires to be "good," were vain to a degree. I do not think I could help it. I was buried under some unconscious assumptions that my culture gave me as a birthright. It seems our contemporary culture encourages us to indulge our vanities, telling us that the highest virtue is self-actualization rather than service. Even if we acquire knowledge, our culture only expects it to benefit ourselves. We are oriented to self-profit, even with things that should be considered non-material, like love or the other virtues. The more "things" we accumulate to ourselves, and only ourselves, the better as far as society is concerned. Even if service is ostensibly part of a person's behavior, the real goal (in our society's view) is so a particular person/individual can feel selfless and noble, an act that is not focused on the act itself, but on the person who performs it. What is real service, real sacrifice, and real selflessness? What does it look like, and how it is performed? I wish I knew. 

In the meantime, in the middle of not really knowing for sure what to do or how to do it. I think that I should try to find regular days in the week where I can focus on one thing. For example, with my art, I have chosen Friday to come to the cafe and draw. Not that I do that, or intend to do that, every Friday. Just that Friday is the day most often chosen for that. Exercise, something that I am not currently doing, is something that I think I should find regular times for. This might be vain to a degree, but I think that, with regard to investing in my health to prolong my life and thereby be able to serve those around me, this plan has more support for that virtuous life I aim at than my art project does. Three times a week for walking seems reasonable, and walking for at least twenty minutes each time is not unreasonable either. But I have yet to commit to a plan. I have thought of doing it after work, but I am reluctant because I do not want to appear as "the fat guy" walking around the block. I guess having typed that out, it is plain that my vanity is keeping me from doing the right thing for the right reason. (I'll have to remember this.)

Now, we come to my language plans. I am already devoting a small part of each day, usually the morning to learning more words, listening to people speak it on youtube, and reading it, but maybe this is all vanity. It is not a language that many people speak, and there is a stereotype of people my age and gender speaking it. Again, most people in my society, even people who are friendly in their interactions with me, think it is sort of pointless.

Finally, the writing: I am doing it now. But, I mostly use this blog to explore my thoughts and emotions more than anything. Writing fiction, or even essays, is a different skill altogether. I may be too old to do either well.

I don't want to reach the end of my life still aiming at something that is essentially vain. It would be nice to find a meaningful work that will sustain my spirit, even if the jobs and hobbies, and other silly occupations I may find do not, or cannot, provide it. I guess that is at the heart of all of this: finding personal meaning. I do think that, more than most, due to my morning prayer, meditation, and reading habit, I have some of the tools. Now, I must figure out how to use those tools to build meaning in my own life for the benefit of others. An attitude of service and transformation seems key, but translating these esoteric ideas into a practical plan of action, into an engine of motivation, seems difficult. I am still reaching out into the darkness and trying to stumble my way into the light of understanding and knowledge. May God help me.

Confidence in Printing and Sanity

Today, I feel like I may have earned some right to the internal title of designer. Like most human beings on the planet, I sometimes deal with insecurities about who I am and what I am doing. Readers may know (because I can't ever seem to stop talking about it in one form or another) how my earlier failures were a severe blow to my confidence and self-esteem. In an effort to repair my life, and at least get my financial life back in order, during the last several years I managed to get an associates degree in graphic design. It was an attempt at gaining a skill that could at least help me find a way to earn my daily bread. Being a teacher is a profession that requires the training that escaped me, maybe learning the design trade could help me salvage some self-respect and help me earn a dollar or two. (The student loan debt I have is outrageous, so I will probably be condemned to poverty for the remainder of my life. The worst thing about poverty, at least in regards to how I view it, is that I do not have the monetary means to support my family and friends in the way I would like. I likely will never be able to buy my parents something they need, help them out of a jam, loan my sisters a few hundred dollars, etc.) Anyhow, it is funny to say that my insecurity in my personal and design abilities makes me secure in the knowledge that I won't be the best designer on the planet.

However, today, I may have earned a little more right to the title. After a breakfast, a little television, and a shower, I drove to work and completed the recipe cards that my mother needed printed for her next monthly project. There were a few minor typos that needed fixing before printing the whole block of them. They're on cardstock, and initially, I couldn't figure out why they weren't printing front and back. It turns out the "reloaded" setting on the paper selection for the copier prevents the program itself from printing front and back. Once I had changed it from "cardstock reloaded" to just "cardstock," the problem was resolved.

Then, I drove into the neighboring town and talked with downtown printer that I was familiar with. They seem knowledgeable and talented, but their prices also reflect it. I needed some size #6 catalog style enveloped, which is a size above 6x9 and below 9x12. Catalog style is a bit stronger than booklet style, and because our mail order department crams our product into envelopes almost near to bursting, I figured we needed it. Catalog style was the way to go. For those envelopes, there is a seam down the middle, and the envelope opens on the shortest end. Booklet style envelope opens on the longest side.

I told them that I had the original file as well as the PDF. They told me that the original file is essentially worthless if the links and the fonts are not also embedded. They said that, for it to be useful, it had to be "packaged." I knew that from school training, but like a dope, forgot. I manually included the link to the image file in a separate folder, but it did not have the typefaces. Fortunately, the PDF saved my bacon. They even had me come around their front counter to look at it on their computer screen to ensure that it looked the way that I needed it to. It did. (For some reason, salesman at the counter assumed that the copier error where the ink had not fully printed the logo was intentional. I assured him it was not.)

Satisfied the job was going to be done, I then drove out to the next printer to have them print the 9x12 envelopes that I needed. They are about fifty dollars cheaper than the downtown printer. The one worry that I still had was wondering if the first printer I visited will use the second one to print the job I gave them, and then charge me extra for handling. Was there a chance that the poor slob who operates the press will see a job with the same logo on two different sized envelopes for two different clients? Will it matter? Will there be any embarrassment for me or the printer if they find out that I used two different printers for essentially the same work? Maybe there might some embarrassment at a professional faux pas, but I guess I am prepared to deal with it and face the fallout if need be.

Anyhow, arriving to the printers, I was immediately greeted by two medium to large sized dogs Clearly, this was a more relaxed style of business where the owner had decided that dogs were okay. I am always initially weirded out about businesses that have pets, but really, I guess I don't mind if the animals are friendly enough. The dogs sniffed my shoe rather heavily before being called back to someone's desk.

I asked to speak to someone about a quote, which they gave me, and was really nice. I hope that the job turns out as well as I hope because you can't beat their price. I had discovered this print shop when I had gone to a portfolio show and discovered that a former classmate had worked there. I figured, "why not?" This is the sort of networking that is supposed to pay off, right?

Then I returned back to work and continued to work on the booklet that needs to be completed in a couple of days. There are a few articles that the boss needs to send me, but it looks like it will get done on time, even if I have to work over the holiday.

I signed out at 5pm, which is normal for me. I wasn't going to do much overtime today because I felt like I had already done enough, and a good job at that. Unfortunately, our work culture seems to run on stress and frustration. If someone is not constantly complaining about being over-worked, over-tired, or having too much with not enough time to do it, then we really are in trouble. That sort of environment seems to work when it comes to getting the jobs done, but at a personal and emotional cost to the people there. It is a fraying of nerves that slowly come undone a strand at a time. Maybe this sort of environment is part of why I feel anxious most of the time. As if the only solution to problems is to worry about what is not getting done, because formally coming up with practical solutions or organizing a plan is apparently too much or out of the question.

I was glad work was done.About an hour later, I was making plans for my monday night. Monday night is my night to go to the center and says prayers or offer devotions. Tonight, a homeless gentleman who may or may not have schizophrenia, was there. It has sort of become my default job to be there and help the ladies feel comfortable about this unpredictable element of a man with a mental health issue. I try to engage the man positively on his terms and help him to feel as comfortable as possible. It is not always possible to hold his attention the entire time, and he whispers and laughs to himself a lot, so there is no telling what he is thinking about in any given instance.

Still, I have to believe that his presence there might be helping him keep a hold on some part of sanity—a reassurance that society still is willing to engage with him. He is not a non-person. People still look at him, engage with him, and offer some small amount of help that they might have. Unlike last time, no-one offered him any protein bars, nuts, or other kind of food, but I noted that he had a plastic bag full of pizza slices. I do not know where or how he may have gotten them, but I imagine that a sympathetic worker at a local pizza place may have given him the left-over slices from a days work. Seeing a bag filled with food like that is a sobering reminder about how much the homeless have to think about the basic necessities of life during a given day. If I am ever homeless, I wonder how I might cope with the lack of food?

His situation is really tough, and unfortunately in our society, apparently common. He is clearly grappling with a mental heath condition that prevents him from acting in his own best interests to get off the streets (if there is a way to do that). He imagines gods and goddesses (literally) are talking to him. They give him warnings or guidance that directly tell him to do something. Of course, a person in that condition is not going to take medication that forces them back into a healthy reality. And, other people he meets in society cannot force him to do it, even as the government won't do it. A family member, might, if they could fight through the bureaucracy, have him institutionalized. But that is assuming that the family members is around or wants to get involved. I don't know this man's last name, so I do not have a clue if he has family or not. I have heard the older folks say that people like him used to be put into institutions where doctors and nurses monitored them and helped them take their medications, something that the government paid for. But that is no longer the case, people in his condition, too far removed from reality wind up on the streets or in jail. Fortunately, for this man in particular, he seems too nice to do anything violent, but I guess that is only as long as his illness doesn't progress or go any further,

As far as devotions at the center went, I hope that they were beneficial to those who were there. It is hard to know. I feel slightly sad knowing that the amount of people who attend seems unusually small. More people could (and probably should) attend, but for one reason or another, they don't. I have tried to make it my Monday priority. It is one of my methods being sane and healthy myself. An investment in the things in life that, hopefully, really matter.

Anxiety over an Uncertain Future continued.

Okay, the last post was a bit over the top, but the fear is real. I am definitely worried about an uncertain future, and while I feel trapped as it steadily creeps up on me, I am really feeling the realization that only I can fix it. It will not go away, and no one else is going to rescue me from it.I have to recuse myself.

Of course, the thing I am talking about—the thing from which I need rescue—is an undefined worry about a disastrous future, which is another way of saying (when you really think hard about it) "I am afraid of myself." I am afraid that I will not be able to change the course of things in time, that I will not be able to establish a foundation for a reasonably stable future, that I will not be able to support myself, that I will slip into homelessness because I did not exert myself enough, did not work hard enough to overcome and eliminate my personal flaws, did not establish routine, healthy, patterns of behavior. I have tried to fix this in the past by re-orienting my thoughts, but maybe not enough energy was put into re-orienting my behavior.

Some of this worry seems to be based on some solid evidence. For example, last night I read over the early posts on this blog from about thirteen years ago, and while my circumstances were different, most of my fears were the same. And, really, the future disaster is the same as the past disaster—my girlfriend leaving me, and the end of my graduate school career. I am still coping with some of the fallout from those old failures. The emotional turbulence of the past is still causing ripples into the present. The pain is not as intense, but it still aches, with the added realization that time is shorter. So, in some ways, the thing I am afraid of is already happening. It is just an extension of something that I failed to stop or fix, except now the consequences could intensify and morph into something new. I imagine it is like being injured in a battle, having a serious leg wound, and rather than properly have it seen to by a doctor and treated, you ignore it and allow it to bleed. The bleeding from my earlier problems has not yet fully stopped.

Last week, I found myself in town purchasing yet another notebook. The idea was that I would be able to identify my goals, the life-changes I needed to make, and then write out a plan of action, forming a schedule and noting which days would be spent working to achieve my goals. I had already done this to some extent.

For example, for what ever reason, a couple of years ago, (during my blog hiatus) I decided that each Friday night, I would go to the local cafe and draw pictures of the bands that played that night. The intention was: 1) to get out of the house and not be so isolated and lonely, 2) practice my drawing ability and keep whatever skills I had up, 3) do something that was just for myself, a thing that had nothing to do with my birth-family and had nothing to do with work. Just for me. It seems to have stuck. I have not done it every Friday since I begun, but I have done it most Fridays for at least two years solid.

Recognizing that as something as an emotional success, I thought to myself that maybe I could try to extend that daily task idea to something else. Maybe if I chose a day for writing, a separate one for cooking, another for cleaning, for exercise, and so on, I would be able to pile up some measure of success or personal improvement. If I thought of it as an 'investment,' and easy enough idea in a materialistic society, I could eventually accumulate some reward through persistent effort. Right now, in my middle forties, I still think that. The note book was the first step in developing a plan.

And yet, I was slightly disheartened to read in my reviewing of early blog posts, that I had a similar idea: "Develop a plan of action for change, execute the plan, reap the reward." Again, the problems are the same, the circumstances and consequences are different.

I suppose that is why the idea of child-rearing for virtues, the virtue training of children, is so important: a stronger character early in life is the foundation for future success and the coping with life's inevitable set-backs. Although I feel that I am more resilient than I ever have been, each of my set-backs has a tendency to send me crashing down into depression and inaction. I tend to throw up my hands when I perceive I have failed in some way.

Maybe this time will be different though. I have to have hope that I have improved over the last ten years, even if all I can see is how far I have left to go, and how the time to get there continues to shrink.

If I am 100% honest with my past life changes, I think my daily morning prayers has been my biggest success and has probably helped me to stop sliding further into despair. I have managed to keep this habit going mostly on track for at least the last several years, much longer than my drawing project. I am hoping that if I continue pray with sincerity, with an eye to developing virtue and change, petitioning for help with past mistakes, then by the grace of God, I might be guided to what I need most. If I can conquer the fear of being alone and unaided in my quest to be a better person with the ability to be self-supporting, then maybe I will succeed in the way I want to. At least, I sure hope so.

Anxiety Burning on the Horizon

My life has ground to a halt on the inside somehow. My emotions are like books that have spilled off a high shelf and lie broken, scattered, and askew on the floor. I feel I am caught in a trap of not knowing how best to pull myself together and move forward with confidence and aplomb I want to feel. Anxiety regarding my future is again creeping up on me, and reading the tea leaves of an unpleasant future, I fear it may already be too late to fix things.

For example, I know I need to repair my health, lose weight, and get off the sleep apnea machine (which I really dislike), but I do not know where or how to start, especially since other concerns take up more time. Doing laundry, having a day off for chores, fixing meals is a hassle that takes up so much time and energy. There isn't time or energy left for exercise. Then, a slimy edge of hopelessness accumulates on all my random thoughts during the day, never too conscious to be examined directly, just a thin film of unease that you suddenly aware of but can't formulate a way to describe it, even to yourself.

I used to feel like I was making progress to things. When I was in college, I was trying to head for a career that was satisfying and could help me afford a decent life-style. That fell apart spectacularly. When I was in a relationship, I was heading toward a family and a satisfying emotional bond with a loving partner. That fell apart. But more accurately, it probably was never what I thought it was in the first place. Youth made it seem like the future was matter of choosing a handful of the best options from a world of possibility, a world of potential benefits that could be enjoyed like biting into a ripe, sweet, summer fruit. Late middle-age has clarified the reality that time is not an infinite resource and that some opportunities will only come once or twice. Coping with loss, and trying not to feel like a failure is hard.

I spend a lot of time praying, hoping to recapture the feeling of security that came from a hopeful future. Trying not to be de-moralized in a world hurting from its own poor choices and disregard for the inherent dignity of mankind. May God please guide me to my best possible future.

Flying Saucer Dream

I had a dream last night. Aliens had invaded and people were completely overwhelmed. Every time a treaty was going to be signed, there was a betrayal. The scenes I remember are as follows. I was in a large museum type of building. Lots of political officials had surrounded the president (He was sort of non-descript looking, and certainly did not look like the man in office today.) They were panicking in a sort of half-controlled manner, pleading with him to do one thing or another. The only choice that seemed clear to them was that the president should retreat to his underground bunker, which was accessed through the fake presidential oval office, which was in the theatre auditorium. Me and a handful of other tourists, naturally couldn't follow.

Just as he and his men and officials disappeared behind some stage props, the aliens marched into building from every side. They were menacing in their troop formations but they did not attack. Escape seemed impossible. Speaking in an incomprehensible manner, they pointed this way and that, before laughing and leaving behind a small white safe on a dolly. A smarter man among us, a professor of some kind, with his glasses askew on his face, realized it was a bomb. He lay over the bomb, frantically working at the combination before it exploded. Even though he died in the resulting explosion, his heroic act saved at least half of the people in the museum, including myself.

I rushed outside, only to see the havoc of flying saucers everywhere shooting laser beams at a panicking crowd. A police officer, helping to get people out of the back of a station wagon, was caught in the beam and turned into ash. I rushed around him into the street. And then I woke up.

A Good Enough Day

Today, I was wakened by the sound of dad shooting water into a metal barrel for the chickens to drink. I was groggy, and took about half and hour to become fully awake. However, for a change, I was glad I was up. I needed to be in Salem for the service I had planned on attending. I am not sure if it happens to most men my age and circumstance, but I find I need this sort of thing as a hope life line that my life has not completely gone off of the rails. Even if I am judged to be unsuccessful in my public life, at least I can try to be a good person in my personal life: develop virtue and all of that.

I was the last person in the building after it was over, and was politely ushered out. I hadn't realized that I was keeping the gentleman who was tasked with locking the building away from the rest of his day. I had been in the library selecting a book that I thought might help me get my daily life in order.

At this point, I drove downtown and after depositing my check for two weeks work, went looking for a place to take lunch. The exercise from walking was sorely needed, but I didn't find a suitable place. The new place did not have the menu items I wanted to eat, and the prices were too high. I figured that my best course of action was to eat lunch in a coffee shop, where I had the most delicious bagel sandwich and a hibiscus iced tea. I should have had it lightly sweetened, but as it was, it was a much better meal than I had hoped for. I considered working on personal projects, like organizing healthy meals for the week, but instead I watched videos on my laptop and glanced occasionally at the youthful, energetic people coming and going trying not to feel too envious. It is, admittedly, a bigger struggle than I would like. I could write essays of regret, but I am choosing not to indulge in too many negative reinforcements on my attitude. Like I said, it's a stuggle.

I had planned on going to the shop and working on my video projects, but the combination of the sun, food, and poor sleep made me feel very tired, so I drove home for a three hour nap. I didn't necessarily want to sleep for that long, but I think I needed it. I am developing a problem with my breathing while I sleep. I suspect sleep apnea, which means that I really need to get my health in control before I suffer greater consequences. I am working on it.

Night brought a trip to walmart (an accomplishment for me) so I could purchase some much needed sheets. I also bought cat food for the cat, and contemplated buying more junk food, but talked myself out of it. I met my biological father there. He's nearly completely deaf, so I listened and pantomimed responses that I hoped were understood, but I suspect weren't. I think he could probably use a hearing aid, but I don't think his pride will let him. I do not know how to feel about him, since I do not really know him very well. What I do know of his beliefs and opinions, I likely disagree, but I give him respect and attention. It seems right to do so. I then spent the rest of the evening at the shop watching videos, and playing video games. The one bright spot of accomplishment came with some figure sketching that I did. I want to keep up on my art as best as I am able. I am hoping it will help.

Now, I must leave for a trip to the grocery store to buy some breakfast items, and then I will watch a little TV at home before returning to bed. I think I did okay for this day doing some of the things that needed doing. Perhaps I could have worked on more necessary items more, and not indulged in too much distractions, but I am not going to call this a bad day. It was a good day. A stepping stone on the path of doing better.

Restlessly Worrying

One of these days I going to change the layout of this blog. It is not abandoned as much as it is neglected. I hope to write more and communicate more of what I am thinking with this silly thing, but tonight is not the the night. It seems that I need to have an outlet, even if it is online for to everyone to scrutinize. We'll see what the future holds with this thing.

Briefly, and with some specifics, I am up late. I do not sleep as well as I used to do. Thoughts about my youth tinged with melancholy occur more frequently than I would like. My future seems to be cramped because of my previous bad decisions combined with a growing awareness of my own limited opportunities. Part of me wishes I had made more of life by now, but another part of me sees I didn't have as much as a chance as I thought I did. I should have gotten my Master's Degree. One thing is excruciatingly true right now: it is 1:30 a.m., dark, and quiet. I need to go home and sleep, but feel anxious and restless. I'm avoiding doing it for some reason. I wish I had a clearer idea about what I wanted out of life, and where I want to take it from here, but all I know now is that, now, I need to stop writing. I will go home and sleep, but mostly because I don't know what else to do.

Coming to the point

There is an idea floating through our contemporary world, of which most who are not scientists don't fully understand, myself included. However, the idea posits (as near as I can grasp the current cultural zeitgeist of it) that time may not actually exist as we understand it. In brief, Time is an illusion of perspective. Of course, my personal experience (or perspective, if you will) of time is that I can accrete experience so that my experience grows and I become a slightly different person, either good or bad. In the objective sense, if I learn math or another language, I can use that learning at a later period.

However, the accumulation of experience and its ability to coalesce into learning, is something that I think about in the philosophical sense. Do I, or can I, become a better person by struggling with experiences that are difficult. Pain, as a physical mechanism, teaches us to avoid things that are harmful to us. However, pain also occurs when we have experienced damage to our systems. Is there a point in which damage has occurred, causes pain, and repair is no possible. Is there a difficult experience that damages us as people rather than teaches us how to become better by avoiding that damage in the first place? I am not sure.

It's been too long since I have written here. Seven months? I am no longer in the depths of despair about my being, but I do feel damaged in a way—like my difficult experiences of the recent past will have consequences that extend beyond my time to try and repair the damage, considering that repair may not even be possible. I have hope that I can be guided to a better path, but I feel a lot of regret for not managing my time better in the past. There were so many lost opportunities for something else that it is challenging for me to try and not dwell on them. Part of me feels like I have ignored some internal warnings much to my own peril.

From here on out, I think that what I will be trying to concentrate on is accumulating the virtues that I feel I should acquire, and trying to endure the experiences that are left to me, ones that I do not want, cannot avoid, but will be forced to face regardless of anything I could do to mitigate them. Yes, I will face difficult experiences ahead, but my focus is no longer on making all of the "right" moves to avoid those experiences, but on making the right changes in attitude and behavior to be able to withstand what I cannot avoid and to adapt to the things as best I can.

I have felt attached to someone specific for a very long period of time. Someone with whom I wanted to spend the rest of my life with. Someone with whom I wanted to build a future with. However, she does not really want to be with me, even with (or because of) our past together. We have been interacting with each other, with degrees of intensity, for over ten years. Recently (like a few days), I have come to feel that it never be possible to repair that relationship, and not because I haven't tried. I am a man of many faults, but now I fully understand some of our obstacles were not ones I placed in our path. I have tremendous sympathy for the challenges that we faced, and intellectually, I place blame with no-one. Emotionally, I feel burned by the differences in our beings that made reconciliation impossible. I have been sad, seeking a compromise along any route that would not require me to abandon my healthy sense of self. I may have been able to make it work for awhile longer if I forced myself to accept the notion that I was the center of all our problems, that I was focus of all the blame, that my choices alone forced us down this road. But, even after seriously searching long and hard for a way to accept all of the mistakes, I found I could not do it. I may experience bouts of low self-esteem, but at least intellectually, I know while I accept responsibility for my previous poor choices, I cannot accept blame for things that I did not cause, nor endure the misery of anger that I am not the source of. It is possible for someone to be unconsciously affected by tragedy, and for the effects of that to spill out into other areas of their lives without them recognizing that source. In essence, another person's actions have traveled through time to disrupt my attempts at closeness. The person I was seeking to make a life with is still echoing the earthquake of pain that another person caused.

Of course, to be truly honest, I believe that if she could heal from all of that, I might have a chance at building that life with her. The change this time is that I do not have much hope of that happening anymore. My cajoling, attempts to seek closeness, efforts at being sensitive and communicative were all rejected. I have done all I know how to do.

Now, I face a future that no longer includes her. I experience regret and remorse for that loss of a potential relationship. Perhaps I always will. But, I now know that I cannot be chained to a future that may not be. I have to move on and try and be a better person in the future.

Trying to Lift My Vision

Another late night: almost 1:00 am now. The issue with today was that I slept for a couple of hours in the middle of the evening (6–9pm), which made trying to go to sleep at a decent hour pretty much impossible. I hardly got any sleep the night before, and my head has throbbed with a sort of pressure headache. I've interacted with everyone politely, even amiably, just as they may have avoided me due to a subtle vibe of alienation that radiates away from me like a silent radio signal.

I continue to wrangle with my negative emotions as much as always, but I think I have been dealing with them a bit better today. Even though today was a short workday, I got a few projects done and feel pretty good about catching up on them by the end of the week. I still have two projects for other people that I must complete very soon, but they can wait for the time being. The summer is my busiest as far as work goes. I grapple with motivation when it comes to my individual designs. That will be my next career/personal challenge.

And, speaking more broadly about how I feel about life and my place in it, I think I can see a certain kind of emotional acceptance about my current situation that makes the inevitability of the future more easy to grapple with. Poverty and struggle may be my lot in life, despite my ambitions for more outward successes. These last few years have really clarified for me how focusing on my inward successes, and trying to develop into a better person, is my true and most important goal anyway. The outer successes would have been nice, but I always knew that it wasn't the most important. And as the prospect for that outward acclaim or achievement falls away, the inward self-directed enrichment process gains some momentum. Of course, I truly hope that no one thinks that I am saying I am perfect, or even that I am a slightly better person than most.

In fact, most of the intense depression that I felt these last few months has arisen out of a painful recognition that, even a year ago, I was a better person than I am now. Through a combination of actions and inactions, I have fallen backwards into a trap that holds me tight within the frozen grip of regret and churned up frustrations. All my good intentions were transmuted into foolishness, and even then, I ignored most of what I should have been doing in the search of another distraction. I have learned the hard lessons of dissipations and lethargy. I still try to come to terms with compromises that have cost me more than I would have wanted them to.

Of course, there are all sorts of signs and signifiers during the day that leads me to one of these thoughts or another, and I realize that it all sounds so very vague. So, I will leave it for now to discuss my day.

Like I said earlier, I had not gotten much sleep. After informing my "boss" that I was tired and that I may not be in to work right away, I ate a small bowl of cereal and went back to bed. I probably dreamed about something, which was frightening in its limitations, but I do not remember it. I do not have nightmares in the traditional sense. My nightmares arise out of the limitations that the dreams show me, out of the possibility of a life circumscribed by poverty, chance, and fate bought through earlier actions. I wish I could tell you how I am haunted by some of them, but most people wouldn't understand the implications. And, honestly, I am glad that I dreaming again. My dreams had left me for a few weeks, and it scared me in the way that adults can be scared without showing it on their surfaces.

I approached work in a workman way and probably did more than I thought I would get done. I feel a little wistful frustration about this job because there are always deadlines that are too close to do any real research or exploration of the themes, symbols, or possibilities. But, I don't dare feel too much frustration because I recognize that I have much more flexibility in this job than I would have anywhere else. I am lucky to have this job, and I know it. In the back of my mind, I am deeply worried that I may lose it in the future, but I do not think that it will be something that I have caused. I feel relatively assured that I did the best I could to prevent that outcome.

After work, I went home and had dinner with my parents before drifting off in that nap. When I awoke at 8:30ish, I talked with them briefly, and discovered that my sister had asked my Dad to purchase her something from the store that she claimed she needed. Perhaps she does, but her needs are always immediate and transcendent above everyone else's. It would be easy to tell another person no, but my sister cannot help who she is or how she thinks. And so the order of the day is compassion.

I drove into town and went to Walmart. I called my parents on my cell phone, and asked them what kind of thing it was that my sister needed. My dad told me, but I couldn't find it there. Therefore, I went to Safeway, and after a lot of searching found, it.

I went back to work and made another gameplay movie for youtube, but I think my heart is going out of it. It takes a lot of work, and the initial returns that I imagined I might be able to achieve appear as elusive as ever. I could do more research over the issue, but that would require even more work.

I've been thinking that I need to return to all of the other interests that I have fostered throughout my life, and continue to develop those. I could go back to writing and drawing. I could read more, take time for myself and photography. Worry less, and allow other people to take personal responsibility for their own lives. I may be an irrelevant person in the grand scheme of history, and I may have harmed inner and outer self and damaged both, but I still have time left. Perhaps, through perseverance and more effort, there is a chance to claim some small amount of personal dignity so I can arise as a person who was given wisdom through some occasional and self-inflicted hard knocks. I wish to hear the voice of wisdom speaking to me, and guiding me through a life of difficulty. To feel the rays of the sun of wisdom and assurance shining on me once more. To be washed in the seas of forgiveness for those actions and inactions. And, to ascend to a wholesome place of truth, insulated from the cold winds of sorrows and pains that are always reflected in the downward glances towards an earthly life. I want to lift my vision towards a broad and warm horizon of better internal possibilities and confirmations that I can personally achieve.

Uncertain about Writing

I am really uncertain about whether or not I should write a book. It seems like it is something that I have put off for a very long time. There has always been an internal prompting for me to write one. However, as I get older, I think to myself that almost everything I thought was important really is not. Every pop-culture reference, joke, effort to improve myself, vocation, avocation, etc. was simply another distraction away from something else I should have been focused on. Maybe that other thing was to express myself and my views with a novel, especially since my writing is one of the few things that I have gotten the most positive feedback from other people about, but then again, maybe not. All I know for sure is that the "one thing" that I should be working for always seems to escape me. I know it is there, but I don't know what it is.

I'll be really honest at the moment. I am solidly middle-aged. I have no money for retirement, a part-time job that I can barely do regularly and probably should have been fired from a year ago, and tens of thousands of dollars in student debt. I never managed to find a companion to share my life with despite my efforts to try, and I have no tangible assets like a house of my own, savings, or a decent car. It is hard not to feel like the world's biggest failure.

I wish there was another word for jealousy. Jealousy implies that there is a passion inside the person afflicted with it, a drive that keeps the fires of emotion burning hot. The jealousy I feel is very cold. It is a sad recognition that many things that I dared to hope for are somehow impossible, so daring to hope feels dangerous. If I had allowed myself to feel the hot jealousy for the average achievements of a common person (ie. a steady and successful job, a loving family, a pleasant relationship with a wife, etc.) then I would be consumed by pain. Instead, whenever I feel the first twinge of wanting more than I can apparently achieve, I avert my inner and outer gaze as quickly as possible. Too much focus on those things will be dangerous. I can't do it.

I keep hearing from everyone around me that the economy really is difficult right now, but I have to say that, when looked at globally, it hardly seems like our economic problems will be solved soon enough for me to benefit from. I need about a hundred miracles for these troubles to go away, but I doubt they'll be arriving any time soon. I don't want to sound so negative, but I have to say that the whole world is in a real fix, and that, while I didn't personally cause the troubles it has, they will affect me more than I would like and more than I can change. Writing, a broad and non-specific avenue towards a fantasy of redemption, whispers into my heart and suggests that it is the only hope I would ever have at climbing out of my current mess. It has been done before, but I also know I'd have to be very lucky and have a better plan than I do now.

Grinding my way towards Discipline

I still end up hurting myself in these weird internal ways that I feel that I should be better able to control. It's those small moments of choice, where the gust of a impulse or whim blows quickly upon you, and then, ignoring a reflective thought, you allow yourself to be pushed in a direction you would rather not go. It's the later recognition of these small moments that grind on me more than I want.

Is it in my personality to foster discipline, to choose the more difficult paths, to accept the many failures and move forward towards hope? I believe, when I am truly honest with myself, the answer is yes. But, I am equally bewildered when I try to describe how I might go about acquiring that discipline—the regulatory control over my choices brought about by detachment—and applying it to my life.

My inner voice says, "I know I can do this. It is within my ability. I must persevere. I must continue despite the emotional consequence of actions or inactions." I know that voice is right. The only path is the path forward. Still, the difficulty that this internal project holds disturbs me in a powerful way.

Functionality

It seems like everytime that I come to this journal lately, it is to write about how difficult life seems. I think I will just accept that. I know that it doesn't endear one to other people to continually discuss all of the problems that life has in store for us as we wend our way awkwardly through it, but this journal is more for me than it is for anything else. It is a place to grasp a few thoughts I have at these writing moments, and fix them in place. The hope is that, by capturing thoughts, they can be examined a bit more objectively in the future, but I would have to develop more of the habit of reading what I have written. Aside from a glance at the most recent previous posts, it is rare that I go back over much of what I have said. I also know that a lot of what I have already said, I have said before.

It is true that my previous post discussed an event that will have (and probably has had) a profound impact on my future and my future plans. Yes. It was one of the worst moments of my recent life, and definitely the worst all year. I cannot help but end up using at as a jigsaw puzzle piece in a metaphorical narrative about my life. Unfortunately, as that awful piece slides into place, the larger story the picture reveals isn't pretty. Perhaps I have the piece in the wrong place, or perhaps it is not a piece to the puzzle I am trying to solve. However, if I place it where it seems to fit, then the story told by all of these little events is ultimately one of failure. Of course, it is difficult to know how much of this failure is under my control. Yes, I have made some bad choices, but then again, perhaps previous experience has made some of these bad choices more inevitable than they would have otherwise.

I suppose I could look at it like this: Through no fault of your own, someone steals the keys to your car. With you keys missing, it is more likely that you will be late for work. Once late for work, you miss an appointment to discuss a new client account, and due to an argument the client had with his children that morning, he is in a bad mood and decides to cancel the order. It would be very human for the person who had their keys stolen to feel frustrated, to feel as if there was something in their control that they missed, to feel like the bad results of the day were their fault. And yet, it wasn't. It was the bad intention of the thief and the bad mood of the client that led to those places.

So, it follows that, due to no fault of one's own, a poor economy could lead to poor job prospects, poor jobs prospects means a financial tightening of the belt, which leads to poor diet, which leads to poor health and frustration, which leads to even further difficulty. It is easy for the people suffering from economic forces beyond their control to feel like a failure for not having done more, for not being super-human enough to transcend those problems. And yet, looked at objectively, they, as one individual, have little effect on a economy that is created by thousands, or millions.

This is where I suspect I am at. I have a narrative about my life that seems to fit. I have missed chances and opportunities everywhere I turn. I see some of the challenges I have had to deal with, especially ones that I know others do not have. But, eventually, I am uncertain. Maybe some of that bad feeling comes from a real tangible force that I have little or no awareness of. I could be grappling with something that isn't entirely my fault.

But, of course, even with all of our challenges that we face, we are responsible for engaging with life as it presents itself to us. We must figure out a way forward, even if there is something pulling us back. After all, I am best able to measure my own intentions and efforts than anyone. And, even after working at this problem for a long time, I keep coming up short. I keep thinking about how I should have known better, should have worked harder, should have dedicated myself to make a more genuine effort. I do feel blessed that, among the people living today, I have a slightly better insight into the kinds of behavior that are more likely to lead to a better place. This knowledge has prevented me from making even larger mistakes with even greater consequences. Still, if there was an objective third person listening to all of my thoughts, watching all of my actions, then I am not so sure I would fall into a positive light.

I do not want to feel like everything important I have reached for has escaped me. I do not want to feel like I have failed at all of the big things in life. However, after petty arguments with people who cannot be expected to be any more heroic or long-suffering than me (and I am light-years away from either condition), I feel like a tremendous failure. I am not responsible for anyone's choices other than my own. I desperately desire, but do not know how to transcend the emotional toll that bad experiences, or my own inability to live up to my high expectations, has on me. I would like to be able to float above some of the petty difficulties that, intellectually, I know do not matter. However, it is too easy for me to feel hurt and frustrated by poor choices I have made that lead me to even more disappointments.

It must be said that the crack of uncertainty about any of this grows larger when I admit that depression could be coloring all of my so-called objectivity. It is hard to judge my best moments and far to easy to condemn my worst. Still, every slip on the razor's path increases my fears that I have not exerted the right type or amount of effort to be a happier person who is functional enough to live life as an independent adult.

Difficult to Say

Sunday was one of the worst days I have had in a year or so. Life seems to hold so many mysteries for me, and lately, most of them have been unpleasant at least on the surface.

Of course, I understand that unpleasant experiences are not always harmful, or exclusively harmful. I'm sure we often learn more about ourselves and each other on our worst days than we do on our good ones, as long as we commit to learning how not to end up hurting ourselves (or others). The bad helps us avoid similar experiences in the future, or acts as a practice when we try to handle them differently. Those awful moments can have benefit, even when you are overwhelmed by strong and and poisonously enervating emotions of frustration or depression.

These difficult experiences, combined with my age, is helping me to realize, in a tangible way, that I will not experience many things in life I have been exposed to. I will never travel around the world seeing its many wonders. Now, I understand that I will probably not have a family of my own, or a house, or a well-paying career that would be emotionally or financially fulfilling and provide me with a positive sense of purpose.

These handful of moments, these light sketches on the pages of life, are ephemeral. Everything is washed out by a greater unveiling of lights where it suddenly takes on a new or changed appearance.

I am not sorrowful that I will not experience them before growing old. No, the challenge for me is to try and not feel sad about not being able to share all of those experiences with the people who I have grown to love throughout my lengthening years. Things don't matter, neither does a new or exciting experience, unless there is someone whom you care for (and care for you) to share it with.

Dream that persists throughout the Day.

Today was not as productive as I would have liked, but I did manage to get some things done at work, as well as try to assist my family in feeling better about their personal troubles. I still need to mail some important letters, but I will get that done tomorrow.

The most interesting part of my day was the nap I had this morning. I have been feeling especially out of energy lately. My night routine isn't much of a routine at all. Aside from being below perfect health, I go to bed at irregular times, so it is often that I wake up at a good time, between 5:00 and 7:00 am, but I wind up falling back asleep around 8:00 or 9:00 am. This was one of those mornings. It was during this extra sleep between 8:00 and 11:00 am that I had a dream that I was working in some non-teaching capacity at a school, perhaps I was even attending some college level class there. It was while I was in the auditorium, helping to clean up or assist with the other younger students that I met the most beautiful and vivacious teacher. Her dark auburn hair and lovely figure was not the most intriguing thing about her. The most intriguing thing was that she seemed to be genuinely interested in me as a potential romantic partner. She wanted to go on a date, not as a way to fill an emotional need of hers or to play out some predefined cultural role that dictated how she should find a partner. It was a genuine interest in me as a person. I remember feeling disoriented by it. I could be a confident person in almost any other scenario except this one. I was pleasantly surprised, uncomfortable, and slightly incredulous and suspicious.

It was this dream that hung with me all day more than anything. More than my sister's complaints about her life's struggles. More than the work that I needed to do. More than the television shows I distracted myself with. And more than the chores I did before going to bed. I am not sure why these internal journeys of the inward spirit take so much precedence over the more tangible ones of the outward being, yet in this case, it did.

Personal Goals for Improvement

I need to spend a little more time reading classic literature. It has a mysterious quality that helps inspire and invigorate my internal life just a little more. For example, just before going to bed, I read the first chapter of Madame Bovary by Gustav Flaubert, and the richness of the translation was—how else can I put it?—savory. When I first discovered some of this classic literature in college, my experiences were a bit limited just because I had not yet experienced many of the classic troubles that refines a person's character. While youth has its many advantages, age brings sorrows and sorrows bring wisdom and understanding. (Of course, as no one is omniscient, that particular wisdom and understanding that age brings is necessarily confined to each individual's vision and personal perspective.) As I grow older, my own perspective on the text gains a lot of this depth.

Today, I plan to take care of some personal tasks I have been putting off. I need to mail some letters, and I should make a trip into the larger city to look for clothing. It would probably help me greatly to make a list of the various tasks I need to complete, as well as figure out a weekly plan for achieving my goals. Spring seems like a good season to do this. The trouble for me is that I sometimes get so bogged down in the plans, or making plans for plans, that I never get anything started. It has helped me to have a personal pad of paper that is not a "journal" or some kind of sketch book with refined art in it. I tend to treat those things with too much trepidation, as if they themselves were the final pieces, and not a workbook that ideas should spill onto in a chaotic mess.

To clarify some of my goals for myself, I should read each day to be a better writer. I should draw each day to be a better artist and visual thinker. I should work on mastering wordpress development so I can have more flexibility with my blogging/writing. I should learn more about computers and networking in general, web design and development, and coding in other languages. This is as good a place as any to explore some of my plans for myself.

Trapped inside the Emotions.

It's nearly been a year since I last wrote something here, and the previous post (after having just read it) is something I really could have written yesterday. The feelings, those pent up emotions that stagger around in my head and crash into each other from day to day, are still the same. Nothing has changed. Nothing.

And, that means, I've really haven't made progress. In fact, in some ways, I feel worse now then I did before. (Of course, there is the chance that I can't be objective enough to see the progress. Yet, looking at it from just the surface, I am a little stunned at how much of what I have written then is the same now: I still feel like I need to improve in all of the major and minor ways I mentioned. Even the bit about "motivation following practice" is something I thought the other day, and until this moment, believed it was an idea I had only just discovered.) Reading, I see a foolish person that year ago, whining about needing to be better and not really understanding how much worse it could be. I need to forgive myself, they say. I need to not be so hard on myself. However, looking on all of my internals in a way that those friends and my family cannot, I see the pain and the failures more closely. Worse, I know how much I could have achieved, but through laziness, fear, and ignorance, see how much has escaped me. I will return to a better life (with more challenges) soon, and I will attempt, yet again, to overcome my failures.

Envisioning a Future

I've been thinking that I really need to be a little more serious about writing. Now that several years have passed along and I have had a few years trying my hand at finding my own way in the world, I've discovered that, despite what I may have wanted in the past, what I thought would be the best course of success in life, success isn't going to be found in personal preferences and talent, but instead in improving myself to the point where, even if I don't wind up doing what I would like, I have become a decent person doing whatever I find myself doing in the future.

(It's a bit hard to explain just tapping it out quickly on a keyboard as the thoughts arrive. At points, it appears we live in an information age where the information we receive is incomplete, distorted, or plain wrong. Forgive what may seem like moralizing or solipsism, but working through these personal thoughts is sometimes messy even if I hope to one day transcend them.)

I worry about not being able to pull out from underneath the hidden assumptions that afflict us all. Nevertheless, despite the potential presence of my own assumptions, the people I see around me, according to my particular viewpoint in the world, seem to feel that future regrets are hidden in not achieving the material successes they incessantly desire. Hidden in failing to achieve a life of material comforts that do not extend beyond their too-myopic dreams. But again, to my point of view, most of those same people do not realize that the vision of material success to which they strive is so far out of reach that failure is an inevitability. We admire achievement and success when it happens, but we do not seem to recognize how rare those things are, or the kinds of troubles they will eventually bring. Instead, we burn in the fire of vague personal frustrations, treating each other poorly because our sense of who we are and what we feel we deserve has been distorted. It's as if our failure to build ourselves in a material image that has always been false is a tragic injustice, that the world has somehow wronged us for not providing us the false comforts of a rich and famous lifestyle.

Which is why it seems to me that life is about becoming a better person through trial and errors while struggling to avoid the overwhelming waves of ignorance, contention, and selfish thinking. And of course, it is not easy or pleasant to think about. But, as seems obvious, the happiness people seek in things, achievements, and worldly success is a mirage. Happiness itself is a virtue that is found in aligning oneself to the better qualities that make us all truly human. And in that sense, it can developed and practiced. I only hope that I can develop it as a professional athlete develops muscle so that I may use it confidently and unconsciously and feel, ultimately, all the better for doing so.

Transformations

Not sure how to describe an illness where the main symptom is a dissatisfaction with yourself so intense that it makes you feel ill and puts you slightly out of time with the Universe. Life continues to swirl around you with the same vibrancy and colors it always had, but instead of a warm and satisfying red, or an enjoyable rich blue with a calming coolness, everything is pasted over with a light pastel yellow that, like a sticky film, clings over everything you happen to glance upon.

There is something about my life that feels a bit unsatisfying, perhaps tinged with the portent of doom or trouble ahead, or an anxiety about the course of the future that will not lay flat, and I cannot shake it. I want to. People who I am close to say that is nothing more than common anxiety, or perhaps it is yet another flare up of a lifelong battle with the inane minor demons of depression, but no. It somehow seems more than that. More frightening.

I have been imploring the benevolent forces in the Universe to guide me to a transformative path, a path where I find the calming centers inside myself, the ones I have been seeking and fix my feet firm upon it to walk straight ahead into both joy and sorrow with an equanimity that has still somehow remained elusive. There is an honorable and dignified course of life that feel remains out of my grasp.

Part of the problem, I suspect, is that I am always seeking the difficulties in life rather than allow myself to be human, to love myself with an impartiality that can acknowledge my failures without berating me for them. Love, not the weird definitions of it that exist in my current culture, seems to be the only proper way to motivate myself to good course in life. Too much sorrow leads to either despondency, or a defeated resignation that permits failures as just another one of life's "horrible" inevitabilities. I need to be able to feel the sorrows, to forgive myself for the pain they cause, and trust that I can endure without succumbing to the worst of them. If I can somehow cultivate the habit of joy, then I will be fortified against the onslaught of sorrows.

Habit, now there is an interesting word. Since the mundane chores and duties of life must be dispatched along with the goal of self-improvement, the best way to handle them is develop good habits. I've wasted too much time thinking that overcoming pain or sorrow or improving myself was an intellectual exercise of the mind more than a life practice that requires regularity in its execution. One of the lessons of the world is, obviously, this: if one wishes to become good at something, one has to practice. Personal transformation of one's inner life can, it seems to me, be encouraged through good habits which help you practice being a decent, good person on a regular basis. As such, the first habit that I need to develop is "discipline." Discipline, as a virtue, is, it appears to me, nothing more than an expression of "Faithfulness." You must be faithful to yourself, your obligations, your spirit, and the larger world around you. Motivation follows practice. Heat produces motion, stillness freezes us in place. This is one of my first tasks in the process of transforming my life: encouraging and practicing the habits of a good character, to becoming a devoted person, morally upright, and always prepared to do the right thing no matter how hard it might first appear to do so.

I think that I am going to have to write more. The only problem that I seem to encounter is that I often do not know what to write about. I think I would like to try to discuss something that is meaningful to me, and I would hope, helps bring meaning into the world. This is not to say that I am some kind of egotist that is seeking to inflict my particular view of knowledge on the world, but rather I am trying to share something with the world that lends itself to a meaning and positive influence for the world itself. I would hope that doing so would help me feel like I have accomplished something good in the world, but I also know (in the depths of my heart) that offering up something that I believe to be good to the world may be personally more difficult for me in the long run. I know that I am being vague about all of this. I apologize. Even if I provided some specificity about what I was talking about, it would still be difficult to express this idea.

It's just . . . it may be that I feel that I have reached an age where some opportunities are closed to me, possibly for the rest of my life. There is a finality to some of these recognitions that is slightly unsettling, a new freedom that it more disturbing than emancipating. Simultaneously, I am also beginning to see that there is still some chance to achieve something that would help the world achieve a greater good. If I can somehow grapple with all these impulses to try and 'do better' or 'be better,' maybe I can achieve my goal. The thought hidden right there in that former statement perhaps expresses my feelings more than any other: "my goals are shifting." No longer do I feel that I can grasp some material life of comfort that always seems just out of reach anyway, a media chimaera designed to ensnare foolishly immature hearts and minds. Yes, even now, I would like to have certain unfulfilled elements of my life fulfilled, but I recognize that this may not ever happen. Therefore, I must refocus my life and change my goals in such a way where I find personal meaning by attaching myself to something bigger and more important than an indolent life comfortably lived for myself and my desires alone.

I feel that I am a reasonably intelligent person who could achieve more in life if I worked harder at it. Every day, it seems, becomes a struggle. I still am constrained by the oppression of lost chances, poor choices, outside forces, and fate. Yet, I am going to try this new journey.

Another Sunday

I awoke this morning rather tired from not having slept very well last night. Sleeping through the night has been one of the more difficult things for me to do lately. I am not sure why I can't; I suspect some aspect of my health is part of it. The older I get, the more my physical health seems to be creeping up as an issue. I feel like it's an unkempt garden, charming early on perhaps, but increasingly a problem later.

Sunday is my day for going out to a study group. I won't say what or why at this point because some things are going to be just for me.

Anyway, I got ready and organized and was out the door by 9:30, time enough to make it to the group if I went straight there, but I decided that I should visit my mom at her shop first. It was a check in. I am concerned about the amount of work and stress that she seems to be constantly under. I don't know how to help alleviate any of that, so I keep checking in. She said that she would like to have an unsweetened iced tea from McDonald's. It is one of her minor indulgences that she allows herself, and I am not going to be an insensitive jerk and discourage it. It is also hard not to see it as a stress reliever. And as a demonstration of care for someone, there isn't anything quite like treating them to food, or in this case, tea.

The wait in the fast food line was really long since they had not made the tea for that day. They were in full-blown breakfast mode, selling their breakfast sandwiches left and right. I indulged myself and ordered one, and later, after having eaten it, wondered how something so remarkably tasty could leave you feeling so unsatisfied. It is one of the oddities about that particular form of fast food.

I delivered the tea back to my mother, all while worrying about how inordinately late I was going to be. I drove in an mild panic thinking about the interruption that I was sure I was going to cause with my late arrival. However, without speeding (a minor point of pride), I was only a few minutes late and relieved to see that they had not yet begun.

As for the group itself, overall I enjoyed it and am already looking forward to next week. I will say that the group dynamic was a little strained during the middle. There are some real gems of knowledge that come out this meeting for me. However, at times, some of the other participants seemed to get bogged down in their own ideas and people start to get frustrated. If I do speak, which I try not to, I only try to point out what I find personally illuminating about what it is we are reading.

Afterwards, everyone decides that they want to attend a buffet lunch downtown, which is where the real heart of the meeting emerges. With ten people, I imagine it to be something like the large feasts you see in period movies where guests try to engage each other with interesting anecdotes about their own lives. The cool avenues of knowledge that are explored during the earlier meeting finally dissolves into the broad paths of warm feeling. I was very worried that the one participant who seemed to be the focal point of the earlier strain during the meeting wasn't eating, and yet to bring up the issue might have caused embarrassment.

After it was done, I made my goodbyes and left. I wandered to the bookstore and made a half-hearted attempt to look for an engaging book on design, but left without a more full exploration. Most of the books there, seemed like ones I had seen there before. I did some more walking downtown before finally getting to my car and calling a former college colleague about a debt I needed to repay.

During my video class, I was in a group that needed an actor. So, I asked a friend from the photography class we shared if she would mind helping out. Because the project involved a lot of on location shots and travel, I was seriously worried that I was asking too much. Therefore, I promised her that I could give her a nine by nine sheet of muslin to use as a photographer's backdrop. I knew that she and another friend had already painted one, and that she might like to make another one. However, that video class was one of the last ones of my final term, and then I was out of school when I finally got the muslin. With it finally in hand, it was difficult trying to figure out how to get it to her. She was working overseas for a few months I had it. I knew that she acted in the video as a favor and wasn't at all concerned about getting anything in return, but I was seriously worried about leaving this promise unfulfilled and debt unpaid.

I finally called her up and asked if I could deliver it to her, to which she said yes. I felt relieved it was finally in her hands. We talked for a bit in her driveway before I left.

I made my way to Value Village to look for some blue jeans and possibly a shirt. And it was there among the racks of used clothes that I started to have some trouble. I saw myself in the other patrons of that store and realized just how poor and out-of-shape I was. The financial poverty I have struggled with all my life has left some deep social scars that seem difficult for me to repair. For one, I would like to dress more attractively, but I don't know how and, worse, would feel uncomfortable in anything other than jeans and T-shirts. Under fluorescent lights, I mentally went down the list on how deficient I felt I was in regards to my appearance, a process which ultimately leads me to same unpleasant mental place again and again and again. My imagined solution to the problem of this bad feeling is irrational, somewhat selfish, and unpractical. Intellectually, I know this. And yet, I want it so strongly anyway that it forces that knowledge to the side where I do my best to ignore it. The real solution to problem is not removing the consequence of these bad feeling through distractions, but controlling the conditions that cause the bad feelings to arise. Strike at the root cause and not its effects. Easier said than done.

I went home and took refuge in bed, trying to catch up on that sleep I missed. I was probably a mistake to do so, but it made me feel slightly better. The empty feeling of not accomplishing something more tangible during a day is preferable to the misery of berating oneself for conditions that cannot be alleviated overnight. I awoke, had a chocolate cereal dinner, watched some television before writing this post. As it is more of the proper time for bed, I am going to resolve to do better tomorrow.