Figure It Out.

A broken road.
Just one long, cracked, strip of asphalt ahead and nothing else beside me. There is nobody in front of me, and no one behind following me into the odd mystery in which I am dazily journeying to.

It’s hot. Man, it’s hot. Yet, I’m wearing a bunch of clothes, so many sweaters around my shoulders and articles wrapped around my head. I can barely see through the thick fabric, or smell, or breathe. I’m just walking…wandering.
I see headlights. I hear the sound of a car passing by, the tires hitting the cold pavement as they drive right beside me. I try to look, to see who it could be, someone to the rescue?
My eyes squint and force, but I simply cannot follow the direction of the stranger; I can’t make out where it’s going, where it came from.

Which way I’ve turned now, I have no idea. For all I know, I could be walking back the same way I came. But who’s to say where I’m going anyway? My direction is probably heading towards the same place I’ve been wandering to this whole time. I can’t help but notice the drop in temperature.
Man, it is freezing. I begin to shiver, to rub my hands together and breathe hot air into them as if it would take the pain away from my limbs that were turning into icicles. Maybe I should just keep walking, it will get warmer again…
I suddenly feel someone grab onto my legs, I turn around to find who is latching onto me with such need and desire, such miserable sadness that they need me of all people to save them from their darkness. But my vision is impaired, my sense of direction completely off track, the coldness turning me numb.
My heart beat quickens and my mind races, not knowing what to do, where to go. My throat closes in panic; I try to breathe but cannot get the sweet oxygen into my body.
And I attempt to run, to try to get to my sweet destination quicker and finally have the satisfaction of being able to breathe and feel, but stop in my tracks when I notice I shouldn’t be running when I can’t even see.

Me, Me, Me.

Selfishness. One of the worst and best attributes to have in life.
Why selfishness is perceived to be awful is understandable. Whether it’s that you don’t share anything with anyone, or you want everything to yourself for you to have; it does sound horrid, almost like you wouldn’t be someone people would want to be around.

But at the same time, isn’t selfishness what keeps us healthy? I mean, where would we be if we never thought about our own selves? What condition would we be in if we were always thinking about others and their needs, and never about our own?
When we’re babies, we learn that we must think about other’s feelings. We should be “understanding” and “open minded”, and we should you know, share our toys, and not eat paste.
But what they left out in this lesson was that sometimes we actually hurt ourselves by not being selfish enough. By not listening to our needs and focusing so much on someone else’s, we could be ignoring our own feelings that really need to be heard for our own good.

I personally think it’s very strong of a person to be able to step back and look at what is good for them; not just wonder what is good for everyone else just because it’s “convenient” or just because they don’t want to “hurt” anyone. To be able to look at yourself and your needs is a very powerful action. And it means that you have enough respect and love for yourself to do so.
For example most people who are in abusive relationships and keep going back to their abusive spouses, people whose friends only put them down, people who let others talk to them however they feel; those are people who don’t have enough love for themselves to be a little selfish.

To just say “alright now what’s good for me, because I’m awesome and deserve the best” shows very strong character and judgment. Not to mention loads of confidence. And those people probably go further in life than most.
But yes darlings, it is impossible to be healthily selfish if you do not like yourself. And that’s…well…because you subconsciously set yourself up for disaster in attempt to punish yourself for being so “horrible” as you would put it in your own mind. Yep, and that’s all subconscious.

I like to study the human mind.

But that’s a whole other blog.

Of course listening to others is extremely important as well, I cannot stress that enough. Thinking of only yourself is the most horrible thing you can do. One needs to accept that there are many other people in this world and their needs are significant also. Besides, thinking that way is just a setup for loneliness and despair.

But back to my point.

We need to be selfish sometimes. It’s why we pay for doctor’s visits, why we do well in school; because we want to take care of ourselves, we care about our own lives.
Why people say it’s wrong when we do it in our everyday lives, astounds me. And they only really tell you that you’re being selfish when they want their feelings to be heard.

Yep, we all do it.

So as weird as it sounds…selfishness kind of makes the world go round.

Well This is Depressing...

Rope...That’s all I see, all I feel between my coarse hands. Just a single strand that I’m holding onto for dear life.

Just rope…

And darkness, man it’s dark in here. I can barely see anything except for the thick thread in front of my eyes. I try to climb it, but my limbs are weakened by indecision, my head spinning from confusion.

How did I end up here?
I look down to see a bottomless pit, I try to squint, make anything out from the shadows. I lift my head up to find that the darkness is simply surrounding me.
I suddenly feel my heart begin to pound louder and louder, faster, I hear it in my ears, I feel it throughout my entire body, the deafening unsteady rhythm striking within me like a drum.

It is now harder to breathe, harder to see, but I do not loosen my grip, I refuse to let go. I reject the idea of simply letting my hands ease up from the rough lifesaver that I’ve been clenching onto for so long.
The concept of just letting myself fall into the uncertainty that was waiting to envelop me frightened me. So I just shut my eyes and hoped that someone would eventually pull the rope and lead me to clarity.

But after waiting 5 days, no one came.
So I took a deep breath, counted to three, and simply...released my hands.


Hey look, I just made a metaphorical blog.

Can I Play?

Oh how nice it must be to be a child.
What am I saying, we were all children at some point in our lives.
Our minds still raw and untouched, still full of fantasies and fears that we have yet to uncover.
We all envy this innocence, for some reason...even though we've all had it.
Of course when we were "little", we wanted nothing more than to be grown up. We gazed at adults, admiring them, wondering when we'd be "able to do that" or "see those movies" or "understand those jokes".
We'd play house and wonder when we'd really have an actual kitchen and a husband or wife.
And when it happens, when we finally wake up with a high school diploma waiting for us or with a briefcase in our hands, all we want to do is go back to that time where we were painting pictures with our fingers.
That time where we had to spend hours and numerous times repeating, just to remember something as simple as our phone number.

Could it be that we envy children because of their ability to forget something in an instant simply because they don't comprehend? As "adults" we can cling onto bad memories and events because we do understand the situations we were put in. It sticks to us because we are aware. Things that happen to us as children are sometimes forgotten because we didn't understand. Our parents would tell us to forget about it and we would just pick up our doll and go play.
But it's not so simple anymore. We're not able to just turn off our minds and turn them over to the wonderful concept of imagination anymore.
I think that's what we really miss the most. The ability to be mentally... free.
Because as much as we like to think we have the most freedom as adults, being a kid is as free as it gets.

Remember Me?

Crash, I wanna fall, I wanna be somewhere in the middle with you.

Where would we be without our memories?
Without those things that happened in the past that made us smile, laugh, regret, think.

A lot of people say that the past doesn’t matter, that it shouldn’t determine a person’s identity.
They try to convince themselves that the past is simply just…stuff that happened, and it does not make you who you are today. They believe that you make yourself who you are and that it should simply be ignored. What matters is now, right?

But how can we just ignore it when it really does define who we are?

We all know experience builds character.
If our minds were erased every few days, we would never be the same person.
Or really a person for that matter.

I say our past is everything. Every little thing we’ve experienced has contributed to the forming of who we are.
It makes no sense to forget, or obliterate it.
We use it to learn, grow…so why are we always told to move on, and erase it from our minds?
Is it out of fear?
Is it because we are told to never “dwell” or “linger” on events that aren’t relevant to the present?


I mean, if the past makes us who we are, there really should be no reason to just put a giant slab of whiteout over it.
We should use it to our advantage. To figure out why we work the way we do, and how to keep the past...the past. To make sure it doesn't repeat itself.

To just erase it from our minds and say “it never happened?”
Come on, does that really solve anything?
Our brain is carefully crafted.
There’s a compartment for everything.

You can’t just choose a file to delete and think that everything’s peachy keen.
Our minds store memories for a reason, in order to wake up the next day and remember who we are, what our address is, what our phone number is, etc.

Because without our memories our identity is pretty much just the blank space under the “Hello My Name Is”.

It’s up to us to remember enough to fill it up.
To remember who we are, where we come from, and why we are the way we are, why we do the things we do.
What makes us unique, weird, normal, funny, serious.
That’s all determined by what we’ve been through and what we’ve seen.
With our experiences, our scars, and our joyful recollections.


Crash, fall, I like it; I like it, somewhere in the middle with you.

You Smell...

Anniversaries are weird when we're young. You know, like two month, five month ones. It makes a relationship sound like...a battle with cancer or something.
"I did it!"
Like it's some kind of acheivement, a struggle that you overcame.
Doesn't that sound weird?
I mean it automatically sets a relationship up to be something that must be "hard" and "stressful" in our minds if we have to celebrate every few months we survive it. 

After all, people run away from relationships because they want to, "have fun" and "live". 
...It sounds like a relationship is some kind of death sentence to me.
And I don't blame em. At our age it's necessary to explore. Experiencing everything possible is essential to our lives. It's healthy.

Because once we get married- that's it. We're set for life. No more checking out other guys, no more flirting, no more late night talks with strangers. It's all down the drain of the "his and her's" sinks. 

Which is why a lot of us cringe at the sound of the word "relationship."
Could it be because of our longing desire to be free of doubt, care, and stress?
Or is it just because we're shallow bastards who want everyone to ourselves?
And that answer will never be found.

I mean, don't brides and grooms have bachelor and bachelorette parties before their weddings so they can squeeze in that tiny bit of freedom before their sentence?
So they can have the last bit of fun with a stranger before they're chained to one another.
Well that's one way to look at it.
The other way is...
...actually I don't think there is another way to look at it.

I mean we all know it's a natural reaction to back away from being tied down. Our instincts tell us to be free.
...like animals.
When you find yourself wrapped up in rope, the first thing you do is try to get out, right? 

But if that's so, why do some of us long for a relationship so badly, if it all sounds so... dreadful?

That goes all the way back to "people want what they cannot have."

When we're single it seems as if everyone around us is a couple. Every person we see at the mall is either holding hands with someone, or making kissy faces with their pooky. And yet nobody looks twice at us. And if they do, they are far from boyfriend material.
When we're taken, it seems as though every gorgeous guy in the world got together and said "lets go tempt that chick cause she has a boyfriend".
Why?
Is it our minds doing it to us, or does being taken actually attract more people?

Ding ding ding, if you picked the second choice, you're a smart cookie.
It all has to do with the energy we give off. Believe it or not, energy is something we can sense as much as the smell of a pie baking in the oven. 
When we are single, we have a hint of eagerness and maybe even desperation in our energy, which turns many people away. 
When we're taken, our energy is just uncaring and distracted, which draws more people in.
Keep in mind, we all do this subconsiously.
...I know right?
Who knew we were so complicated, and that people could actually smell it off of us like perfume?

Eau De Being Obvious.

That was me trying to make a joke.

But back to what I was saying.

There are others who spend their whole lives looking to be...tied up. People who hold out their hands and wait for the feeling of the rough rope to envelope their wrists.


 
But why does the rest of the population avoid being tied down? Is it because of all those songs and movies about heartbreak that scare us into thinking love will always end up screwing us over?
Because we meet someone else while taken and look down to see our hands tied?
Like we all know, the mind loves to wonder. Which is why "relationship" is such a scary word. Because to most people- it limits their horizons. And suddenly they see a big door that says "don't go there."
And stuff like that is just asking to be broken down.

A relationship is something everyone views differently. Good or bad, fun or stressful. It could be a walk in the park to some people, or to others, a walk on eggshells.

Either way, it is a brave endeavor. Ignoring those rumors about heartbreak and sorrow and fighting and despair and drama and simply...jumping in. 

And to me, that is one hell of an achievement. 

You Scared Me...

We all have monsters inside of us. The little constant reminders of things we regret doing, taunting us, trying to pull us into the darkness we try so hard to run away from. Those events that have occurred in the past and contributed to the forming of that little dark patch in our bodies. All we try to do is take a bunch of magic markers to try to turn it into a patch of brightness.
But come on, we all know what’s behind the “magic”.

We all fear monsters. They star in the movies that are supposed to scare us until we cannot sleep anymore, they are the antagonists in stories we read. Hell, we grew up thinking they’d pop out of our closets at night and gobble us up.
But…why are we so afraid of monsters if we have one inside each and every one of us? And why do we fear them if we know what they are capable of?

And this all goes back to our fear of losing control.

You know that feeling you get, when you’re so angry that your heart starts beating at warp speed, and your palms get sweaty, and you don’t think you can take a hold of yourself? You warn anyone that walks your path to step off, or else and clench your fists, almost as if to ready yourself, to release that monster just waiting to jolt out?
Of course, we’ve all had that feeling. Because we’re humans. And we’ve all gotten angry. Doesn’t feel like you have control of your body then, does it?
Cause you don’t.

How bout this?
You’re having the worst day possible, and suddenly, thoughts from the past flood your entire thought process. That guy that screwed you over, the friend you lost, the bad Formspring comment. Whatever it is.

Those are your monsters coming out to play. Taunting you, pulling you down into the dark place where they live. Luring you in with cookies and whatnot.
After all, it is a proven fact that being negative is a hell of a lot less effort than being positive.

But you must be careful, for monsters come in all shapes in sizes.

And we spend so much of our time telling those monsters to flee, trying to forget they’re constant existence in our minds.
Hoping they won’t jump out and scare the next person we talk to.
But of course we know they’re there. We never forget about them. And they tend to come out and play at our darkest times, fiddling with our feelings and leaping across our minds, teasing us.

Of course there are some who like playing with their monsters, who enjoy the occasional play time in the dark.
Those people are most likely to become sociopaths and serial killers, for they have no clear vision in the dark. After all, how could they tell what is and is not a monster?
Sure you can try to drown your monsters in alcohol, or suffocate them in smoke, but in the end, a monster is a monster. And it takes a hell of a lot more than some weird substances to make it disappear.

I mean, you need garlic, at least.

Did I just make a vampire joke?

What many people don’t know is, monsters don’t just disappear. We can push and shimmy away from them as much as possible. But they stay in the shadows of our mind waiting for that moment when the door opens, so they can prance out to toy with our heads.

It’s up to us to always keep that door shut, with the brightest of lights outside of it.