Magnetic

I can’t stop thinking about it.

It’s like I have this ability to make my worst fears come true, but my truest desires? They’re going to take a while and then somehow, I’m going to mess it all up. Have you ever thought about that?

Like how you’re called to present first on a project when you’re clearly not ready. Or when you think that the last thing you want is this person to be with someone else and there they are, being happy and all… without you. Or when you think that you want this house and it’s not going to be there.

I’m tired of that. Worst case scenarios. I’m tired of my nightmares coming true. I’m tired of being unhappy and not where I want to be. From now on, if it’s not where I want to be, I’m not going to be there.

Yoga

How electrifying it is to be truly present in the moment. Every muscle in your body, engaged and alive at this very second. Your breath is yours and yours alone, your breath keeps you alive, your breath takes you through time and only you can control your pace.

Open your heart, reach towards the sun, close your eyes, be here.

If this is what it feels to be alive, I’m addicted.

Turbulent Storms of the Heart

Sometimes I feel like my heart and mind is addicted to chaos, the uncertainty hinging upon the swinging pendulum that is the future. I feel like my future, my emotions, and everything that is me is somehow dependent on what could happen instead of what has happened and what is happening. How does one regain balance?

I suppose it comes from a lack of knowing oneself. Like I’ve said before, I’m an advocate of rebuilding oneself, over and over again. Having the courage to start over because you truly have nothing to  lose. On the other side of that, because I have nothing to lose, I have built nothing that represents myself.

Is it possible to go through life as someone who is nothing? There are basic values that I hold true to myself, but none – at least none that I know of – would ring “That’s her!” if someone had heard of it. I often look back on these memories and wonder why I’ve done what I’ve done.. and what have I done at all.

In moments like these, when I am trying to find peace in my heart, I wish there was a constant that could always bring me back to equilibrium.

Infinity

It’s funny that growing up, we were always taught to follow our dreams. Whatever they may be, somewhere along the way, we learn that we need to have responsibilities and jobs and careers that build us up. Between those two points in life… some of us come to find that they are two completely different things.

Do what you love and you’ll never have to work a day in your life.

-Some dude, probably Confuscius, but the internet also said otherwise, so I don’t know. Believe the sentiment and pay no attention to the source.

Then… there are those of us who don’t really know what our dreams are. Our daydreams have led us to so many lives that we could potentially have from the actions that we could have made and will come to have made. Or maybe our circumstances dim the light that shines on a future that could be. Either way, we simply do not know what we want to do, what we could do, what we should do.

I find myself both amazed and bewildered by people who have achieved so much. Not because they were able to do it, but because they had no clue they would even get to where they are now. Their younger selves saw a vision and exceeded that. For me, personally, that gives me hope.

The future is murky and blurry. Even though that can be a bit scary at times, but the infinite possibilities are there. The sky is no longer the limit. We’re able to turn molecular interaction into impulses that form our thoughts, our ideas, our actions and those actions become physical. The idea that a drawing of a building can become reality never ceases to amaze me.

What is your dream?

The Heart Wants What it Wants

What do you do when you want to be with someone who does not want you back? How do you let go of your attachment of that person? How do you let go of the hopes that you’ve had of the possibilities that had existed?

I wonder if it’s part of the human condition to want things that we cannot have. Is it this stubborn denial to not accept our loss and keep going forward that makes us unique and helps us conquer the future?

When it is a group of people that wants something they cannot have, it is a dream. When they act upon it, it becomes a revolution. When an individual wants something he or she cannot have, it is a rebellious desire. When he or she acts upon it… well, it depends. For some people, it is a selfish act, for others, it is an act of bravery.

At what point do you accept that what you believe is a strong desire that you believe in? And at what point does it become delirium?

I guess it is all personal, these thoughts and dreams. A true revolution does not begin with a mob, it begins with an idea, a simple thought that simply does not die, a thought that simply will not die. A thought that becomes a word, becomes a voice, and then an action and from there, it becomes much more.

A revolution is not a revolution until more than two people believe in it.

Joy

Something notable from Matthew McConaughey’s commencement speech at U of H that stuck with me throughout the day when I was taking my lunch break:

“I just want to be happy.” I hear that all the time. But what IS happiness? Happiness is an emotional response to an outcome — If I win I will be happy, if I don’t I won’t. An if-then, cause and effect, quid pro quo standard that we cannot sustain because we immediately raise it every time we attain it. You see, happiness demands a certain outcome, it is result reliant.

If happiness is what you’re after, then you are going to be let down frequently and be unhappy much of your time. Joy, though, is something else. It’s not a choice, not a response to some result, it is a constant. Joy is “the feeling we have from doing what we are fashioned to do,” no matter the outcome.

Source

Sounds like I’ve been doing life wrong. It was then that something snapped inside of me. Enjoy the journey because it’s not always about the destination. That shift in perspective really opened my eyes. The truth is, everyone wants to be happy.. well, everyone wants to be happier, but it’s a lot harder to be happier when you are focused on the gap between your current level of happiness and where you want to be on that spectrum.

Not the first time I’ve heard this message, but the way it was worded, the way it was presented: Joy is so much better. Happiness is conditional, but joy? To put our spirits into everything we do and to love with your whole heart? To a control freak like myself, this is a gold mine.

My end game for this entry is this: no matter what you do in life, do it enthusiastically – except for things like murder and kidnapping and etc. Know that when you are doing something, it’s done by choice. Sure, I mean, sometimes there are obligations to do something, but why not enjoy those things as well? Why waste the remaining time you have left on earth complaining or focused on what you have?

Ironically, I don’t always have joy in doing what I do. Part of the human condition is to relieve stress by venting it out. However, what is controllable is that now I can strive to find such joy in what I do. What comes naturally is writing to you, my readers, being completely lost in the world of books, enjoying my solitude with nature, and enjoying drinks and food with friends.

What about you guys? What brings you joy?

Whimsical Theories

As a companion post to what I’ve said about the past, I would like to talk about the future here. And then maybe… the present – the irony of that has yet to escape me, of course.

The future is an alluring temptress. 

While you daydream your afternoons away on a hammock, eyes closed with the breeze kissing your skin, bathed by the lazy light of the sunset, you are thinking about how years from now, you will be with the one you love, working the job that you enjoy, traveling to exotic places that leave you breathless. It’s so easy to get lost in the future, the endless possibilities that are simply too many to list.

Where do you see yourself five years from now? Ten years? Twenty? 

Isn’t it odd that the us from years ago are completely different from how we are now, wanting completely different things? The loves that come and go don’t seem so eternal anymore. The events and friends that pass through our lives become semblances of memories that are inevitably concluded long before its lifespan. Suddenly the person you’re with right now, the one you thought you would be spending the rest of your life with, is no longer sleeping next to you. Suddenly you are now happier than you’ve ever been, coming from a place of hopeless abandon thinking that no one could love you to finding someone you don’t know how you could have lived without. Suddenly you find yourself commuting to a different location than your previous job.

A lot can change in a day, and moreso in weeks and months and it leaves one to wonder how the passage of time can be so ironic and cruel at the same time. What happened to the dreams of being an astronaut or being a teacher or being a doctor? Life is about change, I guess. In some ways, the generalities of our past become narrowed into the uniqueness that makes up our history and personality and eventually our future. Who we choose to love, who we choose to care for, where we choose to work. 

What do you think? Where do you see yourself in the future? What are you doing? What would you have liked to accomplish?

Reveries

I think the past is an interesting place to visit. A trip down memory lane is always filled with memories that we desperately try to hold on to rationalize why we have not moved on with our lives.

Seeing his name again, his username, made my heart skip a beat and for a second there, I wondered if I had actually gotten over him or simply replaced a void that is him with someon else. I’m glad he is happy, I’m glad he has found someone else, because in the long run, we would have been toxic for each other. We always yearn to correct the things that aren’t always under our control, but sometimes, it’s best to just let go.

What does it take to reconnect with someone? Can you ever truly go back to the way things were? Before all the fights have been fought and the tears have been shed? I’ve asked myself that question many times and each time, I arrive to this conclusion: The past has happened and now it’s gone. You shouldn’t reside there simply for the comfort that it brings to shield you from your present realities.

Maybe you’re not where you want to be in the present, but were you ever the person you wanted to be in the past? 

Say Yes Today

Every time you say no to something, you are denying a possibility that could be both great and terrible. Do you agree?

I think about all the times in my life that I could have stayed home and relaxed rather than deciding to go out with my friends. Then I think about the times that I decide to go out, in spite of not wanting to or feeling up to it, and at the end of the night, something nice and unexpected always comes to light.

It’s an old and flawed adage, but I stipulate that it could bring you more adventures than the times you choose to have less variables in your day. Nothing against relaxing, of course. A chill weekend with a margarita while binging on a good show? Heck yea. On the other hand, I think it’s choosing the possibility that is murky, not knowing what could really happen, who you might meet, those things are exciting.

Say yes to new experiences, new adventures, new friends, things that are meant to come your way instead of waiting around for what you think could come. Do you remember the last time you found yourself agreeing to something or doing something that was completely a new experience for you? If so, please share! 🙂

Sorrow Needs No Spectators

Leave her alone, I want to tell the people who keep calling her, yet I feel the guilt of not being able to say the words myself. “Are you okay?” “How are you feeling?” What other response could possibly come? My best friend is hurting and at times like this, I cannot tell if my silent support for her is a mark of maturity or yet another act of cowardice that I am used to.

When a loved one dies, or when anything sudden happens that requires the tears of those it affects directly, why do people go to social media to say “I hope you feel better!” or “RIP.” I feel like mourning has lost its privacy and that somehow, like many other things in our life, Facebook, Twitter, and etc. has become an existence rather than a medium through which we express glimpses of our existence.

Hypocrite that I am, though, writing these thoughts on here, but these thoughts are just that. I give you no other glimpse of my life other than what happened to my best friend, and even with that, I feel too exposed. Sorrow needs no spectators, happiness needs no judges, and anger needs no bystanders.

I don’t know how else to end this entry, so I end it with this: When you are alone with your thoughts, completely disconnected from the world, are they still your thoughts?