I Don't Want to be a Masochist Anymore

Today, I finished a novel called Call Me by Your Name by Andre Aciman. It made me realize something... I no longer wish to be a masochist.

When did I become a masochist? I don't know. Perhaps when I first fell in love and got hurt. After that, I probably started to believe that by being hurt I would be loved. I assumed that the person the people men who would hurt me would consequently nurse my wounds as well. Ultimately, I want to be loved. However, I thought being hurt was a primary requirement.

Even when I knew that being hurt was wrong I still chased after those that hurt me. I thought that if they could hurt me, they might also be strong enough to protect me. To love me. I wanted them to take responsibility for me.

I stayed passive. I kept myself weak and compliant. It was what they expected of me. No one else wanted me. They at least agreed to pay attention if I became what they wanted me to be. I was alone. I lost myself. I didn't want to be alone anymore. I was willing to be anything just so I wouldn't be alone.

I convinced myself that I was weak. I told myself countless times that I am worthless, unwanted, and hopeless. I rhetorically asked myself, "For all those that die unjustly, get raped, and beaten, what makes you think God would cater to your desires? Why would God give you someone to love and love you in return?" I would respond to myself and say that I deserve to be loved. But didn't the others deserve to be loved as well? I had no more answers. My mind grows tired every time I ask myself such questions.

I merely saw myself as an instrument for other people's desires. Yes, use me. Yes, abuse me. Just, please, give me time to be desired. I came to see abuse towards myself as sexually arousing. To be dominated over, isn't it exciting? To be pinned to a bed and ravaged by a man stronger than me? For a man to do what he pleases with me, cast me away when he's done, and return only when he wants more? At one point, I thought so... But I know it is wrong. I know that such thoughts were doing nothing more than hurt me. No pleasure. No ultimate benefit. Just hurt.

I made myself worthless.

Perhaps it was inevitable for me to realize that I was irrationally hurting myself. Maybe it was unavoidable for me to accept that I don't want to be hurt by my own self or by anyone else. I learned how to say no to those that only wanted to take advantage of me. I came to acknowledge that I do have worth. I've yet to fully grasp the true breadth of my worth as a person. A person who deserves to be loved. I'm working on it.

Maybe I won't find that one person for me to love and to love me in return. Perhaps we'll find each other too late. It's possible that he may not exist for me. It's a horrible possibility, but it's true. Nonetheless, I still deserve to be loved without hurt. I want to be loved without hurt.

I want a man to be gentle with me. To be passionate with me. To have no intention of hurting me. I want us to be honest with one another in body, heart, and mind. To trust each other with our naked, vulnerable selves and trust that we wouldn't hurt each other. I want to be able to look into his eyes and not see eyes of contempt or cold, heartless, animalistic desire. I want to see the eyes of someone who sees me, acknowledges me, desires me to be a part of him and him a part me, and to experience the highest point of pleasure we could reach together.

I want a man to think of me as his equal. I want him to love me. I want him to allow me to love him. I want someone who sees me as worth protecting as I do him. I want him to help me heal old wounds. I want him to desire me as an intellectual counterpart, an emotional lover, and as a sexual being--as a whole being. I want him to respect me. I want him to be able to say no to me when he knows I'm wrong. I want him to help me learn what is right. I want us to help each other.

I want us to think of each other as equals. I want us to love one another. I want us to desire one another as an intellectual counterpart, an emotional lover, and as a sexual being--as a whole being. I want us to respect each other. I want us to be individuals and not be afraid to say no to one another when we know the other is wrong. I want us to help each other learn what is right. I want us to live, love, and grow alongside one another.

It may be too much of me to ask, but I deserve to at least give myself a chance. 

I Wanted to Kill Myself

In the middle of my freshman year of university I wanted to kill myself.

I thought about killing myself, about not existing, at least five or so times a day, everyday. I thought of how it would be better not to feel anything or to even have a sense of consciousness... I felt constant anxiety. I felt alone.

I did reach out. I did try to find comfort in my friends. But they couldn't understand the situation I was in. I was often met with blank stares or blank promises that everything would be all right.

So what was the problem? Why did I feel like killing myself? Because of a bully.

She made my life hell. She verbally would attack me on Facebook along with her friends, she prank texted my cellphone, she posted rumors about me on online gossip boards for my school, and she would pass rumors around school. For example, she told people that I stuck anal beads up myself, that I was a whore, and she hoped that I would get an STD/STI; she posted links to my video blog on a school gossip board telling people how pathetic I was, encouraging people to watch it, ridicule it, and comparing it to a car crash that "you don't want to look, but can't help but watch." She truly put great effort into hurting me. That thought is what hurt the most: her extremely driven intent to cause me emotional harm.

I felt degraded by this girl and I felt like no one was out there to help me. I had friends and I had people that told me things would be all right, but for this specific situation I felt alone. I was alone. It hurt. I told myself that I hated her, that I wish she would just stop. But it didn't stop.

From September til October, I fell into greater depression until someone I barely knew reported me to my school about my pattern of depression. I was made to go to the psychologist on campus, who couldn't help but scribble notes on her notepad as I would pour my heart out to her. It felt good to talk to someone, but the feeling of comfort didn't last since her constant scribbling convinced me that her compassion wasn't genuine. I was nothing more than a case study to this woman.

After all that had occurred, I don't think I found immediate closure. I don't know if I ever will. I know that I've become stronger and wiser. At the same time, however, even the thought of seeing her still makes me slightly anxious.

As fate would have it, I ran into her today. I was walking with a friend and she was holding tightly onto her friend. I didn't recognize her at first, but in the back of my mind a sense of familiarity clicked. As soon as I remembered who she was, I couldn't help but look away. Her friend laughed as soon as they both passed by me...

After that encounter, I stumbled upon her Tumblr account as I was curious as to whether she has recently written anything slanderous about me. I found a blog post that showed me her vulnerable side. A part of her that I didn't know existed. She wrote about breaking down and all of her insecurities. It made me feel better after reading all she had written. I didn't feel better because I was happy for her suffering. I felt better because it made me realize that she was human too. It shattered this notion in my mind that she was some untouchable entity that could hurt me, but could not be affected herself.

No matter how much I could be upset with how she treated me, I couldn't hate her or find pleasure in her pain, even though she had driven me to thoughts about suicide. At this point, I finally could find myself to forgive her for all she had done. At the same time, I feel as if I've allowed myself to be liberated from the fearful grasp she had on me.

I'm glad I didn't kill myself.
____________________________________________
(The following is the entry written by her.)
Tonight I messed around with a substance I haven’t touched since last summer. I can’t say that I regret it, but it made me feel excited and nostalgic in some way before I even indulged in it. I’m not sure if it’s the steady approach of another year of school or the absence of my boyfriend, but the strange waves of my mood since he left for Florida some days ago have me dysfunctional and restless, but so so tired. Last night I was in the kitchen of the bar I work at, folding silverware, thinking about my life, or the lack of stability within it, and began to cry. Fifteen minutes later I was pounding shots like a champ and went home feeling pretty empty, despite the fact that I spent the next hour engulfed in a rather heavy conversation with a female ex-coworker of mine. I have always known that despite all of my battles, I am very lucky to have the life I live. It is true that the grass appears greener on the other side, but I think of all the people I know who are blessed in terms of money and familial relationships, and I realize I am so rich in experience, strength, and my ability to connect to the smallest and faintest of things. There are moments, however, like this week, when I crumble thinking about how 90% of my peers have no idea what its like to work 60 hours a week as a 21 year old full-time college student, so what - I can pay for my medical bills, receive an education for my ever promising future, and afford the rent to a studio I hardly live in? Meanwhile, I’m accused of being a golddigger and a heartless bitch roughly every 3 months without fail from a bitter kid who has not a clue who I am anymore, but somehow manages to dig up the most insane shit to slander my name a year and some later. I am in tears as I pour out my soul to this blog that I’m sure no one reads except for my crazy ex boyfriends and the insecure Asian girls who strangely envy me. Sometimes I can’t help but indulge in self-pity as I accept that this life is not at all the reality I had hoped for 4 years ago, this is not the reality I had known could even exist 4 years ago, and that my parents would be crushed if they learned that their little girl works until 5am every day because they finally lost the war. I think that it has be awful that I can’t seem to think of a person I could say all this too. My words fall not on ears but a screen, in a box with a scroll bar that keeps reducing in size as these terrible thoughts seize my mind. I wish my boyfriend was here to make me feel better, because as much as it pains me to say something so cliche and trite, his arms really are the safest place for me - where my only worries are whether or not all boys sweat this much and how late I will be to do my next ‘to-do’ if he keeps squeezing me this way. I think, if he were here, that he would scoop me up and ask if I wanted to eat ice cream. I know that I would hesitate a little bit in fear of seeming childish before I nod kind of excitedly. It makes me smile thinking about it, and again, I realize how lucky I am and want to delete this entire blog post all together. And as always, it all ends with me being a hopeless lover with a sleeve full of emotions. Sometimes I think I was born to be living in a world of rainbows and unicorns and I really hate myself. I still really hate myself actually, because if I hadn’t wasted the last hour analyzing my uncompromising feelings, I could have called him before he fell asleep and would feel at least slightly better about being a poor 21 year old who jaded long before her time. GOD FUCKING DAMMIT.

Holy Shit

Reality recently hit me. I'm basically an adult now. It didn't hit me until I went to my first day of school yesterday. For the previous two years, I've been living on campus and just coming back home for the summer. Now that I'm commuting from home, everything seems so different... more real.

I guess this is how the real world feels; living a few miles away from all your friends instead of living in the same building or even just across campus from one another. I no longer belong to that environment of quasi-reality, where everyone lives within this small bubble between childhood naivety and the unfiltered reality. It feels weird. It feels kind of sad.  I realized that childhood isn't a part of life that gracefully fades away, but something that you one day just realize is no longer a part of you. It's not scary, just sad and brings up a sense of nostalgia.

This year didn't start off as exciting as last year, and last year wasn't as exciting as my freshman year. We're truly adults now and it's surprising. In just a little over a year, I'll either have a full-time job or be living in the streets. One of my friends will give birth to her baby in less than a year... She'll be giving birth to the next generation, the generation that will take our place.  No more will there be three month summer vacations. Instead, there will be the two weeks per year sort of vacations.

Life shouldn't be like that. It shouldn't feel like this... Why does it feel like a part of my life is ending? I no longer feel the excitement I felt when high school ended, where I looked forward to what was coming next. Now, I just await the uncertainty of the coming tomorrows.

Love Thyself

I need time to discover myself. I've spent so much time trying to find people to attach myself to that I lost my senses in all the chaos. I forgot that I could be a stand alone person that others could gravitate to. A person others can identify with instead of identifying myself in relation to others. I allowed myself to be blown  here and there, back and forth by the opinions and criticisms of others. I lost myself, my sense of pride and respect for the person that I am... Whoever that may be.

I tried to find love in others without realizing that I couldn't love them. In my eyes, showing that I needed them was love. I honestly didn't know what love was. Perhaps I still don't. I told men that I wanted them, desired them, needed them. Is that love? To want and desire for the sole sake of having, but have nothing to offer? No. It can't be. It no longer makes sense to me.

I need to love myself in order to know what I can offer. In order to know what I'm worth. I'm still learning. It's a path I've rarely taken, if at all. Sure, I've avoided harm, pain, and heartache, but is that love? Could I call it love when all that has driven me are my superficial desires directed towards another and the avoidance of harm? Did I ever think to offer myself to myself? Did I ever think to give myself the pleasures that I wanted from others? How foolish was I to not look to myself for the simplest yet most enigmatic of things? Love.

I am capable of love. Everyone is. I think so, at least. However, I never asked myself if I could be capable of loving myself. To love oneself. It sounds good, doesn't it? A perpetuating cycle of confidence, validation, strength, happiness, and hope. Could that be right? Can I define self-love as that? The will to give oneself undeterred hope for the future, validation of worth, and all-encompassing happiness? Who would get in my way? It would be a relationship between me... and me. It's beautiful. I want it for myself.

To want such beautiful things for myself. That's the first step right?

Story About a Boy

His name is Dirk (yes, that's him in the picture). He went to high school with me. He was two years ahead of me. During my freshman year (2005), around the time Facebook was gaining popularity with high school students, I was the first one (in my school) to publicly display my sexual orientation on my profile. I was the one that guys from school, who were still in the closet, would privately message to confide in and ask questions about "being gay".

I helped him ease his nerves and talk him through his first few dates with a guy. We would chat online way past 2-3am on weeknights; we'd talk about love, life, stories of ourselves, anything that came to mind.

This whole friendship of ours only existed online. He never spoke to me when we passed one another in the hallways. We looked at one another, but our eyes never met. He was the gorgeous in-the-closet upperclassman and I was merely a freshman that nobody knew and everyone ostracized for being gay. Nonetheless, I was satisfied with the secret late conversations we had.

One day, he asked me to meet up, in person. I didn't know what to say. It was so unexpected. Was it a date or us just hanging out? I was afraid. I was ashamed of myself. To be in real, personal contact with a guy I admired from afar and realized I was finally growing feelings for. I was afraid of expecting something from it and being let down in the end. I made up some excuse as to why I couldn't and he said okay.

Our late night conversations continued until finally he said, "Ich liebe dich. Sie machen mich glücklich." I asked him what it meant and he said, "It means 'I love you. You make me happy' in German. :)" At that point, I felt encouraged to perhaps take him up on his offer to meet up, even if it would only come out to be casual meet up rather than a date.

Weeks passed by the time I had gained the courage to ask him. When I did, he asked me for my advice on a guy he really wanted to take out on a date. Night after night I would advise him on how to keep his cool and whether his intended actions were cheesy or romantic. He would tell me about his date ideas such as taking the guy to dinner on top of the John Hancock building, saving up money for each excursion he planned, taking the guy to concerts, etc. I pushed my feelings aside to give him the advice he wanted, but what I felt couldn't be left unnoticed.

Finally, one night, I told him how I felt. I told him that I had grown fond of him. That I wanted to get to know him in person, and perhaps continue our friendship or whatever we had face to face. He told me that he was sorry. He told me that he didn't really know what he was saying back then when he said he loved me because I made him happy. 

I asked him, "What changed?" He said, "I realized I'm only attracted to white guys. Sorry."

The Grass Looked Greener in the Past

This was me no more than two-three years ago. Can you believe it?

Back then, I thought I was fat and ugly. I was ashamed of being surrounded by big groups of people (e.g., parties, eating out, going to the mall) because I was ashamed of being seen. I was ashamed of myself.

I took pictures to compensate for how I perceived myself. I thought that if I could take a few pictures that others would perhaps find attractive, they could convince me that I was attractive. Yes, the pictures I took were nice, but inside I still felt ugly and undeserving. I realized that even if I could change every physical aspect of me, the ugliness I perceived would not change. What I saw was not the problem, but how I saw it.

Now that a few years have passed, the person in the picture seems like a separate entity from me. A person whose attractiveness I can appreciate. I wish I could be that person again. Perhaps I am still this person. Perhaps nothing has changed. I just wish that the beauty I can now see in my past is something I can appreciate in my present self. Maybe, just maybe, in some time, I will look back and appreciate the person sitting in front of this computer. However, I really want to look at myself in the present moment and see the beauty in what is now.

My Own Enemy

Been fighting my own shadow. Once I looked the other way, I had to let it go.

Death

I'm afraid of death. Who isn't, right? It's like a debilitating fear, for me, however.  I've mentioned it before and labeled my situation as "thanatophobia". Should I be labeling it as such? A part of me believes it to be true, but another part of me perhaps just doesn't understand or know how to live...

Whenever I think of death, I find myself saying, "What's the point of it all?" What's the point of building myself up if all that will happen will simply crumble through death? What's the point of loving, attaching myself to others, or even finding what I'm passionate about if such things will inevitably flee from me? It scares me and makes me want nothing more than to crawl into bed and not get up. In a sense, I feel as if I'm trying to fight against death by trying to make sure that death would have nothing to take from me...

Then I realized: I'm giving away my life into the nothingness. Each moment, each passing second, each possibility I don't grasp is a portion of life I'm voluntarily letting go by staying idle.

I'm afraid of death. Everyone is. I don't have a say as to how my life will end... However, I do have control over how my life could be lived. I still don't understand life. Ultimately, I don't understand myself.

Eros and Mnemosyne

I told myself that I wouldn't let it happen again, but I unknowingly did. I didn't realize it until it had already happened and it was suddenly out of my hands. Now, I find myself in the same situation with B. In the recent past, I had the chance to be with someone, someone who could have been special, but a part of me didn't feel ready at that point... Now, when I am emotionally ready to commit myself and see where a relationship could go, B. seems to have started moving on. After things started falling through, B. expressed his fear and uncertainty with seeing me again. He expressed fear towards how he would emotionally respond to being physically near me. In a sense, I believe that he fears the possibility that the feelings he still holds for me would resurface.

It hurts to have someone that you've come to care for suddenly disappear. It's difficult to cope with the idea that you loved and cared for someone, but it wasn't clear until they were gone. In a sense, it's kind of like death; you take for granted the presence of an individual in your life, but once they're gone you realize how much more you love(d) and cherish(ed) them. At times, we are so selfish and we become so frustrated because we want that person to acknowledge how we feel... perhaps to even reciprocate how we feel for them. We fail to realize that they are their own person and we can only do so much. We can love someone so much, but when we don't receive the same sort or amount of love we can feel cheated, used, or unwanted. That's the thing about love though, you only have control over how much love you want to give to those around you, but you have no say or control over how much love you would receive in return. We have to keep in mind that to love someone is to care for a person without expecting anything in return. Nonetheless, even though I am cognizant of how to logically approach love, there is still a tinge of pain when I realize how lonely I am.

I talked to my friend Jamie about my situation with B. and something she said struck me. She said, "...when you let go of someone you know isn't right for you, it's often easy to feel regretful when you see them moving forward and things haven't necessarily changed for you." Did I truly believe that B. wasn't the right one for me? I often said how he was too nice, too naive, too passive, yet I know for a fact that whenever I did verbalize such thoughts, it seemed as if I was just making excuses. When I would exclaim how he was too nice or too passive for me, at that same moment I knew that I didn't believe what had just come out of my mouth. Instead, it seemed as if I repeatedly verbalized such thoughts in an attempt to convince myself of what I was saying. I couldn't convince myself. I knew myself too well to even deceive my own heart. The truth is, the things I saw as faults in him were a reflection of me. I kept saying that I couldn't let myself fall in love or enter a relationship because I wanted to seem independent, strong-willed, ambitious. On the contrary, I've realized that the things I wanted to convince myself as being his faults were traits that we shared, traits that I saw to be my own weaknesses, not his.

At this point, I don't really think there is anything else I can do. The only thing I can do at the moment is sit tight and hope for the best.

It's interesting though how today reminds me of a day he and I shared. Currently, as the sunlight filters through the venetian blinds and a slightly crisp Winter breeze comes through my window, it reminds me of that summer afternoon when B. first told me he loved me. I took him to the one place where I always went to think. We sat under the shade of two trees; the sky was clear, and a slight summer breeze flowed along the lake. The breeze sifted through the branches and leaves making the sunlight that filtered through almost twinkle, fade, and glow in a sense. I sat there looking at his hand as he confessed his feelings to me. All along, I knew that it was the purpose of his visit, but when I was finally confronted by this man's feelings toward me, it was such an intense, raw, and unexpected feeling. I told him that I didn't want to enter into a relationship because I wanted to stand on my own two feet and see the world as an independent individual. However, deep inside I knew that I didn't completely believe what I was saying. I didn't know what to say. I never had anyone profess love to me before him. Ever.

Once he said his piece and I said mine, I suggested that he should take a look at what I called the "love rocks" that lined the lake and lagoon. He got up and he walked to the edge of the lagoon and walked amongst the rocks I often sat on to secretly cry, think, and reflect many times before. I watched him as he stood there looking towards the indistinguishable horizon, where the cerulean blue lake and azure sky blurred into one. He stood there facing away from me and I watched him. I silently sat under the shade of the tree and watched him standing so tall, quiet, and serene. There was a specific moment when I just looked at the leaves rustling and scattering the rays of light that could reach me and simply thinking, "I'll always remember this day. I'll always remember this moment."

At that point in time, I did not feel the same way or love him the way he had professed to me, but at that same moment, as I watched him standing where I used to spend several sunrises sitting and wondering when love would come for me, my own feelings for him unknowingly came to be.

Self-Esteem Issues

I used to not be as insecure as I am today. In the past, especially during my middle-school years, I didn't give a shit about what others thought about me. All right, perhaps that's not entirely true, even though I was aware of the negative criticisms, I never let it affect me. I was flamboyant (borderline flamer), expressive, and most important of all, I was happy.

At some point, I changed. I admit I have become jaded. Even though I told myself that I will never become jaded or consider myself a victim, I still turned out to be. I was so afraid of becoming something that the fear of becoming "it" kept me from seeing my very fears creeping up on me. At one point, I was an expressive person; I took pride in that. Everything that I felt and thought, I was able to verbalize in words. People admired how in-tuned I was with my emotions. I was never confused or uncertain about how I felt and I always trusted my intuition.

Whenever I take a step forward, I become afraid and take two steps back. Whenever opportunities were presented to me, I would get ahold of them, then let go too soon. I have become so afraid and so affected by others' opinion of me that my own opinion became lost to them. Often, I thought, "I don't deserve this positive opportunity," or, "someone else is more well-deserving." What I thought others thought of me became my thoughts, my opinions, my direction. I became so afraid to commit because I didn't know when in the future I would be let down again. I became a gray canvas because I am too afraid to be my inherent self, too afraid to be criticized, too afraid to be alone. I was a gray canvas, not blank, because there is a self I am aware of, but have tried over and over again to paint over.

I am where I am now because I am in between two phases. I have let others determine who I am, yet I am aware of the individuality I possess. There is conflict between two identities as one is a part of me that wants to be accepted (no matter the cost), therefore passively letting others determine my identity, and the latter that desires me to stand for something, to stand up for myself, to express the opinions and thoughts I've come to suppress, and to just be me.

I don't know what specifically changed me. Sure, I could think of key events in my life that might have steered me towards the direction I am facing today, but I'd rather not dwell on them. Dwelling on the past would only tempt me to rationalize what has already happened and make excuses out of them. At this point, I've already made too many excuses, I've mourned and reflected, and now it's time to move on. Where exactly do I move on from here?

How can I reconcile the two and be the person that will make me the happiest?

Who We Are: to Ourselves and to Others

I just recently got back from hanging out with my friend Drew. Drew is one of those guys that I would categorize as a "pretty gay." He's tall (over 6 feet), blond hair, blue eyes, high cheekbones, well-dressed, etc. He's the type of person that I have often observed turning heads. For example, earlier this evening, we were in Starbucks. When he walked to the counter to get my coffee or when someone outside would pass by the window where we were sitting, they'd turn their head to look at him. Contrary to the stereotype of good-looking gay guys with bitchy, pretentious attitudes, he's actually the opposite; he's very silly, generous, kind, and quite the gentleman.

Sometimes, gay friends come across a dilemma where a friendship is implicitly expected to evolve into a friends-with-benefits relationship, an intimate boyfriend-boyfriend relationship, or any sort of relationship between them simply dissolves. With Drew, we're comfortable with just being friends. Frankly, the absence of any sort of sexual attraction between us has enabled me to open up to him at a level greater than I have experience with any other friend. Whenever he and I are hanging out, I don't feel pressured to behave a certain way or censor certain thoughts/opinions. With such statements considered, is what he sees of me the truest form of my identity? When we are stripped of expectations and given the chance to behave in any way without fearing rejection, do we come to see our clearest reflection?

After hanging out with Drew a few times, he has stated that I am very sweet, kind, cute, and quite innocent. He questions why I have yet to find a man and all I can do is shrug my shoulders and respond, "I don't know." In truth, am I truly as sweet, kind, and innocent as he says I am? I feel no attraction to him or any conscious desire to please him, therefore I can only conclude that he sees me in my most basic form. With others, I have sometimes found myself having to act a certain way (jaded, overly optimistic, cold, aloof, etc.). I often feel as if I'm emphasizing certain facets of myself with others, whereas with Drew, I am just me.

What I'm getting at is that I want others to see me as he sees me. I want the rest of my friends friends and other men to see me for who I truly am. Some of us find ourselves trying to play roles other than our own. There are times when we want to seem suave to others, therefore we act more aloof, haughty, or obnoxious. Other times, we want to seem innocent, so we act too optimistic, too friendly, or too accommodating. We try to play these roles in order to satisfy other people's perceived expectations, which we can never truly fulfill, and we forget our role as ourselves. One quote that resonates with what I'm trying to say is something that Judy Garland once said, "Be a first rate version of yourself, not a second rate version of someone else." The thing is, the only way to generally succeed in this world is to stay true to ourselves and to take advantage of our own individuality.

With further reflection, yes, I am a sweet and kind-hearted person. I have tried to portray to others a character that seemed cold, aloof, and suave or too optimistic, enthusiastic, or friendly in order to hide my vulnerabilities. In consequence, portraying traits that were on both extremes of what I truly possess, I have come to surround myself with people I could not develop clear, intimate connections with. I found myself confused and not knowing which direction to take in my life because I lost my sense of identity under layers upon layers of supposed expectations.

With all things considered, I think I'm comfortable and ready to be me. I think I can move on forward and be honest with myself (and others) as to who I am.

La Neige

The first day of December has mostly come to pass and I must say that the weather suits the occasion. It started snowing earlier this morning and it's the first time this season that it has actually snowed in Chicago. Perhaps Mother Nature, God, Fate, etc. truly is/are that poetic.

In any case, it's the first day of December, it's snowing and it's beautiful. The first day of snowfall is always the most pleasant; it falls so slowly like a feather and it almost seems to levitate in the air. During the first snowfall you're walking through it, not "in" it, which is a temporary delight. After a few days or weeks this snow will become nothing more than brown slush and puddles that I will dread walking through to and from class, home, etc.

With snow, I always associated it with reflection. For some reason, I find myself in reflection when it snows outside. Perhaps it's because I'm subconsciously reminded of the passing season and the changing weather. Realizing that "something" has come and gone makes me look back and try to recollect what has passed. It makes me want to re-experience the things I was not aware of until they're out of my grasp. Of course, as you are also aware of, dear reader, we can never reattain each and every fleeting moment. It's like snowfall I guess. You can't catch every snowflake, but the ones that you do get ahold of, cherish the very moment it falls onto your palm until it simply, silently, and placidly melts away.

Visage

I always wondered what it meant to be pretty, to be handsome, to be beautiful. I always believed that there is something beautiful about someone. Even if they're not breathtaking, they have at least one thing they could be complimented on. Yet when I reflect on myself, I can see the things I want to appreciate, yet I can't get myself to do so.

I look in the mirror and I see the things I like, but then my mind turn to thoughts on how others would perceive me. I wonder whether people outside of myself, beyond my own sights, would see what I see. I wonder if they would see beauty. Of course, it's irrational of me to believe that there is some sort of universal opinion as to whether someone is beautiful or whatnot. I mean, there are those that automatically catch our attention and there are those that we can give a few compliments to. I know that I'm not the former, but to think that what we can attain, even if it is something we never truly had control over, is limited to the latter, it's upsetting at the least.

Is it possible to see beauty in oneself? Is it possible to find that belief and self-sufficiently fuel it with no dependency on those external to us? I've come across a few people that seem to not give a shit about what others think and find confidence within themselves, yet through an internal perspective, I feel as if everything I believe, feel, and see is based on external opinion; specifically, how I see myself. I want to believe that I'm someone of worth, someone worth loving, someone who deserves to be happy, someone who is beautiful. Yet contrary to my desires, I feel as if my worth as a person, my worth as a beloved, whether I deserve to be happy or not, and whether I am attractive all depends on how others see me... Is it possible to find worth in ourselves? To see ourselves as being worthy and beautiful even if the world disagrees?