Inattention

Matt told me something the other day that revealed yet another part of my personality that I did not know about. He said that whenever I walk somewhere, I don't pay much attention to anything around me; I just focus on the road ahead of me.

The next time I went for a long walk, I realized that he was right. I don't pay attention to anything around me. When that realization struck me, I took my head out of the clouds and immediately sunk myself back into the present. That's when I felt a swelling of emotion bombard me, all these emotions I had forgotten about because I had suppressed them so much. That's when I realized why I zoned out whenever I went walking--it felt lonely, empty, and scary. You know, for someone who has always prided herself on emotional independence, for someone who keeps saying that she doesn't need friends, I talk about being lonely a lot.

As I explored this further, memories started to come back to me, memories of being lonely as a child. Memories of being lonely and friendless in middle school, high school came flooding back to me. Memories of being lonely in college, even amongst my friends, came back to me. Memories of being lonely now that I'm in grad school...well, those are very recent memories. Somehow, some way, I had suppressed and buried all of these feelings.

Just the other day too, I was driving with Matt and I almost hit two people--an elderly woman and a young girl. I probably would have ended up hitting them too if Matt had not kept shouting at me to watch out. This experience really shook me. That's when I realized that I didn't pay much attention to my surroundings when I was driving either. This inattention almost took two lives.

That's when I realized that I needed to change. I needed to stop living so much in my head. It was so comforting in there, so predictable...but so dangerous.

Now whenever I go walking somewhere, I pay attention. I pull myself out of my thoughts and focus on where I'm going. Whenever I drive, I turn off the radio, turn off my music, and turn off my internal monologue. Focus on driving. Focus on the road. Focus on my surroundings and the people around me. I'm not perfect yet, but I'm getting better. It may be lonely to live in the present, but it can be deadly (and unhealthy) to live in my head.

So goodbye inner thoughts. Goodbye. I'll entertain you nevermore.

Limits and boundaries

I was talking to Matthew last week and he said that I wasn’t the kind of person who would tell others to GTFO.

I was taken aback, but then I realized that he was right—I have trouble telling people no. What’s more, this pointed to the fact that I was not good at setting boundaries and limits. The same way a practitioner should have boundaries and limits with clients or that parents should set boundaries and limits with children, I should do the same with the people in my life. After all, it’s one of the key ingredients to developing a healthy self-concept. Otherwise, I risk a maladaptive form of “fusion” in which my feelings are too tied up with the feelings of others. In cases like this, it leads to an unhealthy relationship where I let people take advantage of me…which might explain my codependent relationships with my family and friends.

Now that I’ve realized the extent of this problem, I can take steps to correct it. For example, whenever I’m in a situation where others ask something of me, I shouldn’t immediately say yes. I should stop and think of how it will impact me. Will it mean re-arranging my entire day or interfere with important things in my schedule? Will it severely inconvenience me? Better yet, how will I feel if I say yes? Will I feel like I’m being a nice, helpful person when I’m truly seething on the inside? Will it make me resentful and irritated? Will it make me hate myself more and more? Is it worth swallowing the frustration and putting on a fake smile all in the name of friendliness? Those are the important questions I need to ask myself. As strange as it sounds, sometimes I have to look out for myself as well as others. My needs should be balanced with the needs of others, not replaced by them.

Wow, my supervisor was right. I should explore my feelings more; they can really point to what’s going right and wrong within me.

Oct. 19, 2012

I spent so much of my life trying to please my mother, trying to please my father, and...not really trying to please my brother, but just getting him off my back. Now I realize that I shouldn't have been having been doing that in the first place, at least, not to the extent I was doing it. I spent years trying to be the "good girl"--obedient, submissive, and docile. Educated. Hard-working. Polite. Courteous. All of these stupid adjectives. I felt as if I spent years trying to measure up to some standard that, once met, would always be set higher. And higher. While that's healthy and normal and even desirable to do with children, it wasn't healthy the way my family went about it. With insults. And unkind words. With emotional abuse. And making me cry. With taking away any sense of decision-making. With taking away my voice. And then my father would grow frustrated with me when because I wouldn't "act like an equal." Children aren't ever "equal" to their parents. Not really. Not even if the children turn fifty and the parents are eighty or ninety. Somehow, parents still see their children as, well, children. They go through this conflict of seeing their child as a child and then expecting them to be a full-grown, functioning adult. The same old argument happens all the time.

Parent: I am very disappointed in you. I expected that you would act better than this. I expected that you were old enough to know better by now.
Adult/Child: How can I act like an adult when you treat me like a child?!

The same argument goes on. And on. I was talking to Matt about it the other day, about how my parents treated me. Then I told him that my parents thought I was abandoning them when I moved far away from home. And I DID feel like I was abandoning them.

"You didn't abandon them," Matt said. "They drove you away."

When I thought about it that way, it seemed to fit my life in a different way. I remembered all the fighting my parents did and how they spilled over into their parenting. I remembered how they treated me and my brother. I remember how my brother treated me and I suddenly felt that it wouldn't be too much of a loss if I never saw them again. Actually, I've been feeling that way since I was thirteen, and because of that, I've worked so many years to escape from them. Escape from a religious fanatic mother who called me fat. Escape from an insensitive brother who ridiculed my feelings. Escape from an alcoholic father who repeatedly expressed disappointment in me for "not making something of myself." And I just got tired of it, you know? I got tired of crying myself to sleep. I got tired of angrily (but quietly) leaving home to go take a walk. Or drive somewhere to escape. I felt tired of escaping from a place I was supposed to call home.

Home. What a strange word. What an alien concept. What a goal to achieve. Something to look for. Something to wait for. Something to fight for. They say that anything worth having is worth fighting for. Maybe a place to really call home, maybe people to really be a family to me...maybe that's worth fighting for.

And maybe I'll get them someday.

Bringing things up

I feel like I made Matt frustrated today. I mean, is it any good to bring something up if it is already too late to do something about it? I think I just made him feel confused; maybe he even felt attacked. I probably should work on that...

Also, at my internship today, a client mentioned how "if someone wants to do something, it's all on them. Changing people, places, and things is nice, but nothing's going to work if you don't change yourself." He gave many examples of how people have fought past temptation and/or bad influence to come out a strong, well-adjusted person. While I feel like his preachings have a strong "free will and individualistic" bent, I do think that there's something to it. There has to be something said for people who resist peer pressure, societal influences, and toxic environments to come out their own person. It reminded me of my (mostly) vegetarian diet and whether I should do something about it. His words also made me think about the contrast between my brother and me. While we had the same parents and grew up in the same household, the same neighborhood, we turned out to be very different people. Is this a result of biology or individual will? Probably a little bit of both. I believe that biological tendencies will make someone more prone to be risk-taking (like my brother) or risk-aversive (like me). Then again, we can also make our own choices, though I, for one, know how hard it is to go against one's nature.

This is something I want to explore more later on.

Internet Addiction

I wrote a blog post a while ago that talked about how I wasted too much time on the internet and how it was really just a distraction from loneliness. Well, today I was reading an article today on internet addiction and I thought, That's totally me! I get so wrapped up in surfing the web that I neglect homework, sleep, and social relationships. The article even said that a lot of internet addicts often rationalized, "Just a few more minutes..." and then that would spiral out of control.What's more, it usually added to feelings of loneliness and people would often pursue online intimacy at the expense of their real-life relationships.Some people were so addicted to the internet that it led to them losing their friends, their marriages, and even their jobs. I'm glad that I'm working to get myself off that path before I need serious help. Nowadays, I don't go on the internet often except for school. The rest of my internet time is spent blogging. :)

Oct. 10, 2012

I was walking home when I spotted something rare and unusual. I was striding along the sidewalk, enjoying the beautiful weather and the nice sunset, bebopping to music only I can hear when I encountered a large black SUV where the entire dashboard had little toy animals glued to it. Seriously, there were polar bears and lizards and horses on this thing. Now they were tiny toy figurines, not giant stuffed animals, but I still thought it made for a wonderful array of fauna on the dashboard. It reminded me of a scene from Chronicles of Narnia where all the animals and mythical creatures are lined up to do combat with each other. Fantastical.

That little display just made my day.

Back on Track

Whew. So I finally got my blog back on track.  I've posted all of the journal entries on backlog and sorted through a lot of my feelings. Some of the posts are published out of order, but I don't know how to correct that. For now, I have to leave them that way.

So what happened today? I ate lunch with friends again. This is becoming a regular thing. I also walked to school in the rain (underneath my trusty umbrella, of course). This is also becoming a regular thing. I've been doing lots of homework and actually keeping up with it. A third regular thing. I think life has taken on a good routine for me, a comfortable pace. However, this does not mean that it has gotten too relaxing. I still have to keep on top of burgeoning amounts of homework and watch my health habits. Fortunately, I've been really good at disciplining myself about getting to sleep at a good time--at least eight hours of sleep every night. Sometimes even nine or ten. I've been getting a regular amount of exercise, what with all the walking. Eating is on a regular schedule and I've kept up a healthy diet--lots of vegetables and controlling my intake of fatty foods and sweets. I still think I need to drink more water, but at least I've been taking my vitamins. Life is good.

Oh, and I finally disciplined myself about ironing my clothes on laundry day! I used to always put it off, rationalizing that I'll do it some other time. Then I'd be stuck having to go to some formal event and I wouldn't have any ironed pants or shirts to wear. From now on, I'm ironing clothes as soon as they dry.

Let's see...what other good habits can I develop? I think I can set aside a time each night to calm my brain and prepare for sleep. I feel as if my thoughts are racing 100 miles an hour in my head, always worrying about homework and errands and other things I have to do. I think now would be a good time to take up meditation practice again...