An Open Letter

I have 66 days left until the 1-year mark of starting working out, and my goal is to join the 1k club before then. I’m a bit nervous, but also optimistic.

Earlier, E had asked the professor if they could stop being partners without asking me, and since it is a difficult process it is now a huge headache. It stresses me out a lot because I’m incredibly busy already this quarter, and I don’t know if I can handle this workload. And now I might have to do 2x the work for a class which is an incredible amount of work regardless. The class is so much work the professor almost mandates lab partners, and I am taking almost double the courseload of a regular undergrad student already. But I also remind myself that I anyway would have been doing all of the work, and so there’s not much of a difference there. But at least now I don’t have to worry about dealing with a volatile person’s behaviors at the same time while juggling their stress unduly.

I do feel kinda bad though because I am realizing that if I behave within what is fully my right to do, which is also not putting in effort for someone else’s gain – I think E would be in hell for a very long time. And I don’t just mean academically, I think this would probably lead to a bad trajectory for their life overall. I also additionally unfortunately have recently acquired what is the equivalent of a nuclear bomb over them – I did nothing wrong, but I know mentioning something I did would absolutely DESTROY them. But with these options out of the way, the thing I think I’m doing which I’m not too sure of is putting in effort of my own, and sacrificing some to make the landing easier for them. I don’t really think that they’re someone I want to invest time or effort into anymore as a friend or person, but at the same time, I don’t think I could sit here and bear witness to someone spiraling down knowing that I could have prevented it. I think I’d rather take on the burden without them knowing rather than them suffer in a way I could have prevented.

I don’t know if this is good.

I want to sleep and I forgot again to do this. I could write about more solemn or depressing things but I think it's equally if not more important to notarize happy moments.

Today I felt overwhelming joy during the gym, and I couldn't even tell why. I'm just happy to be relatively healthy, hash is healthy, things are going well comparatively. I screamed in the car to some of my favorite songs as loud as I could. I found myself just breaking out smiling and laughing. I'm glad I'm alive.

Hey, it’s been a while since I’ve actually journaled. Unfortunately, I feel bad because I don’t think tonight will be the night that changes. I got some work done on a personal project with friends and made some slides for my presentation soon. I also did catch up on sleep a bit, I was so tired that I took a nap for 3ish hours in the middle of the day.

Yesterday I read an 8-page paper on conditional image generation, something I wouldn’t say I’m familiar with. But I actually understood it! It took me a few hours, but I went through and annotated the entire thing. I actually get it. I’m able to read papers, and understand their material! That’s absolutely incredible to me, because I decided against doing a PhD after intending on doing it my entire life, and this was a big factor. I was really afraid of stuff like research or papers, and because of that, I gimped my own potential.

This quarter I’m taking 2 upper division CS classes, TA’ing another upper division CS class, and two grad classes. For the class I’m TA’ing, I have to do all of the questions every week (instead of just 2/4 of them), host 2 hours of office hours, teach at least 1 section, have a weekly meeting, and have 3 hours of code reviews. And then I’m also in 3 rec-cen classes, 2 of them are martial arts and the other one is hip hop. I also have powerlifting training, and that’s another 2-3 hours a day. Oh and tennis. My day starts at 9 am, and I usually get my first free time at 8:15 pm. I usually have to use that free time to do homework.

I’ve also been reading and meditating every day, which isn’t for too long but I find it’s not exactly ideal when I get busy and leave it for the end of the day right before I sleep. I am pretty damn fatigued, I don’t even have time to eat some days. Let alone spend time with friends. I still try to make time, and it’s pretty hard – but I end up usually sacrificing sleep for it, and I am realizing how much I need that sleep.

I’m not sure if I can handle this, to be honest, but also I want to prove to myself that I really do have that dog in me. I want to show myself I’m capable of these hard things.

I’m in call with a friend and I’m about to pass out, but I want to write something. I guess I’ll put this here – I haven’t been able to find this anywhere else online.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1b1YFO6VeyAwcyzU3uNbZrgy9QeUMSesp/edit?usp=sharing&ouid=107078761098343852795&rtpof=true&sd=true

We ended up talking and figuring out some things. It was almost very painful, but I clutched up and did some pretty emotionally mature things to figure things out. I just dropped my expectations of what they will do as a friend. It’s a bit interesting, and I do feel that they’ll eventually have to learn some key things – but also I realized I could be wrong. Oh well, life is a bit interesting. I’m exhausted.

I used to set my birthday on Skype to the day after. My reasoning was I would see who messages me when Skype notifies them, and I’d know they only messaged me because Skype told them to. I don’t think anyone anyway messaged me, but I realized even then how I was setting a trap for myself to just hurt. I didn’t really have much to gain.

I find myself still doing the same patterns. DBT tries to get me to stop, but it feels like a worn-in armchair. I give myself reasons to have hope, even when it’s consistently crashed over and over again. I told myself at the end of today whatever happens is done, and this wouldn’t be another instance of hope. I’m putting my foot down. Class friend it is. I hate myself for still giving hope by mentioning how “if things change, we’ll see”. I say that too often; yet I can’t get myself to denounce it either. In East of Eden Lee wrote something about how he stopped hoping, as it was only setting you up for disappointment. Grammarly is telling me the tone is “disapproving”.

I want to have respect for myself. Stand up for yourself for once. The only bad outcome is an awkward interaction with potentially 2 people. I have to redact something here to avoid dropping a bomb. I keep thinking about how Cal gave in and decided to be cruel. I have toyed with the idea more times than I want. It can’t lead to any good, can it? Even if I wanted to be fully selfish, it’s in my best interest to make it as easy as possible for the other person. A weirdly benevolent form of manipulation. But still, I feel that inherent desire for karma, with them hurting just a fraction of how they’ve hurt me. An eye for an eye. Who cares if it makes the world go blind if I already am – I am sick of being the only one suffering. I am sick of being the one who is putting in all of the work to fix this shit. I am sick of both of us benefitting from my struggle. The fact that I’m who I am and they’re who they are is reward enough I guess. The work I put in isn’t for waste, I think consistently doing this has made me a stronger and more emotionally intelligent person. I’ve still got a long way to go, but at least I’m not there.

I hate having to understand what it’s like to not know something. But I wonder if everyone always thinks this about what they want to hear. I think I’m fairly good at saying what people want to hear, but I could always be wrong. How would I know?

If I’m being honest, I don’t think E will read this or put in any more effort than what I’ll predict now for fun: 1 unprompted message, and 1 invitation for something non-academic. And I guess that’s all I predict. That’s more depressing than I expected. Expected isn’t even the right word here, I expect nothing anymore from them. All I find swirling in my mind are cruelties gone unsaid. They go back into the crevices when I think about Cal’s regret. I fear the day I go through with something cruel. I pray I haven’t before.

I think I've decided for myself that after a certain margin I expect friends to initiate activities or hanging out to some extent. I found myself walking home with them and they mentioned how they went climbing again. I originally had been waiting for them to initiate and figure out when we could go climbing, and they never did. Or anything else for that matter outside of a class group setting. I even saw them one day climbing with some friends, and they even mentioned how one of our friends was also free that day. There's a big chance that friend instigated to them, but I can't give this much consistent benefit of the doubt. I find this ship sailing more and more. But also I'm finding this as a nice experience of understanding what I expect from friends, and having self worth to know what not to tolerate.

I recently started my DBT workbook, which I’ve been putting off for a while, and it nearly immediately hit a chord. I think I’m figuring out what is sustainable and what isn’t. I guess I have to accept that certain bids for attention are going to fall on deaf ears and that they are willing to do certain things but not satisfy certain criteria I would want in what I’d consider a close friend. And there’s nothing wrong with that. I have several people I consider close friends, and I am confident I can find more if necessary. But as it is, they currently aren’t there. If things change, things change. But for now, I think I should go under this assumption. This works!

I hit 225x3 paused today, and I was so happy. Or I guess I think I was, I'm not fully sure. One of the first things I did was text the group chat. I thought about why I want people to be excited with me for achievements, and I think it's probably because of all the achievements that were brushed aside growing up, and I guess still. I think about the ICPC and how no friends were excited for me and how my dad just said “good.” in a text.

When I graduated highschool my dad had a business trip, and he asked me if I wanted him to cancel it. I said several times to not, and I didn't care. I did. I guess I just wanted to hurt and show myself that no one cares. It's a stupid pattern I find myself doing over and over again. I don't really know a way out.

The only real goal I've ever set for myself is ending soon – some day in March is the deadline. I'm afraid no one else will care, and I want it meaning a lot to me to be the only part that matters, but I really wish I had people who were invested in me enough to be happy and excited on my behalf. I told myself I wouldn't consider suicide until I hit 1k, and to my credit I haven't. I don't plan on it either. Just thought it was something relevant in a way.

I asked someone this question recently, and they answered themselves. Because of that I decided to give up on them in a way.

I asked because we're lab partners for a class now, and it's a class they're very scared of. There's a lot of things in life where you can either be afraid and do it anyway, or you can avoid forever. I think this is one of those things, and inherently I want to help push this friend to see how they're capable of these things. But I've definitely realized you can lead a horse to the water but can't make it drink. I've done a lot for this person's sake, and they haven't capitalized on it. When I asked them the question, to me it was because I can keep trying to push them, and they might hate me for causing them stress. But also I think in a month or two if I don't push them they're going to spiral pretty bad because their insecurities are coming true. And even worse, in a few years they're going to struggle very hard in life, and I don't think they'll realize why. I don't want this stuff to happen to anyone, let alone a friend. But they don't want this right now. I don't think they have the foresight to recognize the danger they're putting themselves in. It's only going to get harder every time they reinforce this behavior. I'd help them if they wanted the help, but they don't.

I decided I'll let my future self suffer a little bit as I'll have to spend a lot more time on the class, but I can handle that. I just feel pity for what's going to happen to them. I tried.