An Open Letter

To help combat a lot of issues I was recommended to journal my thoughts while applying CBT – so I’m going to try to get into the habit of journaling roughly daily to express thoughts I’m currently struggling with.

In a somewhat disjointed segway, I’m partially glad no one is currently subscribed to this blog (bye Claire), as I don’t necessarily have to worry about being perceived. But at the same time, that is something I also feel sad about. I reached out to a close friend and directly asked them to subscribe to this blog, I guess in a way to make it easier for me to reach out or express insecure feelings through proxy. On the surface level that does feel like something I want – as in my mind I can follow the (flawed) logical reasoning:

1. I post something on my blog that is relatively obscured

2. Someone goes digging or out of their way to find it and brings it up to me

3. I feel like I am cared for, because this person jumps through these hoops I set for them

For the not-so-idiots potentially reading this do you see the issue? The issue here is when I hide away these things, I expect people around me to somehow read my mind, or to do something so incredibly specific and out of the norm – and if they do not do this then my brain can use this as ammo to riddle my relationships with the idea that they do not care for me.

It honestly seems very obvious when put like this (which I guess is the point of CBT), but this is a pattern I’ve done for as long as I have had access to the internet, whether it had been changing my Skype about me, setting discord statuses, or writing posts on this blog.

It’s a very clear problem I have, but it’s very instinctive in me to do. If I try to psychoanalyze it a bit more, I feel like it’s mostly due to learning this behavior in childhood. When I wasn’t really given support by my parents, I tried this behavior of making subtle cries for help, and when they weren’t picked up I would just believe that they did not care enough for me, and I needed to do bigger cries for help.

But enough about the past – going forward I need to consciously stop following this pattern. To address this immediate concern let me go ahead and stop being a coward and properly do CBT:

Situation: A friend has unsubscribed from the blog + directly asked another friend and they have not subscribed.

Thoughts: The friend who unsubscribed is annoyed by my posting, doesn’t want to read my blog, and doesn’t care about me as a person. For the other friend, they do not care about me enough, as they still haven’t subscribed and they probably felt pressured into subscribing since I directly asked them even though they do not want to read this stuff.

Feelings: Alone, feel like I’m being left again, feel like friendships are crumbling and they do not care about me, feel like a burden on friends.

Behavior: I stop initiating with these friends, pull myself away, self-isolate, and begin spiraling into a depressive episode. Overall become less friendly, and push away friends.

Now for the better take:

Thoughts: I could have fully removed the first friend from the blog when I last had a bad episode, or they could have just been getting too many emails and would rather not have that constantly overwhelming them. About the other friend, they are very busy and relatively forgetful, they genuinely did not remember to follow through with this. In both cases, they still value me as a friend and care about me – they just did not recognize how much weight I put onto that, which is fully reasonable because I did not communicate that to them. In addition, asking them to subscribe, puts an unfair stress on them to deal with my constant barrage of spam and in a way takes away from my freedom to post things, as I have the constant reminder that they will be aware of it. I originally wanted this blog to be something where I did this for myself, and not with any expectation or reliance on anyone else, but also by them not subscribing it helps me break the pattern I mentioned earlier about leaving breadcrumbs and getting upset when no hansel eats them up.

Feelings: Peace, content, less insecure, still loved, happier, more independent, and also free.

Behavior: Less of a demand or undue strain on friendships, more comfortable being honest on the blog and posting whatever/whenever I want with no consequence, along with being friendly and more receptive to friends and love, as I don’t have the idea in my head that they don’t care about me.

Wow isn’t CBT magical? That was an INCREDIBLE amount of writing, good grief I should take it to a publisher at this point. Jokes aside, I do immediately feel better, and less shitty than I had been feeling for the last few days about this issue. I hope to do this more frequently, especially since I don’t have the pressure of someone being obligated to read this due to me, which I’m grateful for.

I’m proud of you Anshuman, I’ll talk to you again soon! Love you.

I’m more or less writing this because of this video that I rewatched recently. Right now I am trying a different medication (Adderall), and as someone who has struggled with activation energy issues I wanted to write down this sentiment:

You won’t be ready. It won’t be perfect, there will be several things that are wrong, and there are other things you are waiting for for it to be correct – as once you have those things you will finally do that thing you wanted to do, right? Well no. That goalpost will always move until you psych yourself out enough that you never end up doing it. You won’t be more prepared, you aren’t good enough to do it, it will completely fail, and it will be a horrible experience.

But go ahead and do it anyway. It may go worse than you’d think, it may even go better. But you don’t have the luxury to wait around until every star aligns to go out and do the things that you want to do. Just go ahead and start it, take action toward it.

There’s a great chance it won’t work, people will laugh at you or mock you, and you will fail horribly. But let that liberate you in a weird way – if you can really accept that, and still do it there is genuinely nothing holding you back anymore. That fear of failure, judgment, being worse than you thought it would be, others laughing at you, etc. if you can still do it then that’s how to really get to where you want. Do it because you want it, and because you love it.

Be unapologetically you, do the things people will mock, do the things that are doomed to fail. Put your heart on your sleeve, and live like it’s your last chance because it fully is. Live a life where when you look back, you’re glad for every mistake you made.

I ended up writing this as a blog post because it’s both vulnerable, but also something potentially weird to mention to you so I wanted to leave it in this weird limbo of a medium, where I can later decide whether or not to send you a link to it.

I just got out of my therapy session and talked for nearly the entire time about some uncomfortable feelings I’d been harboring for a while, and she started to talk to me about attachment theory and how that was relevant. As I got to understand more about myself and why I feel the way I do, one takeaway was how comfortable I feel around you. I feel like I can be myself, both the good and the bad parts of me – you’ve made a very safe and inviting place for me and I really wanted to thank you for that. A consistent thing I always reflect on after interacting with you is how safe it is for me to express myself and to figure stuff out, and that honestly comes through difficult and uncomfortable things that you’ve done, like opening up, being radically honest about private things, or even making mistakes and showing me that it’s ok to not be a perfect human being.

I know I’ve said this more than enough times, but I realized I’ve been almost suppressing how sad I am that you’re going to be gone physically for 4 months, but I’d rather this be a happy thing. I’m looking forward to seeing plenty of pictures and videos from Europe, and I’d also like to call at least once in a while so it almost feels like we’re just driving around in a car somewhere in Goleta.

I know it’s not a goodbye, but I’ll still miss you dawg

I recently realized a weird category of memories I found myself holding on to tightly.

One day I went out with a friend to go shopping at Trader Joe's. She fully was in a committed relationship, and we are platonic friends – but she mentioned that to others it must seem like we are a couple. I've had several moments like this, and I find myself looking very fondly at them.

I've felt guilt at this, as it feels like I'm disrespecting the platonic relationships I have with these friends – but I realized I don't necessarily see myself thinking of them when I feel fondly. For me, it feels like that's a casual way of them saying “hey, you look like someone loveable – I could believe you to be in a regular relationship”.

I've found with the handful of times I've experienced this, I've started to believe more that people could see me in a romantic context – not the platonic friends persay but that there's a potential in me. These memories have honestly helped me a lot to unlearn some of the crueler stuff I've heard as a child, so I sincerely thank those friends.❤️

I went through four or five mental ways of how to approach writing this, but I couldn't get the thought down in a way that mattered.

I watched the sun set while walking up, and I smelled that crisp, but also soft and warm air. It gave me a childlike happiness.

Everything can change, just give it a bit of time and effort. The butterflies will come to the garden.

She killed herself because the treatment stopped working. I've been off the treatment for almost 9 months now. I think the only thing I can do is be happy you don't see how hard I'm struggling.

I wish you got how much I sacrificed to try to win this war, I stopped my medication not because I wanted to try drugs, or because of the effects it had on my body, or the handful of other side effects I've had to deal with. I stopped because it didn't fucking work, and I was willing to try anything to give me a chance to live.

I wish you saw the suicide notes I wrote, the plans I made to end it starting as young as elementary school, the times I would hurt myself to try to get the voice in my head to dullen out a bit more.

I wish you got how fucking HARD I have to fight. Just because I don't mention the intrusive thoughts, the suicidal pulls, the constant cruelty, or the handful of other nails piercing my feet to the ground, it doesn't make it any easier for me to walk.

I wish I could tell you or anyone this, but I get how painful it is to compare struggle, and that is something I never want to do to someone. But God I wish I could get this feeling out.

I don't have the luxury to not deal with my issues. The second I let one slip by, I will kill myself. I don't get a fucking chance or a breath to take a break. And not once did I complain. I decided I will fight this with every fucking fiber of my being, and I refuse to die until then.

I decided I would do ANYTHING to win this war. She followed a chain of people who lost to this illness. I refuse to.

Someone asked me what love felt like:

To me it was the time I told her I wished someone gave me flowers, and her saying she wished she could have surprised me with flowers before, to make that wish come true.

It was the way we spent hours going through her home town on Google maps, with her as my digital tour guide, giving me stories along the way.

It was also how fast my heart beat as I left the confession note in her bag, and how vivid I remembered colors looked.

It was her wanting to give me a hug goodbye every time we went apart.

It was seeing her flaws and shortcomings as a person in it's naked truth, and still feeling happy to be with them.

It was the times she cried and I told her I loved her no matter what, and how to this day I still do.

It was the late night Skype calls we would have, having fun playing on Minecraft servers late on a school night.

It was the way her face would light up talking about the way an art piece was framed.

It was the way I see her still in the backs of music videos, when I noticed the way the lines point towards a focus.

It was the way we cried on the bench as she told me she wasn't enough and wanted to leave.

It was the way she would fall asleep in my arms.

It was the way she wouldn't want to wake up.

It was the way I showed you that tree and told you why it was beautiful, and how I think of you every time I walk past it.

It was the way I wanted more what's best for her rather than me.

There is something intoxicating about the idea of giving something everything to the point of self-destruction. The idea of being bloodied, bruised, and ultimately broken but still not giving up, and giving it everything you have – quite literally. Something about looking at life in the eyes, and refusing to submit. It’s almost like an absurd defiance of the rules of life.

Being willing to give it more than what you have feels like the only thing that can cause change: the kind of change to make waves, to affect people you have never nor will ever meet, to leave a legacy, to make a change in a way that matters.

Oh darlin', darlin'

What have I done?

Now I do my talking with a gun

And blood will spill into the gutters

And it will stain the morning sun

Ooh, tell me what the hell I've done.

Summer has always been a difficult time for me, without the constant progression of school or the friends around me in person, I almost always get depressed without fail. I’ve been fighting off this feeling for the last few weeks, and I came to a minor realization that I wanted to jot down.

Of all places to find out, while watching a YouTube video I saw someone’s raw emotion, and it reminded me of an Olympic weightlifter – it was just a primal release of happiness and pride, as a man fell to his knees celebrating his victory. For some reason, this reminded me of the gym – specifically that feeling of pride and the happiness it has the potential to bring to me.

The thought of lifting a new personal record, or pushing my body to break a barrier feels like something that could break me out of this dreary spell, and while thinking about it more it feels like at least part of it has to do with change. If I can lift a new weight I was unable to do before, that feels like something changed. Whether it was something mental, or more likely physical in this context, something changed regardless. In some ways, this almost feels like hope: hope that something will change and that the patterns that continue in life don’t just ceaselessly repeat on for eternity like Sisyphus’ boulder.

I’ve felt trapped by various different things in my life, and I’ve continually come back to the conclusion that I am fundamentally unhappy with life. Relatively recently I’ve taken it upon myself to actively and consciously try to repair a life to one I want to live, and it often feels like changes I make are superficial or individually don’t actually change anything. I know looking back how much of a difference it’s been, but without the instant feedback showing that things will change, it’s honestly hard to keep living. I think the only way to continue this is to trick myself into believing that every individual new achievement or milestone will be the final straw to break down the shortcomings of my life. If I don’t believe that how am I supposed to keep living like this?