the way the night glows in the moonlight onto a clear lake of water that fish swim

A Train of Thought

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I spend all this time writing and thinking
truth be told
Sometimes I want to remain silent and listen
But my mouth gets in the way
how will I ever learn if I am the only one speaking
It’s a habit I mean to break
Maybe I should just decide.
That seems to work well
can I just decide to be different
is it really that easy
Will the unrelenting force of nature and habit quiet them just based on a decision
I don’t want to be a half measure
but am I really able to make myself immune to the coming tide but saying I will not be affected
that seems naive
but maybe that’s what I need
to be naive
to lack that understanding and go full force
to go beyond who I am and just let the world happen
to become exactly what I want by choosing to be that way
maybe that’s what separates people from being great and grand
that we wallow and can’t just choose
I want to be great
so I must choose
to be great
and to do
great
things.

It would be easy to leave it up to the future
to let my future self
make the choice
but will they really?
because they are me and if I am unwilling doesn’t that mean
they will be too
maybe that’s the secret
be the future self you are always looking towards to get stuff done.
If I put it that way
it almost seems like I am a hero
the hero I always needed
be the man you always wanted to be
by doing the things you’ve always wanted to do

I hope I don’t lose this lesson
I hope that I can hang onto it
but even if I do
if I found this place once
it will always be easier to find this place again
there is always hope.

The World In The Life Of A Guy: Part 2 – Decisions

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There is some unspoken part of being a man, a requirement to have a firmness of choice.  It’s confusing to me because I am expected to make decisions and stick to them even when I am unsure. To cut through the fog, and smoke like a sword, swift and with purpose.  It would be a false bravado, and maybe that’s what I need, to fake it until I make it. If people are to give me the power, perhaps I should learn to wield it, and do what I think is best.

The decision, that force that tears through the cloud like vengeance, requires me always to have the tempered blade ready to use in moments where it’s do or die, and I may have to kill.  That what decision feel like at times, subjecting myself to the fog of war, where left, right, up, and down seems negligible to the enemy in front of me. Trying my best to survive, as each choice takes its toll on me, I am just like others, not wanting to make decisions all the time.  I sometimes push off the responsibility to others so that I can go along with the ride.

The expectation is a guy I will make and stand by my choices, sway people like waves on an ocean to my choice. To be the lighthouse that brings the boats in during the dark nights and rainy days, a constant to turn to. It becomes the responsibility of the one making the decision, the one making this choice, to keep everyone in mind.

I don’t know how many times I’ve sat across from people trying to figure out what to eat and looking for that evasive input that would point me in the right direction it eludes me once more.  Seeking to narrow down the multitude of places that all swarm my brain and are all equally good.  Even sometimes when I make a decision, they tell me to choose again. It’s effortful and taxing in situations where the decision is much more significant, but maybe it’s a matter of learning to get stronger and more resilient so I can go further along.

I know that I overthink most things, and not every decision is tantamount to a national emergency, but like most people, I don’t like being wrong.  I guess I should learn to get over that, learn to make decisions the best I can with what I have.  I am an academic at heart so collecting information is my go to, but I need to know when enough is enough. When it doesn’t pay to squeeze out that last drop. It’s all part of growing up isn’t it, making do with what you have, and embracing the limitation and coming up with something new.

Maybe I shouldn’t put that much emphasis on what I do, and maybe I shouldn’t care as much about others think when I make decisions. Maybe I will just choose and let the cards fall where they may. I only know so much and am working with what I have because I’m “just a guy” right.

To: Love

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Dear Love,

I haven’t heard from you in a while, and trust me, I knew after our last encounter we needed some space.

It’s just been strange without you around. I remember you, and I having been inseparable since I first met you around 6 or 7.  You used to play with me whenever I felt lonely or down.  All through school, you accompanied me through my awkward phases and social situations, nagging me in the middle of class, diverting my attention.  I didn’t mind, I always enjoyed myself when you were around even if things didn’t work out as planned. I remember how charismatic you were, telling me stories and tales about others people who knew you and dreams of the future you had with me.  You were always there, pulling at my heartstrings, making me feel the true immensity of being crushed by the unrequited feelings I had in my chest.

Years went by with this persistent feeling, as I got older, our relationship deepened. I came to better understand you.  I took some time in high school to grow on my own without you around, knowing that we would reconnect as old friends when I got back. That period I learned not to lean on you, that I needed to learn to stand on my own two feet without you around. I couldn’t expect you to carry me in the future, especially if I didn’t have anything to give you in return.

Through heartbreak, I found you, through experience and a desire to not make the same mistakes I sought you. I thought you would leave me disappointed again, but this time you came back in spades. It marked a new depth to things, you really got to know me, and I really got to know you.

We were around each other for a while, taking a break every now and again. My college years were full of experiences with you, learning and growing.  It started to feel like this was what growing up and maturing felt like. We hit a groove, a rhythm, an understanding that maybe this would be something that continued without pause.

Then it happened, you and I got into a bit of a disagreement.  It wasn’t something unusual, and normally I would bounce right back, but this last one didn’t sit right with me. I knew we needed some time to figure things out.  I had taken you for granted, and you hit me where it hurt. It became heavy when you were around, and I just couldn’t handle the strain, there was too much memory, too much complication, and too many unresolved feelings.

I realized we couldn’t just keep going on like we used to, that I needed some time away from you. There is no blame to be cast, it just one of those things that happen.  Without you around, I could figure out myself and grow. Part of me knows that if you were around, I would get comfortable and complacent. Part of me believes this is the best for both of us, that one-day things will work out okay. Part of me is afraid you might do the same thing to me again, so I don’t know how much to trust you.

Time will mend these wounds, the experience will overwrite the pain. In the end, I know sometimes you treated me like crap, pushed me into situations where I would be let down, but I don’t regret any of my moments with you because you gave me memories I will cherish forever.

One day we will find each other again when the time is right, we meet like old friends who bump into each other at the supermarket, and without skipping a beat, we will reconnect. Until then I wish you well and hope you are okay. Know that I’m not gone for good, I will figure things out.

I miss you love, and I love you. I promise I’ll come for you again soon.

Sincerely,
Me

 

When My Heart Fell To Silence

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One of my favorite authors is Paulo Coelho, and my favorite of his books is the Alchemist.  Its one of the few books which have had the patience and desire to read multiple times.  Most of the book is about the journey of a man looking to find his personal legend. All along this journey, he learns how to listen to the voice of the world and how to listen to the voice of his heart.  There is a point in his quest, where obtains all he needs to live a good life, a life better than what he had before. There he considered the end to this quest, stop following his dream and settle down to a life worth living.  It was then, a wise man told him, should he end this campaign to fulfill his personal legend, ignoring the calls and prods of his heart, one day his heart would stop talking and grow silent forever to be lost to him.

I find myself slightly askew, feeling like there is something missing within me.  Sometimes it feels like my brain is drowing, waiting for air to releave it of its suffering, only to sit working on what I only hope will grow into something better.  My heart rests itself in a grey cloud, feeling the luke warm of the air around it, never feeling content, but also never getting the motivation to get out of this shroud. I am not unhappy, but I am not exactly chipper as my usual self. This feeling of cynasism creeps forth as my heart and mind lash out at me like a wounded animal.This is slow and painful insanity that eventually overcomes and become a psuedo reality in which there may be no percievable real escape from.

My feeling is at this moment I am the furthest I have ever been from my heart, and where my personal legend may lie.

Its exasperating, my heart is whispering strange thoughts and notions into my mind, wanting me to cut loose and go while, escape from the grey clouding my heart, give my brain some fresh air to breath. I sit here and I think about it, process it, there the revelation of my current standing in life, this is my chance to finally listen to my heart and leave to where I want to go. I must take contol of the reins and move myself back on this path. I must find this lightening path, the road to the end of the tunnel, I will see the light of day again.

We must face ourselves in the mirror and I can’t become statisfied with what I see in return. Change comes from a need born deep with, a necessity that will push me further than ever before.   I will start on my journey, start on my course, follow where my heart leads and never look back.

This I promise, I will start now, right this minute, because tomorrow is already too late.

Convert To Humanity

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I’ve gone to church for all of my life.  Mass after mass every Sunday,  learning about what to do, how to do it, and what is the righteous path. Growing up in the church makes people a bit apathetic, less responsive, and less zealous. I can remember sitting in the pews when I was younger, dosing off as the something akin to muscle memory took me through the motions.  Responses and prayers at that point just become words and empty ritual that your hearts not into (not the best way to practice religion).
It was in these brief periods of dozing that I realized there were a group of people who had all the love and faith to put into the mass, who hung on every word. They would sit in anticipation for the next lesson, and always have a distinct reverence for God, and be the loudest voices when it came to singing and praying.  These people I would find out later usually converted to the religion. People who ultimately chose to be there, not because of some familial obligation or routine, but because they found exactly what they were looking for. As I got older, I had always had a great deal of respect for them, because it’s their zeal that I aspire to.

It was around age 7 when if you wanted to find me I would be in one of two places, staring at a screen in the living room, or watching a screen in my bedroom.  It’s not that I was particularly antisocial, but I had always felt more comfortable with a monitor in front of me.  If I wasn’t at school or with friends that was what I was doing.  Video games and cartoons were my life, a consistency that I sought, and for some time, the only consistency I had.  I wasn’t much for humanity, people were fun to be around, but I always guarded myself against them. For a while there I didn’t understand the appeal of people, though at times I enjoy being around them, I always defaulted back to that life in front of the screen. People and I seemed to be on a very different wavelength so when was playing video games it was my home, it was my haven, where I would go to escape into the world I felt like I might actually belong to.
As I grew older, the feeling of something missing within me began to grow.  Though video games and anime were fun, they ultimately could only provide a mostly superficial experience.  No matter how far I delved to fill this part of myself, I was never really satisfied completely.  I doubled down, how can something that had sustained me for this long suddenly be lacking. Hundreds of episodes, countless games, and hours staring at the backlit screen of a laptop, I needed something to change, but for a while nothing did.
It was much later when I started to see the value in those types of relationships we foster. It took a while for that desire to spread root within me. It was then that my love of humanity began to grow because it was something I realized I wanted to be a part of, something I knew would make me feel more complete and alive. I wanted to know as much as I could about this group that I seemed strangely distant from. I wanted to be apart humanity because I finally accepted I was human.

When I think about why I believe in humanity so much, in the goodness of man, the greatness of our capability.  I realize, I chose to be part of this miraculous people and have fallen in love with our antics.  It’s a zeal I find reminiscent to those converts to religion. I sing out praised of humanity and acknowledge their shortfalls. I find that I love people because doing so makes me feel whole. It birthed a passion that I can’t live without.

At the end of it, I believe in how great people can be.  I have always been a lover of history, and it has always been enough evidence to show me how much we can accomplish if we really push ourselves. Within the last century athletes, academics and activists have pushed the boundary and advanced our society beyond people hundreds of years ago would be able to fathom.  Though there are times in which we follow a misguided or evil path, we always show a high capability to learn and grow.  Our greatest strength is to adapt and teach others a better way and strive for a better future. I am a convert to humanity, a believer in our purpose, I will sing our songs to the heavens and hang on every lesson.

The World In The Life Of A Guy: Part 1 -Sex

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Written on my wall since high school is a simple question printed on a label maker. “What Makes A Man?” it says.  This ambiguous question, with no clear answer, is something that I come back to regularly as I contend with realities of the world. Hearing stories about what men are capable of both good and bad makes me question what type of person I want to be. Over the last several months I’ve been posing questions to people around me about their interactions with men. The answers I received were confusing and at points horrifying. I want to show you what it’s like for a regular guy out there in the world, one who doesn’t necessarily know if he is an outlier or the rule.

Sex, it always starts with sex. A stupid place to start but a grand motivator for most men.  Guys will usually have a story about something they do or have done because of girl. I among them found my love of running because of a girl in high school telling me she liked guys with runners bodies. As I get older, this departs from the much more innocent motivations of young; a desire to get from point A to point B as quickly as possible is found. Guys are motivated by sex.  I can’t honestly deny this, what changes is willingness fight against this all-consuming emotion to find a higher ground to stand on.  In our mind, sex it presses up against us, invading our thoughts and without strong mental fortitude it wins out the day. It whispers fantasies and delusions into our ear, denying that reality in which we are for one that could possibly be if you were to play the game right. That is no way to condemn us to being sex fiends, but something we must contend with.  That inner strength is what I find as being the man is all about.  The ability to put these thoughts and feelings aside for something that is much greater than the hedonistic vices of sex can provide me.

It’s that relationship, though, between guys and gals that so intertwined with this dynamic that it becomes bogged down but the tension between friendship and sexuality.  From When Harry Met Sally, a movie about a man and woman attempting to have a friendship that eventually turns into a romantic relationship, even the one of the protagonists clearly states that he doesn’t believe men and women can be friends because sex will get in the way. This idea was foreign to me, why can’t we foster and hold relationships with people of the opposite gender?  It’s within the expectations that are held, the way we picture things when I say I have a relationship with a guy friend versus a girl friend. Not to mention the amount of narratives I’ve heard from women of always having to be wary of ulterior motives when entering a friendship with a guy.  With all I’ve heard, the hesitation is warranted.  Love is a drug, and we are addicts, so if you need a fix, you’ll try to get it from anywhere. 

Do I believe we different from the previous generations of human beings in such a way that we can deviate from this cycle of sexual magnetism?
No, but I do believe in the human spirit, which can look create the world we want and I do believe in values and the ability to motivate ourselves to relationships that go beyond sexual attraction.

In this regard, I find to be the best way to end this conversation about being a guy in this sexual environment is talking about what I strive for. This comes from many hours thinking about the kinds of relationships I want to foster along with listening to troubled tales of the lost souls out there in the world. My truest goal is to find a place and strength to be able to say no to sex.  With the ability to wait and find a sense of truth beyond the physicality of it all. Don’t get me wrong intimacy has a place in every adult relationship, but I don’t want to be under the control of these feelings. It’s not to deny them,  but to find a way to curb them appropriately. The world does not revolve around sex and I shouldn’t either, I want to enjoy the world and people for who they are and not have this lingering thought in the back of my mind. It’s what I am working towards, and something I want for my relationships in the future…but hey, at the end of the day I’m “just a guy” right.

A Square Peg In A Square Hole

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How do you keep yourself outside of the box? How do you keep these thoughts flowing like a stream in the spring? Can I foster this type of non-unilateral thinking?

There is a dream I have that I would be one of those people who comes up with this novel way of looking at the world. A type of perspective that widens the world of those around me.  That dream turns into a nightmare when I realize that I might not be cut out for this dream.

I look at forks in the road of how life can go, and in some ways, it’s easy to follow the set path before me, it has been well worn in. So many before I have walked these steps and gotten to where they wanted to go. Then there are paths I see which are less worn but still recognizable. Those paths may be different, and the road might be harder to follow, but from the perspective of I stand, the footprints are still warm from the person before.

The problem is taking the last path, the path that has never been taken before. Where there are no roads ahead and feet, have never tread. In a system where I like to know the laws and parameters to work within it’s those who bend and break those rules in the right way that seems to be able to push past the boundaries of what we consider doable.

In some parts I am afraid of that path, I have been taught this road can lead you to nowhere, to dead ends, and to danger. Ironically it’s that path I have to take if I want to accomplish my dream. Life has no clear way to feeling you where to go, it has many suggestions but no real stake in which direction you take. Each life we live will always be different the one of the next, and yet we feel this force that draws us together to have this type of unifying experience with each other. A way to be able to relate with one another. And maybe that is my hesitation, as it is I feel that few know me and even fewer understand me and if I keep moving away from people onto my own path I will lose that connection I have worked so hard to create. That It will no longer be understandable as to what I am trying to accomplish. I like to know things and to be taught, but I have no guide, no way to know if I am moving in the right direction. With no sense as to what direction to take, do I just step out and hope for the best?

Even now as I am typing this, it seems silly to put so much weight upon this fear, the fear to not know where which way to turn. I know the world is full of people and that there are people are like-minded all over the place, but having been without them before there is a fear just the same.
I know in the future I want to step out and act in my own way. Follow the path my feet set out for me. I will likely live differently than most people, and I will place along the road I was meant for. This is something I have and will be working on for the rest of my life.

Invasion Of Thoughts

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I noticing myself drifting off again, drifting into space where thoughts pervade my consciousness. Sitting there staring into the distance, imagining the horrors of existence.

It happened again, once my mind is tired from the day, or just don’t seem to have enough energy to fight off the coming storm.  It starts with a small “You can’t” and builds from there. These invasive thoughts that cross my mind like floodwater during a storm, I am helplessly trying to block the current as it drowns everything in touches.  I start to think negatively, working to fight back against this onslaught of thoughts and feelings I don’t want.  Once the gates are open, I just have to wait for the storm to end because I don’t have the endurance to fight against these persistent waves.  All I can do is watch and know that it will let up eventually.

It takes me the dark alleys of my mind and makes me deals with all the backhanded things that have ever popped up.  These are the things that don’t even come up on my radar normally but are apparent deeply seeded in my brain. Things like my fear about never amounting to anything, my hesitation with not knowing if I am on the right path, a constant stream of thoughts about not being good enough.  As a whole, these ideas throw me for a loop and even though they are not truthful, the ideas have already taken root and tied themselves to my very being. Will they go away, probably not, but will become easier to manage if I continue to work at it.

These thoughts are something I can’t avoid but at times are remedied simply by a good meal.  Makes me confused about the validity of the ideas.  I wonder if I should take them seriously and if there might be some small truth to it all aside from highlighting my insecurities. I don’t know if I should follow them down the rabbit hole or I should be weary that it might just lead me to a sewer.  The thoughts can poison a day or a make a good moment sour. Like with weeds, if unattended they multiply. Is my mind giving me a dose of reality or just some sick fantasy I never knew I had?

I snap out of it, only a moment has passed but it leaves a mark on me.  A smile that was once there disappears along with the gleam in my eyes.  It will be a little while before they truly return.  I keep at it, moving forward knowing there could be another storm waiting for me right around the corner.

A Resolute Resolution

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What will I become in this new year?

I see a vividly a version of myself standing upon a hill with back faced to me.  A much larger more powerful person stands before me, confronted with the future, ready to take on the challenges of tomorrow.  He has a grin as if he knows what the future hold and how to move about it. This man standing at the other end of the year is challenging me to catch up.

Resolutions don’t work, at least no the majority of the time.  Trying to change yourself in so many ways all at once and expecting result immediately is only setting yourself up for failure. Anticipating the arrival of the new year to have some sort of bearing on how well you are able to do something is a bit silly. Moments should be grasped when the motivation is at hand, not when we feel like the motivation should come.

This is why I don’t have a resolution but a resolve. I want to be better, stronger, more compassionate and helpful. I want to be that man on the mountain I see before me, not just stuck staring at the back of what I could be.  I want to the one who is more of a man of action, one who is less hesitant and less likely to be paralyzed by fear and indecision. This might seem vague but what I am to do is eliminate the feeling of being able to do more by actually doing it.

In learning all I can, I came upon a concept of deliberate practice. The practice that you do to continue to push your ability and skills to the next level. This is the way you become an expert at something. This is something I must learn to do, deliberate practice of life.  To make it so I am constantly pushing the boundaries of what I can and can’t do. Learning how to get to each of the next stages in my own life.

This is my promise to myself that I will be that man I see on the hill, that man who is challenging me now, so by the time next year comes around, I will be able to challenge my past self too and welcome the next challenge with a smile.

This is my resolution, this is my resolve. I hope to all of you that we are all successful in our pursuits, but I have a back to catch up to, and I have to get started now!