It is so paradoxical that humans in general have this deep-seated aversion to change and growth, but change is the way of the universe. Change encompasses all. Steadfastness and constancy are abstract terms, in a sense. There is just no way of describing the primal fear inside of me that has held me back, keeping me stationary. Picture a string of yarn pulled to the point of fraying, but then pulled no longer, but also not let loose; a perpetual almost-breaking point. I feel myself irritated randomly. I want to inflict violence for the minutest reasons. And there is an ache that urges me towards the only resolution I can see as right. For once, I feel myself compelled to do what I should do; yet, I have always done what is comfortable, or satisfying, or safe. So this whole stepping out, jumping off, blindly flying is not coming easily. I am one of those people who anticipates something so much that the fear of it happening and the expectation of its disastrous consequences turn out to make the actual event seem like nothing in comparison. But this fear, this increasingly nauseating feeling of doom, also keeps me from experiencing. I will probably never sky dive. I will probably never jump off a 30 foot cliff into the water below.

If I had wings I would probably be too afraid to spread them and soar for fear of flying too high or diving too low. A constant assessment of potential future disaster runs through my mind with each new situation. It isn’t the flight down, but the jumping off, trusting my wings, that always makes me turn around and walk back to my warm place in the dirt. The ridiculous part is that I’m well aware that every time I trust my gut and do what makes me feel horribly vulnerable, something good always, undoubtedly and assuredly, results.

The only conclusion I can come to is that there is a masochistic element to my nature. A part of me that insists that pain is comfortable. Which means that somehow that part of me needs to heal before I will be able to take the leap.

I keep mulling over the fact that I have so many problems that need to be fixed: Anger that has built up over the years as I was told to suck it up and shove it down, grudges towards people I love the most that result from being too easily wounded, a constant nagging voice in my head that convinces me that all the world is negative, devastating internal self-loathing (which is getting weaker), blinding selfishness, jealousy towards people who have what I want, criticism towards others who I feel I’m better than (because it feels oh-so-good to pretend that I have the right to judge), a shoddy reliance on God, juvenile irritation at the smallest things, fear towards things that will probably never hurt me, a deep love for worldly appetites, a biting, hurtful defense mechanism towards people who disappoint me, a self-righteous delusion that my way is always right, too much focus on the flaws in my appearance… which is truly only a selfish distraction, an over-dependence on expectations… which very often lead to disappointment, a tendency to block out inner reflection because it’s so much easier to pretend like everything is ok, a complete and utter lack of motivation to do what I need to do, a crystal clear knowledge of what is right mixed with a tendency to do the opposite. And the list goes on.

Part of me feels like I have to fix all of these things. On my own. And it’s like in the cartoons when the cute little dude sets his mind to climb a mountain and he gets to the edge of it and looks up, thinking to himself “that’s not so bad,” but then the clouds clear and he sees that the mountain continues far past what his eyes can see. When I was young I didn’t think there was much wrong with me. I thought I was a pretty good person, aside from my weight. I thought “If I could just lose weight, I would be perfect.” What a simple perspective. I think the world is so messed up because people refuse to look at themselves. They would rather not know their own soul. It’s better to make up flaws about oneself, the ones that don’t really matter, and say “I have this huge nose and thighs that look like cottage cheese. I have to take 445,032,243 pills a day to keep myself from having a panic attack because I’m deathly afraid of light bulbs and WHERE CAN YOU GO WITHOUT SEEING A F’IN LIGHT BULB? Nature? *GASPETH* You mean where those uncivilized, naked people live? OH NO!!!”

Then they wonder why they either cry all the time or can’t develop genuine emotions. They can’t fall asleep at night, have 6 kids, and consider suicide at least 10 times a day. If the TV isn’t on, it’s the nagging voice in their head telling them that he/she and others will never be good enough and that the most horrible thing ever is going to happen in 15 minutes.

“So take the light bulbs out, barricade the door jams, and be sure to build a make-shift panic room in the storage shed so that we will all be ok when the narcoleptic mass-murderer with no opposible thumbs comes for us. BARRACUDA!!!!”

Or it’s the opposite. Mr. and Mrs. Fakey-polite-Botox-stinking-rich-douchebags just put a ten-room addition onto their house in Beverly Hills. They had to level housing project in the process (b/c they’re on the outskirts, ya know), but it’s ok because all their neighbors said it was an eyesore. The now-homeless people have built a thriving community of cardboard boxes a few miles away and they seem to be doing much better! Mr. and Mrs. F-p-B-s-r-d just love when everything works out. Now they will have enough room for the 20-lane bowling alley, the in-home theater, the day spa, the pet parlor, the trophy room, the money-burning room, and all that other crap they HAD to have. Joy. And life is so perfect for them. No problems at all. The truth is that the problems are ignored. Got a problem? Throw money at it.

These things are masks, cover-ups, nuclear bomb shelters that keep out the personal crap. The real, painful stuff. The wounded and brokeness. The hate. Gotta shove that down, hun. Can’t let it get in the way of “happiness.” What is happiness? It seems fake. Joy seems real, but joy is there despite all the crap. Joy is being able to look into the ugly parts of your soul and say I don’t like myself right now, but God still loves me.” Most people can’t do that because they never take the blinders off and look at the inner garbage that they’ve accumulated. You know why? Because if they did, then they would either have to do something about it, or ignore it. And ignoring real problems weighs damn heavy on the conscience. Nuff said.

But who am I to talk? I have known that I need to sit down and write since the semester ended (allowing me enough time to breathe and, thus, write), but I haven’t until now. I need to write about so many things, but for some reason I just don’t have the drive. I want the drive so badly. I want my fingers to itch with anticipation to get out the next word and my emotions to overflow into language. I feel like I’m wasting it. All of the potential energy. It’s just sitting there, escaping as useless heat into the atmosphere. And inside I’m restless. Pacing back and forth in my mind. Like an artist contemplating his next attempt to put his thoughts into a tangible form.

I just feel like I know more than I give myself credit for. But then I tell myself that I really don’t know anything, and the things I think I know are just perceptions… relative viewpoints. One minds thoughts. So I waver between those extremes and at times I feel like I might be going crazy, but then I’m hit with this awesome feeling that truth has to be real. I know that love is all that really matters in the end. And if that’s true, then there are other truths. And I know in my heart that God is there. I feel Him everywhere. All I have to do is sit and close my eyes and I feel Him.

Not that I’m anyone special. Any single person can feel that. They just have to believe in it and open their eyes to the insanely unexplainable reality that we live in. There is so much more than we assume. We pretend like we have this thing figured out. With science and philosophy and such. Psshhh. When I finally realized, for myself, that God is real… and that I hadn’t even begun to see myself how I really am, let alone Him, I realized that this thing that we call reality… the experience that we call life, which we put in a toddlers story-book version and tie up with a nice little bow, it’s a phantom. You will only hear this here folks: life is a ninja. Just think about that one.

And here goes the life thing butting into my writing time, the only writing time that I’ve alloted myself in who knows how long and I can’t stay focused. Just because my stolen internet wants to be difficult. It seems like whenever I’m doing something really good for me, there’s always some kind of distraction. My music, which I just figured out is the catalyst for my writing (MAJOR brain fart), is not cooperating. Blast it all. Errrgghhhh. I hate how all of this menial life stuff is always calling my name: “Alese, look!!! Over here!!! There’s some dirt on the ground!!! No, don’t write about your shiz in an attempt to self-therapize (?) yourself. CLEAN ME!!! EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!” Like the midget on Austin Powers. He’s so cute. I would like to keep him in my closet for rainy days. Oh, my brain comes up with some strange things. I wish I could eliminate these things from life: sleeping (but not napping), eating, driving, cleaning, moving heavy things, sadness, fear, anger, and extreme temperatures. I’m sure there are more, but that’s all I can think of. Always-clean hair would be nice too. I don’t mind showers. And drinking. Mmmm, water.

“I wonder how I’m supposed to feel when you’re not here. Cuz I burned every bridge I ever built when you were here. I still try holding onto silly things. I never learn. Oh, why? All the possibilities. I’m sure you’ve heard.”

I think it’s irritating that I write massive amounts when I finally decide to write. It’s like always being nice to everyone, bringing them fruit baskets and knitting them Christmas sweaters… then going on a killing rampage with a hydrogen bomb. *sigh*

I hate that every time I write, it’s negative. Even this is negative because I’m whining.

I love air.

That was pitiful. I need to grow some happy wings and write about lovely things. It feels hard and uninteresting though. I wonder why? I guess it feels like I’m just boasting when I say good things. Maybe that’s it. It’s hard for me to say good things about other people too though. I wonder why about that as well. Maybe because not many good things were ever said about me growing up. I could never take a compliment until a few years ago. I would always think the person was lying. Then one day, I told myself that it was rude to disregard people’s compliments. I told myself that I would force myself to thank them from that point on. So I started, and after that I had the epiphany that most people won’t go out of their way to give someone else a compliment unless they really mean it. So now I can accept compliments and you know what? I get them way more now than I did when I told the person they were fill of shit. Shocking.

You know what I could go for? A really good dream. One of those ones where you wake up and get pissed off cuz you’re back down to earth. Except this time, for once, I want get through the whole dream. It seems like the very rare times that I’ve had really good dreams, I always get rudely awoken by some random thing. But the bad dreams, I have to yank myself out of and smack myself after I’m awake to be sure that it wasn’t real.

It seems unfair that the bad side of life seems to outweigh the good. Is that just perceptual or is that true? Maybe I’m just negative. I do have an explanation though. I think that the Earth has more bad things in it because it isn’t God’s kingdom. The world is given over to evil because humans have more evil in them than good as a result of the Fall. But that’s just my own personal theology. That’s why it’s so hard to grow into goodness. It isn’t our earthly nature. We have to remember God. Only when we remember God do we see that the earth is not our home. Our bodies are shells. We are meant for somewhere better.

“I’ve gone for too long living like I’m not alive. “

“We’re still chasing our tails
In the rising sun
In our dark water planet still spinning
In a direction no one wins
No one’s won.

See, I don’t belong here
Well, I don’t belong here, I will carry a cross with a song

Where I don’t belong”- Switchfoot

“What a shame we all became such fragile, broken things.
A memory remains just a tiny spark.
I give it all my oxygen,
to let the flames begin.

This is how we’ll dance when,
When they try to take us down.
This is what will be.
Oh, glory.

Somewhere weakness is our strength,
And I’ll die searching for it.
I can’t let myself regret such selfishness.
My pain and all the trouble caused,
No matter how long
I believe that there’s hope
Buried beneath it all and
Hiding beneath it all, and
Growing beneath it all, and…

This is how we’ll dance when,
When they try to take us down
This is how we’ll sing it.
This is how we’ll stand when
When they burn our houses down.
This is what will be.
Oh, glory.”
- Paramore

That’s all I have in me tonight. I’ve been writing for two hours. SLEEP

There’s a defect in our societal genetic code that provokes us to enjoy the suffering of others. Have we always been this way? It’s obvious that the Western, individualistic, industrialized mentality has led to extreme social disconnect. An utter loss of community. No more front porches. Each person in the U.S. is too stuck to their TV, computer (ha!), education, job, or drug of choice to reach out and love the person next to them. Or to even consider the merit in stumbling along through road rage, random irritation, superiority complexes, self-esteem issues, I-am-God delusions, and unrelenting judgment to the other side where each one of us prays for the people we see on the street, worries every time we hear an ambulance, and reaches out to strangers in the smallest and largest ways. Not to say that there is an easy transition from one extreme to the other. Or that we will get there without the help of an outside source; be it therapy, God, talking to those who see the world in a different (and less negative) light, etc.

Of course, the real reason that people do not love others is because they don’t understand the importance of loving themselves. And if they do see the importance, they can’t figure out how to start embracing their flaws, mistakes, and fears. So it isn’t even so much a community problem, but an individual, psychological problem. We can’t love who we are inside, but are constantly looking toward this imaginary, ideal person that we could be if we would just try a little harder… weren’t screwed over so much… didn’t have such a bad life… had gotten a few more chances… and a laundry list of other things. And all the while, this beautiful and perfect version of ourselves continues to not exist, and the flawed, human version continues to stay stagnant. We do not grow. We do not realize that our purpose is contained within our flaws. We are meant to accept the flaws that don’t matter to our internal well-being and grow out of the ones that are holding us back.

Instead we hate ourselves and kick ourselves. The internal voice does not shut off. A constant tormentor. In my case it replaced the voice of my father, who, God love him, did not ever mean to be the killer of my self-esteem. He was trying to help me avoid the things he went through as a teenager, but the criticism that was seen as constructive to him stuck in my head as a constant reminder of my lack of worth. Not good enough. And this voice follows us into adulthood and mutates into a monster that holds us down.  We never see that the lack of self-worth is keeping us from changing the world around us. It is holding you down. It is selfishness in disguise. It is the opposite of God’s opinion of you. And this is at the root of our loss of community.

I can’t say for sure that people used to feel that they were useful to this planet, or at least useful in their immediate environment, but now people do not feel like they can accomplish anything. They feel small. They feel worthless. And if they are worthless then so is everyone else. But they add to that and say, “I can deal with my own flaws (because they are familiar), but this other person who does ____, I don’t agree with his flaws and they are obviously worse than mine, so I will dislike him and hope he fails.” Throw in disagreements when it comes to lifestyle and cultural differences and conflict is guaranteed.

But you see, if people were to start accepting their own flaws they would see that other people need acceptance too and the cultural differences wouldn’t seem to matter so much. Because when it comes down to it, I think I’m better than you and you think you’re better than me. You might disagree with me, but talk with me about a topic we have different views on and I’m willing to bet that you will take your own side. Of course we all have differing levels of this superiority complex, but it’s there nonetheless.

Any personal, moral, intellectual, and spiritual growth occurs through a humbling of our egos. In order to learn a new thing you must admit your ignorance. In order to grow you must admit that you are still developing. We are only human. But the key to my whole point here is that we are all only human. And that’s pretty much all we are. The differences don’t matter much when you break it down. The problem with humanity is that we are so caught up disagreeing, bickering, complaining, judging, and hating that we can’t see that our value judgments towards other people are keeping us from moving forward as a species.

You being a stickler in your ways does not solve any problems. It just makes you feel like you are “right”. Why is it so important to be right, especially when it is only you who thinks you are? Because when you die, no one is going to say “well at least he was always right.” They are going to say “that guy was an asshole, he wouldn’t listen to anything I had to say.” And you won’t grow as a person because growing means that you tweak your values, beliefs, and judgments to be better, more mature, less selfish.

We won’t start to make the world better and bring people closer until we stop relying on the government and media to tell us what we need to be doing with ourselves. Consumeristic capitalism intends for people to think that they are horribly inadequate. That’s the only way that we will buy all of the crap that is supposed to make us better, but does nothing but give us a temporary material fix and empty wallets. Advertising is designed to make you feel worthless. We as a society must begin to see through this and stop it by no longer voluntarily exposing ourselves to it.

You will notice that as you begin to accept yourself, you will begin to embrace the people around you. You might think it will start with family, but it will start with strangers. It is the hardest to re-wire the way you interact and think about your family because of the history you have with them, but it is possible. But you won’t be able to accept anyone else until you realize that you are worth your own time. So turn off the TV, close the beauty magazine, cut up your credit card and start discovering who you are.