Troubleshooting: Faith

I never had faith. I remember certain episodes in my childhood, which at the very least had something to do with it, if not the reasons themselves. The older I get the more my childhood feels as if it were a lucid dream of sorts. It feels like I experienced that whole portion of my life last night, and now I can only make out bits and pieces, though those bits and pieces are very vivid.

I can recall that when I was younger I was disappointed many times. At a young age I developed a strong sensitivity and desire for pleasure. It’s no wonder that I would come to be highly disposed to addiction once I came of age. I longed for pleasure like I was starved of it. I longed for cartoons, and new toys, and parties, and cakes, and candy, and friends, and laughter, and sleepovers, and Disney world. I needed it. I suspect that this was because I always felt slightly unhappy or unfulfilled and so I kept having to feed that emptiness with anything that I found pleasure in. There was a point that when I perceived pleasure over the horizon I would get terribly excited and expectant. I would look forward to that pleasure. For example, if my parents said they would take my sisters and me to a movie on Saturday, I would spend the rest of the week salivating over seeing Hercules. But if for whatever reason my parents had to cancel I would take it extremely hard. Like I said, I was awfully sensitive. I remember the feeling of disappointment after unrestraint faith that whatever I was looking forward to would come to fruition would fall through. I hated it.

After a few years of these kinds of disappointments I developed a particular hypothesis. My hypothesis was that if I allowed myself to look forward to something it would surely not happen. And so at an early age I became a pessimist. Of course at the time I didn’t think of it as pessimism. I thought of it as a sort of universal reverse psychology. I believed that since I was raised in the church, but, in my opinion, was a very naughty Christian, God was ready to punish me at every turn. I reasoned that God would take from me what I wanted the most, be it a day at the movies, or a particular Christmas present. And so I felt that if I got excited about something in my future, it would tip Him off and He would take it from me as punishment for not being a proper Christian boy. Instead I thought I would trick Him by continually telling myself things like, “It’ll never happen”, “It probably won’t work out.” This served two purposes, it could either successfully trick God and my little pleasure would fly under the radar and find me “to my surprise” or else if it didn’t happen, my expectations didn’t have far to plummet and I could console myself with an apathetic, “I knew it wouldn’t work out” Interestingly, one of my parents’ method of punishment was to take from me something they knew I valued when I misbehaved.

That mindset followed me throughout my life. It certainly played a substantial part in one of the other headlining issues in my life, relationships. My confidence with the girls I like is a close cousin to my reverse psychological pessimism. Rather than to speak to a girl who I would like to date confidently and expectantly, I speak to her as if she would never want anything to do with me. Because I believed she wouldn’t. I believed that because I liked her, she would automatically not like me. So to me it was already a lost cause from the moment I perceived my attraction to her, and my efforts to talk to her were a mere formality. This is an obvious form of self-sabotage. I still believed for most of my teenage and adult life that God was waiting at every turn to compromise all of my undertakings for anything that I wanted. This was my way of coping with Christian Guilt I believe almost every child who is raised Christian but doesn’t “follow the rules” harbors. And so, when I would be politely (or otherwise) rejected by one girl or another, I would immediately think to myself “I knew it…” and several things would happen in my mind: my self-confidence would decrease, my pessimism would increase, my disesteem for God would increase, and my fear of loneliness would increase.

My pessimism for all things that had to do with my future grew. By high school, it was certainly pioneered by my relationship with women, but certainly not limited to it. I felt that most anything I would get excited about would not work out and so as I grew older I became paranoid. I excelled at school because for the most part I could control the outcome. I found comfort in the first half of college through this kind of control. I knew that if I knew the material in my classes inside and out, I would ace the exam, and receive guaranteed pleasure. This I did. Of course there were times where I fell short, but for the most part, I rarely felt threatened about the future of my grades. It wasn’t until law school that my, nearly religious by this time, pessimism in academia was provoked again. The subjective grading system of Law school put me at the total mercy of fate, and in my experience that never goes well. Unfortunately, “I know I won’t get good grades” is not the thought one wants facing an employment season that one has been told is entirely dependent upon grades. Employment, by derivation, was also out of my hands, and so I was naturally convinced that I was not going to get a job, only for the fact that I wanted one. My mom would work to calm me down as I mourned not getting a job 8 months in advance of my first interview. She would remind me that everything would be alright, and that God was in control. Upon her saying this, I would become all the more inconsolable—she’s right, He is in control. And since I can remember, that’s been my greatest fear. To me, He never gives me anything I want. I wanted to go to Tulane, and a hurricane destroys New Orleans and I go to FSU, I want to go to Harvard and have a perfect college campaign, then I fall flat on my face at the finish line with the LSAT, I want a girlfriend and instead I get a million girl friends, all who tell me I will one day have a very lucky girlfriend. He’s going to ruin this for me too, I thought.

So it would seem that my misgivings were not merely me protecting myself from disappointment, but an all out mistrust of God derived from the belief when I was a child that God was going to punish me by taking away anything that he perceived I desired. But later this expanded to God actively punishing me by allowing the things I most fear to happen. Using another relationship example, if I did get a date with a girl I was interested in, I would not find relief. I would become even wearier. Because I feared that something was going to go wrong to ruin the evening. I developed a this-is-too-good-to-be-true mentality in addition to the others. In my first year at law school, aware at how fortunate I was to have been accepted to Columbia, I felt it all to be too-good-to-be-true, and was terrified that I would somehow manage to fail out or else be kicked out. Another area of my life that this has manifested itself in is in my crippling fear of flying. Since I was a child I have had a ghastly fear of falling to my death. I remember reading the myth of Icarus in middle school and how profoundly it affected me when I learned that he plummeted to his death. I remember having a dream in middle school of being on a tall tower with some friends and one of my friends losing her footing and falling over the railing, and before I could grab her hand, she would fall to her death with a blood curdling scream that would have me wake up in a sweat, breathing heavily, scared to death. I had that dream twice. To this day I can’t watch news footage of 9/11. Despite the statistics of how safe flying is, for a long time I was convinced that every time I boarded a plane, it would be my last time boarding a plane. I believed that for the simple fact that I felt that falling would be the worst way to die, it would be the perfect punishment for me. And the fact that I had no control over the flying of the plane, to me, was the final indication that it was certain to happen. It wasn't long before I believed that I could never let my guard down. It was bad enough that I was not living like God said I should, to allow myself to become comfortable would be outright cocky. I learned to never relax, for I knew that the moment I did I would provoke such a reaction from God that I was sure He would never let me forget. Indeed the times I did allow myself to get comfortable in life I would perceive a catastrophe to happen that would scare me out of my comfort and back to vigilantly waiting for the next tragedy. This was especially true when things were going well for me. I thought that at least if I was anxious and stressed all the time He would take pity on me. So it was that I would never allow myself to relax and "trust" that things would be alright. It took tranquillizers to get me to and from Asia the first time I went, because I refused to allow myself to relax and trust that I would arrive in one piece.

By law school I had figured most of this out, though I don’t believe I had put most of the pieces together yet. I remember confiding in Mike that I always felt as if “something bad was about to happen to me”. And this could be in any form, physically, emotionally, and most dreaded of all, spiritually. This had caused a number of mental maladies within me. I mentioned earlier it led to low confidence in any undertaking I took, but it also led to chronic stress. I would stress about everything as I worried about all that could (and what I perceived would inevitably) go wrong. Of course this made me miserable on the inside. On the outside no one would be able to tell, I made sure of that. It was always important to me that everyone perceive me as perfect. Occasionally, though, people would tell me that I stress too much or that I’m too anxious. I couldn’t explain to them that God and I had been fighting for a couple of decades and that I have been looking over my shoulder waiting for His next move. They would think I was crazy.

So how is this resolved?

In a number of ways: organized and laid out here into words, it’s tempting to believe that this should have been easily recognized and dealt with at a much earlier age. But I must remind you that all of these feelings developed subtly over several years and manifested in dark feelings, not black and white words. It wasn’t readily apparent to me that my phobia of flying and my low confidence when talking to girls I was romantically interested in had a common denominator. In accordance with human nature, rather than turn around and face the demons chasing me, confront, and resolve them, I opted instead to push forward and try to act like a person who didn’t have very severe and debilitating emotions and beliefs. And Alcohol and Tobacco went a long way in helping my acting.

It’s certainly not easy to read what I have written here. It’s sad. It makes me sad that I lived like that. It makes me feel like a terrible person for allowing my mind to become so run down with lies and faulty thinking. But I have learned that the first step to growth is understanding and accepting that we will all emerge from our childhoods with unique issues that will show themselves in our adulthood. For the large part, much of the things that went on in our childhood were not necessarily our fault. And so as adults, we just have to suck it up and look under the hood to see what’s wrong. It may not be pretty, but if we wish to lead better lives as better people the only choice is to pull over and pop the hood. If we attempt to continue driving like the engine light isn’t furiously blinking we put ourselves and others in danger as we risk crashing.

To me the solution to this problem is clear. I need to develop faith. It begins with acknowledging that the pessimistic mindset I developed when I was younger to defend against disappointment is no longer required. At this age, I can understand that sometimes, often times, things don’t go our way. When that happens we’re presented with an opportunity to practice flexibility. But I can also understand that it wasn’t long before I began to selectively perceive events in my life, focusing on what didn’t go my way and simply overlooking the innumerable amount of times things went just as I would have liked.

The second and most important element to my pessimism, and what makes using the term “faith” appropriate, is my view of and relationship with God. My relationship with God remains the center of every issue I have thus far discovered. Looking at this entry alongside previous entries in which I mention my relationship with God, we can see the problem. I felt that I was leading a life outside of the “rules” of Christianity and therefore was “bad”. Also, my perception of God when I was younger, as with the vast majority of people who grow up in Christian homes, was one of a strict God who punishes. That’s what happens when one learns about Hell in Sunday school. At such a young age, no matter how the Sunday school teacher explains it, all that a child is going to remember is “bad”, “sin”, ”evil”, “Satan” and “Hell”. I came to know God as someone who was watching me and not pleased with what He saw. I rebelled from Church because I found it suffocating, not because I didn’t believe in God. I have never been an atheist. And so even when I was living as I pleased, I was very aware that God was watching me. And so when I found myself in positions where He was in control or where I needed His help, I expected that He would use it as an opportunity to punish me. So in that way I did have faith— faith that he would punish me for my rebellious lifestyle.

Many would be interested to know that the lack of confidence that they perceive in me and befuddles them is not so much a lack of confidence in my own abilities, but a lack of confidence that my abilities will have any weight on the outcome, as I felt for a long time life was fixed for me to lose.

I mentioned a couple entries earlier that once I entered college I underwent a time of spiritual growth and transformation. Indeed, I learned I knew not the first thing about Christianity, and after much research, fell in love with it—like falling in love with a friend you’ve known since middle school and never noticed much until you actually took the time to get to know her in college. My understanding of God was transformed as I learned about a real loving and understanding God. And for a while much of the weight of my pessimism was lifted from me as I saw the world through new eyes. But as I also said in that entry, something would always come along to distract me from God and all of this spirituality business, and I would turn all of my attention to her. It was always a “her”. I would follow her to my own destruction. And the negative feelings that would result from my relationship with her would fully revitalize my pessimism. I would blame God that it didn’t work out. And spend the next year or so mad at Him, not talking to Him. In that year I would forget all about the loving God I learned about, convincing myself that I was going through a “phase”, and regress back to my primitive belief in a God who was going to punish me for again wandering off the path in search of “worldy pleasures”.

This has happened several times. This is the first time I have been able to see all of this though. To no-one’s surprise, it was always me and not God behind my misery. I believed what I wanted to believe, and Gods nature never changed. I would say I wanted to go to Tulane and Hurricane Katrina’s timing ruined my dream, but I would neglect to reflect on the fact that I was able to stay close to my best friend by going to FSU and but for going to FSU I would have never found my love of languages—I would have been a philosophy major. I talk about not getting to go to Harvard, but I fail to think about how I was accepted to Columbia with an LSAT score that left much to be desired. I talk about lost loves and rejections, and I gloss over the fact that it was my own lack of confidence that turned many girls off to me, and a vast number of those girls would never have been right for me anyway, and that at a certain point I was just going through the motions and didn’t have an affinity for many of the girls I flirted with. I go on about getting a B- my first semester of law school and stop just short of saying I was offered a job that I, by no means, earned.

I have never died in a plane crash.

The truth is, my whole life, God was looking out for me, and I twisted all that He did into a sob story to protect my pessimistic beliefs. I believe I did this because that mindset became so ingrained in me that I felt like it was a part of me, and secondly, I hate change. Also I would have no one to blame for all of the disappointments I have had. I would have no one to direct my anger toward. And being angry for not getting my way is far easier than accepting the life truth that life isn’t something we have in our back pocket— we will often not get our way and no one will be to blame. And I would have to admit that I was wrong. That I spent the majority of my life believing something that was dead wrong. And it would be just as irresponsible to blame the church. No one in the church had the intention of driving me, very literally, crazy. To be sure, my sisters, to my knowledge, have never struggled with the kind of pessimism and depression that I have though we three went to church at least twice a week together. Perhaps they didn’t even harbor a Christian guilt.

Thank God that I have finally learned this lesson. I am ready to perform life-changing surgery. I am going to remove a cancer thats roots run deep so that I may live life without this pessimism. I am excited to look forward to my future confidently and expectantly without wincing. Most of all, I am ready to learn about faith, faith in myself and faith in God. It involves relearning much of how I perceive reality and I expect it to be painful, frightening, and, at times, frustrating, but I know that I will come out on the other side transformed for the better.

When I don't hold back.

There is no good time to change, I found. No matter when you do, your body and mind will reject it, your friends and family will inquire as to why you have changed and sometimes challenge those changes, and you will constantly wonder if you’re making the right decisions.

I guess we have no choice but to either change or not at all as there is never a perfect time.

Good.

In the past when I sought to change, I would make some progress, but I could tell the whole experience was crippled. I made progress, but I could have, or should have, grown at a far more rapid rate. Looking back I can see that each time I held back. I drew the boundary lines for my projects around the confines of what society deems “appropriate”. I didn’t know it back then, but while I wanted to grow, and experience a new way of living and seeing life, I wanted to do so without alarming anyone to the actual changes in me. Indeed, I tip-toed about, careful not allow anyone to notice the subtle changes in my beliefs and demeanor. I shutter at the thought of explaining to someone why I have “suddenly” decided to stop doing this or start doing that. I’m afraid of what they would say to me in response. And even more terrified of what that would think. It’s a personal weakness—the fear of man. It will also be on the chopping board in the coming years as I sweep through the valleys of my mind, razing all the villages that were built on lies and insecurities to the ground.

It occurs to me, and this is humbling, that I will never become who I truly want to be if I hold back even in the slightest. And so this time I won’t. I’ll allow truth to permeate to every area of my life. I will be brutally honest with myself. I will allow the light to be shined upon every dark corner and when my flaws, those demons within me are exposed, I will not look away. I will acknowledge that they are my doing and they belong to me. And when I need to catch my breath, I’ll catch my breath. And when I need to cry, I’ll cry.

What surprises me is how many people confuse growth with growing older. Some people believe that without actually doing the leg work that they are growing simply because as they age they are able to check off the hallmarks of life—graduate high school, graduate college, get an advanced degree, start a career, get married, get a promotion, coast… It’s my opinion that this is not growing in and of itself. Some people believe life is just a series of events that one completes, they stop spiritually maturing when they are good and comfortable. They see others who aren’t yet at their level as immature and anyone working to reach even higher levels of consciousness as “overly-spiritual” or “self-righteous”. They themselves are in the sweet spot. They look for nothing outside themselves except someone of the opposite sex to love them. And if they aren’t religious they constantly put off making the decision of whether there is a God or not. Or they simply say they do not know, and put it out of their minds, as if to say that if there were a God it has nothing to do with them—the creation. Or they could possibly be atheists, quite comfortable in believing there is no such thing as God, just death. Just nothing. And perhaps when I can understand atheists and how they are content in the belief that all life is, in the end, meaningless, yet still lead a life like it means something, then I will have reached a certain level of maturity, or at least understanding of things otherwise illogical, myself.

I know things have gotten rather serious since my first blog entry. I think I revealed more about myself than I originally intended. But I’ve grown comfortable with this arrangement. And as I go into the next year, the theme of the entries will once again change. As I grow I will blog my musings. I hope that a year from today I would have finally taken a real step towards becoming the man I know I was meant to be.

I’m interested to see what growth looks like.

when I don’t hold back.

To Ride the Fence

I spend much of my time wondering whether I am among the worst of the best men, or rather among the best of the worst of them.

I Got Lost Trying to Find Myself

I was taken hostage by life at an early age. I found that in my childhood my true personality was defective, faulty, and would need to be changed if I would ever want to be happy. I’ve always had a soft-hearted nature. When I was younger, I was quick to befriend the kids who everyone made fun of or seemed lonely because I couldn’t bear the thought of them crying alone because, for no real reason, no one liked them. Of course at the time I couldn’t verbalize so articulately how I felt, but I felt.

So I was bullied too.

I could never understand why some of the kids were so mean, so aggressive. Why they found so much joy in the misery of others. Why they wouldn’t simply listen to the teachers instruction. I mean, we all got into trouble, but where as with me it was because of a lack of focus or more of a child-like negligence—I would spend more time goofing off or in my head, with those kids it was a calculated intent. It was like they reveled in their bad behavior.

As we all got older, the acting out became more extreme as they got physically stronger and learned more, strengthening the tools to inflict misery on those they deemed weak around them. What guy doesn’t remember the first time he got put in a choke hold, confused, tapping vigorously on the assailant’s arm as a silent plea for mercy. There was no reason to ask “why?”, it was just because. I can remember lying on the floor coughing and sputtering, struggling to catch my breath, my eyes filled with tears because I didn’t do anything to deserve this treatment, I would never do this to another. I felt frustrated, and weak. I didn’t want to fight back, I wanted to be left in peace.

At home I lived in an extremely psychologically healthy household, perfectly balanced with morals and love. But unfortunately for my sisters and I, our neighborhood and school life did not reflect the world to be about morals and love. I’m not sure how Staci and Jodi coped with the disparity, though I know for a fact that neither of them had a smooth road to maturity either. As for myself, I observed a few factors and came to a conclusion. Around the fourth grade I observed that I was unhappy. I observed that I felt dissatisfaction in life. I felt like there was something essential missing. I felt isolated from my peers because my parents made me and my sisters spend a third of the week in church where I was taught lessons that I did not see observed in real life. I felt awkward. I began to recognize that everyone in my school, church, and neighborhood were all black. I started to associate most black people with violence, aggressiveness, insensitivity, and poverty. And I struggled with my identity because though I was also black I didn’t think, talk, or act like any of the people I was coming into contact with, nor did I want to. And I didn’t know how to deal with my growing curiosity toward girls, who for the most part ignored me. My conclusion was that there was something wrong with me and the natural feelings I had as to right and wrong and how to treat people. In elementary and the first half of middle school, I spent most of my time feeling out of place. I did my best to fit in among the friends who I did make, though I remember most of the time I felt a discomfort at a lot of the things they did and said as “wrong”. I just went a long with it and suppressed how I felt and laughed instead.

As I grew older I dedicated my time to learning how to stay in sync with the motions of society, how to blend in, how to become a “normal person”. I emulated and acted out a lot of what I perceived a “cool guy” would do from different things I saw at school, on TV, and in movies. By middle school, I learned that the most aggressive, most obnoxious guys were the ones to win the attention and affection of girls. However, incapable of being intimidating and Alpha; loud, animated, and obnoxious came out in the role of the “funny guy” when put through the filter of my God-given personality. It did succeed in winning me the attention of girls but not their affection. I again felt ashamed and defective.

As I grew older, into high school, I was still struggling to feel “normal”. I had learned a lot by now. The vast majority of lessons were in stark contrast to what I was learning in church, which I had all but abandoned by this time as useless, though I retained many of the morals and my belief in God. High school was about learning to unlearn my morals, and I completely put God out of my mind. I learned to curse more, I learned that I shouldn’t take girls so seriously if I wanted them to respect me, I learned that respect was earned by doing something sexual with a girl on the weekends and then reporting to your friends on Monday. I learned that you could do or say anything as long as you assured everyone that you were “just joking around”.

Indeed I was learning all that I needed to become a normal person and finally not feel so unfulfilled, so broken. Soon, I thought, I would be accepted and I would be happy. All my lessons in school were reinforced by cable television and movies. Sex and relationships should be my number one priority, followed by abusing substances and bragging about it, followed by not taking anything too seriously. Those three things came together to make a person normal, I thought. Not church, not morality, not spirituality, not taking the countless issues out there seriously, not even thinking of our future really. Not only were those things not fun in and of themselves, I would have no friends. Of course “good” was still done in its appointed capacity. The vast number of us wanted the opportunity to party on a varsity level so we did what we needed to do to get into college. At the time going to college wasn’t about our future education it was about more sex, more drugs, and more “fun”.

I completely failed at all of these. I failed to lose my virginity in high school. I had somehow gotten it in my head that I wanted to lose it within a relationship to a girl I really cared about. We can already see my personality getting in the way of being normal. Not only that, but I wouldn’t get into a relationship with just anybody, I had to “love” her. So I spent all of high school looking for her, and when I finally met her she wanted nothing to do with me romantically. Her story is one for another day. Also, even though I partied and drank a lot, it only made me feel worse about myself. Sure there was the occasional drunken make-out that would gain me some respect for myself, but drinking did more harm than good. And finally, there is “fun”, or joking around, or not taking things too seriously. Perhaps the greatest reminder that I would perhaps never be a normal person was because I could never naturally enjoy “having fun” or “just joking around”. I would get uncomfortable when guys would talk about other girls like they didn’t have feelings, I would get upset with myself when I would laugh at their jokes and make my own. I didn’t want to believe the world was like that. I wanted to believe in romance. I didn’t like peer pressure, and I didn’t like pressuring others. I didn’t like hearing a sentence composed only of curse words, I didn’t like hearing people mock God and religion, I didn’t like how guys would compete to prove they were the most macho even when it led to physical fights. None of it made sense to me. None of it felt natural. My biggest question was always “Would he like that if someone said/did that to him?”. To me people were huge hypocrites who knew how to deal it, but became aggressive and indignant when someone did them wrong. But I did my best to blend in, to give myself a chance to let it all sink in. Honestly I felt like I was two different people. I just kept laughing, hoping I would one day actually find it all funny.

By college, soon my hunger to fit in was fueled solely by women. I had succeeded at winning the respect of most guys I met, but only the friendship of girls. I just wanted a relationship like the ones my other guy friends so easily slipped in and out of. To be honest I had put all my hopes of fulfilling this feeling of emptiness into finding the one girl. I figured once I met her, everything else would get colored in. But I still didn’t feel worthy. I still wasn’t normal enough. I still felt different than what I knew a real man was supposed to feel. By now I had everything down pat as far as the basics-- how to talk, how to party, how to drink, and how to smoke. But I was only becoming more confused by the day. And after being emotionally destroyed by the girl I had a crush on senior year of high-school, I felt pathetic. It seemed no matter what I did, I still didn’t feel like girls acknowledged me. I was riddled with insecurity. And I was broken on the inside, broken and divided.

I never successfully pushed God out of my mind. At rock bottom over my high-school crush’s rejection, desperate and alone, I was forced to self-reflect for the first time and ask myself, “What is going on? Why do I feel like this? Why am I even alive?” First year of college launched an intellectual and spiritual renaissance for me. For the first time I saw life for being much more vast than the closed eco-system of high-school and chasing after temporary pleasures. I started to think about a career, started reading books on psychology and religion, and started to see signs that a lot of what I naturally felt wasn’t a defect or weakness but were actual gifts from God like empathy and a natural kindness and a warm personality.

I found God personally during the renaissance. But from there my problems would only get worse. I had a hard time assimilating my Christian beliefs in God, with my actual day to day life, much like when I was a child. And society largely scoffed at the idea of God so now I felt more alienated than ever as I joined a small minority of believers. I felt like doing something drastic anyway and so I pressed on. I gave much over to God as a lot of what Christians believe in I naturally did too. But other things, I did not. The classic case for most Christians, I would not turn over the books of my sexuality to be audited. I completely glossed over that. And so I was spiritual in everything else, but when it came to relationships, I kept that out of the reach of God. I instead decided I would “figure it all out” on my own as I went on. And for some reason I felt like God would take all the fun out of my coveted future relationship. I just couldn’t bring myself to look at sexuality and romantic relationships through the fish-eye lens of Christian values. It was too much and I had a vivid idea of what it would have to entail to make me happy, and I knew for a fact some of that ran afoul with Christian values. Throughout college was a series of lessons. I would get caught up in one thing or another, forget about God, get hurt, run back, get comfortable—cocky, find myself in a new situation, forget God, get hurt, and run back. I grew frustrated with myself because it seemed no matter what I did or believed I still felt like crap. I still always felt pulled in both directions, a spiritual direction and the direction that society was telling me was normal.

I never found what I was looking for. None of my sexual experiences were particularly satisfying, though when I was a virgin I was told that sex would be the ultimate high. I found it more clunky, awkward, and out of place than anything else. And it didn’t feel right at all. Maybe because none of my experiences were with someone I was committed to and was more filled with friends and sometimes acquaintances when we “had one too many that night”. For me this would serve as the source for a deep, sad, dissatisfaction that would last for a couple years. When I told some of my friends about my experiences they would tell me that I just need to relax and let go and not be so tense. In other words, they said it was me. I couldn’t understand how they were enjoying it so much. How the characters on TV were. How the rappers were praising hook-ups in their songs. To me it was the worst. The ultimate let-down. Though I found dissatisfaction in sex, I kept trying anyway, hoping that it was just that I was getting with the wrong girl each time. But as I came to find out, it was same script, different cast.

It all leads up, all the experiences, the stories, the tragedies, losses, failures, disappointments, frustrations, and anger, it all leads back to me. The formula to my misery is a simple one. I was born, as I grew older I noticed a natural feeling or spirit inside of me. I noticed that when I lived by what this feeling guided me to do I drew unwanted attention and was made fun of and bullied. I observed that people who acted opposite to how I felt got everyone’s attention and praise and seemed happy. I decided that whatever I felt was wrong, and that there was something wrong with me. I struggled to retrain myself to act and think like I thought a “real man” should according to what I saw in media and in my environment. I failed often, reinforcing the idea that there was something wrong with me. The more I tried the more miserable I became, further reinforcing the idea that there is something wrong with me. A part of me felt ashamed at the things I would do or say to fit in, but when I tried to learn more about God, a part of me felt like I was giving up on really being successful and turning to religion as a crutch. I became even more miserable because I didn’t know what to believe or what to do. I was lonely, and confused, and unhappy, and I felt like a failure. And all of this was because when I was younger I felt like there was something missing and I set out to fill it.

Life and The Toll it Takes

So what is it? It seems to me that I have, in my life thus far, stood outside the gates of substantial personal growth a few times. Each time, I can already feel the real-life changes by merely staring through the gate. But as I approach to enter, I blackout and find myself once again on the outside of the gate—it usually feels as if I’ve been rejected and propelled further than from where I started. The whole process lasts about a year sometimes less sometimes more.

Why is it that every time I begin to grow that somewhere in the process I find myself right back where I started? It could be that I don’t come with enough to sacrifice—I’m too young, I haven’t yet experienced the loss and the pain required to grow. It makes sense as with every time I approach the gate anew, the same lessons I learned the times before are ever more clearer, ever more meaningful to me given the recent difficulties that I have been through which I would adamantly proclaim were the “most difficult things I have ever dealt with (yes even more difficult than “that time” or “that time before”)”.

And I can only be fooled by life so many times. I retain a fair amount of embarrassment from the fact that it has taken me so many false starts to get one lesson or the other. I would think I had mastery of a virtue or discipline or life truth in the good times, but when tested, I abandon my lofty philosophy and panic—I take to the streets announcing my ruin and lamenting the recent and unjust loss of this or that in my life. I stress and I stress. In turn, I blame my self and then others, my self and then so many others. And then in a parade of horrors, resign to my room alone, hold my breath, and squeeze, as if through throwing a depression tantrum God will reach down and give me my way. It’s humiliating given my age and what I ought to know by now.

God calls my bluff and does nothing although I threaten to abandon my belief in Him. He keeps his poker face. And eventually I tire myself out in my misery. Exhausted and out of options I’m forced to accept whatever it was that upset me so severely in the first place. And when I say accept, I mean come to terms that it happened, that it hurt me a great deal, that it is NOT what I wanted, that I may never have it the way I wanted, and that it may or may not have been fair. And then I move on. And it is the moving on that brings me right back in front of the Gate. In my search for what I did wrong, I am returned to the arms of the very truths and principles I abandoned in the chaos of challenge and obstacles. In my search for healing I find that they remain there, unchanged by what has happened since the last time I saw them, more applicable than before and had I had the consciousness of mind to apply them then I could have saved myself much heartache, despair, depression, and trouble.

This in itself is enough to trigger another crisis as I can get depressed about how much time I wasted or how things could have been different if I were more mature and didn’t forget the things I had learned. But worst of all I could come to the crushing conclusion that no matter what I do, I will always end up back in front of the gate of personal development, doomed to never cross its threshold, doomed to always lose my-self in the everyday challenges of life—lose hold of the truths that are to be my weapons against floundering at the most basic level of human development.

I refuse.

And maybe it’s because I stand before the gate once again, and consequently, influenced to the point where I’m drunk with the confidence that I can evolve that I say so with no trouble. All that I have been through thus far was not in vain. The misery I have endured, self-inflicted or otherwise, since I moved to New York and entered law school will serve an important purpose. It will be my sacrifice, my toll to pass the threshold. The feelings of inadequacy, failure, heartbreak, loss, emptiness, fear, anxiety, embarrassment, addiction, frustration, and all the other nightmares I have harvested in the past year and some odd months will now serve their purpose as I believe I have enough to pay the toll.

To Learn Something

If when I had my first kiss with a girl I really liked I thought I knew happiness, I didn’t know happiness. If the first time I was rejected from a girl I had a crush on I thought I knew pain, I didn’t know anything.

I know what it means to learn. I know how humiliating, how painful learning is. I know what it feels like to allow myself to dream, allowing my expectations to fly by the strict limitations that reality demands of all of us-- to think that when I got my guitar that I would be playing the most gorgeous songs in a matter of weeks-- to think that when I signed up for my first Japanese class I would be speaking, reading, writing, and comprehending it perfectly in a year.

It’s tragic to be so optimistic sometimes. Because the truth is hours and hours of practice would have me play a song imperfectly at my best and awkwardly starting over several times playing in front of others, my heart beating faster than the tempo and my fingers shaking out of nervousness so that the strings buzz when I strum.

The reality is that the same phrase that I have practiced over and over again, in the moment I can’t recall it when I need it the most—throwing off the flow of conversation. When I do recall it, I pronounce it as if I had just picked up the textbook that morning, betraying the fact that I had been studying for several years.

Most of all I know what it’s like to feel that I have finally gotten the hang of it, only to find that I haven’t even broken the surface of the lesson. I long desperately to get it right the first time, to get perfect marks. My deep, overwhelming desire to be perfect will get me no further than anyone else and I’ll find that my best intentions won’t earn me any extra credit. I’ll learn the hard way like everyone else. I will be humiliated too. I will get the answer wrong though I painstakingly put thought into my answer, the song won’t be perfect though I have been practicing for as long as I can remember.

We learn so that we can one day be good at something, to be skillful and capable. We see those who have learned and they are so graceful and strong. We’re inspired to start learning whatever it may be. And at some point in the process we get to the point where we realize how demoralizing learning anything can really be. The phenomenon acts as a sort of gate-keeper to test those who deserve mastery and filter out those who aren’t willing to go through all the pain it takes to earn it.

When we’re learning and we taste failure-- pure, dark, undiluted failure, how are we to respond? When we thought we had the answer in our grasp only to find that we were not even close, what do we do? Life can be so monotonous and routine, that we forget we can experience profound levels of joy and pain. So when we do, we don’t know how to react—we let it out in tears of joy or tears of pain—we rid ourselves of such levels of feeling.

I don’t know anything. With no other choice but to wake up the next morning, get dressed, and take care of my responsibilities I have no other option than to resume the course despite the humiliation, despite the disappointment, the frustration, the discouragement. I have no choice but keep practicing, to keep learning, and to keep hoping that one day I will finally have learnt something.

This is awkward

I have sat down at least 6 times to write a new post. But I can't. The ones I complete aren't fit to be posted. I don't know how long this will last. So let's take a short break in our story until your hero can figure things out. Sorry.

A New Chapter

And who’s going to blame me for being confused anyway? Dammit, I had it all figured out like a year ago and now I’m not sure about anything. Is this a part of growing up? Celebrate because you swear you have finally figured it out, only to stand on the sidelines and watch your theories crash and sink against the jagged rocks of reality.

The sea analogy is perfect because I feel like I have been drifting out at sea for a year now, going nowhere in particular, waiting to see land, waiting to be rescued. Since exams other law students have come out of hiding to admit that their soul was crushed too by the reality of what we’ve gotten ourselves into. I’m convinced that the practice of law is much like law school in that both will leave no time to be a human being. Unless one stands up for themselves, they’ll just be worked into the ground.

I have worked my entire post high school career to make sure that I didn’t fall into any of life’s traps- premarital pregnancy, pyramid schemes, get arrested for something stupid, become a communications major, etc, etc. I, like everyone else, have failed a couple of times, but nothing that I couldn’t recover from. But they finally got me. Law School. People can sing praises to the rooftops about how great it is to think like a lawyer, etc. But I know from experience that at the end of the day it just puts you in debt and sucks your life away as you try to pay off that debt. I don’t care—I said it.

But it’s okay. It’s better to know the problem now so I can begin to fix it. I’m not going to practice law forever, and starting now, I am already planning my great escape. I figure as long as I stick close enough to business, when the time comes, I can transition to business with a quick MBA degree and some solid networking. That’s the plan.

Outside of the topic of law school, your protagonist has become a shell of his former self. I’m not about anything anymore. I don’t have any aspirations or goals. I feel incapable of finishing what I’ve started. And I feel like I’m going to end up living the rest of my life without becoming the amazing person I used to burn with passion and anticipation to become. I don’t know where these feelings of inadequacy and hopelessness came from. As you can see I’ve tried to fight them off, but they keep coming back.

I think a lot of my unhappiness comes from the fact that I am highly aware of my own mortality. Sometimes I feel like I’m going to die of old age next weekend. I mean time flies and I’m getting impatient. I’m already 24 and I haven’t even accomplished 4 major goals in life. Don’t even get me started on working through a serious relationship. I am watching the best years of my life fly by while I’m alone and I can’t seem to do anything about it.

That’s why I get frustrated in class, I really do feel like I’m literally wasting my time. If they would just tell us what we need to know, I could use all that extra time that would have otherwise gone to listening to my classmates get interrogated about the facts on something useful and lasting. No one understands though, they probably just think I’m lazy and have no work ethic. Please, I’m so above that right now.

I need to calm down and go back to the basics: Who am I? What do I wish to accomplish? What is my idea of a successful life? What activities would make me proud of myself? Am I strong enough to have faith in my abilities? Am I patient enough to see it through? What am I about??

Time is running out, I know it is. And I don’t want to be wallowing in the purgatory of character development until the end of my life. Law school and work are a perfect poison to induce my most feared tragedy as they are great at distracting you from, you. Working day and night, always stressed out, always a deadline, always competing with your classmates and co-workers is a great way to burn years of your life away without ever once stopping to say, “wow, this is my life. This is how I’m spending my only life.” Trust me when I say no one will even hint at the problem because a) people are selfish and they don’t care about you or how your spending your life and b) you’re just there to make money for them anyway. So again, unless we get off the treadmill, we will never be able to work on the serious business of life as the treadmill is not going to stop by itself.

I’m tired of looking in the mirror and seeing a shell of my former self. I need to get back to work. It’s not too late to rebuild myself stronger and eventually surpass myself when I was in my prime last year. I can do it. I’m not going to get manipulated and bullied around by law school and law firms while they hold a carrot in front of my face to keep me running and jumping through hoops. They can keep their honors, and their awards, and their pluses, and their prestige clubs, and every other tool they use to get us to work harder for them. One of the first premises I built my life on after entering college was that I would never be a statistic. Despite all that I was told and warned against in college I held onto that, never being discouraged. But for some reason once I got here that resolve was shattered and I finally gave into the mindset that I was no different than anyone else and that I would suffer the same fate as the majority of people in my situation. I allowed myself to think that I was the one who was wrong and that it was entirely unreasonable for me to believe I would learn all of these languages, live a comfortable life style, excel at various hobbies, travel, and spend time with my family and friends. I came here and started to believe that those were all dreams which only served as evidence of my immaturity. Law school educated me on life in the real world: work until you die. Forget about all the things you ever thought you would do. Forget about the person you thought you would become.

Now we’re getting to the heart of it. I am the way I am now, because I allowed law school and the other legal institutions to brainwash me. Although they succeeded in convincing my mind of that fate, they couldn’t convince my spirit and the result was such a severe dissonance that I could never fully accept the story they fed me. And now I have officially rejected it one year later. I’m going to go back to what I was doing before I got here and this time I’m pissed that I fell off the path for so long, so easily. I will work with twice the resolve to build the life that I have always envisioned for myself.

After a year of complaining and helplessness it’s refreshing to finally feel the warmth of renewed resolve well up in my chest. It’s satisfying to feel a familiar confidence return to me. And most of all its encouraging to feel the hope that anything I so desire is possible if I decide it is.

This is the start of a new chapter.

This is where I get serious.

Our Song

Maybe I don’t fall in love enough. With a certain conviction, I know what it takes to feel alive. And I stubbornly resist any other mantra. I lack the raw materials to see my desires actualized so I recklessly simulate the profound feeling with music, biding my time until my eyes lock with hers and we both know that the next track will tell our story.

First the guitar: I don’t know quite what to say so I improvise, leaning heavily on my charm-- relying on my smile to compensate for the meaning absent in my words. I string together the right notes and my riff is a melody to her ears.

Drums, they sync to the beat of my heart as I go in for our first kiss. Ever so slowly-- there’s a kick and there’s a kick and there’s a kick. Though I can’t help but smile at the last second, injecting the levity of snares and hi-hats into an otherwise intense moment.

The sound of piano keys chase one after another as we continue to get to know each other, jumping octaves because life’s unpredictable, and spontaneity keeps the listeners in sweet anticipation.

The horns signal that things are getting serious; loud and exciting in one measure, slow and sultry when the sun has its back to us. Trumpets march us to the bridge, to somewhere quiet, where we can be alone.

But the beat can’t build forever. And the music gets louder and louder, too soon neither musician can resist—and though we said we’d wait--

There’s a Crescendo. There were never two people more into the music.

Like life, it wasn’t composed to last forever. So the music fades, lingering, lingering, and it fades, lingering, and it fades, and it’s gone.

When was the last time I heard that song? It was so long ago but I can’t get it out of my head. All I do is hum it to myself trying desperately to remember all of the words. I wish I could just play it over and over again.

I wish I could play it just one more time.

On the subject of simplicity, desires, and shame.

It could be that all we have in the end is our strong resolution in our own victory. In a way when disaster strikes and we fail it’s our own shoulder that we cry on. We say things like, “It won’t end like this. I’ll get it in the end one way or the other”

That may be true. In my pursuit to have it all I find that I have very little. What some consider my victories—school, trips, this, and that are the means to my end and not the ends in themselves. Though I have to be clear that I am thankful for such means, I still grow impatient.

I am terrorized day and night by fantasies of my ideal life. Ironically, everything that I see through the movie screen of my wandering mind is in stark contrast to everything I feel now. Oh it is true that the thought of sitting in a quiet park on a day where the weather is in as good a mood as this guy is an irresistible vision. Our bills are being paid on time and I’m taking various lessons in the city for music, dance, art, and languages and so is she. Plans for drinks at the new bar that opened on Main sauntering through my mind before being carried off with the breeze, I wonder if we can still get tickets to the evening showing of--

I have to fight it off. None of that is real.

I’ve overdosed on such humble visions of grandeur and it only serves as a distraction. The reality is I have no job, no “her”, no time for seminars and recitals, and 2 months of this semester left. The harsh difference eats away at me and so I can’t focus when I’m being talked at in one of my indistinguishable classes.

Will anyone fault me for my immature rush to grow up? What cliché can they throw at me that I can’t counter? To enjoy life today? To appreciate what I have now? Stop it. Such ill placed mantras have no place in my current life. I was born different than most; I have a burning passion for the modest and as it stands life is too complicated. And after all, one should follow his dreams.

I feel an irrational amount of guilt for my secret desire for a simple life. My classmates and professors are carrying on about policy, and philosophy, and theory, but I wish to talk about things like life, and God, and friendship, and romance. Ugh! I’ve truly gotten soft. Or maybe life has finally simmered me down to the basics. I do feel that at one time in my life I would have enjoyed one of their conversations, but these days I can’t muster the interest. Life is so short. Do I really want to spend it debating the contrasting opinions of retributionists and utilitarians?

I may as well shed my guilt as well. If I look at it from an economic standpoint, let those who want to think about such things think about them. And me, I can embrace my simplistic desires. There is nothing to be ashamed of. In the end the world will be a better place.

On my journey to regain the romance of life it’s crucial that I start following my heart anyway. What do I really want? Who am I? These questions remain unanswered as long as I refuse to grow more into myself and explore the benefits these feelings could give birth to.

What is the key to living unapologetically despite the results? Isn’t it the conviction on the inside? There is more than a grain of truth that a successful life has to start on the inside. I imagine that a person must first nurture and nourish the desires they have in their heart. These desires are self sustaining and don’t rely on motivation. If a person were to tend to these feelings they would continue to grow until they spill out of the person and start manifesting themselves in their outward life. Then, tell me, what better way is there to live a life than where your desires are both on the inside and manifested on the out? Then we would truly live out our fantasies. At least that’s how I see it.

I want to go in search of the legend. The one where you wake up everyday excited to start your day. The one where you’re in control and you’re living life the way you’ve always desired. The one where you wake up and as soon as you see your reflection in the mirror—you see a winner. It has to be real. I can feel it. It’s just that there are so many things that get in the way of grasping that life. More frustrating is that at the same time there is nothing in our way at all.

Trials and Tribulation.

Perhaps life is all about gestures. My roommate seems to think so as he believes half-heartedly using toilet paper to wipe down the bathroom sink and smear whatever comes out of his body and onto the vanity mirror is the proper response to a request to: “clean the bathroom.” I’ve been meaning to ask him what part of the house he believes the toilet and bathtub seceded to. What ever territory they’ve joined forces with he had to have observed the poor state of the toilet as that high grade toilet cleaning paper had to be disposed somewhere.

Don’t worry, Adam, mommy will flush for you.

It was enough that he had to wipe down the sink and mirror, to have called him back into the bathroom just to flush the roll of toilet paper he had disposed of in the bowl would have been too much.

After realizing that he took my request to mop the bathroom floor to mean that he technically did not have to sweep the floor before he mopped it and that he could use the stale body wash that spilt behind the toilet as a tile cleaning agent, I decided that I better just clean the toilet and properly wipe down the mirror myself. As the bathroom floor now has clumps of hair in each corner and the tile itself has a sticky slippery consistency, there is no telling what he would transform the toilet into after he was done “cleaning” it.

Screwing up one’s responsibility is only cute as a child, and even then everyone only gets one. After that our parents usually instruct us on how to do things “properly”. To be sure, we hate them for it, but it usually bears fruit later on in life as by habit we’re clean, respectable members of society. But as what I can only estimate to be a “man”, riding the fence between being clinically overweight and plain obese, this sort of wanton ignorance and tragic sloth can only be considered a natural laxative, forcing me too look away after a certain amount of time lest I lose the calories that I work so hard to gain.

How am I handling it? I’m getting by, I suppose. Holding everything else in my life at the moment constant, this roommate situation is making me a very upset person. My first frustration of course is: “How can something like this exist?” One of my weaknesses is that when I meet people who do or act in a way that I didn’t think was possible I completely blank. I don’t know what to say. How can someone be that inconsiderate and dirty? He’s not doing it to spite me. He really believes that he cleaned the bathroom. That scares me.

Then I think: “How could his parents do this to me?” This is a crucial moment in my life. My first year of law school and I have been given this to live with. In essence I have been handicapped, forced to compete with others who live in 1 bedroom apartments, studio apartments, who live with people they get along with, people who can be properly classified as fully functional adults, and whose apartments get sunlight.

I wonder if my professors are worried about me. I wouldn’t be surprised if I heard a knock on the door to find that one of them had dropped by to check on me, explaining that they could sense that I had been dealing with “trouble at home” just from the way I conduct myself in class. I would be lying if I didn’t say that my living situation was finally starting to affect my overall attitude and when I can’t even look forward to coming back to a clean, quiet home after a long day of feeling like a failure (which is pretty much the typical day for anyone at any law school) that I didn't feel a general sense of dissatisfaction with my life.

As Glinda The Good once said, these things are sent to try us.

As soon as I was given the opportunity I applied for a room transfer. I find out next week the status. It will be a terrible experience to move in the middle of the semester but it cannot be helped. And I eagerly await the day where I can savor the look on his face as I pack the T.V and surround sound system up-- he and his girlfriend (yes ladies, he’s taken) have grown quite fond of them.

We’ll see what happens. At the moment, I am very cranky and tired. I did not do as well as I thought I would last semester (even after adjusting for the unrealistic assumption that I was “special”). This semester is my chance to make it up but I am even more clueless in these classes than I was last semester. I have supplemental study material on its way. But as I wait for reinforcements, I grow more and more hopeless with every day that passes and I skip class to avoid being called on as I have not read and use the time to catch up. This, in turn, makes me feel even worse because I still haven’t shaken off the conditioning that “those who skip class are doomed to failure”. Irony, in a rare public comment, reported to have had nothing to do with the fact that I got my best grades in the two classes I deliberately skipped the most. That only leaves the mysterious comment left by Reality when questioned on how this could occur. His sole sentence was: “What do you think?”

I think class is useless.

I promised myself I will never look back on this moment of my life and romanticize it. I tend to do that once enough time has passed. But not with this. I will always refer to my 1L year of law school as objectively a terrible experience and one I wish to soon forget.

I have gleaned some gems this semester however. As a consequence of the massive amount of stress generated at school and at home I’ve been chased into the very bosom of my long time enemy-- the gym. I have developed a habit of going at 6am every morning on the weekdays and any time on the weekends. It is amazing. It’s so quiet in the mornings, no people, no cars. I love the people who are attracted to the gym at this time and we all seem to share the same sentiment as one another: they can’t get to us here.

Besides the quiet and serene of the waking up early, the gym also has given me an outlet for what I used to enjoy of school—control. I used to feel in total control of my school career. I put in hard work I got perfect grades back and just like that-- I felt sexy. Not anymore. I feel like no matter how little or how hard I try my grades will just be (no pun intended). But in the gym, the more hard work you put in the better your results. And you can watch the progress like a chia pet. I love it. It’s my own secret personal project. I look forward to it everyday, and I go no matter what the situation is in school.

I also found a pretty cool church. Much more comfortable than one I tried a month or so ago. I go with my friend Sam. The pastor preaches with a healthy balance of spirit and education, and it is packed full of happy, healthy families. I daydream that I'll have a family someday. And we will go to church every Sunday and get a treat afterwards, not a care in the world. I kind of skip all the work in between. It’s lovely, really.

Patience and faith are all that can get me through this most uncomfortable period in my life. I constantly remind myself that I’m merely making the payment for the joy that I will be experiencing in two and half short years. Until then I can only hope to grow further into myself. It’s true that hardship, if it doesn’t break you, makes you. At this point I’m too big too fail, so even though on a conscious level I feel like giving up, in fact I feel like if I didn’t give up I’d ultimately fail, on a subconscious level something tells me that I can handle this. Something tells me that while on the surface it doesn’t look pleasant; when the smoke clears I will be one of the people on top. Where do I conjure these ideas?

In any event, I’m about a week behind in every class, and the work that I have done so far I don’t understand any of it. I’m going to take the next couple of days to calm down and organize a strategy. By next week I hope to be caught up and able to see the big picture in the class. On top of that I want to write a good outline for my appellate brief, and pick a topic for my term paper.

I can’t lose here.

I Returned One January.

It’s hard to find inspiration in New York to write like I used to. Even on its best days the city still feels a little suffocating. All of the vegetation is dead, so when the sun comes out it’s kind of sad—like a lover coming back to an empty home. I whisper reassuring words to the sky on my walk to class: “They’ll come back in the spring, the grass, and flowers, and trees. Don’t you worry.”

Poor thing.

The sun won’t come out tomorrow—well at least according to this forecast. It’ll be overcast with a high of 24 degrees.

Tallahassee on the other hand handled winter with a certain dignity and poise. And waking up to 30 degree weather could be refreshing because the sky would be blue (and you could see the sky), the city is still mostly green and quiet. Perfect for inciting the whit and metaphors that a proper blog entry requires.

I’m not sure if I am regaining my powers or whether they never left me. Surely, Marvel was right to call me a Disney Princess. Besides the fact that both I and the other princesses believe in a little fable I like to call “true love” we have another, more practical, thing in common. Things work out for us. The big difference between the girls and me is that unlike them, I lack a certain faith that things will work out. I don’t have a song that declares that someday everything will be different as I humbly mop the floor or run errands. I don’t confide in rodents and small scavenging birds that soon my ship will come in. I complain and worry.

Do things work out for me? Always. And when times are good, I’ll be the first one to say so. But when it doesn’t look like I’ll come out on top, I lose all hope. Even when the situation hasn’t revealed itself either way I am inclined to believe it won’t be good for me. I wonder what my life would be like if I had confidence in myself, in my love life, in my professional life, just among friends.

Well January has been an interesting month. I was able to meet Chris freaking Botti and the band. It was a great concert and an amazing way to start off the year. And just last weekend, I went to see Esperanza Spalding do a late evening show. Before attending, I met up with my friend, Steph from the New York Times, for drinks at this swanky pizza bar on the lower east side. I can never get enough of “drinks” in New York, something about the whole business makes one feel so grown-up. We made friends with the bar tender by using a combination of our strengths: my witty and awkward banter regarding the lack of pepperoni pizza on the menu of a pizza bar and her being beautiful. Unsure which one of us worked our magic, We made his night and he gave us a list of two other restaurants he works at. We all made a pact to one day meet again at a speakeasy themed bar some blocks away.

After dinner and drinks we went to the concert. It was cozy and the music was spectacular. There were two drummers in this one jazz band and their solos gave me goosebumps. After the concert, Steph points out one of the drummers at the bar behind me. As I turn around I come face to face with Esperanza herself! How did she get behind me so fast? I panicked, and fumbled, all that I could get out of my mouth was a gurgled “what’s up?”

Smooth, Mr. Morrison.

The couple next to us kept their cool and ended up getting a picture with her. Meanwhile, Steph and I were fumbling for a pen and a receipt. By the time we got our act together she had vanished into New York never to be seen again… well, until the 10:30 set. Steph and I decided we couldn’t leave it like that and settled on the idea of going to see her again in the future and having a proper meeting. Ugh, if only I handled it like when I met Chris. It must have been the suit.

Besides the bi-weekly rubbing of elbows with Jazz musicians, I have been going out more too. Ashley introduced me to my first New York night club in the meat packing district via back door leading into the club from some restaurant—the kind that cover the tables with white cloth. I fell in love with one of the table dancers. I divided my attention between her and two women dancing to Katy Perry while on stilts. Really.

Like magic, viola, I have friends. As opposed to last semester when I had four, now I have many, including guys! And they are normal, regular people. Just like the kind I would have found in Tallahassee. One of my New Years resolutions was to gain a healthy social life up here. At least 3 other guys to play FIFA with once a week= success. I was even invited to play basketball! Ha! Me play basketball!

I have come to peace with my three year sentence in Law School. Now that the first semester is over the school has lost its only advantage it had over me, uncertainty. I had no idea what I was doing last semester and the only time it all became clear was after the exam. Now I didn’t come here intending to be Mr. 4 point 0—been there, done that. I just want a job, I want to pay off these loans, and I want to continue on with my life. So the thought of not getting all A’s or being in the top 25% of my class doesn’t bother me. Given that I had no idea how to do well here, If I can make it out of last semester dead average, here, I would consider it an achievement. I have gotten one grade back so far and it is looking as if that may become a reality. If I can get the same or higher marks in my two other classes I will be in a very handsome position for the rest of my time here.

That being said, I can finally get serious this semester. Oh yes, they got my ass last semester. But I know exactly what to do now. And the truth is I didn’t get A’s at FSU because I’m smart—no—I got A’s because I am clever. I am good at planning, I’m good at knowing what to study, I'm good at learning how to learn, and I’m good at pacing myself. I am much more confident this semester in my performance, and I expect a beautiful upward trend in my grades for my first year overall.

It has been finalized and I will be returning to Japan for the summer. When I view my life from the audience's perspective I have to say that I am impressed. Without thinking about how much worrying goes into the process, and when I ignore the fact that I don’t really know what I’m doing 90% of the time—I just jump into opportunities and commitments—without all that goes on behind the scenes, the show looks well put together. I say I am going to go to law school, and I do it. I say I want to be an international lawyer—and I’m off to Japan. When I look from the perspective of others it’s amazing, really. I mean if I weren’t me, but I knew me, I would be so impressed by myself.

Unfortunately I am me. So I am not allowed the pleasure of being enchanted with myself. I know what’s going on in the inside too well and everything tastes of porridge* I am working on becoming a person on the inside that matches the person that everyone sees on the outside. Direction, purpose, integrity, morals, discipline—these are all things that must be enhanced before I start accepting compliments from others. Otherwise they are not complimenting me, just God’s impressive ability to use anyone. Besides myself, there are a few others who know whats going on behind the scenes. The Captains**. Oddly, The Captains are the source of some of the most generous and flattering compliments. Even Marvel***.

*Everything tastes of porridge: An expression used to inject a note of reality into our daydreams. The point is that no matter how grandiose our schemes or how successful our self-delusions, the taste of porridge or the reality of our domestic affairs will always be there to impinge on our fantasies. Porridge, formerly a staple in every household, is a most appropriate symbol of the practical, basic nature of home life.

**The Captains- The Captains are for better or worse my best and most trusted friends. An entry is forthcoming explaining The Captains in detail.

***Marvel will deny ever having said anything that could be construed as a compliment or even constructive criticism.

Author's Note

In regards to the past couple of posts, I haven't been myself recently. I explain below:

Will we ever be perfect? Will we ever be able to go to bed comfortably, the thought that we have taken every precaution to keep from inadvertently harming anyone or anything. Maybe the clue to that question lies within the earth. You know, seeds planted too close together will eventually hurt each other as they compete for water. So as plants grow side by side, sometimes their roots interfere with one another.

That's kind of like with us, right? As we grow, sometimes we hurt others in the process. Some people are okay with that. I'm not. I like the thought of being perfect in others' eyes. So I am always extra careful to make sure that my behavior is of a good nature. But humans aren't perfect and every so often I fail.

When I fail at these things something interesting happens. I see myself with new eyes. Where I once saw one habit or another as normal or natural, I begin to see the flaws in my thinking. I wrote about this in my very first entry. I find bugs. I immediately get upset that I didn't realize that what I was doing was questionable, then I change it.

The truth is my enemy. And the truth is I would never grow unless I screwed up. Without making mistakes I wouldn't be able to identify the problem. Without puking all over my parents foyer I would not know that 8 Smirnoff Ice watermelons are not an appropriate amount for a gentleman. Without waiting until the last minute to start a paper and consequently receiving a poor grade, I would think it's okay to procrastinate. We all have to fail and make mistakes if we want to work the kinks out and become better people.

But it's always a painful and humiliating process. Often times we only prove to onlookers that we don't quite know how to fully work our bodies and minds yet-- we're clumsy and inconsiderate.

What am I talking about? What do I know? You know I was destroyed in the past 4 months. Last post I talked a little about how I used to believe I would grow up to be great. I really did. The past four months, I didn't believe that anymore, in fact, I couldn't figure out why becoming great was so great. No motivation. I was depressed.

But no one likes to be depressed, especially someone who likes to be normal... someone like me. So I told myself there was nothing wrong. Of course there was something fundamentally wrong. I moved to a new city and started a strenuous graduate education. I missed my family, I missed the friends that I literally grew up with, I missed my car, I missed my state, I missed the freakin' I-10 for goodness sake, and I missed what I had for a few months with a girl.

Law school immediately pointed my focus to the future. To me this meant a relentless job and no freedom. I started to feel like my days of relaxing out in a backyard and arguing with Mike were over, replaced with memos and resumes. I was sad. I began to doubt my ability to do well at the school. I began to doubt if I would make any friends at the school on a real level. I have a simple kind of cordial relationship with my roommates, so my apartment doesn't feel too welcoming either. There were too many assignments for phone calls and there was always a crisis. Meanwhile, I can't go to the corner deli to get a sandwich without seeing like 12 dudes proposing and a couple every few feet.

It's true I hadn't prepared myself for the transition. I was intimidated by the school. I was intimidated by my classmates. I was homesick. And I was lonely and confused about what to do. And I would not acknowledge any of it. And I made it through the whole semester without breaking down.

But not the break. I acknowledged everything. I acknowledged that I was scared to death by this school and by my upcoming career. I admitted that I missed my friends and family dearly. I admitted that I was severely confused about my feelings for a girl and what I should I do about it. And I admitted that I was painfully lonely and frustrated with life.

And there was my friends and family ready to listen and give me advice. They are always there for me. They are so patient and kind to me. I sat on the floor in my room and called each one up. They let me vent. And verbalize every ridiculous complaint and worry that I have and then explained to me why this was only a phase and why I would overcome this. They convinced me that it's not over yet, but just getting started.

I have been ridiculous this whole semester. I lost my way big time. I lost hope. I lost faith. and I lost myself. But I'm back now. And I have got a lot of ground to make up. If I ever become great, all of the credit belongs to my friends and family because I would have given up countless times by now but for their encouragement.

So we can go back to our beautiful story now. You know, the one we're I'm awesome, and positive, and full of good ideas and witty one-liners. That one.

Working With a Vision

In my beginning years of college I had strong sense of purpose. I didn't know exactly what I was going to do, but I knew I was going to do something big, great. In fact I would spend my moments before bed thinking of big things that have been done in the world, that way I could just choose something from that list and make it my goal.

I'm not sure what made me think it would be as easy as making up my mind. To be sure my blind confidence was the driving power behind my excellent academic performance and my unyielding belief in going to an Ivy-League law school that had I been more realistic, I would have never pursued and settled for less with the belief that it was impossible to achieve more. The whole thing is the premise behind my Dreamers entry.

By the third year in college I was running out of that faithful, child-like mentality and I began to see boundaries and preset courses in life-- get job, save money, start family, blah blah, retire. With all the problems people around me had just making ends meet, I started to feel foolish in thinking that I was going to be special, that I was going to do anything. I maintained my grades and work ethic by habit, not because I had a vision. I looked to getting into law school as if it were the finish line rather than the start of the next book in my series, so once I would finally move into my grad school dorm I would have no idea where to go from there.

It's true that I lost what made my life meaningful when I was a freshman and sophomore in college. But now I want it back. I want the vision back. I want that cool knowing, that confidence that I will rise above the obstacles, that I will be picked out of the crowds, that I will be acknowledged for having "something special". Having that feeling as one works makes even the most painful exercises seem rewarding and a privilege. As you feel like your hard work will pay off and you won't get screwed over in the end to a chorus of your loved ones chanting "it all happens for a reason"

I know that the reason this past semester seemed so miserable is because I was working with no vision. I assumed that here I would just be a cog in the machine and I was only working for the end result of getting some generic job and paying off my loans. Which the way everyone carries on here, I should be so lucky. That was my biggest mistake as I had no enthusiasm for my studies and I was wasting a crucial opportunity.

Well It's the first day of 2011. Although it is completely irrational, for some reason January 1st always makes one feel empowered to make life changes. I'll bite. Today I'm forming a vision for the rest of my time here at Columbia and beyond that. I'm going regain my attitude that I will be taken care of and will see all my plans through. Most of all I want to fall in love with life the way I used to back then. I want to put in hard work knowing that every bit of it will be acknowledged and serve a purpose. I want to boldly march forward in my everyday with a feeling of confidence and assurance that I will simply be taken care of.

I'm going to return to that way of life and I'm sure I will see my positive expectations come to fruition.