Friday, June 28, 2013

Très Très Faux

We cultivate in a society filled with illusions.
The illusion of luxury, of drama, of culture that we pretend to exude in hopes of seeming less shallow.

But let's not fool ourselves. Why else is social media relevant?
Not because we want "to connect" with our high school crush, but because we want to know if we're doing better or worse than him or her. And what better way to measure that than mentally rating their instagram pictures, twitter posts, and facebook activities. This inherent competition drives us forward not live up to the dogma of being "better than good enough," but rather, to be better than someone else's efforts to do the same. And while you're secretly worried that your social media stats don't measure up to Social Suzy's, she is too. So much for "a tiger does not lose sleep over the opinons of sheep," right?

Welcome ladies and gents, to this vicious, self perpetuated cycle. 
It all began, once upon a time ago, in a land somewhere on planet earth [insert your location] whenever you were born [insert your DOB]. On that magical day, your soul was sold to the Devil of a society that relies on the superficiality of its own existence. It wastes no time imprinting the opinions of "sheep" in your tiny little head. Based solely on the constant comments of how "cute" or "sweet" or "darling" a baby looks, a parent subconsciously reinforces the importance of superficiality in our lives. Think about it. The first time you lay eyes on a child, you immediate rate them on a level of adorableness. And who can blame us, we have been trained to think that way since our days in utero. My point is that we have been bred as a species that focuses on the opinions of sheep.


Look, quit lying to yourself, everyone gives a fuck. I've never met anyone who truly doesn't care what people think or say about them. Maybe a couple people feign the illusion of doing so, but these are the same people also believe that sharing a Facebook picture of an African orphan with a cleft lip equals donating money to Unicef. And if they are in fact out there, they will most certainly not be writing books or handing out motivational memorabilia from their travels to Shitfree Zone or Hell or North Korea. Even so, our fresh-out-of-fuck-ers definitely care what their conscience believes of them. And since we largely reflect our environment, is our conscience not a biproduct of years of listening to the opinions and absorbing the morals of our uncles, siblings, parents, teachers, role models, etc.? Hence, when we give importance to the opinions of our neurological commander-in-chief or his cardiological counterpart/secretary of state, we take decades of nurturing into account. Right? Right? Right.

+Stay True

+S.



Sunday, June 9, 2013

Rest-a-little, Ness

Restlessness is the plight of man.

Look around you. Literally, take a second to glean your surroundings for a second. If you're reading this in the morning or in the middle of the day, you're most likely outlined by havoc, by people constantly rushing to be somewhere so they can be somewhere in order to see someone so they can be someone. If you're reading this at night or in the quiet comfort of yourself and ironically the entire internet, don't be fooled into thinking you've escaped. Around you are remnants of chaos: to-do lists detailing your life goals for the "Summer of 2013! #yay #yolo #froyo #volvo?," Facebook photos that Becky posted 2.3 seconds ago of her Study Abroad trip to Roma where she's putting that art major to good use by chatting up local Paolo from the fish market--did I just recite part of The Sisterhood of Traveling Pants Trilogy?, or better yet, a recent or not so recent photobooth strip/t-shirt/random memorabilia you've kept that reminds you of an Ex whose chaos you've forgotten, but can't seem to erase. They are bridges to-and-fro the past and the future, emphasis on the future, but they seem to distance us from what lies underneath...which I realize is the point of a bridge, but this analogy is getting away from me and it's too late to turn back so just go with it...

We are the creatures of the fleeting moment, convinced that if our thoughts don't turn into actions at this moment, that the moment will disappear in of itself. It will be trapped in a Narnia of lost and forgotten moments, rendered useless because, well, we didn't have the damn key to the damn armoire in the first damn place. And gasp! A lost moment is inconsequential to our lives, and what is inconsequential is a waste of time, and time wasted is not gained so, alas, we will be doomed to lives of loser-dom and hobo living that our parents warned us about. Ok so maybe I'm overly simplifying the entire scenario, but let's be real, we've  all ridden this train of thought.

We are controlled by clocks, ticking away rhythmically to a future we are supposed to have completely mapped, colored coded, and laminated with a key. Every moment has to have purpose. Every impulse controlled and constrained to what is or is not productive for future you. Running towards a future that your parents can brag about to their friend's uncle's coworker's son at his high-school graduation.

Forget about stopping to smell the freaking flowers, spoiler alert: they pretty much all smell the same. I'm talking about really being in this moment. Close your eyes, focus on your breath, and just be. Sometimes that's hard enough without everyone imposing their lives onto you via every social networking forum ever invented. Don't dwell on what was and please, for your own sake, don't run to the future or you'll be looking at Becky's photos and wishing you were her instead. Stop the Restlessness, and Rest a little, Ness.

Friday, May 3, 2013

Every story is a clichéd story

>4:24 am
>tired out of my effing mind
>studying for a final
>I've already taken the class before
>last time i failed because I was dating a guy

He cheated on me. With my best friend. 

I don't think there could be anything less clichéd about it. Besides, the details are gruesome and gory and irrelevant to anyone else but me. Maybe that's what makes stories "like mine" so sad: they are completely useless to anyone else in the end. No one else suffers or ever will suffer for the consequences. No matter how many tears you shed, no one will understand soley from your experience that when a heart breaks, you can literally feel it. I don't think there's a raw emotion as crying 70% of your water weight, as being so incredibly pathetic in hindsight, but being able to do nothing else. 




Listen, I'm fine, I promise. But there are moments that I'm just not, and I wish that it wasn't that way. I wish that I'd gotten to move on rather than him. But it's ok, right? For now, I'm going to pretend that it is. 

I'm still scared of moving on, but more so that I never will. 

>4:37 am
>still tired out of my effing mind
>still have a final
>i'm probably going to fail this class again

i'm a fucking mess, what's new. 
damn, i love that this place is anonymous. 

Friday, April 26, 2013

Ouroboros

I want to succeed.
Or do I?
I am too preoccupied with the aesthetics in life.
The pretty aspects of it: the color, the feel, the fun.
I want it to be a Cotton Commercial--no mess: clean, simple, straight to the point.
But why?


There is no guarantee that life will work out for me.

That should scare the shit out of me but it doesn't.
I'm Willy Loman, so disillusioned in my own thoughts.
I've created a paradise; an alterate reality
And it stands unbalanced, with no stilts to support it, inevitable and defenseless from crashing down upon itself. 

Give me a wake up call.


Wake the Fuck up. Work hard, then harder, no breaks. All I want is peace. But there is no reward for peace, only regret and heartache. Peace is overrated. Run fast, fly away, but never to escape your present situation. 

Yet, things are so much easier said than done.

I want to escape.

Wake up.
This is real.
What am I doing?
Why won't I stop so I can begin?
Or is there no such thing?
Are stopping and starting parallel to one another?

No, they are simultaneous.

For one journey to end, you must step into the other at the same time.
Be at two places at once--> The Present and The Future
Fuck the past, just learn from it.

Through death is life. Life is a continuous ouroboros. I want to die, then live afterwards. But, I must do both at once, simultaneously. I am too preoccupied with the aesthetics of life. I want to succeed. 


Or do I?


Wednesday, April 24, 2013

Degagé

I'm going to be bald in four days.

The reason isn't important. Well actually, it would be vital if I was talking to anyone else, but it isn't, not really. The truth is that I'm doing this more for myself than for anyone else. I'm being selfish, in thinking this is going to solve the problem, in knowing that it probably won't, but going through with it anyway.


Let me let you in on a little secret. Not the kind that you whisper in your plaited-best-friend's earlobe during recess. That's someone else's secret, one you've mistakenly adopted as your own. This is the type of secret that you mostly likely keep to yourself, hoping that when you think it, feel it, inhale it amongst the bullshit perfume embracing you, you pray that others can't smell it on you.


I hate myself.



I always have.


It's not one part of myself, really, but the clusterfuck of things that "collage" me into this person. I hate the way I look, the way I pretend to look,. The way I talk, the way I pretend to talk. The way I pretend to have my goals and ambitions color-coded and labeled, the way I am eternally a wreck and seem incapable or even desirous to change.


Most of all, I hate my passivity.


I hold the bystander effect in my own life.


My decisions, actions, looks, goal, speech are all illusions of a different person.



I'm going to be bald, and the only reason I'm doing it is so I can say that I've taken an active stance for something, for once.