From how my life is looking, I’m confident my fall from the tree embarrassed gravity for not working hard enough.
There’s a day where you wake up and realize that you are just like your parent. You grow up in denial with the fairy tale of thinking you’ll be different, you’ll do this, this, and this, which your parent never did; therefore, you’ve got to be the exception to the “like-mother-like-daughter” and “like-father-like-son” majority. The realization innocently starts… with a subtle notice of your face scrunching up the same way as your mother’s or when you look at the mirror and see your smile favors your father’s in every way. Gradually, you start noticing behavioral similarities, such as how you always laugh to avoid conflict, or how you always expect the worst from others.
When you finally come to grips that becoming your parent is an inevitable part of life, you rationalize that it’s not so bad as long as the negative traits you acquired don’t affect your well being.
Then…you spend your Friday night staring at the bottom of your mason jar, refilling it with some orange juice and Hennessy, tears cascading down your face, because your worst fear is your reality.
You are your parent.
Constant pattern that I’ve noticed of myself is that I always default to assuming the worst. I either think no one loves me, or I think my friends really don’t care about me, they have ulterior motives so that’s the only reason they tolerate me. Or if today was a really good day, something fucked up is definitely about to happen soon.
It’s a nagging pain that I go through on a consistent basis, but I was stopped in my tracks the other day when I finally connected the origin of this behavior to my mother.
(If there were no negative consequences, would you join me without hesitation?)
You would enjoy our time together, which may be your fear.
Sometimes I think you hesitate because you know deep down that you would enjoy yourself in a whole new way if you let go of your inhibitions with me… and that is one of your biggest fears. That is what keeps you up at night. That is what makes you feel guilty even though you haven’t even done anything. The fact that you know this to be true is what keeps you questioning your every action around me.
Well I don’t want to be your source of guilt or restriction…
You were my escape…my sweet, sexy escape from dealing with the broken pieces of me. Instead of learning how to put my pieces together on my own, I would focus all of my energy putting your pieces together in the hopes you’d return the favor.
Oh, how foolish. Oh, how naive. Oh, how hurt I was.
How silly of me to depend on someone else to put my pieces together, when I’m the one who knows where all the pieces need to go. You were stuck with the job of putting a puzzle together but not knowing what the final product should look like. I now know that I should be in charge of assembly. Then frustration arises when you don’t know how to fix me. Ha! Shame on me for putting that pressure on you. Shame unfairly on you for making you “the reason” for my moods, my emotions, my level of self-worth. I gave you a responsibility that did not belong to you. In fact, you had no power over it at all. But I convinced myself you did. And the truth of it all, I had the power over my self-worth, but I assigned you that power so I didn’t have to deal with the trauma and pain I’ve buried inside.
You were great support, but I wanted a dictator. You were the love I never had, but I wanted abuse. You were the security I didn’t know existed, but I wanted uncertainty. Silly me. Silly me. What I wanted, I didn’t need. What I thought I needed was merely born from ignorance.
And now I pause and wonder…how many times have I let my ignorance stop me from obtaining greatness, my full potential, and ultimate joy? My ignorance of thought, the limits I’ve created when boundaries weren’t set, the prolonged beats of overcompensation may have blocked me from an alternate life of joy.
With these revelations, I apologize to you. I apologize for unrealistically expecting you to be my hero who would rescue me from the torture chamber of my mind. For I must be my own hero in order to live my happily ever after. I apologize for imposing my insecurities on you. Maybe if I would have learned this back then, my happily-ever-after would feature you as my co-star.
No love ever lost in my heart for you. I continue to love you from a distance. Thank you for being my first love and helping me grow and learn.
DISCLAIMER: Some of these lessons are based on the examination of the behavioral psychology of myself and loved ones. Some of these lessons involve what I’ve learned about big corporations, our society and the media.
Sorry to bother you, but you could change your life by reading this post. I mean this could possibly help you see yourself, people, society, and America for what it is….or you can just think I’m a lunatic with conspiracy theories with no supporting evidence.
All I ask of you as you read this is to have an open mind so that you are now aware of these lessons. What you do with this information after you read it is up to you. Therefore, use this information wisely.
I’ve grown up with this belief that having a spouse and finding ‘true love’ will solve my problems. So, I’ve been waiting around yearning to get rescued by someone so they can tell me about myself, solve my problems, and essentially heal me. However, common sense hit me upside my head one day this year and taught me that I need to rescue my own damn self from my problems. I need to depend on myself to tell myself about myself. No one else can tell me about me. I’m the only one who should be doing that. In Mark Manson’s bestselling book “The Subtle Art of Not Giving A F*ck”, he makes a good point that basically says people can’t solve your problems for you; you have to take responsibility for your own shit and figure it out your damn self (of course, I’m paraphrasing but it’s still truth).
Even though my first time hearing this saying was from a contestant on Netflix’s Rhythm & Flow show, it has validity and power to it. My brain, insecurities, and mind are my worst enemies. However, I have the control over them. I have the power to rewire my brain by changing my habits and self talk.
This is a bubble that is hard to pop because it means you won’t look at your favorite television show the same. So if you don’t want the happiness you get from a television show to be forever ruined, go ahead and skip to Lesson #4 once you finish this sentence. For those of you who stayed with me, don’t say I didn’t warn you. So think about your favorite American television show or just a television show that you really admire. “Friends”, “Cheers”, “The Boondocks”, “The Simpsons”, “Home Improvement”, “Grey’s Anatomy”, “Full House”, “Big Mouth”, “Star Trek”, “Seinfeld”…..these shows and so many more have a common theme amongst them all. Next time you watch an episode, imagine that the writers are playing a mind game with the actors/actresses. Imagine that the actors/actresses are going through mental hell with their dialogue. Imagine that the executives of the show are trying to send a message to the actors/actresses. Imagine the actors/actresses are trying to send a message to each other, the executives, and us the viewers through the dialogue and tone of voice. Pay attention to the hand movements, facial expressions, and characters they use for certain scenes. Because of this television programming, we haven’t realized that our brains are wired like these tv show scripts to say what we want to say without actually saying what we want to say. But I’ve said too much…
If you’re not confident in yourself, then people won’t be confident in you. Many researchers will tell you that people gravitate towards leaders with confidence. I mean, think about it. Are you going to get on a plane where the pilot says, “I’m not that great of a pilot”? Do you want the surgeon to operate on you who is not confident in his/her skills? Are you going to follow the orders of a boss who doesn’t believe in their ability to succeed? The answer to all these questions: Fuck No! So if you want to be the leader that you know you can be, then start believing in yourself first so that people start believing in you.
Nowadays, power is in data. As a millennial, I’ve been freely giving away my data since I was in middle school. All these online media platforms innocently ask me for my name, birthdate, phone number and interests. Here I am, giving my information away for convenience and the feeling of connection. However, this information is going somewhere. Someone has all of this information. Who? I don’t know. But everything anyone needs to know about me is out there for a large corporation to take advantage of in order to sell my data to a business that wants to advertise to me. Not only that, but isn’t it weird that someone in this world has access to the most intimate parts of my life (i.e. control over my “smart home”, track of my purchasing habits, etc.)
Okay, this is the part where I probably sound paranoid as fuck and could possibly be on the corner yelling about “the man” and how he’s out to get us. I’m aware of this. However, you don’t have to believe me…I just want you to be aware. So here are a list of some companies that you should keep your eye on: Alphabet Inc. (owns alot but mainly Google), General Electric Company (GE), Uber, AT&T, CBS, NBC (maybe part of GE), Time Warner, Viacom, News Corp, Amazon, Netflix, Disney, Verizon Communications, Apple, JP Morgan, Facebook, and Twitter.
Lesson #6: America is the Most Sexually Fueled, yet Sexually Frustrated Society
America has a society where all advertisers know that “sex sells”. Yet, we refuse to have open dialogue and discuss sex in public. We’re prudish about sex but it’s in our faces on a daily. No wonder America is sexually frustrated. There’s this theory in America that white suburban women have desires of being with a black man for “a sense of danger”. There’s another theory that many men in heterosexual monogamous couples are secretly hiding their desire to be with another man sexually, which is why the face of a woman in a perfume ad is not needed. The idea of being with a woman while seeing the face of a beautiful man is the ultimate guy porn. Or maybe my lack of sexual freedom is causing me to believe such ridiculous theories. Either way, have more consensual sex…it leads to a happier life (and maybe a better America)!
These were some of the major lessons I’ve learned after being an observer of our world in 2019.
I would like to acknowledge the following people, events, and art that contributed to my realizations this year: Jon Stewart, Late Night Show with Stephen Colbert, John Oliver, Dave Chapelle, Jerry Seinfeld, NBC sitcoms, Shonda Rhimes, CBS sitcoms, FOX sitcoms, Fox News, Sorry to Bother You, Netflix writers, my Google Home, Donald J. Trump’s administration, Rachel Maddow, Pod Save America, the censorship of the Federal Communications Commission, Anderson Cooper, Amy Schumer, the laziness and stupidity of society, Brexit, Hindenburg, Germany, the UK, the Cold War, World War II, Ronald Reagan presidency, Richard Nixon’s presidency, behavioral psychology, body language, the manipulation of the English language, greed and corruption of corporations, and the 1st amendment.
I feel like I should pre-warn every encounter we have with an apology.
See here’s the thing: I do not like myself. To be honest, I have a deep hatred of myself.
This self-hate didn’t just occur recently. It’s a deep rooted seed that’s been growing in my thoughts since as young as I can remember. It started innocently with myself realizing at a young age that I don’t really have anything important to say, so maybe I should be quiet. I began to not trust that my ideas were of any value. They later morphed into me realizing that I, as a person, don’t have much value.
Once my brain held onto this core belief, the trust issues flourished. I question why people love me. I question why people bother to spend time with me. Since I can’t understand what I like about myself, I damn sure have raised eyebrows to you all who claim to like me when you don’t have to.
The times when my brain’s paranoia breaks down and asks you, “what do you even like about me,” your response is the polar opposite of the perception I have of myself. That’s when my mind tweaks out of control. I feel as though my brain has a malfunction when I hear your response because it’s been telling me for so long how horrible, unimportant, and worthless I am; hearing you, a friend, debunk my perception of myself causes a glitch in my brain trying to make sense of it.
And my preferred response to anyone debunking the perception of my worthlessness includes becoming defensive and proving you wrong. My method of proving you wrong ranges from becoming a selfish brat who has to get her way, to killing the vibe with my silence and not being in the present moment.
I guess it’s how turtles climb in their shell when they feel scared. And yes, hanging out with you scares me.
It scares me because I feel you’re going to finally “come to your senses” and see me how I see myself.
The fear of you seeing me the way I see me is the reason I cry. It’s the reason I begin to distance myself from you. It’s the reason I sometimes do and say asshole shit to you. It’s the reason I can’t sleep most nights.
So, that’s why I’m working on rewiring my brain to see the positive traits of myself and to accept the negative traits of myself but not enlarge them to immense proportions while I work to improve on them.
As I’m working on this, please be patient with me. Remind me to speak up for myself when I trail off when I talk. Let me know when I start becoming a selfish toddler and try to control every thing we watch or do. Call me out on when you feel I am hiding how I feel and think with euphemisms and double entendres. And definitely reassure me that you still love my crazy ass even after I get on your nerves with my weirdness.
I strongly believe I don’t deserve your friendship. But I know that I need your friendship.
Your friendship holds so much value to me. Our friendship is the most valuable thing I have, and I damn sure don’t want to lose it because of a conviction based on deep rooted issues that are based on insecurities in the alternate reality in my head.
