Confused

The Year in Status was one of the FB apps that I really liked. It summarized in 40 pictures all my status messages for 2010. Reading through it I realized what an amazing emotional journey it has been for me. Consider this:

No matter how many times I messed up my life, you stayed by my side. Your presence is my affirmation that I must be doing something right. Now that you're gone i feel lost, like a ship being tossed in the sea, without direction or destination. I don't know when will my wandering end. They say home is where the heart is. Now i just feel homeless. (March 26, 2010)

And this:

I promised myself to live one day at a time but its not easy doing so with a heavy heart. It is when all is quiet and I’m doing nothing and I actually feel time passing that is the hardest. It's like losing tiny pieces of me and they're gone forever. (April 12,2010)

And also:

Don't get me wrong, I’m usually a cheerful person, but there are times when I wish I’d disappear and the world will forget me in an instant. At best, that's like Richard Gere playing a manic-depressive patient in Mr. Jones. At worst, that's like Kurt Cobain blowing his head off with a shotgun. ( May 26, 2010)

I don’t remember if I really felt that depressed, or if I was simply observing how my emotions swing from being positively exuberant to being melancholic. That felt like a long time ago, I don’t remember now how long ago since I felt so bad to post anything like that. I can't see myself feeling like that again in the future.

For me it started with the statement: "Your past doesn’t equal your future." (FB status.11/07/10) That is of course from Anthony Robbins . I purchased his Personal Power Seminar cd by accident when I bought a dvd that didn’t work, and I cant find anything else interesting. His ideas helped me turn my life around.

So what did I learn from him? For one thing, happiness is a choice. Our quality of life depends for most part on our ability to maintain a positive emotional state. This state is affected by how we think and how we use our body. For example, if you sit or stand like you would if you are absolutely happy, and talk loudly and excitedly and put a large smile in your face like you normally would if you are feeling great and have some exciting news that you can't wait to tell a friend-- if you act like that, it would be difficult to stay depressed for long.

In fact, it takes more effort to stay depressed. You have to slouch and look downcast all the time, you have to speak in a depressing tone, and think about negative things and keep on feeling sorry for yourself, and not breath well, and look disinterested in everything that's going on…the list goes on. And you have to all these to "stay depressed." It takes so much effort that thinking about it makes me feel exhausted already. Fortunately I don’t have to do that anymore. :-)

It’s so much easier to feel good and think happy thoughts all the time. Remember Peter Pan?

Robbins has this exercise: Make a list of the positive emotional states that you regularly feel in a week, and then figure out what you did to get to that state. Mine were: ( hmmm. let me think for a minute, i forgot. ) Feeling happy, energetic, confident, sexy or desirable, and feeling loved. The things that lead to these were: talking and laughing with friends, sleeping and resting enough, maybe exercising, dressing up in nice clothes, and talking to someone who makes me feel loved or wanted. Hmmm. Does that make sense?

The negative states I used to feel were feeling rejected, unloved, undesirable, unhappy and low in energy. The things I did that lead me to these negative feelings were: not sleeping enough, and talking with my ex. I always end up feeling dejected every time we talk coz she always make me feel unloved and unwanted, but i do it anyway. I know, it doesn’t make sense!

That is past now. Nowadays I just do the things that make me feel positive, and avoid the opposite. Makes more sense.

( Sometimes I still stay up late and not get enough sleep, but hey, gimme a break.)

There was a time when I felt depressed every time i don't get what I wanted. I realize I am not the same person now. The way I define success and failure have radically changed. For Robbins, if he learned something out of everything that he does, then he considers the activity a success. He will consider that he failed if he didn’t learn anything at all.

I think I agree with him on this one. Going through the screening process for new supervisors definitely taught me a lot. It learned new things about the workplace and also got to know myself better. Bruce Lee once said. "All knowledge, ultimately, is self-knowledge" or something like that. We all learn from our own experience.

Two weekends ago I was in Quezon City to meet a girl that I have known for a few years now. She's always been there for me whenever I felt down, and she always made me feel loved. She has since decided to cut off our communication and "end this pseudo-relationship" since I am someone who is "stuck in the past" and "who can't love." ( her exact words) I should be feeling devastated now, but I'm not. I have been through that part of my life. I will not hurt anymore. And what can I do if I am not ready to love again? Do I really want to be in a relationship right now? I don't know.


Am I confused? I don't know what I really want right now. Maybe that's not so bad. " No want, no mind.". FB status, 02/17/2011