a--musings

[a--musings]

The narcissist.

May 6, 2022. I wrote a lot about this by hand in my journal, and I felt compelled to rewrite it and share this here so that maybe one person—just ONE—can spare themselves the misery, the pain, the extreme insecurities and self-doubt a person can inflict on another. This is the story about...E.

Do you know what you were doing that was hurting me, E? That was the last question I told myself I’d ask you, before cutting off ties completely, and moving on to a much happier, more successful life far away from here and far away from you.

Over the past two months, I felt a strange mix of frustration and vehement indifference when I would see the 41 missed calls, the daily unnecessary text messages, and the pleading voicemails full of empty, superficial apologies—the rambling on and on about nothing, trying to lure me back in with crafty swaying words, which I can now see clearly as utter bullshit. It’s funny how the mirage shatters and what used to sound like sweet talking became awkward stuttering hidden behind musical cadence. I wanted to talk to you every time you reached out because I wanted to hold up a mirror for you to look into and finally face yourself. But it’s futile. I know that now. Nothing can ever change someone like you, and I need to stop believing it is my purpose to heal you.

Look for the evidence. That is the mantra by which I followed to navigate my life for years before I met you. I’m smart enough to make accurate deductions based on the information that is presented to me. I wouldn’t be a doctor if I couldn’t. And yet I fell for it. The love bombing. The grandiose gestures of love and affection. The over-the-top charisma. The intense intimacy to create familiarity so immediately. The “I love you” that I felt was far too soon—that I wasn’t sure I even wanted at the time...and yet, I allowed it because I truly believed you were a once-in-a-lifetime type of man. But all of these were acts done to create the addiction to ensure I would cling to you. And I think of all the exes you would reminisce upon and criticize to oblivion—who you claimed would always try to come back and continuously long and beg for you—fell for it too. They didn’t know that it was all just a facade. That you so craftily play the role you knew we all wanted. I had my suspicions about you. The stories never added up, and you could never recognize that my memory far surpassed yours. I would catch you in lies and attempts to manipulate and control storylines to benefit you. The discomfort I felt upon learning how quickly you turn over women, and how similar we all had been. Small, petite Asians in healthcare. You all called them all “Bub.” I never allowed you to call me that because I felt like we all blended into the same person to you. And we did. Because we were just there to serve as a supply of validation and self-esteem regulation that you desperately need. It was dehumanizing. All of it was. The evidence kept pushing me to believe the opposite of what you urged. I knew who you were, E. As I had explained to you countless times, a lot of medical training is really just pattern recognition. I saw the evidence from day one. I began noticing the very very predictable set of patterns you portrayed. But I overlooked everything because I desperately wanted to believe you as much as you believed you. I took on the role of the villain. I called myself borderline, when I was just an empath desperately trying to absorb the chaos and toxicity that you caused every time you lied to me. Why did I do this? Because I thought I loved you, and I thought doing so was loving you. I wanted to play along and pretend to protect you from your insecurities because that’s how I felt I could best support you. I ignored my brilliant friends who have trained extensively for years in the art of observation and human communication. He’s hiding something. He’s not genuine. He tries so hard to display himself as the good guy, but it doesn’t feel real. He’s wearing a mask that he will never take off. My own father was suspicious that you had a deep-seated wound at your core. But I grew angry with them and distant in defense of you, even though I always knew that they were right. I degraded myself to stay with you and I am still learning to forgive myself for that. 

Look for the evidence. I see it now: the evidence of who you really were, in contrast to who you falsely claimed yourself to be. The grandiosity and the over-exaggerated stories you would tell about all the talents and skills you had in order to hide your mediocrity. The constant criticism of everyone I loved for no reason at all. The subtle jabs at me and tiny wounds that eventually tear large, gaping holes in my heart. The superficial, false self you presented to people you claimed were your closest friends who never really knew you. You need the praise, the admiration, the constant supply of validation. You are incapable of being alone, and that’s why you move swiftly from person to person, breaking new women in your wake without a hint of remorse. You just need to hide your true self because you are ashamed, and in the process you destroy people. Because in the end, nothing is scarier to a narcissist than being left to face the person they can’t stand more than anyone else in the world—themselves.

I’ve sat here for months, reflecting on all the things that made me feel that I was beneath you. But I’m not. I feel sorry for you. I feel bad for whoever has to end up with you. Because you always paraded yourself to be better than you really are—some stand up guy with strong morals and values that were inconsistent with the way you actually lived and acted. I allowed you to make me feel like I was a monster, and I am not. I am kind. I am loving. I am generous. I have lifelong friends who love my genuine self and want to be around me, regardless of my darkness and the shitty things I do as an imperfect human. I would never treat someone the way you treated me. I would never say the things about people that I would hear you say on a daily basis. I am open with my flaws, and people still accept me. I never had to put on a show for anybody. I never had to lie to get people to view me so highly, and I don’t even care if they do, nor need them to. I am smart. I work hard. I am honest. I am real. I have integrity and stay true to my values. I follow through with what I say I will do. I’m a fucking medical doctor. 

And I wanted to ask you so badly, do you know what you were doing that was hurting me? I wanted to ask you in hopes of opening your eyes and to force you to face who you were—in hopes of protecting the other girls unlucky enough to be used as your newest narcissistic supply. But I don’t care anymore. I am not a superhero. I am not the protagonist to your villain. It is not my job to save the string of broken hearts you will leave along the way. 

What I can do is urge others to LOOK FOR THE EVIDENCE. Nobody in the world is “too good to be true,” and if they are, they are playing the role to make themselves that way. Love yourself enough to trust your judgment, knowledge, skills, and capabilities to own your truth. Don’t ever let anyone try to take it from you and twist your reality into something that serves them and destroys you.��If something feels wrong, it probably is. You are smart enough on your own to interpret reality. Never let anyone take your truth from you.

One of the last voicemails you left for me was a request that we meet to talk about our relationship so you could learn how to be better. But I don’t need to, E. I already know what I learned from you. I learned that although I am flawed, I am wise enough to learn from my mistakes and grow. I learned that to never doubt myself again. But you, E. You have no integrity and have never been able to take accountability. You have never been able to apologize for your blatant lies without blaming them on me. I will not sit with you and tell you all the things you can learn to tweak to deceive other women. The only thing you can learn from this is how to better hide a fucking receipt for a box of condoms that you bought for someone else during a time you claimed you were faithful to me.

—a.

[a--musings]

The rewind.

November 29, 2019. There are not many things I regret in life. I never make definitive decisions until I carefully and cautiously--and more often very anxiously--contemplate all options and all their possible outcomes. So when something deviates from what I had expected, and the outcome of my choice is much worse than I had predicted, I have a momentary feeling of sadness and disappointment, quickly succeeded by clarity and acceptance. Sure, the end result was not what I wanted, but the decision I made was well thought-out, logical, and the best option I knew, given my choices. So the idea of crippling regret is so foreign to me. Because if you really think about it, you will never know how things would have worked out, had you made a different decision. It could have been better. It could have been worse. But clinging onto hypothetical scenarios and accepting them as certain, absolute scenarios is merely living in an imaginary world and a surefire way to suffer throughout all experiences in life. I do not allow myself to be tortured by miserable what-ifs.  I am more than okay with all of my choices. I accept my logical, rational thought and skills in decision-making. Years and years of self-reflection have allowed me to develop my gift of discernment and ability to see things from different perspectives. I completely and utterly trust my own wisdom and insight, and these qualities have become my greatest source of self-confidence. I will always accept the consequences of my actions because I know I did my absolute best. 

And I reiterate, there are not many things I regret in life. I trust myself and my logic and my ability to use wisdom to make the best decisions. But I will always regret all the stupid little things I did to lose him. 

I wish that I could press rewind.

—a.

[a--musings]

The noise.

November 22, 2019. There’s just so much noise sometimes. Most times. I find so much comfort in sweet solitude that it’s just so difficult to give up. I will always choose to spend time alone, given the option. But it’s most certainly rarely ever an option, particularly in a world in which I have chosen my life work to impact lives and interact with others constantly. I almost always have to listen. Even to the deafening sounds.

Continuously on the search for my solace—my peace amidst the chaos—to temper and drown out the never-ending noise. 

—a.

[a--musings]

The end.

October 22, 2019. I was never good at endings, but I guess things are different now. Like every other feeling in life, repeated exposure to a certain experience inevitably numbs the resultant response. We became habituated. Desensitized. We adapt. Adjust. We create a new normal. So much that it becomes hard to believe we were ever pained in the first place.

I was never good at endings. I could never let anything--or anyone--go. I was never ready. But it was never in my control to choose when people walked in and out of my life, and that was the lesson that I needed to learn. I had to withstand the crushing disappointment of an ending. I had to sit through so many goodbyes, one after the next, far before I was ready to let go. But it kept happening over the past few years--constantly and incessantly. It hurt and hurt until it just didn’t anymore. And I realized that was truly the only constant pattern I could grasp: everything and everyone is transitory. 

I’m better at endings now. When people want to leave, I let them, and it hurts less and less every time. Of course there was always be that quick, momentary tiny pang of sadness, but I accept it and move on. Life only moves forward. What will always remain is me.

—a.

[a--musings]

The round peg and square hole.

September 24, 2019. When you put in the time and effort and attentive care into genuinely getting to know yourself and discovering what you naturally gravitate towards and what will allow you to be the most thriving you that you can be, it is fairly effortless to determine what isn’t for you. It becomes a natural instinct and immediate feeling of “no” with absolute certainty. The off-ness is simply existing in a way that you don’t want to deep down inside...and you learn to pursue things that will center you and experience life in the most you way that you can.

Just a year ago I described myself as malleable, because I didn’t know who I was. So it was easy and most comfortable for me to change myself to become whatever form fit my surroundings. I was a shapeshifter, a chameleon, and constantly morphed myself into what other people wanted from me, with ease and with no hesitation. I totally neglected myself and disregarded attending to what it was that I actually wanted because I never realized I had to. But living like this gave me a deep, inescapable sense of unhappiness--an irking, gnawing feeling of utter “off-ness” with an origin of which I had no understanding. I was off and unhappy because I was acting in ways that were inconsistent with what I truly needed to feel fulfilled. And once I started discover what those things actually were, I became stubborn and unwilling to compromise when I did not allow myself access to these things.

It’s become so easy to feel myself twisting and turning and shoving myself into some mold that’s not me. I know when I’m situations that do not allow myself to be me. And when I can sense this feeling--this forcing of a round peg in a square hole, I know with all of my heart that something simply is not meant for me. Identifying it is the easy, simple part now. Taking the necessary steps to move forward once I recognize the wrongness of it all is the part that breaks my heart.

--a. 

[a--musings]

The current situation.

September 12, 2019. Embracing the uncertainty and relinquishing control. Or trying at least. There’s a reason why they always say, “if you wanna make God laugh, tell him your plans.” I am so, so terrified of the idea that a vast majority of the life predictions I have made for myself have been wildly incorrect. I wish there was one certainty...one absolute outcome that I can rely on. But there really is not. So what’s the use in planning anymore?

What I can rely on, however, is my utter knowledge and confidence that whatever unpredictable storm and strife that is coming my way, I will fully and utterly handle and tackle and remain victorious over. Because I have proven to myself that time and time again, I am immensely capable of handling the unfortunate throes of life and all the suffering that it can put me through. 

Bring it on universe, you silly, fickle thing.

—a.

[a--musings]

The new mindset.

September 1, 2019. Over it.

—a.

[a--musings]

The fantasy.

August 11, 2019. Part of growing up in such a complicated environment meant I had to deal with a lot of complex issues that I was not equipped as a child to deal with or understand or process. Virtually ever human has had this experience in development. And so we find ways to cope—to make sense of it all and find meaning in anything because we simply lack the language and perspective to understand it, and we don’t have the ability or maturity to process the situations occurring around us, and to us. We develop preferential defense mechanisms, of which we are unaware, that subconsciously shape who become.

I have always had a wildly creative imagination. I was even cognizant of this since I was a child. I always remember when people would ask me what I was so curiously daydreaming about because I had a very obviously stone-like pensive face whenever I got stuck inside my head. People would have to say my name multiple times with increasing volumes to pull me out of it. But on the positive side, I was never bored as a child. My mind was always wandering in the most fascinating ways. I was entertained by my own limitless thoughts and the realities and universes I was able to think of and experience internally. Because whatever world I could internally escape to was more tolerable than what I experienced on the outside.

I still have a wild imagination. I dream up worlds, imagining things that do not exist. They saying goes: create the things you wish existed; I thrive off my creativity and dive into countless projects because I am always actively seeking ways to make changes and improvements. I am a dreamer. I make up scenarios in my head of how things could be better, and then I go on and make it happen. And that’s why I’m beginning to wonder if I’m so problematically stuck in my imagination, and so convinced virtually anything I think of could become real. I dream up ideals and fantasy-lands—full of scenarios, things, people—that are far better than the ones I experience in reality. That’s exactly what I did as a child, after all. It became a natural habit, and throughout development, I continued doing it. It has always been my defense against the experience of unbearable and confusing pain. I get so detached from the reality because the worlds I imagine are so much better. Escaping to fantasy became an almost instinctual habit and is still engrained deeply into my daily experience. I wake up. I brush my teeth. I slip into fantasy. I walk to campus. I get a cup of coffee. I slip into fantasy. I sit in lecture. I listen to professors speak. I slip into fantasy. I go to the library. I slip into fantasy. It is a constant part of my daily routine.

I’m beginning to realize that such a mind set and hyper-focus on hypothetical scenarios only fuels and perpetuates my constant state of dissatisfaction with reality. I am so caught up on what could be that I reject what is. Because, to me, what could be is what should be, and anything that falls short of that simply is not good enough. But just because I can imagine something doesn’t mean it is possible to come into fruition. And now, I begin to question...what if I keep searching for something that isn’t real?

“I worry about you. I worry that you will have to walk this earth alone when we’re gone. You’re always digging and digging for deeper. You always want more. You might not find anyone who can connect with you the way you’re looking for. You are always searching for depth that might not exist.” My own mother told me that.

I kept thinking that someday I would be able to find someone who could connect with me on some elevated, ethereal, otherworldly level and could understand all the deepest parts of my soul and allow me to see his. I kept thinking that I could find someone who, above all else, would choose me and the complexities that follow--someone who was not only capable of the deepest depths, but chose to share it as well. But maybe my mother is right. Maybe they’re all right--all the friends who can’t seem to understand what I’m looking for, and can earnestly admit they, too, have never find someone they could connect in that way. None of them even need to. Maybe my constant dissatisfaction and high expectations stem from an idealized, hypothetical person in a dream world that I fantasize. Maybe no one in reality can possibly fulfill someone else in that way. Again, it’s a slippery slope to have an overactive imagination like this. Just because I am capable of imagining it, doesn’t mean it can ever come into fruition. And I might miss out on something real if I keep escaping to desires of what is not.

--a. 

[a--musings]

The unmoved trees.

July 15, 2019. Perhaps I have been much more narrow-minded than I previously believed myself to be.

When I was young and naive, and wildly inexperienced with the dealings of the wide spectrum of human personalities and perspective, I was lost. Thinking back to my childhood self, I was often times bemused (honestly, not too far from who I am today) and incapable of finding someone to which I could relate (again, some things never change). I felt alone, especially with my parents, whose relationship with me was so complex and broken back in those early days. We would fight and scream. I would cry. Years later, they would come to regret the words they said that shattered me as a child—and I would eventually learn to forgive them. But at the time, it hurt. It cut me deeply—just the standard trope of the Asian-American born to foreign immigrants of impossible expectation and nowhere to displace their stress. Our fights were vicious. My household dynamic was tumultuous. I would have never survived it all without my siblings. After every fight, my parents would always come around, offering me gifts or money as tokens of apology—never truly saying the words “I’m sorry,” nor verbally acknowledging the hurt they caused and validating my emotional response as sincere. They just bought me things I never cared for, thinking it was enough to heal the wounds. But it never was, and it hurt me to believe that they didn’t care enough about me to give me a true apology—to just say they never meant it all. The hurt and pain festered for many years, with neither I or my parents aware that apologies were sent and never received.  It wasn’t until I was an adult, able to reconcile by recognizing our drastic differences in culture and communication that I learned that this was their true apology. They both didn’t grow up in households that strongly valued words of affirmation and verbal admission of accountability. I had been angry because they did not appease my needs, but I had been blind to their perspective the whole time as well. I could not be mad at them for not knowing that I needed them to just tell me they were sorry. After all, how would they even know that this is what I needed? This is not what they needed to forgive. I perceived their offerings of objects as the thoughtless, easy way out of owning up to a mistake, but that was never their intention. The way in which they were raised taught them to think nothing of spoken words, and to regards gifts as truly symbolic of love. The way in which I was raised did not. This is where the disconnect began.

And that’s when I realized I have always been close-minded, as all humans are, in my perception of peoples’ wants and needs. I still remember when I was perpetually dissatisfied with life, suffering from feelings of emptiness and a constant longing for something more. And then, a few years ago, I met my dearest friend AW. He was quite odd and eccentric and different…but he helped me realize my natural desire to search for meaning and soul-deep connections in my life. He helped me realize that at my core, I am a very spiritual, philosophical, and ardently sensitive being, seeking belonging and depth. I had been searching for answers to the sources of my lifelong unhappiness, and once I figured it out, I was able to seek out the relationships and more profound experiences that I inherently valued, consisting of open expression and intimacy—things which I repressed. Not only did AW directly point out this quality that he could easily identify in me, but he offered me the deep philosophical human connection that finally made me feel a little bit more complete. He was my spirit guide, and one of my first soulmates who rose me from comatose, inspiring me to help others become cognizant of what was missing from their own existence. I believed it was my responsibility to perpetuate the awakening, like a ripple effect that had to keep reaching others. I was changed, and I wanted to change people too. But then I became a dreamer, an idealist, fantasizing about an ideal world that would be happy and more satisfied if others simply discovered the very same realization. I was suffering a savior complex, believing that I was saving people from their own ignorant bliss and blindness towards this absolute truth. I was convinced humanity was lacking in the same way that I was, and in response, I was offering them the red pill, offering insight and opening their eyes up to seeing truth behind the illusions, and what their bland lives lacked. I was offering them a safe space of openness, sensitivity, and vulnerability, and they could create their most fulfilling lives because of me and my influence.

I had an air of arrogance and self-absorption, unable to consider that people may just value different things than I do. I had no findings or evidence to back my belief. I had those reinforcing moments, when shy and closed-off friends expressed their gratitude for helping them open up, and for the rare, refreshing conversation of actual substance when I asked pondering questions that they have never been asked before. I loved intensely connecting with people and having heartfelt conversations that were pure and authentic and discussed deep things in life. These relationships were insightful, inspiring, and, “you make me feel so much less alone in this world, like someone genuinely cares,” was my favorite thing to hear. But then there were the shocking moments of disinterest, when my gentle coaxing was seen as prying invasiveness and intrusive to some. “I’m not talking about this right now,” one person would snap at me. “Why did you have to make this all philosophical? I just wanted to hang out,” another friend grunted. “You’re too inquisitive. Why are you always probing and trying to learn my secrets?” They want me to probe, I would convince myself. They need me to help them be more vulnerable and open up. They need me to help them feel comfortable with self-expression so we can all share our genuine experiences and relate to one another. They need a place to let out their secret emotions and hidden feelings. They just don’t realize it.

But there were so many times when I tried and tried, and people were aloof and coldly unreceptive to my warmth. Helping other people feel less alone made me feel lonely. It started to become clear: most people were just on a different wavelength and I was failing to get us to align. People did not want to have the conversations that I wanted to have. After too many disheartening moments, I called AW. What was I doing wrong?

“AW, I don’t understand. I just want to help people fill their emptiness created by the mundane aspects of everyday life and superficial, meaningless chatter. But I’m starting to think most people don’t actually care about meaningful relationships, or conversations about anything real. But didn’t you think that this was the one thing that everyone needed to be happy? Didn’t you think that everyone was searching for this?”

“Sure, humans are social creatures,” AW responded. “We need to form relationships for happiness. But there is no objective measurement necessary for a sufficient connection for everyone. Some people are absolutely satisfied with certain fleeting experiences. There are different levels and  forms of happiness. Not everyone is cognizant of it and not everyone has to actively seek it.”

“Are you telling me that not everyone values soul-deep connections, intimacy, and authentic companionship? I thought this is what we needed, as humans, to reach ultimate happiness and self-actualization. I’m offering them a safe space to open up, have pure and honest interactions, and reveal their authentic selves.”

“A,” he laughed. “Don’t go trying to move a tree. Not everyone wants to open up. Our value system system is a product of our experiences. Remember the elephant and the men? Everyone places different weight on different values and virtues. We see things the way we do because our experiences create our perspective. They don’t value you what you do because they simply can’t. Their life experiences didn’t set them up for that.”

“But revealing all of oneself genuinely and entirely lifts the burdens and pains of existence!” I vehemently preached. “We are universally bound by our need to deeply connect with one another and we can only do so by transparency, vulnerability intimacy, and affection!”“

A,” he sighed. “You can’t force people to want what you’re trying to give. You can offer your gift, but only those who seek it will accept it. Give them the opportunity to open up, and gauge if they’re willing to connect with you. But not everyone needs the vulnerability or the depth, and you can’t force your own values on other people. People can achieve happiness and fulfillment in ways that don’t require this. You can’t push them to see things the way you do. They were never shaped to. Don’t try to move a tree.”

He was right. How did I know what someone else needs to be happy? I mistook an idiosyncratic need for a value commonplace to all humanity. But I am not enlightened with the wisdom of what the whole world needs. I am not woke to the absolute truth. I am aware of my own truth and what I uniquely value, and I can’t simply project or impose my values on someone else because I arrogantly assume whatever I desire must be true for all. I had only discovered this truth for me. I need transparency, vulnerability, openness, and authenticity. Why did I believe this applied to everyone else too? Your value system is a product of your life experiences. Not everyone needs deep, meaningful connections and long existential talks about purpose and meaning. But I fallaciously believed everyone held these values; this was supposed to be the common theme that connected all of humanity. 

No. There are plenty of people who can live full and satisfying lives without it, just as I can without deeply buried, limited self-expressions and simpler conversations. There are people out there who prefer casual, superficial levels of experiences and closed, private, guarded expressions of themselves. Superficial does not make it less valuable to everyone. Some people find quality in it. Not everyone needs a deep connection, solely because I do. I can’t assume that every other human is simply unaware. Certainly not. The only guaranteed needs are food and water and an environment that supports our body’s physiological activity. Who we are, what we value, and what we search for is a product of our own experiences. Something about my own life events and my own upbringing made me predisposed to this need to find meaning in everything, but this did not happen for everyone. Why would they find worth in all of this?

So don’t try to move a tree. I must remind myself of this every single day. I find so much joy in loving others by enriching their lives with depth. There are people who need it and there are people who value it. I can merely offer enrichment to those who seek it, because those who seek it probably need it too. But to those who find no value in my offerings? I feel very bad for all of the people I probed and pried open, who I kept pushing to expose themselves in ways they did not want to. It is so very wrong to assume anyone knows what’s best for someone else—to constantly push and try to make someone place worth in what you find worthy, when they inherently do not value the same thing. Some lacked the life experiences to shape the mindset that would motivate them to value and find worth in such things. I have to stop forcing others to accept what I’m trying to give. Once a person shows that they are a tree, I must take them for who they are and stop trying to inspire them to be something else. But to those who who can understand the language I speak, and eagerly await the rare moments of profound interactions—I will always search for you.

—a.

[a--musings]

The good listeners.

July 12, 2019. People only enjoy my company because I offer them a place where they can talk about themselves incessantly and overzealously for hours. That’s all most people really want. Most people will jump on any opportunity to focus on themselves and hear their own voice, and can quickly sense that I will give them the chance to do just that. I am a very good listener; I listen because I enjoy understanding different types of personalities and figuring people out. I enjoy listening to people’s thoughts and perspectives, especially when they’re so vastly different from my own. It is interesting to discover how someone else views the same thing, and it’s fun to ponder how they created their frameworks. But I am most often left baffled because most people can rant for hours and hours without asking me a question in return, or even noticing that the conversation has been entirely one-sided the whole time. I am constantly having complete conversations with a person by contributing absolutely nothing. I often times can tell that a person is already forming their next sentence before I even get my first word out. I can see them detach as they become distracted by their own thoughts. It’s bizarre. I am astounded by the lack of awareness. 

And that’s precisely why I stopped going on random dates with random men months ago. I am incapable of going on a first date that doesn’t last for hours, in which I am left absolutely unmoved and utterly exhausted by listening and nodding politely to the ceaseless monologues. I am astounded that these men actually believe the date was a complete success, blissfully ignorant of the fact that I simply offered a free 5-hour therapy session that allowed them to open up for the first time in their machismo world. But I get bored by the predictable eagerness of the pleads for a second date. They spent the entire time trying to convince me that they were worthy, but never realized they never put in the effort to discover if I were worthy enough for them as well. All I did was sit there and listen. At no point in our interaction did I ever show myself and open myself up. At no point was I able to express genuinely myself or give them a chance to become acquainted with me. How exactly did they know we had chemistry? How did they know were actually compatible? How did they know they wanted to see me again? If you replaced me with an unbiased psychologist, the interactions would likely be the same. Within two hours of meeting one guy, I knew about the death of his father during his childhood years, and how it altered his family dynamic. I’ll never forget the excruciating detail of every daily interaction one surgical intern had with every anesthesiologist. I still squirm in disgust when I think about the arrogant neuroscience research assistant, condescendingly explaining simple parts of the brain, and unaware of the neuroscience degree I already held, and that I had been a neuro grad student at an Ivy League university, simply because he didn’t even ask what I did. Could most of these men even name three things about me? Very rarely ever. They weren’t interested in me. They were interested in the opportunity I offered them to grant them moments of self-absorption and elusive preoccupation with themselves entirely. I was a place--a concept. I never felt the need to talk to them ever again. 

But it’s not just dating. It happens with “friends” too, and it is just...draining. What makes it all so much worse is that when people talk about themselves, they rarely say anything interesting, insightful, inspiring, or new. Most people, I hate to admit, are really just not that interesting at all, and you can pry and pry and ask thought-provoking questions but you will still get nothing out of them. But that’s fine. I respect all ranges of personalities, and you can’t expect every single person to offer you something you will find useful, or even just entertaining at all times. Some people simply lack the life experiences or emotional maturity to impart any wisdom that appeases my curiosities. That’s okay. But truthfully, I can’t help but attach some kind of judgment to the one-sided, bad conversationalists who, quite frankly, just come off as self-centered. Some people don’t really have anything that speaks to my personal curiosities--fine. Certainly, I am in a totally unique environment full of heightened arrogance; these cases of flagrant narcissism have been different. But when a person is boring because they can’t talk about anything but themselves? When they come disengaged and their eyes gloss over as they very unquestionably search for ways to steer the conversation back to themselves? That is infuriating. 

I can say that most people know significantly less about me than I know about them. I know more about friends’ family members, whom I have never even met, than these friends know about me. It wrecked me for a while. It disappointed me. It made me feel used and belittld, as if I don’t offer anything valuable but a soapbox for people to step on and declare their own self-love, or a place to hold someone’s bags while they stepped in the spotlight to shine and bask in their moments of glory. It made me feel uninteresting and one-dimensional, as if people didn’t want to spend time with the real me because nobody was intrigued by me. People were constantly drawn to me and found me magnetic solely because they wanted mirror to look into; essentially, that’s how it was. I grew incredibly, intolerably bored with humanity, and all the humans that consistently made minimal contributions to my life. Why didn’t anyone else have this problem? I would always watch people talk to each other, but they would always talked at me. Eventually I realized nobody has this problem because I’m pretty freakin great and unique in my ability to really listen and step outside of my own existence for a moment to give someone my full allegiance. I take interest in people and things outside of myself, and I understand people with empathy, and without passing judgment. I am effortlessly skilled at learning how people think and quickly figuring out how to communicate back to them in a relatable way. People talk about themselves so much to me because I earnestly prompt them to open up, and they might be forced to bottle themselves up elsewhere. I should see this as a good thing.

Very few people have the ability to recognize and realize moments of self-centeredness, or the ability to think outside of themselves. It has become such an admirable, rare quality for a person to be aware enough to know they have been talking so much about themselves that they’ve totally disregarded the interlocutor. It is such a rare, admirable quality to be peculiar and immensely curious about the outside world and everyone in it. That’s why when I do finally stumble upon a needle in the haystack, and finally experience a refreshing moment of interacting with someone who is both interested and interesting, I become absolutely enthralled by their company and cherish our relationship so deeply. I search and search for someone who genuinely wants to hear me and offer compassion. It feels like one in a million times, I finally feel the heartwarming sentiment of hope from recognized awareness and genuine interest in the other, or I finally hear the simple “but enough about me, how about you?” Those moments make me forget about the ennui of most human exchanges.

In writing this, I realized my shift in perspective, as I once thought these types of interactions represented a disparaging flaw in myself. Now I recognize that it is merely a reflection of a positive quality I have harnessed and constantly exude so naturally. It is so very healing to consider other alternatives that explain your experiences, as opposed concluding with the negative, insulting, and self-victimizing reasoning. Perception is reality, and I think the change in viewpoint both reinforces and reveals a growing self-compassion within me.

—a.

[a--musings]

The escapism.

July 11, 2019. I find it both confusing and peculiar that people just can’t seem to be alone with themselves and with their feelings. I’ve observed so many people, as of late, so quick to silence their thoughts and distract themselves from themselves by doing whatever they can to escape. Perhaps I never noticed it during the school year, when the stress of class and mandatory events is enough to mask the hidden fears of aloneness. But the idle mind is a dangerous threat to some, and I’ve been unintentionally watching it all happen in front of me, just by silent observation of my surroundings. There is just so much need to turn away from oneself and look outward for company. But solitude and loneliness are completely different things, as I’ve preached before. I don’t think many people are cognizant of this.

Are you really having fun going on meaningless and boring dates just to have some stranger sit across from you, just to have SOMEONE there? Is sitting on the same beach next to the same people every single day for hours actually that fun for you? Do you actually want to go to the same dirty bars to get drinks spilled on you by drunk sweaty assholes who slur their hot breath in your ear? Are these low quality experiences even worth much to you? I sometimes want to ask. I don’t mean to offend or place judgment at all. People should have all the power and freedom in the world to go on and spend their time in whatever way they want. Who am I to tell you what’s best for you? We are each our own individual with our own unique perspectives and experiences shaping our existence and our personal desires. But there’s a very clear function behind why people do things they very unequivocally do not really want to do, beyond the obvious external validation and need to feel liked and praised.  It’s a strange dependency for something—anything, almost in an addictive way. Like a desperate grasp to cling on to whatever is there, just to have something near. It doesn’t matter how meaningless and utterly non-contributory something is to their lives. Just as long as it’s there. Just as long as they don’t have to be with themselves to cope with the dissatisfaction or discomfort of their reality.

It’s reflected in the string of 15 texts I get from a friend when I look away from my phone for an hour, just because she’s home alone. It’s a random 2-hour long phone call from another friend to talk about nothing, simply because he can’t seem to have no one to interact with. It’s the cries of FOMO, for which I actually (and shockingly) have to console people. It’s the nagging complaints in my ear and actual hurt when I tell someone I’m too tired or too busy to hang out. It’s watching friends, clearly too exhausted by each other to enjoy each other’s company, try to force interactions just to entertain one another. It’s the need to swipe on all the latest dating apps just to have someone to look at, and to send flirtatious messages of meaningless nothings. It’s the odd way that many of my friends will clutch for dear life to their phones, incapable of falling asleep if it isn’t in their hands while they drift off, or as soon as they waken. It’s the (almost offensive) times I sit right next to a person, and they are still hypnotized by their phones because my presence is not enough to fulfill their needs. It is the constant stimulation, the search for the deafening noise to drown out the haunting anxieties. It’s the escape from unpleasant realities and dissatisfaction with the here and now. It’s how we, culturally, survive our daily hells and our immense cognitive stress. Do we not recognize our need for noise? For company? Do we not recognize our fear of solitude?

Not too long ago, I was the same way. I would call my sister or my most supportive friend P whenever I encountered an uncomfortable, anxious thought just to run away from it--ultimately, finding ways to run away from myself. If they didn’t pick up the phone, I would keep running to the next person, and the next, and the next in desperate attempts to avoid feeling the discomfort and the pain of whatever was irking my soul. I couldn’t handle it. I couldn’t just simply feel the feelings or think the thoughts. It was painful—unbearably so. When I finally effortfully chose to make myself alone, I forced myself to grin and bear it. I forced myself to feel it all. I suffered, but I experienced self-compassion, and my perspective began to change. I am not saying I am above people who need absolute escapism as a mechanism of survival; it does not make me any better than. After all, such a defense mechanism is sometimes healthy, and I still do it myself. As humans capable of deep, deep suffering, we need moments that will take us away to just breathe. But to what extent? And at what cost? Learning to rely less on searching for distraction has made me feel at ease and at peace way more often throughout my day. I don’t need to constantly create other realms of reality. I don’t feel the mental of exhaustion of continuously looking for ways to run. I can simply exist in this one and ride the dynamic waves of human experience, and I can cope just fine on my own. Life is complicated, but beautiful because of its variety. I would never watch a movie that solely highlighted the idyllic ease of every character’s lives. It is the complexity that makes life interesting, worthy. In the same way, I choose to watch all moments of my own life, rather than cutting corners by burying the low points with the highlight reels. I will strive to be open to all experiences and allowing myself to accept every heartbreak, every disappointment, and every hidden pain to just come and go..

If I were to give myself advice a year ago, it would be this: find a way to be alone and just exist. Find solace, comfort, and peace in just that, and deal with every aspect of life. Allow yourself to engage in the opportunity of human experience. Face the issues. Feel okay with feeling like shit, but give yourself time to figure it out. Rid yourself from the need to avoid and escape yourself. Rid yourself of the need to run to something—anything. If you find the need to always withdraw from your world, change your perspective. Change your story. If not, you might miss out on yourself.

—a.

[a--musings]

The love, defined.

July 10, 2019. Recently, many friends of mine, knowing that I’ve been reading Osho’s ideas on love, have asked, “what is love, A? Have you figured it out?”

“I’m not sure yet,” I provoke. “You tell me what you think it is.”

And that’s when the floodgates open and the banal platitudes come pouring in and I cringe at the clichés. They say that the ultimate partner is one who will readily give up everything for you. Love is selfless sacrifice, and if you really love someone, you would give up your all to be with them. If so, I don’t want it, I think to myself. How much am I supposed to compromise--to reject parts of myself just to accommodate someone else? How is it actually me that somebody would love, in that case? And why would I ever demand someone to give up themselves for me?

So then they say that love defies all logic and reasoning. It doesn’t make sense; it just is, and it makes you crazy along the way. Let me guess, you probably have “Live, Laugh, Love” plastered somewhere on your walls, I think to myself. Are you implying a nonsensical state of delusion? One that keeps you stuck in some false reality? Sounds like a chemical imbalance to me. Love brings the freedom to allow clarity and helps you align with yourself. What is illogical about that?

And then they say love is when you find someone that you just can’t live life without. You can no longer envision a future without the person. You don’t feel like yourself without them. Sounds dangerously codependent, I think to myself. I would never, ever hope to make someone feel incompetent without me. To feel like they need me to be capable and worthy? To not exist fully without something outside of themselves? Again, I don’t want it.

So, what is love to me? I’m still figuring it out. Part of the reason why I ask is so I can gain insight and borrow ideas that might resonate with me. To fully accept one philosopher’s beliefs is to deny the uniqueness of every individual’s experience with humanity. I can’t run around claiming the definitions of Osho, or Nietszche, or Socrates are truth. I am creating my own, which at the moment, is messy and incomplete. But there are common themes that I do believe to be true: love is absolutely logical, it is freeing rather than limiting, and it starts with the self.

Not too long ago, I made a mockery of “love.” Humans aren’t meant to be constrained to one partner, I argued. It’s not even evolutionarily advantageous for a male to stick with one mate. Love is just another idealized social construct, stemming from predating attempts to define a neurobiology reaction, that ever so happens to be beneficial in supporting our primal needs as animals to perpetuate our contributions to the world’s gene pool. All we are intrinsically driven to do is reproduce, essentially reincarnating through offspring and achieving immortality. Love, at its root, also supports the beneficial bond of co-parenting to produce capable offspring. You don’t really “love” a person in the romantic sense that we were taught. You just intrinsically need a partner to help you raise healthy kids. As a society, we just use the glamorized idea of “love” to bind two people together. That’s all there is to it, and it’s naive to think of infatuation as anything more than that. 

I falsified this detached perspective, and depicted a relentless need to base every idea on logic and science and microscopes. It made me feel cooler, better, helped me feel less stupid and weak, and less of a wide-eyed, naive, poor little girl to be pitied. Ugh, pity. My ego detests it. So I created and embodied a false idea of a strong, independent who is above romantic connection to be fulfilled. My stance fed my ego because it allowed me to be condescending and superior to the emotional friends brave enough to live honestly and openly.  

But I lived in a perpetual state of cognitive dissonance, and in doing so, I trapped myself in a cage. I preached all things logic-based and analytical, but my natural actions and patterns of behavior proved otherwise. You can say all you want, but it is so very difficult to restrict and conceal true motives in your actions. My dear friend A once told me, “always pay attention to actions, never the words of a person. People can say whatever combination of words they want,  but what they do will always tell the truth.” My action were loud and clear once I stepped back and admitted to myself that I created a real world inside my head to retreat to from the facade. I was cold and aloof, under the guise of simple indifference and disinterest in affection and intimacy. But what of my earnest and most sincere behavior that I didn’t have to reveal to anybody else? I would daydream for hours, staring at clouds and pretending my love life would follow some cliché rom-com trope. I would ruminate on all the mushy-gushy stuff, thinking about who I would whisper I love you to every night and every morning. I would think about myself as the coldhearted scientist, patiently (and secretly) awaiting the rescuer who would defy all these thoughts and prove me wrong. Ironic, wasn’t it? I was already proving myself wrong. 

When you are vulnerable to judgment, you are too ashamed to be yourself. I was harsh with myself, feigning heartlessness and apathy, but I was just guarding my fragile, delicate heart. When I began to develop self-compassion and humility, I started to allow myself to just be, in my truest realest form. I stopped being ashamed and embarrassed of the truth. Besides, one personality type was not better than the other—they are simply just different, so why must I choose to play the part that I didn’t even want to? Eventually I chose to be me, and anything that didn’t get along with that simply was not meant for my life. I finally started to become happy after admitting, accepting, and recognizing every part of me. I am a textbook romantic. I am sensitive, expressive, idealistic, emotional, bohemian, eccentric, and abstract. I can also be moody, complicated, temperamental and difficult. Why is that something to be ashamed of, anyway? I was placing judgment on myself, forcing myself to take on a false identity to spare me the shame. So...I am not the level-headed, practical analyst that I claimed to be after all. So what? I see the world through a different lens than others. So what? What is there to analyze? To what is there to attach judgment? Why did I think my authentic self was lesser than the self I portrayed? By whose standards? The person I portrayed was neither better nor worse than the truth. I just wasn’t me.

We have to find a way to come back to ourselves, to be in touch with our center. That’s how we can truly live a fulfilling life and realizing our own inherent value. This is how we are utterly freed from the need to find something outside of ourselves. This is how we know of our infinite worth on our own. We don’t realize how crucial it is to begin weeding through the bullshit that was projected onto us—the nonsense we internalized and accepted to be our own authentic self. We are told who to be, and what to view as acceptable and glorified traits. In churches, in schools, anywhere in society. There are too many external factors rigidly affirming who exactly we need to be in order find inner peace and in order to be whole. But what happens when these things don’t ring true for us? Much of our grief and suffering as humans originates from the fact that, since birth, and in virtually every aspect of life, we are kept away from ourselves. We are taught to keep these truths hidden. But before you can truly love someone, you need to discover your true self, your absolute. Creating the habit, mindset, and perspective to fully understand embrace the wide spectrum of the human condition starts with how you perceive yourself. To understand your true self will open up your mind to understanding that other people have their true selves too. You will know who you are and what it means to exist consistently with your values. You will understand how to not change your core for someone. To not expect someone to change their core for you.

There are a million different things that I had to learn and accept about myself, and this is why I question whether or not I really meant every I love you. I am a complex person. This is the truth. And for many years, I kept viewing this trait as an imperfection. I was dating men, year after year, who made me feel like I was fundamentally flawed, and I was unhappy because of my complexity. There was too much going on up in my head, they’d say. They wanted me to be simple. They didn’t want me to think and write because they didn’t think it was healthy to strengthen my habits. They couldn’t tolerate my need to search for deeper, hidden meanings and symbolism in movies and songs. “Why can’t you just listen to a song and enjoy the rhythm? Why can’t you take things for face value? This is why you’re unhappy. You can’t enjoy life’s simplicities.” Eventually, I realized that it wasn’t that I was unhappy because I was difficult and complicated. I was unhappy because I couldn’t accept these very traits and chose to continue fighting it—fighting me. I was in relationships that encouraged this struggle with my inner self. Imagine that. Someone who is supposed to love you is telling you, “you’re unhappy because you are you, so change that.” The truth is, I was unhappy because I was in an environment that did not allow me to be me. In return, I likewise created an environment that pushed them to reject their simple, undemanding ways. Read more books. Talk to me about philosophy and astrophysics. Why are you not interested in neuroscience? If you loved me, you would watch more foreign films and go to slam poetry at sketchy coffee shops. But all of this simply wasn’t them, and expecting them to speak my exact same language was not loving them. We were keeping each other away from our true selves. They saw my complex thinking patterns as flaws, just as I saw their inabilities to do so as flaws. Neither were. We could have accepted our differences, but we didn’t. This was just not love. 

I don’t want a partner that will readily give up anything for me. I don’t want someone who will morph into the person he thinks I want him to be, nor expect me to do so. I want a partner who will know he never has to. I want a partner who knows I am here to accept him for the way he genuinely is. I have no right to decide who a person should be—no expertise, gifted with omnipotence to tell someone what to change. I hope to help him learn that he is already inherently valuable and worthy all on his own. To love is to foster an environment and seek opportunities that will continue helping him to strengthen the connection with himself. To love is to put in the time and effort to understand each other’s souls, and give one another the space to be, unbothered.

Come to me as you already are. That is all. Let me know myself. Let me help you know yourself, too. Let’s share these things with one another. Let me encourage you to pursue the things that will help you understand what it is that you are, and let’s inspire one another to live as that person to the best of our abilities. Because that’s what you do when you love someone, I believe. You simply let them be, and you help one another grow into your most authentic selves. You appreciate all parts of each other. When you love someone, you acknowledge that this is who you are, and you do what you can to add depth to their acceptance and understanding of that. You free them from the urge to change, or run away to avoid themselves. You empower them to face themselves. My friend S told me when you love someone, you expose your flaws to one another, and though you know these imperfections exist, you still would never change a thing. 

But then again, if this is the case of love, then perhaps I love every single human being in existence. I encourage my siblings, my parents, my friends, strangers I walk past on the sidewalk to be true to themselves, and I want them to know this is who I will take them for, and I will never judge them for that. This is love. 

But to be in love? Perhaps it’s when a person bares their soul to you—the good with the bad, and the beautiful with the ugly—and you still want all of it because you organically connect with every part of them in the most deep, significant, and beautiful ways that you can’t seem to do with others. Is this being in love? Maybe. But I don’t know. I suppose that’s a question for another time.

—a.

[a--musings]

The peach.

July 5, 2019. “You can be the ripest, juiciest peach in the world, and there's still going to be somebody who hates peaches.”

I have thought about this quote many times throughout my adolescent to young adult life, especially when I was younger and the idea of perfection was still viewed as attainable. If I could just be the best at everything—the funniest, the happiest, the smartest, the brightest, the sweetest—then who wouldn’t love me and crave me? For so many years lived in vain, I tried to be just that. I was the ripest, the juiciest, the best I could ever be. And I still faced the startling harsh rejection of the non sequitur that didn’t seem to follow the storyline that I set up in my head. Torturing myself with self-blame and fighting to reach an ideal inevitably ended in acceptance. It was never my fault and it was never in my control. Some people just don’t like peaches.

He hates peaches. It’s quite all right. What is not all right is latching on to the idea that I can urge someone to just give peaches a try because I can make him like them. To waste my energy convincing someone to build an acquired taste. You will like it—no, love it—eventually, as long as you keep trying it. I promise. No, no. No more of that. There are plenty of people out in the world who already love peaches, and are already in search for the ripest, juiciest ones. And once they do find me, I won’t have to convince them to take a bite.

—a.

[a--musings]

The cold.

July 2, 2019. It is sometimes a struggle to remain warm. I try so hard to not allow people and experiences to jade me, but I feel like each and everyday, I experience new encounters that slowly turn me cold. Sometimes I think it’s for the better to become this passively withdrawn, hardened person, but most of the time, I would hate to display such a pretense—limiting my truth and becoming a shell of myself.

My warm, nurturing energy is my strength. It’s one of my unique qualities that I bring to the table. It is something that I learned as I met this new cohort of people and professors, constantly observing each other and making remarks on what is most prominent of each of us. I inspire an environment of warmth, empathy, understanding, and togetherness; very few are capable or willing to do so. Denying such a strength to be embraced would be like voluntarily locking myself into a prison. Not only do I personally enjoy fostering this kind of environment, but others can benefit from it, too—ultimately allowing me to combine passion with purpose. What could be more rewarding than that?!? I believed myself to be unrelentingly kind, loving, and big-hearted, regardless of what was happening around me, and despite how all the ways in which I was treated in return. This is who I was, and I believed that as complete truth. Nothing could shake me from that.

I told myself that I never want to reject a natural part of me ever again, especially the positive parts that can bring sunshine on another’s darkest day. But it’s just so hard to remain true to your virtues when so many external factors discourage you from doing just that. I am becoming jaded, cold, affection-less, impatient, and detached. I don’t want to be kind to people if it means I am inconvenienced. I don’t want to put any energy into making someone else smile. Should I be surprised? They warned us of this happening in medicine. Don’t forget who you are and why you’re doing this, they pleaded. But I am starting to forget. I feel the discouragement happening everyday. I’m not as willing to offer people my time anymore, not willing to offer a shoulder to cry on or lend a helping hand. I talk to so many interns, residents, and fourth years who smile at my naivety, and comment nostalgically about their memories of being a hopeful, starry-eyed baby, as I am. 

And so, it’s inevitable—I understand—to become jaded and hardened and distant and cold. I know this to be true. But it does not have to be the whole story. I will work tirelessly and effortfully to at least reserve some part of me—to keep at least one undying flame within—that I can one day rekindle, triggered under just the right circumstances and for bringing warmth to the right people who really, truly need it. And maybe these parts of me are not necessarily lost, but just laying dormant deep within, while I allow other parts of myself to grow.

—a.

[a--musings]

The anniversary of lessons.

June 13, 2019. Today is a very special day, and I denote “special” in the most peculiar and unexpected of ways. I have finally reached a meaningful date in which I can more objectively view such growth—an actual starting point from which I can tangibly count the days of my rapid change. A year ago, I very erroneously believed that I was a finished product. At 26? How funny. How quaint. I was not a finished product, nor am I now, nor will I ever be. This vision of myself as a happy old lady, staring at the sunrise over green pastures in permanent clarity and peace, reaching the high point of enlightenment was always just an unattainable ideal that no living being would ever reach. 

Last fall, a friend of mine told me about one of the greatest books he’s ever read in which a Roman philosopher (was it a Roman philosopher? maybe?) wrote about a list of people in his life who had impacted him in some way, detailing what he learned from each of them. He wrote about his mother, his friends, his colleagues—anyone who at some point and in some way impacted him. From each, he was able to derive some profound message and life lesson that allowed him to develop his perspective and form his identity. What a beautiful thing it is to sit back and fully realize what it is that each person in your life has given you, and fully acknowledge the impact that every single person can make on your life and your being and your transient existence. When you turn experiences into something you can learn from, you gain closure and you can finally move on. Above that, you gain opportunities for insight into growth, and an opportunity you might have missed, without the pain and the chance of reflection. I thought it was wonderful and useful and fascinating the way that Roman philosopher (maybe?) was able to look back and speak on what each individual soul had gifted him throughout his walk of life. So I thought, what painful and beautiful and heartbreaking and funny and carefree and impactful lessons could I write about? What has the human condition taught me about my own existence?

This is the story about the culmination of lessons that I accepted one year ago today. This is the story about T. 

What did I learn from you, T? You were so important in so many ways that it’s so very hard to create a simple list. It would never do you and all your complexities justice. So many lessons from that earth-shattering heartbreak that I know can be written so beautifully. But it’s all just so complicated to fit into one piece of writing. You were the shockingly abhorrent eye-opener that I needed to wake me from my illusions and my strictly narrow-minded perspective on life. You were the most horrific pain that I desperately needed to feel, to shake me from the trance that held me back from accepting and truly knowing myself. I was naive, foolish, and so assuming that I had finally reached the end of the throes of life. That the hells I went through prior to meeting you was the payment I needed to make for having you. That in order to reach the eternal bliss—the heaven that I thought I found in you—I had to earn you through passing tests from the universe. You were my reward for going through so much strife and struggle. You were my prize that I won for making it through, and everything was going to be okay after having you. You were what I suffered for. I cringe now, but a year ago, this was my truth.

For months, I believed this. You were too good to be true. You were everything I ever wanted. You knew about philosophy, and loved it as much as I did. We coincidentally had been reading The Alchemist at the same time that summer. Transcendentalism was also your favorite. How many Emerson quotes did we recite back and forth to each other? We both had an affinity for Eastern values being integrated into Western. You introduced me to Alan Watts. I introduced you to poetry. We read Khalil Gibran’s The Prophet every night together, before falling asleep. We took walks together, cried in the library together, marveled at the random butterflies together (the omens, remember?). We read books at the beach together, without saying a word. You taught me how to ballroom dance on rooftops, and learned my favorite songs on the piano to play for me when it was 1 AM and I was too discouraged to keep studying. You taught me about mental toughness. I taught you about compassion and perspective. I wrote you love letters almost every single day. You inspired me to create beautiful things again, when I had been stuck in the darkness and shadows for so long. We were soulmates. You made my world beautiful.

But for some reason, the more you said you loved me, the more I questioned myself. The less I could see my worth. Did you love me? I never believed you. I couldn’t accept it. It was a feeling impossible to describe, but it just never felt quite right. It was all off, all wrong—like forcing puzzle pieces to fit together, even though they didn’t quite perfectly align. I became restless. It was a gut feeling that nagged me to my core. It was an instinct kept warning me through my daily anxious thoughts and tendencies. I never felt like I could rest, like I could never be at peace. It consumed me and I let it, because if I didn’t, I would lose you. My life and daily behavior centered around trying to make it feel okay, trying not to lose you. I spoiled the shit out of you. I gave you more of myself than you ever deserved. All to appease the uncomfortable, gnawing anxiety that I had to do everything in my power to keep you. And in doing so, I utterly lost myself. I neglected my true self, my own bearings. I stumble upon the rough drafts of those love letters I wrote for you, and I see now that my language reflected an obsessive need, a way to fill a void. I cringe. I feel disgusted. 

“I love you,” you would tell me, much too often. 

“No, you don’t,” was my immediate, reflexive response. With no thought and no hesitation, “no” was always my instinctual rebuttal. I never asked myself why. Why did I always deny it? 

“You don’t love me, and you don’t really want this,” I would say. “You’re not ready for a relationship. You’re too young. It doesn’t feel right.” But I watched as you fought me and grew tired and frustrated with my rejection of the love you offered. You said I didn’t believe you because I didn’t recognize my own worth. That I could never accept that you loved me because I didn’t love myself. I said I’m sorry, over and over again. I would get angry and call it subconscious self-sabotage, fully believing that I would be our demise. What is wrong with me? I would sob into your chest. Why do I have to ruin everything? You blamed it on me and my insecurities. I accepted the blame. You were right: I was paranoid. I was just insecure. I was letting you tell me what was wrong, totally and completely disregarding my intuition. I hated my unbearable skepticism, and my illogical cynicism. I’m incapable of accepting and trusting beautiful realties--that’s why I feel like this. I ruin everything. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. Very soon I would learn that I was very wrong.

Despite my attempts of forcing puzzle pieces to fit, I still felt the inescapable gnawing “off” feelings. I still saw the subliminal signs and hidden messages--the warning signs to walk away. And slowly, the facade started to unravel to objective evidence supporting my suspicions. The way you tilted your phone around me. The way you treated our classmates that meant nothing to you. You weren’t friendly to my friends. You didn’t care to impress my sister. The way you played so innocent and naive when a girl would send you naked pictures. The disgusting stories you told me about how you mistreated women in the past, and the lies you told to get what you wanted out of them. You told me about all the fuckboi bullshit you actually put women through, and made fun of them for their “stupidity” and falling for your manipulative tricks. I laughed along so uncomfortably, but I was horrified with the realization of what kind of selfish, devious monster you were capable of being, and of all the lies you were capable of telling, and your disrespectful, dehumanizing outlook on others you felt were beneath you. Truthfully, I had never met a person so deceptive and vile as the person you were in those stories. But I was the one who changed you, you urged. I was different. You were different now, all because of me. Yet, I began catching you in weird, meaningless lies, one after the next. From the random time you told me you didn’t buy something off of Amazon, though I knew you had (what was the point of that stupid lie?) to the more detrimental dishonesties, like kissing your best friend or meeting up with your ex behind my back. You had an honesty problem your entire life, you admitted to me towards the end of it all. You were a pathological liar. That should have been enough. But it wasn’t. I was still okay with the illusion and I was accepting of remaining in my fantasy world. I forced myself to be. I was hiding the truth from myself, dodging mirrors that would force me to face the facts, avoiding all the inklings and urgings of which my subconscious was desperately trying to make me aware. I chose to see the world through rose colored glasses, as opposed to accepting it all for what it really was. I was smiling through the pain, delusional in my conviction that you were made for me. Nobody in this world would get me like you did. I wasn’t me without you. I couldn’t live without you. I never wanted to be in a world that you didn’t exist ever again. 

And then so abruptly, last June, you left. “I’m not ready for this,” you explained over the phone.It didn’t make sense. I had told you that it didn’t feel right the whole time--that you never felt quite mature enough. You weren’t ready, I would always argue. I was paranoid, you would invalidate. Oh, T. I was right all along. I was angry with myself for not stubbornly sticking to the truth. “I told you that you weren’t ready and you lied to me,” I sobbed. “I know,” was your only reply. It didn’t matter, though; it was inevitable. I didn’t trust my gut feeling; I should have expected this. I mourned your departure and stopped eating for weeks.  And despite it all, I still spent the whole summer trying to transform myself in ways to win you back. So pathetic. My undying loyalty has always been a gift and a curse.

We reconnected in early August, forced to return to school to face each other. And for a moment, I regrettably believed the story wasn’t over. I spent time with you back then. I talked to you. I laughed with you. It started feeling normal again. I still love you, I would slur in your ear when I was drunk. I’m sorry for everything I did to ruin it. I’m sorry. I met other great guys that August, but I couldn’t fully shut the door on you. I didn’t understand why weren’t together anymore. Everything made sense when it was the two of us. I demanded the answer from you: don’t you remember how happy we were?

“You never would have loved the real me,” you vaguely said to me one day. “I wasn’t myself that whole time.”

“What does that even mean? Are you a serial killer?” I joked, though secretly alarmed.

“We’re not as compatible as you think we are. That just was never me,” he continued. “I can’t be with one girl forever. I have to end up with someone who will let me have sex with whoever I want while she stays loyal to me.”

“What? Like an open relationship?” I was repulsed, but I tried to feign nonchalance so you would continue to open up.

“Ew, no,” he said, disgusted. “I can’t be with a girl who’s fucked a bunch of dicks in her 20s. She has to stay loyal to me. I need to be able to do whatever I want, but she can’t. I just love pussy too much.”

I shuddered, horrified, and overcome by feelings of terror.  Ew, what the fuck? Never did I ever expect this selfish, misogynistic garbage from you, T. I felt like I was trapped in a dark room alone with a complete stranger. I was afraid. Who were you really this entire time? Did you actually like The Prophet? Did you just google Thoreau quotes before seeing me so you could sound like you knew who you were talking about? How much of the T that I knew was real? 

I froze, still stunned with the realization that you truly were the professional liar that you warned me about. I had to pause to catch me breath while we sat there in silence. As I began processing it all, I had one tiny moment of “well....maybe I can do this. Maybe I can allow him to do whatever he wants. As long as he comes home to me afterward. Physical intimacy doesn’t compare to the connection we have...” And as soon as I heard my inner voice contemplate such a dynamic, I instantly detested myself. I finally began to put myself first. What is wrong with you, A?! My inner monologue finally shifted. Get your shit together and gain some self-respect, you idiot. You’re above this. And I swear, in that moment, I could hear the door finally slamming shut on you, on us. We never had another conversation about us ever again, unsurprisingly. After all, we never really did exist in the first place.

I learned so much from you, T. I learned that I’m smart enough and strong enough to figure out what I deserve and to demand it. I know much more than I believe I do, and I know that I have never given myself enough credit—that I too quickly look outside of myself for the answers. That I am inherently valuable and capable on my own, I have had all the answers all along, inside of me. I learned that I have gift of intuition, and that if I feel a certain way—if something seems wrong or off—there is probably a very good reason. I always knew I was settling, deep down inside.

Our end was never my fault for my insufferable skepticism and pessimism. I learned that I had a very dangerous and toxic tendency to blame myself for all the wrong, and that my ready acceptance of all the guilt could be used to take advantage of me one day. I let you blame me for so long. I learned how to finally respect myself. 

I learned what love is. I learned what love is not. I learned how it felt to be loved conditionally, to know the harsh, painful reality of what it was like to be loved only to a certain extent—only if I would give you what you selfishly desired. That was not love. That was ownership. That was inauthenticity. I don’t need someone who reads The Alchemist or puts up with my 2AM musings on poetry or teaches me about Alan Watts. I want to be with someone who simply appreciates all these parts of me, and allows me to feel whole on my own. I learned how to identify my inherent values, and how to walk away from people and things that do not align with them. I thought I needed you to be at peace with myself, but here I am proving myself wrong. There is no one in the entire world that you can’t live without. And I know exactly what I do not want for myself anymore. I am unwilling to compromise. 

Maya Angelou said, “when someone shows you who they are, believe them the first time.” I bore the consequences of choosing someone over my own intuition—of trusting someone who proved to me to be untrustworthy countless timeless over trusting myself. I’m intelligent enough to see the truth early on--I learned that I am gifted in sensing the inauthentic and dishonest motives, and seeing through the disingenuous bullshit. 

There was a part of me that knew I clung onto the concept of you, T. I forced myself to believe you were the T I so desperately wanted you to be, and you loved me enough for those 8 months to play the part. But in the end, you were just another bandage to cover my wounds—to hide the broken parts from myself. There were so many things wrong with me, so much work on myself to be done, but I was always finding distractions to deter me from the pain of growth and moving on. I wasn’t ready to love anyone. I needed to “love” this concept of you as a diversion—a way to avoid loving myself. When you left, I was stripped of everything. I was naked and alone. But I realized I needed to be to establish who I was on my own, outside of anyone telling me who I was. I never would have learned all these things about myself if it weren’t for you, T, so I thank you and your (quite frankly) fucked up mentality for granting me wisdom and insight into myself and humanity. I look back in hindsight and with clarity that T never even existed in the first place. Your sole purpose in my life was the lessons that you brought, and now they are complete.

It took me 76 days to tell you that I loved you. It took me 171 days to realize that I probably never did. I’m sorry. I will never apologize for that.

—a.

[a--musings]

The summer love.

June 11, 2019. Is there something in the air? I wonder. Or perhaps there’s some kind of trite cultural association with summertime and romance and the sudden expectation to pair up due to excessive free time and hot weather and skimpy outfits. Cue Grease’s Summer Lovin’, accompanied by the eternal rolling of my eyes. 

I don’t understand it, but for the past month, I’ve been having the same conversation with different people. Virtually everyday of my life, and multiple times throughout the day, a friend will tell me, “I really NEED to set you up with someone! I just NEED to find someone for you!” Okay, but where did this dire need come from? 

Sure, I often make self-deprecating jokes of the likelihood of ending up alone (which I have truthfully learned to accept as a very okay possibility). But these “selfless” offerings and favors from “matchmakers” are entirely unsolicited. It is perplexing. Vexing. Such logic is complexing. Why is there an assumption that this is a void to fill? Is it really that weird that I choose not to pursue anyone anymore? That I don’t feel the need to actively search for a partner and force myself to spend time with random men? The mere thought of having to put on a fake smile while sitting across from a complete stranger as they probe me under a microscope and superficially question if I’m worth any of their effort...my God, it’s cringey beyond any capacity that the human language can explain. It’s agonizingly boring and very embarrassing. The whole thing absolutely pains me for a multitude of reasons. But most importantly, I don’t need to watch someone actively question if I’m good enough. I don’t need another reason to question myself.

And yet, that is a hard concept for others to accept and understand. It’s always, “are you dating anyone?” To which I respond, “I actually don’t really remember the last time I went on a date.”

“Liar!” One acquaintance said recently. “I don’t believe you at all.  You’re a very, very cute girl. There’s no way you aren’t dating someone.”

Another friend said, “I just don’t understand why you’re single. I don’t get it. You don’t even have any red flags.”

The issue has never, ever been whether or not I’m cute enough, or whether I can find someone to go on a date with. But I always find it fairly interesting that this is the immediate conclusion that many people tend to arrive, and so very instantly, too. With the risk of exuding absolute arrogance, it is very unlikely that I will ever have any kind of struggle or difficulty in finding someone who wants to go on a date with me. That’s just the way it genuinely is. Female privilege, I guess. It is not hard to find a date, and it has nothing to do with any failure on my end. I truly do not see the need. My life is not lacking because I am single. I don’t need a fiery romance to feel whole, or to have enriched, exciting experiences. I can feel fulfilled and satisfied with life, independent of having someone alongside me. 

“Don’t worry, you’ll find someone when you least expect it,” people often comfort and reassure me, as if singlehood automatically warrants suffering. It is not suffering to enjoy your own company. To be yourself, unquestionably. To not have to answer to someone. To make small or big decisions without having to consider anyone else. To learn what it is that you truly want out of life. To even just learn the simple things of daily living, like how you really want to spend your time throughout your day, without any external factors influencing you. What is suffering, I have found, is playing the game. 

This is not saying that I am completely emotionally unavailable and too self-absorbed and self-involved to give anyone the time of day. I have not written anyone off. I am not completely opposed to romantic pursuits. I just don’t have the patience to create these facades, leading boys to acquaint with the mask that I put on, instead of me. Now that I’ve finally started the slow and painful journey of self-discovery, I am finally learning to really love and appreciate who I inherently am and what I inherently value. I want to present myself in a way that is consistent with my true nature. But unfortunately, the whole dynamic of dating just doesn’t support authenticity, genuineness, and free and open expression of true thoughts and feelings. Dating is playing it cool. Dating is a chase that leaves me unamused. Dating is just a power struggle, craftily putting up defenses to ensure you won’t get heartbroken. It’s a constant series of mindgames and subtleties and subconscious manipulations and overanalyzing each other because both people are unwilling to express themselves honestly, out of fear or out of a lack of maturity. It’s a game of chess, filled with subtle, very planned wise moves to maneuver every situation to gain some desired outcome. It’s forcefully morphing into a (sometimes) reduced version of yourself. It’s learning what a person wants and what they find desirable and adapting to become that for the person. It’s complying with introjected regulations to be accepted by someone who very obviously does not really want the real you. It’s protecting yourself from vulnerability, inhibiting any form of a real human connection. It’s falsehoods and pretenses and secrets and living a lie—what I feel to be true suffering. 

I have spent a regrettable amount of time going against myself to keep someone happy. I have been self-deceptive, unrealistic, and untrue to myself. My past relationships were all so dangerously and irrationally instant; I wanted them immediately. I fell for the foolish, tricking trope of the spark and subsequently put them on a pedestal because I am, unfortunately, a hopeless romantic. Once I felt this spark, I romanticized and idealized our relationship in my head. I played it out the way I wanted it to be. I figured out what I had to do to make it work, like a director, making all the right pieces fall into place in order to create this beautiful, passionate story of our romantic lives. S wanted a simple, uncomplicated girl, so I drank cheap beer and watched baseball and sports bars for 12 hours. A wanted the armchair intellectual so I stuck my nose in pretentious books that I did not want to read. T wanted the party girl, and that’s who I became, drinking and going to parties with people who didn’t care about me. I never gave these men the chance to fall for me--the true, real me...nor did I give myself the chance to decide if they were even right for the real me. I never allowed enough time for them to discover who I was, or gave them a chance to learn about my real strengths and weaknesses. I felt the spark and dove right in and that inevitably led to the downfall every single time. Fiery romance? No. Just highly intense, superficial fleeting moments of flawed idealism in which we were “in love” with concepts of each other. Unsustainable and unrealistic.

So no, I don’t have any interest in being set up on a blind date with a so-called “soulmate” by a friend who unintentionally overhyped me and my attributes. I will not, as another friend suggested, more frequently visit museums and talk to strangers in hopes of meeting a compatible mate. I’m not expecting to sit at a coffeeshop and lock eyes with a mysterious dark-haired stranger across the room. I don’t need the romantic fairytales of summertime and hot weather and skimpy outfits. I don’t need to awaken the hopeless romantic within me, where I completely change who I am and become whatever fictional self that they want to keep the romance from fizzling out. I yearn to be free and authentic, naturally expressing my humanity and my honest nature. And if there is ever someone that begins to fall in love with that, then I’m open to reception.

Over the past year, I slowly and deliberately got to know myself and my traits—my flaws and all. I searched my soul and discovered both the beautiful and the ugly. I understand what I offer to others, and understood my unique gifts. I fell in love with myself after getting to know myself, slowly, over time. And that’s exactly the way I hope to be loved by someone else. Because I won’t have any suspicions or doubts. Because now, I’ll know why. And besides, they always say that it’s the gradual, slow burn that builds the most heat. It gradually builds to become the strong foundation of an unquestionable partnership.

As horrendously cliché and cheesy as it sounds...this summer, my romance will continue to be with myself. I will be me, stubbornly and uncompromisingly, and I will say what I want to say and feel how I want to feel, and I will be a happier person because of it. If someone does happen to become enamored with the real me and my authentic expression, I will allow it to grow. If I have someone alongside me, then it’s fine. If I’m utterly alone, then it’s fine. None of it really matters. I will always enjoy my own company, despite it all. 

—a.

[a--musings]

The hypocrite.

May 22, 2019. Humans can be extraordinarily surprising. Often times, in good ways. Unfortunately, often times, in bad. Then there are those undeniable unfortunate moments of appalling abhorrence and experiencing the shocking spectrum of human nature. But every once in a while, there is an unexpected spark of unusual goodness and compassion and congeniality, serving as little reminders that we will never have to walk this world alone, simply because we are not. There is no way that we are. There are too many people in this world throughout all walks of life; we are bound to eventually find someone who can understand even the slightest, as they face similar human experiences alongside you. You may just never know it.

Isolation has been an uphill battle, and I have been fighting the good fight for months now. Ironically, it has only been burdening to escape the throes of loneliness when I wasn’t alone at all. Constant feelings of yearning solitude and dissatisfaction created this urgency of self-protection, pushing me to build walls between myself and “other.” Feeling isolation causes me to self-isolate, keeping the distance between myself and people far enough to limit their impact on me. I can’t feel the inability to create meaningful connections if there is nobody to connect with at all, right? I decided I would not give anyone the opportunity to make me feel like something was deeply lacking, and I would do so by seclusion. After all, the only times I felt lonely were when I was not.

But what kind of life was I forcing myself to live? I was a fervid advocate for openness and vulnerability, encouraging people to open their hearts up to entrusting others with their deepest sensitivities, and searching for ways to inspire my peers to receive such encounters with compassion and understanding. Yet, I was hypocritically deciding to live in defensive fear. I was fraught with mentally taxing cognitive dissonance and the endless confusion over my conflicting thoughts and behaviors. But this is how I accepted life to be for myself, and I worked to establish a new normalcy, regardless of how much it contradicted with my true inherent nature and innate values. Everyone should be open and compassionate, however, I will be closed off. This was my philosophy.

Last weekend, I, a drunken fool, locked myself out of my apartment and had no choice but to Uber at 2 AM to sleep on a friend’s futon. We were still quite drunk, making childish jokes, and having the same meaningless, belligerent conversation to which I have become accustomed. We were talking about food and alcohol and people and sex--just mindless chatter and drunk small talk, filling his apartment with the tipsy, booming laughter that I ordinarily fight so hard to escape. 

“Sometimes I feel sad,” he said so abruptly. “Apart from one person, I just don’t have any real friends here.”

What? I sat up, caught off guard by a sudden moment of earnestness, that had a strikingly sharp contrast from the lighthearted conversation mere seconds before.

He continued, “I don’t have anyone who understands me. I don’t connect with people. Everyone tells me that G and I are such best friends and we get along so well, but it’s not true. He doesn’t get me, and he never will get me. We don’t have much in common beyond the superficial. We have fun together. We’re outgoing. We go to parties. That’s about it. I hardly have anyone. I haven’t been able to make any real, lifelong connections. It’s lonely.”

I reiterate: there are too many people in this world throughout all walks of life; we are bound to eventually find someone who can understand even the slightest. In a random moment of vulnerability--in his sudden decision to trust me with his truth--I discovered something about a dear friend that I had never known--something that resonated so profoundly with me. I never knew he felt so lonely, as he never knew that I did too. But he took the chance to confide in me, sharing feelings that mirrored my exact thoughts, as if he had some supernatural ability to read my mind and verbalize my hidden truths. I was surprised. Astounded. Amazed. Not only by the fact that he was so willing to trust me with his most recent pains, but that he was just like me. We were both so lonely, so isolated, reaching out for months to find people who would meet us at the other end, and wanting the same depth and substance that we yearned for. I was finally not alone in this. I had someone who finally understood and shared the same sentiment. I wasn’t crazy. I wasn’t some black sheep or social outcast who was the only one dissatisfied with the way things were. In that moment, I knew with absolutely certainty, that I was not entirely isolated all along. I didn’t have to walk through life alone. I didn’t have to fight the fight by myself. With no hesitation, this is something I knew to be an absolute truth. That alone was healing.

Such an experience also lead me to realize that I had been a hypocrite. Nobody knows I’m isolated because nobody cares to ask, I would angrily think to myself. How had I missed this common sentiment in my dear friend? I hadn’t asked him. He hadn’t opened up to me because I didn’t foster any type of relationship that lead him to believe he should. All along, I had not been genuine, I had not been vulnerable, I had not been the things that I claim to value--the things I push and pry others to be. If I had been, he would have known I felt the same way. He would have come to me sooner and admitted he shared the same struggles and the shared the same experiences. When you open yourself up to others, and show yourself in the truest, realest, most sensitive and vulnerable form, you are giving them a place to open to you too. Having the courage to be vulnerable might just encourage others to open up and be vulnerable as well. I think the world needs more of that.

—a.