The beginning, again.

Thank you Foxtrot. Each day is a new beginning.

 

Gratitude. Today I take a moment and realize how grateful I am for everything that I have. This is not easy. This is not simple. This is something that all of us take very seriously. But at the same time we need to be thankful for everything that we do have in our lives. For me right now that's friends, family, a job and more importantly myself. I can be a little selfish in this and say that I'm proud of who I am. I'm happy with the flaws and the moments of doubt and sorrow. I'm proud of all the mistakes and the times where I've wanted to end it all. Because every moment makes me me. I'm thankful for my family that have been a support line for me. And my friends that have put up with my shit more times than I know. I'm thankful I still have dreams and goals and what a positive future for myself. I'm thankful I didn't end it all when I thought about getting a gun that day. I'm thankful that each day the sun rises and sets and I have the same amount of hours to live as they day before to make everything I want possible for myself. I'm thankful for the reader who sees this and the person who writes it. Each day I work towards being more grateful about my life and the things that I have to live with. Each day is a blessing that I can only pray I'll get again and again. And each day I think about moving forward toward the life I want to live and it's working. It's working and I'm grateful for that. Keep being grateful for everything you have my friends. There are always things to bitch and whine about but the things that keep us going are the things we are grateful for and happy for.

 

Temptation. Every day I walk around and there is temptation. Ways for me to act out. Ways for me to slip back into the type of behavior that I know will ultimately lead me into a deep deep depression that I don't want to go to. Movies, music, my iPhone, literally walking around the mall sometimes I see a beautiful woman and my mind starts going to those familiar places. But as long as I'm able to keep some of the temptations at bay then I can make it through. I'm saying "no" much more in my mind these days. Succumbing to the whims of a stray thought have always lead me to acting out. My emotions can get the best of me and before I used to just numb them, and now I try my best to just feel them. Let them wash over me like a warm blanket for a moment and then breathe. Just breathe. I've heard in the past, "How can you stop it? It's everywhere? Sex is literally everywhere so why even try?" I've said these words a few times myself. I used to answer with "yeah, sure why not, just go for it." But now I say things like "Stop. Think. Don't act. Take a second and relax." By taking that one moment of time to really analyze what's going on it's made the difference in these last weeks. For some reason today has been a very tempting day for me. But I keep reminding myself, just breathe. It'll pass, and I can focus on what's important for myself. If you're reading this, I hope you are resisting the temptations that surround us. I hope you can notice them for what they are, and then let them pass as you move forward in your journey. Be strong.

 

Moving on. I've probably always cared about people way more than they ever cared about me. I've over cared, put myself out there. Perhaps even to a fault. Moving on from people has always been difficult because maybe I'm addicted to those relationships too. The daily knowing of seeing someone or the usual activities that I'd have with them was calming. Losing a friend is hard, especially when it comes to the circumstances, which in relation to what I'm writing about deals with objectification and manipulation of certain situations to get a sexual high I'm searching for. Yes, I've lost many close relationships because of this. And I can't help but think that I've hurt all the chances I've had at real love because I always searched for one thing to satisfy me. But it never did. It only left a hole so much bigger in my life than I ever knew was there. Losing friends is like having someone in your life pass away. There are stages. Grief, denial, anger, acceptance, all of those. I feel like in some way I'm doing that with the person I was. That person was me. I loved him, just like I love myself now. But I have to say goodbye to him. I have to come to terms with the fact that I won't be able to see them anymore, or allow myself the chance for that. Because I do not ever want to go back. Ever. Particularly this last week has been challenging for me in letting go of that. Accepting that the person I was is disappearing and a new version of myself is being born. I have no choice. I have to. I have to move on from all the old relationships that hurt me, the ones that I damaged, and that includes my relationship to myself. I have to be willing to move on from myself to go forward in this life. It's a strange concept to have to mourn yourself, but I have been crying a lot more lately, and maybe this is all a part of moving on.

 

Irony. So confession time. Yesterday I watched some porn. I don't really think I was struggling, I don't think I was losing myself. I just think I was in a weird place at that moment and felt the need to act out. It has been a few weeks. No excuses, it was a weird moment. But something was completely different about it this time. Over the last few weeks I have been consciously doing everything I can to become more aware about myself. I've been doing my best to not push down my emotions or run away from feelings that have been coming up. While there have been awkward moments, overall it has been really great for me, and I'm grateful for how I've been able to respond. With that being said, yesterday was the first time maybe ever I watched porn and did not completely disappear into the numbness. I was sitting there watching it, and my first thought was that this was the most stupidest thing in the world. These women are clearly not have a good time at all, and there was absolutely no intimacy involved with anything happening. I noticed all of this and found myself not caring about watching the porn, but thinking about the people. I found myself thinking, I wonder what their dreams were once? I wonder how happy they are in their lives? I wonder if they just shove their feelings down so deep the way I used to just to get themselves through this. I laughed. I just laid there and laughed at the absurdity of it all and how I realized I had been wasting my time on this. I wasn't aroused or interested in them. I "finished" though, even if it felt a little forced. I looked at myself in the mirror, and instead of shame, I felt a little pride. I know it's counter to what I've always felt and maybe a little foolish, but I was happy with myself. The realization was more than I thought would come from a moment that used to bring me such pain. I am learning. I am growing. I am realizing who I am and having moments where I can recognize the situation and not numb it down. I am learning to be happy. I am also not punishing myself for small missteps, instead trying to visualize the opportunity to grown from them and move on. I have no desire today to look at porn. Even when I was watching it yesterday I knew I wouldn't want to watch it again. I don't know if I'll slip up or act out again, but I do know that I am learning from my mistakes. I'm starting to like this me more and more.

 

Depression. It's taking over my life. I work harder than ever and have more than I've ever had before, but it's meaningless. It's nothing. I look at pictures of friends. Nothing. Of family. Nothing. Of experiences from my past. Nothing. In fact that can be worse because I always conjure up the bad memories from my experiences. That trip to Europe, tainted. The times I had in college, worthless. This is what depression is, even though my life is pretty great. Everything is shit, and what does it all mean. I don't think I would, but I've contemplated suicide more lately. Too much perhaps. How easy it seems to simply wander off into the void and everyones life would go on and be ok. How I would gladly just give up every shred of responsibility and throw away the last penny in my bank account if it could bring me peace. Some sense that life for me is going to get better. That I'm going to get better that all the things I dream about can get better. I know the mantra "One day at a time". I know the phrase a 1,000 mile journey begins with one step. I know that I am ultimately responsible for every action I have. But I also know I'll never get back the last two hours of my life I spent watching porn. Those videos that arouse me, but in the end disgust me more than ever. The 2 seconds of euphoria I achieve from my release and then the days of shame and guilt that follow. This is my journey. This is my depression. And right now, this is my life.

Day #0

 

Day #1

Steady thoughts. Steady. Don't waiver. Don't drift. Focus. Remain strong. Each day is a challenge, a lesson to be learned. Calm your vibrations. No need to hurt yourself or to run away from your thoughts. Breathe. Breathe. Breathe. Reach out with shaking hands if need be, but reach out. Breathe. Remain true to what your instincts tell you is right. Push away the thoughts of what is wrong. Do not judge. Do not shame. Accept. Accept and grow from it. Hold hands. Hug. Love. Cry. Feel. Sadness happens. Let it happen. Anger happens. Let it happen. Happiness happens. Let it happen. Do not deny your truth. It is who you are. Do not deny your past. It has led you to this moment. Accept all situations. Breathe. You are loved. Breathe. You are learning. Breathe. You are growing into the person you want to be, day by day. Smile... then breathe. Then live.

 

Day #3

Control. It's not a matter of power but will. I do not desire the power to control myself. Only the will to make the correct decisions. Only the timing necessary to go from one edge of the knife to the other. I am in a word, working. Work hard. Be patient. Focus. Breathe. This has been my mantra the last week. These words have given me strength. These words are mine now. And I will continue to use them as long as I can.

 

Day #7
Perspective. What's important. What do you truly, deeply and passionately want in this world. Love, happiness, tears of both joy and pain. A life worthy of living. Family. As each day moves on I feel stronger, and I feel my decisions are moving me in a positive place. I've had bad nights. I've had nights where I wanted to revert. But I didn't, because I know now it's not worth it. It's not worth it. My life is worth more to me that a few minutes of numbing myself. My life is worth more than slipping and falling back into old habits and routines that I know I'll have to dig myself out of over and over again. My life is worth more than that. My health is worth more than that. I keep remembering that. Work hard. Be patient. Stay focused. Breathe.

 

Hell. It is a real place. It is not some imaginary location in the minds of the mystical or religious. It is a place that exist, inside your mind whether you want it to or not. Hell is the knowing that people you love will die, and there is nothing you can do about it. Hell is that feeling of being powerless to your thoughts that subside in your mind, always there at every turn. Hell is the loneliness that is everywhere no matter how many people you are surrounded by or how happy you feel at any one point in time. Hell is real. It is soul sucking and it makes me feel like there is no hope sometimes. I become consumed with all things negative and forget all the positive in the world. It is taking me too long to return to a place of thoughtful peace and mindful awareness. I am struggling, again. And again, I start over.

Day #1

 

I'm losing sense of who I am. I'm forgetting my worth. I constantly drive myself into wedges that I cannot remove myself from without hard choice or massive sacrifice and apparently I'm not willing to do either. I fear I will be stuck here in this moment of shame and guilt forever. I fear I will not grow, I will not learn, I will not be happy nor do I truly want to be otherwise I would never do these things to myself selfishly over and over and over again. It is no longer hate, I do not hate myself I simply wish to be gone, and not even dead gone, but gone as in not here nor ever was here. As if my very existence was a thorn in the sides of the people I cared about most, even though they know nothing about my struggles or contemplations of shame. I am utterly, and without a doubt alone... at least inside my mind. I've written about hell, and it is only because the great beauty that is out here in the world, I do not see it, do not embrace it, do not enjoy any part of it. I ignore it, and listen instead to the urges of my disease. This is a moment of reflection. And I also know, that no one will see it.

 

Where do I begin. It's been a while. My last entry from Oct. 19th 2016 actually came a day after I had had dinner with a beautiful woman. I was in a relationship for some months. I was enjoying the idea of moving forward and truly being at peace with myself and diving head first. But I am always worried and always thinking about my past actions as a shameful representation of who I actually am, even if it's not. The first few months of the relationship were nice, and then the me monster appeared again, and I was all but lost to the fantasies that don't exist. I don't know why I did, but I know the moment I started watching pornography online again the relationship went south. Of course, I never cheated on her. I never acted inappropriately with anyone else. That's happened to me and I could never do that. However I emotionally cheated, and I suppose that's just as bad. She had her own problems, trust issues and self esteem issues that I could never make better. I hid all my troubles from her. This woman that I had loved, and I couldn't share a thing. Looking back it was doomed to work, dealing with sociopaths is never easy, and trying to have a relationship with one is even harder. And now that I'm finally at a point of moving somewhat forward, I cannot help but feel failure at the edge of everything I do. My work suffers. My relationships with my friends suffer. I constantly feel as though I'm alone and that nothing is going to change that. I woke up in a sweat the other night and could only think of one thing; suicide. Ending everything. I would like to say it was an overreaction to my sadness, but I planned it out. Who I would leave my stuff to, where all my things would go etc. It was an in depth of how the after-me life would look like. The worst part about it was the thought that once it was done everyone would just move on with their lives and I would just be a figment of their imaginations; someone that they used to hang out with, but just doesn't come out anymore. Like I would be nothing at all. And as weird as it sounds there is some small comfort in that, that if it did happen people would be ok.

I miss her. Not the shitty parts of everything but the moments that made me smile. I'm getting older so I think I would want to be with someone, a companion. She wasn't it, but the idea of her lingers in my mind and feeds this sense that time is running out. Maybe I'm boring. Maybe I don't do anything in my life or take adventures or live to the fullest because of the shame that I have. There was a time when it was gone, but now it just sticks with me. It does not recede. I hear my part of the song getting softer and softer and at times I just want it all to be completely over and done with. Will it ever get better? Will there ever be peace? Will I enjoy any parts of the beauty of life. I want to, I really do. I don't know what it would look like, but I do.

 

Not sure I'd be good with that. I don't react well to drugs in general, but thank you for the suggestion.

 

The move on.... The time between making changes while trying to stick to them, and engage again back in the real world. Some days are better than others, but I've been keeping away from the internet porn distractions. Unfortunately I just distract myself with so many other things. TV, social media, all that stuff. At this point my sadness has been wrapped up into a big ball of wtf happened and how the hell do I go forward. When the wave hits, it hits hard, like a tsunami. I'm hoping it gets to the point of baby waves soon, but I must be patient. The hardest part of all of this is that I'm learning that my dissociation from my relationships goes back to my childhood. Of course it does, doesn't it always. We dig and dig and try to find out why the familiar in our minds is actually the evil that tears us apart. Mine is my need to make my father love me. And learning that my last relationships were pretty much like my dad makes this whole thing very weird, but also makes perfect sense. My girlfriends took things to personally; so did he. They all turned everything around onto them and disregard any of my feelings; kinda like he does. They try to say everything they did was out of love and for the strength of the relationship even when their actions were harmful and obviously manipulative; just like him. Claiming to be strong minded, but always being a victim; just like my dad. I love my father. I get the weird sense that if I didn't this would be a whole lot easier in the way to notice those types of personalities and move on very quickly from them. But I've always been kind of an enemy to him. Competition of a sort in this world where he would have to beat me down to swoop in and save me. And because I wanted his love I just took it. Because I wanted their love I just took it. I took the abuse. I took the tirades. I took the mental breakdown that was all the relationships I had. Never really having a say in anything and being on eggshells all the time. Even now I act the part with the relationships I truly care about. It's never served me, so why now? The questions are crazy, but the answers are insane. But with the insanity I find some peace, and continue forward.

 

Connection.... Finding that way to look past my own insecurities to open myself up, even just a little to anyone. As I get a little older parts of me understand the gap between meeting peoples true minds and intentions and just gliding on the surface that they choose to show us. I think the most difficult part of all of this is accepting the risk of being turned down. There is an idea that is lodged inside my brain that tells me that I'm not good enough, nor will I ever be. Self-love. That's what my therapist says. Being kinder to myself in the way that makes me feel good about myself. All I've ever wanted was to be accepted I think. I'm not sure I did anything else except for that reason. As I look back on it, perhaps my way to connect with those that I wanted to was to always sacrifice my own wants and needs to fit theirs. I know I did that with my family, my relationships. And then the happy place that I was able to find some kind of feeling in was porn. It was easy. No work. No judgement. No connection. I get exactly what I want and I'm in and out. But the real truth is that it's a lie. Porn sucks you into a meaningless relationship with fantasy. It takes the better parts of your romantic nature and distorts it into one of degradation and shame. The women in my life no longer look like people, but objects. Acting out while in a relationship brought about so much shame and insecurity that I couldn't even make love to my partners. It was always a recipe for disaster. But there have been many times in my life when there was not that shame and true connections existed. The first kiss. The first deep look into the eyes. That one time I held on so tight I thought I'd never let go. Those moments are there. I think now I'm looking to get past the moments of shame and truly live in the most present way I can.

 

Thank you for that Seb. Writing about it definitely has helped a lot too. In my head it's all so jumbled but when I actually focus on what it is I want to say it becomes more clear. I think that is an excellent way to think about those things. I'll try that.

 

Pressure. There exist something inside our society (particularly in the US) this crazy pressure to succeed. This idea that in order to be happy we have to succeed in our jobs/love life/status. We are constantly bombarded with this idea that if we are not somewhat flawless in these areas, or as perfect as we can be that we will be big failures. Bluntly, it sucks. I grew up in a house where it was important to always put up the good show, and do everything for sake of my fathers watching eyes. Pressure to get good grades, to run faster, to be better than the next guy, but more importantly to make him proud. I was thinking out loud today that I grew up in a world where it was more important to sacrifice my happiness, my needs, my wants for the betterment of the family; to make him proud of me. I love my dad, but it's not the child's job to sacrifice their happiness for sake of the parent. This concept has leaked into my adult life, and persisted ever since. No wonder my last relationship was with a complete narcissist. Me being vulnerable and willing to completely sacrifice my desires to better someone else fits right into the playing field of a person who only wants to control someone for their own selfish needs. I think that's why porn was so easy for me to get addicted to. I could be in any fantasy I wanted, any woman I wanted, any situation my heart desired and I could get it any time I wanted. For once I wouldn't need to sacrifice any time, or effort to get the satisfactions and instant gratification that comes along with using porn. But the feeling was short lived, always. So it increased and intensified until there were days where I would just stay in front of the computer for hours on end. I wanted love, healthy attention, intimacy. Every time I asked my dad to do something for me it was a chore, a hardship, a burden. So I just stopped asking. Stopped wanting. Whatever was easier for him and what he needed was the way to go. Same with my relationships in my life, whatever they wanted and desired was always more important than what it was I wanted and needed. And always in the background porn was there. The fantasies of escaping away to fulfill any desire I had of intimacy that I've craved so much in my life. The pressure of being the good son, the loving boyfriend, the nice guy, the good friend, the reliable one. Always at the sacrifice of my wants and needs. And why not? I could meet all my wants with the click of a button. But now it's not enough. It never really was, as even as a child all I wanted was to feel someone close, to breath them in and have them want to be close to me. It's not about sex, but about connection now. It's not about lust, but about intimacy. Pressure has always been for the betterment of others for me. Time to switch the thinking, and put the pressure on myself for my own happiness rather than others.