Sympathy

"Everybody ain't like you!"

My mother burned that into my brain.

She wasn't speaking on race, gender, creed or sexual preference, she was just speaking on people; on their person.

Although in life one may struggle to empathize with a persons person, no matter how much you've grown, no matter how unprejudiced or less tainted you may be, everybody ain't gone see shit how you do. Though I sympathize for the person who may be ignorant to the realities of life and the significance of an unsocial, I also sometimes cannot understand how or why people choose to judge or speak on things that that do not know; especially when based off of the not so timeless precedents set by their elders.

Un-orchestrated ..

I seem to have fallen in love with the idea of being loved and wanted, when truly all I want, at this point is to be dealt with (no, not handled). At this point in time I haven't quite figured out how to love myself in order to be loved by another. Still selectively tolerable of another individuals pros and cons they may or may not consciously afford me, I see that I'm not ready for love, but to be welcomed for all that I am without complaint. Though I am aware this may be quite a bit to ask for, I feel that it is nothing short of what I deserve.
As most have experienced heartache and break, self love and self hate, pain and pleasure, as well as extreme heights of happiness and sadness, I too have endured the same. However, I have yet to calculate the sum of all these variables. I have yet to compose the perfect symphony that will crescendo itself into my future. Still sitting at last chair, second violin. Although, I am my own composer, instructor and violinist, I've barely learned to differentiate between treble and bass cleffs.
The irony; my orchestra career was cut short via my own lack of self confidence. Hah. And so the orchestra plays on ...

8.6.14 - overdue

It's always easier so much easier to give sensible, applicable advice to anyone other than yourself. Some of said advice may be residual of experience, or may even be easily accessible via common sense.

Being told on more than one occasion that I take such good care of people, everyone, other than myself, I've come to realize I do so subconsciously. However, being the person that I am, the person that I want to be, I thrive off of being able to help someone, because more often than not, I feel as though I can't help myself. Not only that, but it makes me feel worth something. Going through so many hard times myself, I know how important it is to feel and recognize that someone cares; especially when you just don't have it in you to do so for yourself.

I've always felt like I don't need or want anyone to take care of me the way that I take care of others. Truth is, I do. I need someone to go out of their way to not let me push them away. To fight this battle with me. Truth is, I don't want my wreck to be theirs. I'd rather combine their struggles with mine and free them from it. In a way I've programmed myself to hurt and stress, as if to intentionally create normality of these emotions. However, I am nowhere near numb. I feel everything. Every little thought that bogs my mind. Every ounce of stress that weighs. Every bit of rejection and defeat that sends me leaping ten steps back into self pity. I feel so much that more often than not, I'm not sure what i truly feel. It's almost like I feel so much that I'm constantly feeling everything at once. Yet, my feelings have nothing on my thoughts.

My thoughts are what feed my sleepless nights. Nights that i shadowbox with sleep as a miserable attempt to avoid yet another day of thoughts and feelings. But, tomorrow always comes, my thoughts never leave and my feelings only grow stronger and more present. Never able to escape myself; and I never will be. I'm not sure why every bit strength and advice I so easily and freely give out, seems applicable to all recipients aside from myself. How can you possess the humility to care for others  and not yourself? I could say it's because I have daddy issues, because my biological mother abandoned us, or even because the woman who raised me, as loving as she was and is currently dearly missed, was an addict to the dysfunction of addiction.  But for how long can I lean on these facts/plausible excuses before I can find it in myself to change? I've grown plenty, but I don't seem to have changed much. My comfort in my constant lack of stability continues to grow while I become more and more complacent each day.

I'm soul searching. Peace of mind is what I desire.

"Like a moth to a flame, burned by the fire. My love is blind can't you see my desire?"

Defense

Uncertain whether or not I've been victimizing myself, I have terrible luck, or my life really, sucks - just like genuinely sucks - I've been stuck in this whole I dug for myself. Either way, I have to work through this on my own.

Self medicating via vices is just as momentary and voluntary as the pain that I attempt to suppress. Though these pains penetrate my exterior and feed off of my soul, it is of my own doing. It has always been easy to put on my mask and most robotically say, "I'm fine," but it's different now. I'm not fine. All of the things I'd previously suppressed have come back stronger than my love for self, my hatred for this discomfort and the wrath of a woman scorned, all in one.

I never learned how to cope. The Board of Education never offered a course for that in school. No shoulder to cry on without judgment. To the wolves they threw us. I'd given the idea of therapy a quick thought, however, I do not believe that I am in need of therapy, but something therapeutic.

Peace of mind: how do we attain this? I believe that peace of mind is a personal journey, of which I have denied myself the privilege. Maybe I have yet to tap into that piece of mind that tells you it's time. I suppose it may be out of fear. Fear of the unknown. Fear of the possible risks. I've come to accept this lackluster life, to the point that i am intimidated by the changes I'd have to make, no matter how potentially freeing they may be, in order to obtain a better quality of life.

The potential for growth is always there. We just ... I just need to harvest it.

- Slim

50 Shades of Fake

Why exactly do people say, "I'm sorry" when you tell them about a tragedy? Because all I think in those freeze frames of conversation, is, "What exactly are you sorry for?" Are you sorry for me? Please don't be. Is it because you weren't there? Ain't no skin off my back.

Tragedies can, and will, teach you a lot of things. Like acceptance, grieving, compassion, and love. Always gratifying, though exhausting. Always.

Why is it that we're groomed to be empathetic? It's like that movie The Invention Of Lying. Who made this shit up, because it's clear that lying has become a game of role play. I mean, I'd like to imagine that at some point in history everybody was so truthful and chill, and some random dunce fucked it up. Asshole.

If I'm like, "Yeah my mom passed away a couple summers ago," I'd rather you say, "That's shitty. How are you handlin that?"

Why exactly do people say, "I'm sorry" when you tell them about a tragedy? Because all I think in those freeze frames of conversation, is, "What exactly are you sorry for?" Are you sorry for me? Please don't be. Is it because you weren't there? Ain't no skin off my back.

Tragedies can, and will, teach you a lot of things. Like acceptance, grieving, compassion, and love. Always gratifying, though exhausting. Always.

Why is it that we're groomed to be empathetic? It's like that movie The Invention Of Lying. Who made this shit up, because it's clear that lying has become a game of role play. I mean, I'd like to imagine that at some point in history everybody was so truthful and chill, and some random dunce fucked it up. Asshole.

If I'm like, "Yeah my mom passed away a couple summers ago," I'd rather you say, "That's shitty. How are you handlin that?"

Empathetic

As time slips through the hour glass I lay in bed, eyes wide shut. Not so gracefully attempting to escape tomorrow and what it will bring. Avoiding sleep like responsibility. Thinking a little about a lot.

I don't know why I do this. Manifesting self as my own worst enemy. How long have I been here? How do I free myself of the animosity I've felt for the things I could have, and maybe should have done differently, irregardless of the implied lesson learned? Am I a self loathing?

If I could map out each point in life at which I lost a little of my being I'd probably go insane. Looking at he evidence of my issue. The evidence that is me. I think I've denied myself the privilege of empathy and supplemented with self apathy when it was most applicable. I've never wanted pity, but I overlooked the healing powers of the comfort you get from someone giving a fck about something that isn't them. I grew up quick. This big girl still cries.

I read a post on Tumblr once that gave a totally different take on the glass half empty/full thing that's had me thinking for some weeks now. It said something alone the lines of, 'Hold the glass out in front of you at arms length. Wether the glass is half empty or full, it only gets heavier the longer you hold it there in place.' I'm the water in the glass. I was lite and hopeful at once.

I should probably put the glass down and switch arms.

Goodnight.

"They" got me fckd up.

Who is they?

For as long as I can remember, I've heard people say, "You know what they say".

Well who the fuck is "they"?!

Whoever the fuck "they" is got me fucked up! 

"They" don't fuckin know me. My convictions. My passion. My vices. My LIFE.

A gentleman said to me today, "I know a rich woman when I see one!" I replied, "Oh I'm not rich with money love, just confidence." He then replied, "See I knew you were rich with something."

I haven't made all of the right decisions in my short 25 years of life, but it one way or another, sooner or later, I've learned from every last one of them, whether it be deciding to go to one restaurant or the other. I made the most mistakes when I listened to "them". Thinking that these prehistoric, politically correct concepts were actually legitimate. Pshht.

These people don't know me. 99.9% of the people in my state, let alone this country or on this planet, have not even an inkling of my existence. 

All I'm sayin is, my parents always taught me to be an individual. Independent. Strong in your convictions. "Speak now or forever hold your peace" my father would always say. He never told me I should only do that in moderation. 

I don't believe that all humans were meant to be friendly with one another, it's never been that way. I don't know why there's this cushy pillow of fantasy chillin under this issue, but whatever. I shouldn't have to be like you for to like me. That is a total crock of shit.

We won't always be able to appease the people that we come into contact with. I had to learn that it is far more expensive to be delusional than to be yourself in this world.

So, I just wanna say, what you eat don't make me shit. I don't fit a mold. Don't try and convince me I'm doing something wrong while I still have breath in my body and a place in this world. Apparently I'm doing something right.

I Shit You Not

I love my father so much. Recognizing his voice on voicemail is so comfortable! 

With that subtitle bass and professionalism that resonates through vocal cords to strike my soul and recall not the bad times but the good that I've accepted as truth to water my growth  like the lotus that grows in the mud; the thicker the mud more beautiful the flower 😏

I love my father like Hov loved the summer - "Dear Daddy, I know you gon miss me. Fore we been togetha like Nike Airs and crisp tees" - fore I hope you never leave me. I pray to my God.

Dysfunctional

Not to come off as that cliché, stereotypical, woman in love, who can't let it go, you wouldn't understand, type, but she was my fresh squeezed lemonade on a hot summer day when that's all you needed to relieve your parched state and cool your being's temperature.

As a friend once said, "Am I crazy" for wanting someone that's done me no good aside from allowing my heart to bun-jee into loves inescapable grasps - but only for that moment in time, that seems so brief in retrospect.

For the first time in my life I'd been backhand pimp smacked by love after I thought I'd learned my lesson.

"Foolish" I thought to begin, but soon I gained consciousness and humility, and I didn't feel bad.

I felt human.