Thursday, July 25, 2013

Life

Since the last time I've blogged I've been through a lot. There's just something magical about the world we live in. In the past 4 years I've spent in college, examining myself, reexamining myself, looking at the world, and now finally accepting the world for what it is- I realized that it all up to me to decide my fate and where I go in life. It's not just about being a deep introvert constantly thinking about things, there's a whole other world out there that we don't know about.

I think a few months after my last blog I had begun having some very bad anxiety issues... That spring semester that I had gone through went extremely badly. The reason? The realization that I cannot continue with the lifestyle I had been living in the next oncoming years. Things were going to change, whether I liked it or not.

As I pulled myself out of this phase, I once again understood how little I had experienced with "living". I realized that nearly everyone around my age was going through the same thing, unless of course their circumstances greatly differed from mine. But for the most part, nearly all my friends and acquaintances seem to have been going through a period in their lives where they start to really worry for their future as I had. Nearly all of my friends that I had in high school ended up enjoying the club life, parties, and weekly trips to the bar. I too enjoyed them to some extent, but I never had constant streams of pics of myself at fancy clubs as some of them had. Some are still partying, some have gone off the radar, those that have gone off the radar are most likely going through what I went through.

I uttered the words out my mouth "I'm finally 21!" before and now I'm telling myself "Holy shit I'm 21, I have another 9 years before I'm 30". Countries have different regulations concerning the official age of adulthood, but the transition from teenage adolescent to a fully conscientious adult is unfathomably huge. There are people who do indeed reach that stage early in their lives, but for most others it may take much longer, in unfortunate cases, some don't ever get to that point in their lives even venturing in to their middle-ages. But it's this transition that's so important to become truly happy with yourself in life.

Mmm this blog has been coming off very preachy. The reason for all this revelation is all because of how I pulled myself out of my rut. I spent the past few years constantly re-examining myself, as is evident on the history of this blog. I had my retarded moments, my crappy epiphanies, and dark times when I just looked out the window and only saw black and white.

I realized it was time to move on. And take on the world for what it is instead of just isolating myself. Recently in my life I've be going through some huge up swings. I landed myself an excellent position in an IT department at a rapidly growing company, and I've made a HUGE decision for myself when I graduate from school.

I've decided to enlist myself as a Marine Officer after graduation. This is an option for grad students as most others have join the Marines as "enlisted". Marines coming out of boot camp are FIT. Much more so than any other branch, making it a very respectable branch. They're the branch of our military that is on the front lines before the army and the everything else. That said it isn't easy to join, and it certainly is not easy to excel. I only feel that I will be happy if I can put myself to such a challenge and come out of it successful, anything less and I'll be back to the same joe schmoe I was and many other people are. 

I've already started preparing, adding tons of cardio to my weight lifting routine. Basically along with lifting I'm running 3 miles nearly everyday, and over the course of the next few weeks I'll be upping that mileage to improve my time during the 3 mile run for the real deal. I can say for a fact that I have never been so physically and mentally healthy in my life until now. Getting that office job, 9 - 5, AIR CONDITIONING (note I worked in a sweat shop beforehand), has been a huge morale booster. Took me months to land a job, glad it all paid off.

Pretty much everything that you have witnessed in this blog site was my growth of maturity through college. EVERYONE will go through this, not just as I have but in their own ways. You're not ready for life just coming out of high school, especially if you haven't lived with a lot of true hardship in your life. You will continue to grow through your 4 years of college. You may be like my friends, partying all the time, going to bars, or simply just traveling every goddamn corner of the world. But eventually things around you will settle down, and you'll have to THINK just as I have about where you really want to go with your life. Even for people who believe they have it all figured out, they don't, there will always be so many challenges to come for them. These challenges will break them down, and they will have to learn to come out of it, but when they do, they will be happy.

This will be my last blog post. However maybe a year from now I will come back to say something! This blog is precious to me. It truly is a journal that I can use to look back on, and learn from. A year from now my circumstances will be COMPLETELY changed from what they are now at this very exact moment as my fingers pound my mechanical keyboard. I may be a Marine, I may be a depressed otaku, I might even be dead OR I might even achieve something beyond my wildest dreams. Life is beautiful, not matter how bad things can get there will always be light at the end, and you can reach it as long as you try. If you're not happy with where you are now, you have to ACT to move on.

The purpose of life, at least for me, is to seek true happiness.

God speed, thank you for anyone who reads this.

Tuesday, February 19, 2013

Life as an Introvert

今を生きて-Asian Kung-Fu Generation
This song is notoriously hard to find...
http://musicpvmw.blog86.fc2.com/blog-entry-8528.html

I've been a fan of that band for so many years now... I probably love them the same way middle aged people love classic rock.
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Lately I've been coming to terms with a lot of things in my life or at least I think I have. Nothing seems to be in the ”100% certainty category” anymore, especially because I've been contemplating "Life" in general (sometimes I feel like a mountain hermit). My world is small and feels closed off, but really it isn't all that closed off at all.

For the past 2 weeks I haven't talked to my IRL friends very much. Besides a few instances of Facebook or Skype chat, I have been keeping to myself. After reading a forum thread about introverts I realized how many points made in the opening post rang true to me. I've always known that I was an introvert but I never really delved into it and examined myself in that light. Basically this is how it goes. Introverts are not anti-social, they just have a short battery life when it comes to socializing. The way I compare myself to that is how I go out and go party on rare occasions or something as simple as going for lunch with my mates. I can't do it often but I relish the time I spend with my friends when I do. But too much exposure is stifling. I hate myself for doing it sometimes, but I just shut myself in. When my battery is recharged, I come back out of my cave refreshed and ready to take in another dose of "Life".

Coming to terms with that has been difficult. However in the past few weeks of shutting myself in, I've made a few peculiar acquaintances online. Playing an old game called Quake, now remade as Quake Live, I joined a clan on a whim and met some interesting people. This wouldn't have been possible if I had been playing more mainstream games such as SC2 or LoL. Quake is over a decade old, and so there are quite a few older players still playing it. 

I've been happily talking to a 38 year old father, an odd gamer lady of 27 years of age, a guy just slightly older than I working night shifts in tech support, and your typical 15 year old kid. Quite the combination isn't it? I'm used to talking to my usual mates over Skype, because well, I've known them for years and I know them IRL. But this was obviously a new experience for me. 

I still drink. No "buts" about it, I just drink because I enjoy it and it doesn't seem like I'm getting away from it anytime soon... But it's really nice to have a drinking buddy. Even though its over a voice chat haha. Even so,  the experience of drinking with someone online is very real, or surreal I should say. The 38 year old father and I seem to get along quite well, we share our stories, talk about the game we play, we drink, and most importantly we laugh. Plus the fact that there are other members of the clan in the same voice channel makes it all the more merrier. The fact that I could interact with all these different types of people made it very "fun" for me. 

So what's the point of all this? I guess I've begun to accept myself a little more. Lately I've only been trying to change myself, which just isn't working. I don't operate the same way as other people do. My bro and his girlfriend go out so often, I look at that and shake my head and say "No, sorry, that's just not for me." I feel like if I want to go on with life without feeling restless and full of anxiety, I would need to correctly identify with myself. The foundation for my life has already been laid down, that is something I cannot change. Right now I just need to slowly lay down the bricks and understand each and every one of them.