Again, Who Am I Kidding?

I have respect for your time so I’ll make it quick.

It’s strange. The more I create and try to follow my dreams the more I sense this imaginary person sitting next to me giving me the side eye. What is that about? Oh great – it’s not enough that folks who physically exist give me the side eye, but now my hyperactive imagination wants a piece of the pie too – son of a b****. I wake up, get the courage to do and grow, and each bold step I take somehow only comes off as this risky, stupid, ugly business that is only ruining my reputation as a competent human being.  I love it.

Is it just me or does walking this nonlinear line we call life everyday sometimes have you feeling like you want to brush your face and wash your teeth in the morning instead? Oh it does? Good! That’s right – we’re all f***** up. However, I have a solution to this. After all, “I’ve observed that life never presents us with an unsolvable problem. The solution may humble us or require us to do things that we’ve never done before, but there is always a solution.” – Psychology of Wealth

All of the ups and downs and ins and outs I have should be charged to the game. I’m going to charge each and every hour to the damn game – my hours of mastery that is. I read that it takes 10,000 hours to master something (go look it up lazy pants!) So for me it doesn’t matter; a book read, a word spoken, a sentence written, or a conversation had – I’m charging it. As I jam Kendrick Lamar, hoist my little sails, eat my oreos, and start moving forward through these turbulent, uncharted territories I will try to remember these words:

“You don’t have to be afraid to take a risk. You just have to be prepared to do the work.” – Psychology of Wealth

“You have to just march into your fear. Oh-well, everyday just march on in there.” – The War of Art

“There are no accidents; there is only some purpose that we haven’t yet understood.” – The Psychology of Wealth

“Your work will inevitably be the timeless communicating to the time bound” – The War of Art. It is fundamental that you continue to be authentic, vulnerable, and courageous for this reason because the cycle must redeem itself and continue.

…And now I’m just writing a bunch of quotes. I should have started a quote blog not a blog for creative thoughts. Nonetheless, consciously invest in yourself no matter how you are perceived by others, no matter how bleak it may seem, no matter what look the imaginary bum is giving you, and no matter the circumstances. 70 % or more of our thoughts are negative and redundant. Be audacious for change. Start mastering.  

Basic Diagram of Vulnerability

As I hunch in this lumpy chair, weary of any work I've gotten done today, and typing my brains out like some mad scientist, I of all things have the desire to write about love. Great, I mention the word love and my shoulders instantly tense up. See! I can't do this...*takes a deep breath*. Okay, hopefully I can explore this physical manifestation before I hyperventilate and realize how much I despise talking or writing about this topic publicly.

Nevertheless, it’s like this: BE ALL YOU CAN BE TODAY. You know, Carpe Diem and shit – do that until the wheels fall off because one day you’ll wake up and love will be painfully staring at you with its fucked up eye. I mean staring you right-smack-dab in the middle of your face (I say painfully for a lack of a better more horrifying word.) When I think of love I stress out. I think of agony when I think of love. I think of worrying. No matter who is in this love with me there is a guaranteed heavy dose of stress, agony, and worrying. There are these super highs and super lows. There are these walk on egg shells days. These, "Don’t puke while I puke but you still puke any way days (oh great now we have to clean up the freaking puke!)", and there are these wonderful debate days about anything minus oblivion (okay, no, yup it’s now plus oblivion that was just confirmed.) It really beats the hell out of me sometimes. 

There are these, "I’m this close to leaving your ass days," and then something really funny happens and I don’t. There are these, "I’m literally so very tired and so very sick of you days." There are some, "What would I do without you days," (those tend to be my favorite), and some, "I just want to stick to you like white on rice days." There are even these days where we agree on the same thing we disagreed on a couple of days back (huh?) 

When I think of love I think of fake car chases and running to the Toyota quick because “they’re out to get us” – whoever “they” are, “Mash the gas! Let’s go baby! Hurry!” (ahh yes, invisible bad guys – jealous?) Love makes me think of scrounging for pennies just to make sure we make it to the place we always eat at (when we clearly don’t have enough money at the time and could easily downgrade or go somewhere else.) There are these days I dunk my head underneath a tub of hot water so that my entire body is immersed and I just float there lifeless wondering what the hell love is. 

Yes, love is patient, yes, love is kind, and yes love is unconditional. I love to love. I get that that’s love. I do. No one ever mentions the “other side” of it on the other hand. There is definitely another side. There’s the stress, the agony, and the worry – that tense feeling you know. As gut wrenching as that sounds it’s there too. Nonetheless, going through those feelings can be rewarding; nights are warmer, days are more promising, and the companionship is priceless because the love has gotten a chance to go through every crevice of your mind and heart; every peak and every valley. You’re all in this thing and you can feel every tick–tock of it so much so that you’re affected emotionally, spiritually, and physically. 

I’d say love is an investment; it’s abundant yet expensive. There’s a work ethic to love that I believe I can only pseudo master because I haven’t a clue how to really get in there and truly understand or figure it out (maybe there’s nothing to figure out.) There are some days where silence is appreciated, where certain looks are understood, and where a good, deep, long, and tight hug is really all the words you need. 

Wisdom is on love’s coattail and that dynamic appreciates with time. Love is falling in love over and over again. It’s not giving up on each other that day as to spare you another 24 hours to try and get it right again. I accept everything that comes with love as I mature in love (I say that now but don’t quote me on that) as long as I (as Stephen King put it), “…keep talking, arguing, making love, dancing…,” and courageously loving, it will be.

“We came from similar working-class backgrounds, we both ate meat…Yet what ties us most strongly are the words, the language, and the work of our lives.” – Stephen King

Something, Something...Burgers and Bikes

Judgments and comfort zones - who needs em'.

Have you ever sat down at a restaurant that has outside seating and you choose a table outside, order all this great stuff, and your waiter comes and serves you a table full of awesome, juicy, hot, tantalizing food? I mean, well of course I have to consider the fact that you may have an entirely different perspective of what awesome food really is. But so, you know whatever. I don’t know what your “awesome” food is but I’m talking about the burgers, the fries, the ribs, the steaks, the wings, the potatoes, and all the etceteras. You sit there at the table eating what you like the most in the most grotesque, primal, dog eat dog way and a swarm of cyclist in their little cycle club I guess rides up to you only to stop at the light that happens to be right at the corner where you are; the corner that happens to be right next to where you are currently happily stuffing your face. Two of the cyclists stare (glare really) at you while grabbing their thirst quenching, sparkling water jugs that happen to be hooked to their coordinating fanny packs; fanny packs that are strategically wrapped around strong, chiseled abdomens. You for some reason decide to put your head down, eat smaller bites, and chew slower at this point. They finally get a green light and the whole platoon takes off in a synchronized stride while you pan the landscape of the food on the table in front of you and realize you’re so glad you ordered extra cheese. Oh no? So that’s never happened to you?

Or what about the “Craigslist meet up”. You know, that awkward exchange of emails/comments/texts/calls phase before you actually meet up with them because they have something for dirt cheap that you are dying to have and too lazy to get it any other way. You guys try to meet at a central location and the person tells you what they are wearing and what they look like but you’re still like, “What?” You get there and there are 4 people who are dressed like the description your now stranger/friend said so you stop each and every one of them hoping, no, praying it is the person with your crap so you can get this over with. You grab each look alike by the shoulder or tap them gently and they turn around and say, “No, sorry you have the wrong person lady,” or they give you the side eye like, “Did she just touch me?” You give up. You call the stranger/friend on your phone while still at the central location frustrated and a little nervous and ask, “Hey, so are you here?” They say, “Yay! I’m looking right at you!” And you see them waving their hand and smiling in the darkest corner the place has with a full glass of wine and one empty glass right next to it. You smile, wave back in a truly thankful manner, run over and say, “Hi!” You proceed to make small talk, inspect the product, exchange money from there, and leave quickly. Oh no? So that’s never happened to you?

Whew! Well it hasn’t happened to me either and I hope it stays that way! I will say this though, you have to live. Put yourself in uncomfortable places and see how you react. Get to know yourself. Be in that moment and really get to know yourself. Observe, engage, and live. Peel out of that weird shell that doesn’t fit you good anymore anyway. Start shedding it – or don’t shed it, I don’t know. It’s hard to even decipher my own madness and by madness I mean my writing. As I type I think I know exactly what I am talking about and it makes total freaking sense to me, but to my dismay it does not to everyone else; to my dismay it never will let me tell ya’. I’m thinking quite possibly I’ll be incoherent forever, and that’s okay because no one reads this shit anyway. I’ve been reading and running across passages like, “You can’t afford to doubt yourself” and – oh my favorite, “If you can’t even take 20 minutes out of your day to write then give it up clown.” Yes, that’s definitely one of my all time favorites. Ha, it's funny, as soon as you get the nerve to do anything you start building up your confidence. It gets to be the type of confidence you will need to do what people will judge you for or to do what you didn’t think you could.

Maybe a burger next week doesn’t sound so bad after all and downloading that Craigslist app should be fun.