To those concerned, I have been feeling a lot better since my last post. I decided to leave a space heater on in the room at the front of my house, with a wide, uncurtained window facing the street. This past weekend I woke up to sun shine, made some coffee, and read for an hour. Afterward I cleaned my apartment (vacuumed and all) and watched Harold And Maude with Julie. It was a perfect day of setting myself a simple to-do list and feeling really accomplished. That night, Julie, Laura and I had a "potluck". I made a teriyaki vegetable stirfry, Julie made a quiche, and Laura made a dish of baked rice and squash with almonds and feta cheese; it made for an amazing dinner. Sunday I went to a Yin yoga class with Cori. The concept of Yin yoga is holding poses for a lengthy amount of time (about five minutes.) When doing this, you attempt to relax your body into stillness and prevent yourself from making the kinds of constant adjustements that I am all too prone to doing. The whole idea of meditation through stasis is fascinating to me, and it is a practice I would like to continue. The rest of my weekend I spent relaxing and watching movies.
This week has been slow again. Tanya called in sick on Monday, and Jerome told me that he was going to be leaving RingSide and offered to impart some of his knowledge to me. On Tuesday I talked with Cody about my goals and aspirations for the future, and it made me feel optimistic. All in all, it coincided wonderfully with my learning how to realax for a weekend and feeling more confident in myself. I am even learning to have a better self-image... but I feel that it will have to come last.
This Saturday is my dad's birthday, and I am meeting my parents for lunch Saturday at Benihana. We're then going to my aunt's so I can use their TurboTax software. After that, I'll be looking forward to another sunny Sunday relaxing and composing my monthly mix CD for March.
Wednesday, February 25, 2009
Tuesday, February 17, 2009
alienation and exhaustion
It's strange how last week I was feeling really great, and now two days of not being booked on anything and I'm feeling really depressed.
I billed almost 40 hours last week, and had an easy time getting to sleep at night. We had a company meeting Tuesday to discuss the re-branding of RingSide Creative as an "Integrated Media Studio™". It made me feel very optimistic about my future at this company. I've found myself fairly ignorant about the troubles with our economy. I just don't want to feel like I'm relying on my luck holding out. Often this suppressed paranoia motivates me to do more, but sometimes it just stresses me to the point of fatigue. At the end of the day Friday I left promptly at 5:30 to drive out to Ann Arbor to have dinner with Alex, Kenny, and Kyle for Kenny's birthday. After the stressful yet productive week I had, I really needed a drink. Dinner was great, we spent a few hours talking about nerdy stuff while waiting for the time to drive over the mall and catch a movie. We saw Yes Man, which was a lot better than I had anticipated. Of course, the main idea was all about a guy learning to say "yes"... and then learning when to say "no", but I appreciated it's focus on opening yourself to opportunities. After the movie we drove to Kenny's place and went around Ypsi trying to find a bar, but they were all either full or uninviting, so we called it a night.
Saturday I woke up to a couple of inches of snow. My mom had been nice enough to clean off my car, and I made it to Michigan Productions only a couple minutes late. While we were setting up, I noticed one of the girls who was helping with the student-run webcast. When I went down to grab a bagel, I noticed her again and struck up conversation. After the lecture, I asked her name and whether I would see her again at the next lecture, and she said 'yeah'. I told her to have a good spring break, and the next time I see her, I'm thinking of asking her out for coffee, if she doesn't have a boyfriend.
Since then, things have been kind of downhill. I came back to my parents to a houseful of relatives. We were having lunch to celebrate my dad's and two of my aunt's birthdays. I felt a lot of awkwardness that, to me, feels like resentment from my relatives because I've lost a lot of weight and, for my age, have a successful career. Maybe this is more of my own paranoia taking hold, but it's a feeling that I can't deny and feel constantly, not only from family. Regardless... I tried to maintain a casual attitude about the kinds of issues they were discussing that I felt they were worrying too much over. I tried to express to my mom how uninviting it is to have the host fretting the entire time. I also faced some snide questions from my uncles. I just don't feel the family support I think I should have. After everyone left I played dominoes with my parents, and like I knew he would, my dad wanted to drink some wine. I cheerfully agreed, but with the kind of tension that always seems to build between us, drinking just made us bicker even more. I'm really kind of angry with my dad for how he's become. He is ridiculously lazy, evidenced by his startling weight gain and unhealthy sleep patterns. All he seems to do is play computer games, watch movies, and record a multitude of VHS tapes from the DVR. I'm sure he thinks he's being productive, but he's not. He even tries to give me some of his tapes to watch, and I refuse to encourage this habit he's gotten himself into. I haven't had the courage yet to tell him how detrimental I think his lifestyle has become. And it doesn't help that my mom has no idea how to confront him. While she agrees with my thoughts about his decisions, she defends him every time I try to side against him. Not to mention I feel that she has her own self-esteem problems; the kind that I usually fall victim to myself, but have come to realize as weakness that I want to help her overcome. Every time I try to show her how fruitless and damaging her timidity and apprehension is, it only seems to reinforce it.
I drove home Saturday night, and Sunday I didn't do very much. The most productive thing I did was read for a good hour or so (I'm in the middle of "Sons and Lovers" by D.H. Lawrence.) I also watched Instrument, the Fugazi documentary, and rediscovered why I liked them so much.
When I came to work Monday, I just didn't feel very well. It was a hard to explain feeling, and it's still with me to an extent. I can only define it as a feeling of depression... I'm not motivated to do anything productive, and yet I need something to keep me busy. It's a dangerous catch-22, especially because a lot of people around the building are staying busy, and I feel like I'm falling behind. It doesn't help that I set myself up to operate without anyone's help, because when I can appreciate companionship I don't have any friends around. Today is going better... I feel I am becoming aware of my problem. Writing about it seems to help. I have to learn to slow down but remain in motion. I try to do the very best at everything, and I have to learn that is not possible. I have to learn to take time for myself, and to do that I have to learn what it is I really need. I am still working on that last part. At least I know the kinds of things that are not helping me. I still have a long way to go.
cue "Help!" by the Beatles
I billed almost 40 hours last week, and had an easy time getting to sleep at night. We had a company meeting Tuesday to discuss the re-branding of RingSide Creative as an "Integrated Media Studio™". It made me feel very optimistic about my future at this company. I've found myself fairly ignorant about the troubles with our economy. I just don't want to feel like I'm relying on my luck holding out. Often this suppressed paranoia motivates me to do more, but sometimes it just stresses me to the point of fatigue. At the end of the day Friday I left promptly at 5:30 to drive out to Ann Arbor to have dinner with Alex, Kenny, and Kyle for Kenny's birthday. After the stressful yet productive week I had, I really needed a drink. Dinner was great, we spent a few hours talking about nerdy stuff while waiting for the time to drive over the mall and catch a movie. We saw Yes Man, which was a lot better than I had anticipated. Of course, the main idea was all about a guy learning to say "yes"... and then learning when to say "no", but I appreciated it's focus on opening yourself to opportunities. After the movie we drove to Kenny's place and went around Ypsi trying to find a bar, but they were all either full or uninviting, so we called it a night.
Saturday I woke up to a couple of inches of snow. My mom had been nice enough to clean off my car, and I made it to Michigan Productions only a couple minutes late. While we were setting up, I noticed one of the girls who was helping with the student-run webcast. When I went down to grab a bagel, I noticed her again and struck up conversation. After the lecture, I asked her name and whether I would see her again at the next lecture, and she said 'yeah'. I told her to have a good spring break, and the next time I see her, I'm thinking of asking her out for coffee, if she doesn't have a boyfriend.
Since then, things have been kind of downhill. I came back to my parents to a houseful of relatives. We were having lunch to celebrate my dad's and two of my aunt's birthdays. I felt a lot of awkwardness that, to me, feels like resentment from my relatives because I've lost a lot of weight and, for my age, have a successful career. Maybe this is more of my own paranoia taking hold, but it's a feeling that I can't deny and feel constantly, not only from family. Regardless... I tried to maintain a casual attitude about the kinds of issues they were discussing that I felt they were worrying too much over. I tried to express to my mom how uninviting it is to have the host fretting the entire time. I also faced some snide questions from my uncles. I just don't feel the family support I think I should have. After everyone left I played dominoes with my parents, and like I knew he would, my dad wanted to drink some wine. I cheerfully agreed, but with the kind of tension that always seems to build between us, drinking just made us bicker even more. I'm really kind of angry with my dad for how he's become. He is ridiculously lazy, evidenced by his startling weight gain and unhealthy sleep patterns. All he seems to do is play computer games, watch movies, and record a multitude of VHS tapes from the DVR. I'm sure he thinks he's being productive, but he's not. He even tries to give me some of his tapes to watch, and I refuse to encourage this habit he's gotten himself into. I haven't had the courage yet to tell him how detrimental I think his lifestyle has become. And it doesn't help that my mom has no idea how to confront him. While she agrees with my thoughts about his decisions, she defends him every time I try to side against him. Not to mention I feel that she has her own self-esteem problems; the kind that I usually fall victim to myself, but have come to realize as weakness that I want to help her overcome. Every time I try to show her how fruitless and damaging her timidity and apprehension is, it only seems to reinforce it.
I drove home Saturday night, and Sunday I didn't do very much. The most productive thing I did was read for a good hour or so (I'm in the middle of "Sons and Lovers" by D.H. Lawrence.) I also watched Instrument, the Fugazi documentary, and rediscovered why I liked them so much.
When I came to work Monday, I just didn't feel very well. It was a hard to explain feeling, and it's still with me to an extent. I can only define it as a feeling of depression... I'm not motivated to do anything productive, and yet I need something to keep me busy. It's a dangerous catch-22, especially because a lot of people around the building are staying busy, and I feel like I'm falling behind. It doesn't help that I set myself up to operate without anyone's help, because when I can appreciate companionship I don't have any friends around. Today is going better... I feel I am becoming aware of my problem. Writing about it seems to help. I have to learn to slow down but remain in motion. I try to do the very best at everything, and I have to learn that is not possible. I have to learn to take time for myself, and to do that I have to learn what it is I really need. I am still working on that last part. At least I know the kinds of things that are not helping me. I still have a long way to go.
cue "Help!" by the Beatles
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