Trying to find clarity

So that freight train from my last post? Yea… turned out that it exploded in my meadow like a nuclear bomb…. Right when I was finally becoming so happy too.

It was as if I had raised the white flag saying that I surrendered in a war that I had begun and my opponent let me go free… only for that grudge to explode as a nuclear bomb when everything was finally alright again, when I was finally, for once, happy.

I’m trying to pretend that I am ok… hoping that pretending will become reality…

But to say that I was ok would be lying.

I’ve always known that my concept of love has always been a little shaky. I’ve never really had great examples of it in my life… but from this experience I know what love isn’t… or if it is this… then love is not something that I want at all.

A very different situation occurred to me 8 years ago that had the exact same outcome as this current situation. The common denominator in both of them… is me.

Maybe I’m the creator of the nuclear bombs… sure I don’t hit the detonate button. In fact I’ve usually run far away by the time that that button is even considered being pushed… but the button could never have been pushed if it wasn’t my fault for the creation of it in the first place.

:(. I don’t know what to think. I feel though like if I ignore it then I am a horrible person. I feel like though if I try to reach out to the nuclear bomb to make sure it doesn’t have a secondary explosion that my touch will make it go off. But if I do nothing it may go off anyway.

I don’t want it to go off at all… I want it to be ok and not need to explode… but maybe if it is going to explode in any situation, I deserve to go down with it (just to clarify: this is in very non-suicidal terms on my part).

Seriously… why does my life have to be so complicated?? I hate drama so much… but I can’t get away from it… I think it’s because I care too much… but what if my caring is what is creating the problem?

*sigh* 😦

 

The dangers of frolicking in a meadow

As you can probably tell from my lack of endless ranting and postings on my blog… life has actually been going pretty good. Not perfect by any means… life wouldn’t be fun if it was perfect… but the sunshine was coming back into my life.

It was like I was frolicking through a meadow (please take this in a sarcastic tone) where everything was daisies and sunshine. There was no need to worry about anything except you know maybe the occasional snake that might be slithering through the tall grass (aka papers to be written and lectures to give lol)… I saw the good in the world yet again and was believing my life would always be in the sunshine…

…and then for a moment… I closed my eyes… feeling the warmth of the sun… basking in the heat while frolicking… minding my own business..

AND THEN WHAM… a freakin freight train comes barreling through my meadow hitting me down to the ground…

I WAS NOT EXPECTING A FREIGHT TRAIN IN MY MEADOW!!!!!!

I’m still trying to assess the damage… but I hope the injuries aren’t severe and that this freight train is quickly moved out of my meadow…

right now I’m stuck under the freight train’s shadow… I want my sunshine back!!!! and all my pretty flowers!

 

My Valentine

Who needs a guy in their life when they have the most adorable puppy in the world who can be their Valentine? 🙂

 

Here we go Blue Bird…

I think I’m finally ready to move on…

But I will always miss you… you were the air I would have killed to breathe…but my burden to bear is a love I can’t carry anymore.

But I’m ready to let you go. And it is time for me to finally fly.

 

Broken Objects

I was broken once… I don’t think I am broken anymore. I mean I have my ups and downs just like anyone else… but my soul isn’t broken anymore… I feel like a whole person.

Because I’ve been there… I’ve been broken… I’ve been in spots where I never thought that I could live again, let alone be happy… I want to help others who are in that spot… for them to realize that they can be whole again… its just a process that you yourself have to be fully committed to.

Yes, I could not have been whole again if it wasn’t for the wonderful people who were and are around me, loving me, supporting me, just being there for me. But in the end… no matter what they did for me in the end I had to fix me.

My friends were able to put bandaids on my wounds and make some spots not hurt anymore… but it was like I was a leaking bucket… No matter how much they tried to fix me and no matter how much water and love they poured into me… I just kept leaking and I drained them. There was a hole no one else could see. Only I knew where it was and only I could fix it.

And I did. It wasn’t easy. In fact it was the hardest thing I’ve ever done in my life. But somehow after months and months of being empty… I was once again able to finally feel whole and full.

It is so hard now… when I see someone being in the place where I once was… to not try to constantly fix them… to constantly fill up their bucket. I try SO hard to fill their bucket up… but I keep draining myself out…

It is like on an airplane… you shouldn’t help someone else put their oxygen mask before you put on your own…

Thats what I tried to do. I had my oxygen mask on! but somehow in the process of trying to help the individual they accidentally tore mine off and they still don’t have theirs on! So I am now having to fumble for my oxygen mask and they are panicking and it is making it hard for me to get mine back on and they are still needing oxygen!

My own bucket is emptying out because I was pouring absolutely everything I had into the individual.

I have to separate myself now from the individual. Not just for my own good but for theirs too. I can’t help them if I am empty or oxygenless.

But I need to realize that until that individual can calm down and reach for their own oxygen mask or fix the whole in their bucket that I can’t see…. there is nothing I can do for them. It is so hard to watch helplessly… is it wrong if I completely turn away from them? If they are killing me in the process of killing themselves?

I wish I could help the individual so much. There is nothing else in this world that I would rather do, but I can’t save them. They have to save themselves. They have to fix the hole I can’t see… they have to calm down and allow me to put the oxygen mask on them or reach out for it on their own.

 

Ice Cream and Undying Passion

Ask any of my friends or family members… I am obsessed with ice-cream… definitely to an unhealthy degree. lol.

The best: chocolate chip cookie- dough… but of course when life is going really badly and I need to feel better… Ben and Jerry’s Half-baked is always there for me and my sadness…and well if you have looked at my blog recently you probably can come to the conclusion that Ben and Jerry’s Half-baked and I have been BFFs. lol

Seriously… I think all occasions should call for ice-cream… whether really happy occasions or really sad…

But sometimes… ice cream and I have to go on ‘breaks’… Ice cream always knows that I love it… but sometimes all the saddness and the Ben and Jerry’s starts adding on the pounds… and well this passion of mine becomes unhealthy… right now ice cream and I are on a bit on a hiatus because of the cold… while ice cream may help my heart and fill my stomach it can take the bone chilling cold from outside and make it become an internal feeling… and we all know I hate the cold… sometimes I just get tired of ice-cream… although I LOVE it… sometimes you can have TOO MUCH of a good thing… I always return back to it though… I can never go that long from it…

So what this all boils down to though is that I am passionate about ice-cream. 🙂

Even though this passion is often unhealthy and it can often burn me out… I always find myself returning to it…

LOL… so why this long ode to ice cream? Well I believe that in order to be happy in life… one needs to be passionate about what they do… and as we all know… I’m questioning my current life path… am I passionate about it?

Academia (for me) is very unhealthy… in fact the field work for academia is what caused my OCD to become severe.. it also makes me a constant perfectionist that I don’t know how to not be that makes me constantly freaked out about work and have absolutely nothing of a social life… academia makes me feel lonely… because I don’t have many friends b/c I’m constantly trying to be a perfectionist about it… and also I don’t get enough sleep because I’m always trying to stay up to do work that I haven’t done because I just don’t have the passion or want to do it.

But maybe it is just because I am burnt out? After all I am passionate about ice cream… but I can have too much and I need to take a break… well… I’ve taken breaks… winter break… summer break… many weekends… and am I really ever craving for the semester to start again or to get to my work? Not really… I may be craving to not be bored any more… but that is kind of just like craving for food in general compared to ice-cream… I never crave to jump into research full steam ahead! or into the reading I need to do… in fact I always dread it…

but I am passionate about certain ASPECTS of my field… I love how the research that I do helps others… and that I am educating students so that they broaden their minds and see how beautiful the world really is.

so should I risk being unhappy in all other aspects of my academia just for this one portion??

You know what else I absolutely love? The Potato… I love potatoes… they are seriously the best food in the entire world… I am completely and utterly passionate about eating potatoes…

EXCEPT… I refuse to eat potato salad… I HATE potato salad… yes I love the potato… but I don’t like the mixture of it with mayonnaise, onion, pepper, egg, and celery… individually all of those are pretty good… but somehow mixed together and with potatoes… it really makes me want to vomit… therefore I am only passionate about one part of it… but all together I hate it and therefore I don’t eat it.

Can I apply this to academia? If I only like one aspect of it (and it isn’t even the main component of it like the potato is in potato salad) is it worth wanting to feel like I want to vomit all the time?

I think the answer should be no… at least that seems most logical to me…

Can’t I find other things in which that one aspect is a part of that I love more? I love various potato casseroles, MASHED POTATOES ARE AMAZING, baked potatoes are amazing, chips, and fries, soup with potato, potato pancakes, really potato in anything (EXCEPT wrapped in dough.. but that might just be because I culturally grew up eating perogies and have a mental block against them lol).

So therefore can’t I look for a different career path in which I can help people and empower them that doesn’t have to be in this field of academia?

But I’m good at making potato salad… but I still hate eating it… I’m good at academia… and I still hate being a part of it… making potato salad though for others and them enjoying it is really nice… but in this one case.. I think it is ok to be selfish… this is MY LIFE after all… if I can only cook one thing in the world for others to enjoy and for me to eat… why make potato salad just for others if I don’t want to eat it? How about finding something better that uses potatoes… and you know what?… I may not be good at making it for others at first… and they may dislike it… but I will eventually learn and get better at it… and enjoy the food I am finally making…

but can I really correlate food to career paths? But shouldn’t passion be passion? It should be all the same?