Again

I need to start writing again about the things I'm learning.
There's a fear, a refusal to let the world see the inner workings of my mind. A resistance built upon an egotistical stance that I can recall everything I want to remember and don't see a need to writing it down.

But there is a real need. Although we're the sum of our collective experiences, sometimes it's not easy to remember what those experiences are.

In college I learned about Dostoyevsky's "perfection" as defined by human's conception of God. That we create God in the image of perfection. Because this perfection exists, we are by default, imperfect, and we can never become perfection as long as we have its image in mind.

I can't find this exact quote or passage. Maybe I'm remembering it wrong.

Remembering. What is it?
In class we watched Hiroshima Mon Amour, and I presented on La Jetee.

It reminded me of my favorite Proust quote that I always go back to, and may get a tattoo of on my arm. It's applicable in so many situations because it's beautiful, and general, yet symbolic enough to represent the literal and the figurative. To me, it always meant a destruction of everything I knew to start again. In my most intense moments of vulnerability, I've always found one last hope, something more powerful and immense to carry me on to the next chapter. Last night, I recited it to a friend of mine who's mother is undergoing a cancer battle. I think to him, it must mean something different, and stronger than what it means to me. Funny, maybe it was a divinely inspired message- why did I choose to tell him at the time I did?

Mais, quand d’un passé ancien rien ne subsiste, après la mort des êtres, après la destruction des choses, seules, plus frêles mais plus vivaces, plus immatérielles, plus persistantes, plus fidèles, l’odeur et la saveur restent encore longtemps, comme des âmes, à se rappeler, à attendre, à espérer, sur la ruine de tout le reste, à porter sans fléchir, sur leur gouttelette presque impalpable, l’édifice immense du souvenir.

I loved La Jetee. I watched it 3 times. I wrote this email to a friend, but never mailed it

Here's one of my favorite films- it's a 28 minute masterpiece by Chris Marker made in '62 during the Cold War

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yqMEc0oe4yc

It's sci-fi but deals with very real issues of nuclear war anxiety/trauma

what I find most intriguing: the investigation of memory and relationship between past/future and the power of the present. Of preserved immaterial moments, death and stillness

it's cool because as the audience we are forced to construct a fluid narrative out of all these still images, and we do... much like how we live our lives, constructing meaning out of randomness. It's also cool knowing how we construct memory- every time we recall something, it changes. All of what we think are memories aren't accurate!!

Sometimes, I forget to remember. When I look back, I realize my message was always very clear. I'm now finding the context and platform for myself to synthesize it and deliver it. It is a message of feminism but of embracing femininity and not trying to be masculine to win the game. It is a message of self acceptance in the end, that is more universal.

Being back in my element now, I'm running into chance encounters again. This means I'm on my "path"

Eckhart Tolle's New Earth really touched me. It helped me re-evaluate the ego and its role. The sensitivity I experience is really just my ego, and me taking things personally is a reflection of that and it isn't anything constructive. I also learned of the pain body. Those with heavier pain bodies have the potential to transform it into something powerful. In my best moments, I feel the raw emotion inside of me come out to help. I want to enact change. I want to help people. 

Someone told me recently that when he met me he felt he started to undergo a transformation. He realized there was hope for him to live life the way he wanted to, to find happiness, a new start.

Maybe i'm starting to become a symbol of the destruction/recreation process I've forced myself into many times.

A guy grabbed my face and tried to make out with me when I was only just being friendly and engaging him in conversation (NO flirting at all). It felt very disturbing to me when I refused him and he said, what, do you have a boyfriend or something? As if I had to be claimed to not want to make out with him, otherwise I'm open territory. It sucked, the entitlement, especially coming from someone who seemed like such a nice guy. He's so indoctrinated in this masculine entitlement that it was natural for him to say that as his response. I really didn't like it. 

But I do like it when one person in particular acts territorial towards me, even when we both know he shouldn't. Because I know he cares. I suppose it's the people we choose to open up to, we want to allow them to claim us, that we are okay with submitting to.

I'm not a submissive person by nature even though I used to be by default because of my upbringing. Now when I submit to someone, it's a choice, it's out of respect, it's allowing them the power to set the tone. This is a rare thing. This means I trust and want you. This power is not to be taken lightly.

What is sex appeal? Why do some people refuse to harness its power? Are they afraid?

Is Gone Girl a representation of someone who's so confused by all the social roles a woman has to play and refuses to play them anymore, to then set the rules of the game?

Or is it just a version of sociopathy.

Homecoming

Every time I'm home I feel such an internal struggle.

I realize more and more that my parents and I always failed to connect.

That's why for most of my life I only wanted to be around those I couldn't connect to, because it felt familiar.

The ones I did connect to I couldn't handle. I didn't understand the feeling of truly relating to someone.

My values are so different from those of my parents and my culture. Yet they're also not entirely in sync with Western values because I am Chinese. I guess I'm just me.

Only recently, this year, have I become comfortable enough with myself to accept true connections.

Now I'm learning the subtle differences between all connections
Emotional
Psychic
Intellectual
Physical

I often wonder why most movies have a narrator that feels she doesn't fit in. The ones that are about the super popular girl aren't as relatable.

The isolation I felt all my life can be channeled into something great.
Even if my subject matter isn't relatable
My struggles and my message are universal.

Checking In- A post from 2014

This has been the year during which I wasn't afraid to take risks and change the way I was living.
Then, miraculously, everything fell into place.
What was me before, a scared, anxious and unconsciously self destructive little girl became an independent, self-assured and free person.

Once my mind and heart sought out the same path, everything else from environment, friends, finances to even my physical body refined itself. I'm not saying I don't struggle day to day- some of my friends have been there for me during moments when I was having a bit of a mental breakdown and felt hopeless, but those moments have been few and far between.

I live my life untraditionally because there's nothing stopping me anymore. It all flows now- no longer do the jagged edges of time passing stab me.

I've always been a firm believer that when things are meant to be, they feel effortless. I'm not against working hard, as I've always worked hard for the things I want, but it's an affinity- an ease that's felt when both you, and whatever else whether it be a person or an opportunity both have doors open for one another. In the last 4 years I've been around too many people who believed the best way to get by was to keep knocking and trying to force yourself into a closed door. Some of them eventually get in and get what they want. But what I really want is for what I want to want me too, not acquiesce to my disrespect.

"You're too nice," I've heard all my life. Even though in the past few years I've been around such mean and aggressive people, I still make an effort to maintain my softness and kindness. I believe everyone deserves to be treated kindly because even the shittiest person has a reason for why they became that way. I don't abide by superficial heuristics to judge people- oh he's this and that, so then he's probably this way. I don't write people off. I want to know what's really at play even though within a few seconds of meeting someone I'll already know what they're all about. The rest is confirmation, and understanding, and being generous with my time, my ears and my heart. I care. Until you start acting like an asshole to me, and then my attention on you is gone. Always a giver, never a taker. Until you take too much from me and give me nothing back and I feel absolutely drained.

Spending the last day and a half re-reading old journals, I see who I've always been. A thinker, a writer- a girl who had an interesting insight into the world and into herself that was wise beyond her years. What's changed is my determination and strength. Feeling lost before, I didn't allow myself to have the things I wanted, or be proud of who I was. Now, there's a ferocity that has developed. A thankfulness in being me and a deep thirst to show the world what I'm capable of. Some of the people I've admired came back to me this year to tell me they respect me so much. Hearing the astrologist tell me that I'm much more powerful than I know or allow myself to believe. I know I'll get there, it's just me stopping me because I'm my toughest critic. There's also an emotional blockage that's still residual from my past. My life always felt very hard. I was shone a lot of cruelty and felt starved in some senses from a young age. I'm much more than what you believe me to be, and even when you know me you'll keep on finding out more. The ones that have truly understood me tell me I'm like an onion, with layer after layer and even more, when peeled back. I don't think there's a single person in this world who knows everything about me and I'm fearful that there will be that person, because then they'll be too close to me.

I'm going back to school in the fall for a passion. I've finally found a place of work where everyone is compassionate and "gets me" and doesn't judge me. What I've treated as my bad habits and vices in the past have now all become good qualities. The constant evolution and actualization will never stop- I love identifying what I need to work on and continuing the process. Right now, I'm working with a life coach to focus my goals, intentions, work on developing productive habits like time organization and planning so I can unfold the future I want for myself.

There will always be an openness though- for chaos, for spontaneity, for more self discovery. For that person I never knew existed who pops in and teaches me something new about the world and about myself. This is a journey and every single year is both the biggest battle, and the biggest pleasure.

I really never knew I'd get myself here. But I always had it in my mind: 24 was going to be that age it all fell into place.

I quit my job. Broke up with the guy who was utterly wrong for me. Changed my lifestyle and developed self respect. That last part is the most important.