Oozing Creativity

Pretensions

    When I was a kid, I hated pretending to smile to other people. Say hello, good morning, have a nice day like I mean it. Sure I was a brat and nonetheless spoiled. I hated concealing my emotions just so I would look polite towards other people. I didn’t understand my dad who kept a smiling face in front of everyone despite the seething anger, frustration or irritation he showed to us. What a fake, I kept telling myself. 

     Even as a child, I was already too idealistic. Why do you have to lie, to fake and to hide emotions when it would be better to let other people know? What’s so wrong with telling the truth?

     I’m taking Corporate Communications right now and it should teach us how to act, to speak and to think like we’re in the business of Public Relations. I thought to myself that wasn’t PR a bunch of flowery words and misleading statements? Perhaps I was wrong. I remember my prof telling us that you can never sound sincere, you can never fight with conviction if you don’t believe in yourself, in your job and your company. Guess she’s right.

     I also learned that I will have a hard time if I’ll venture in the field of PR. I realized that I don’t easily believe in things, I don’t even trust my own judgement at times. It’s so hard for me not to show the truth. Sure I can conceal it with a bunch of lies, or even silence but I can never be too sure of concealing my feelings about something. It’s the only thing that’s hard to control. 

     There were times when I felt comfortable weasling my way out of sticky situations. Pretending to be numb, careless, unsympathetic and apathetic. I can do that to cover up my nervousness, anger, confusion, frustration, excitement, and grievances. I wanted to keep every thing inside so I won’t lose my composure, my poise, my stand.

     Recently, my patience was on the verge of dissipating into thin air. I came back to my five year old stance on pretensions. Hindi ako plastic. And I couldn’t tolerate people who treat me so. If ever I don’t feel comfortable I’m not going to pretend that I enjoy your company at the moment. I just want a breather. I needed space to just let it all go, flush all those nasty feelings out of my system. And it takes time.

    On the other side of things, some things limit me from opening up my mouth and just throwing a sarcastic comment. I was so frustrated at that time that I really wanted to answer back and say all the things that I know to disprove and discredit every thing that will come out of her mouth. Sure, I’ll certainly cause a pang, or perhaps tore her heart out with the things I can say. But I didn’t. I held back. I backed off. I was the one who turned her back. I was the one who dismissed the argument. I was the one who gave up and let her win. It would be pointless anyway. None of the things I say will change her for the better. It will only cause fractures and rift relationships apart.

     It’s hard to keep all those things in me. It’s hard to restrain myself from telling the truth, letting all the ugly truth out. It’s so hard to pretend how I should feel and act. Now I realized that I will never be a good actor. My Acting class is my anger management class after all. Just the let the anger out. 

     It’s pitying that I have to resort into acting like so. As if I had the worst attitude ever. Being a reformer, I wanted to change, to correct things but being a realist restricts me because I know that I can’t do that. It’s frustrating enough that I don’t know what to do to help. Maybe it would all be better to just pretend that I don’t care. Retort to another individualistic and selfish shell. 

This is how I feel. Please don’t talk to me.

I’m excited for the interblock.  

10 Ways to Save Yourself from Messing Up Your Life

Just what I need to read. And for those who are stressed too.
1. Feelings and Thoughts. Stop taking so much notice of how you feel. How you feel is how you feel. It’ll pass soon. What you’re thinking is what you’re thinking. It’ll go too. Tell yourself that whatever you feel, you feel; whatever you think, you think. Since you can’t stop yourself thinking, or prevent emotions from arising in your mind, it makes no sense to be proud or ashamed of either. You didn’t cause them. Only your actions are directly under your control. They’re the only proper cause of pleasure or shame.

[ I remember how my emotions clouded my perceptions 3 years ago. I was foolish, too emotional and thought provoking. I think too much. ]

2. Distress. Let go of worrying. It often makes things worse. The more you think about something bad, the more likely it is to happen. When you’re hair-trigger primed to notice the first sign of trouble, you’ll surely find something close enough to convince yourself it’s come.

[ I used to be so laid back. I let others do the worrying but now it’s so different. So many things moving oh so fast. And I’m the only one who can notice every thing.]

3. Analysis. Ease up on the internal life commentary. If you want to be happy, stop telling yourself you’re miserable. People are always telling themselves how they feel, what they’re thinking, what others feel about them, what this or that event really means. Most of it’s imagination. The rest is equal parts lies and misunderstandings. You have only the most limited understanding of what others feel about you. Usually they’re no better informed on the subject; and they care about it far less than you do. You have no way of knowing what this or that event really means. Whatever you tell yourself will be make-believe.

[ Make-believe? Well, I guess so. To think of so many illustrious things bordering on the impossible… perhaps they’re all just a fraction of my imagination and will remain to be fiction. ]

4. Self-Critique. Take no notice of your inner critic. Judging yourself is pointless. Judging others is half-witted. Whatever you achieve, someone else will always do better. However bad you are, others are worse. Since you can tell neither what’s best nor what’s worst, how can you place yourself correctly between them? Judging others is foolish since you cannot know all the facts, cannot create a reliable or objective scale, have no means of knowing whether your criteria match anyone else’s, and cannot have more than a limited and extremely partial view of the other person. Who cares about your opinion anyway?

[ This is what lack and too much self-confidence can do. Although it’s nice that I usually look at myself first before commenting on other people. I’m not perfect and so is the rest of the world.]

5. Guilt. Give up on feeling guilty. Guilt changes nothing. It may make you feel you’re accepting responsibility, but it can’t produce anything new in your life. If you feel guilty about something you’ve done, either do something to put it right or accept you screwed up and try not to do so again. Then let it go. If you’re feeling guilty about what someone else did, see a psychiatrist. That’s insane.

[ These negative feelings does nothing to one’s life after all. If I did something wrong I shouldn’t burden myself with such thoughts. After all it’s over, better focus on what’s ahead to make sure it won’t happen again.]

6. Others. Stop being concerned what the rest of the world says about you. Nasty people can’t make you mad. Nice people can’t make you happy. Events or people are simply events or people. They can’t make you anything. You have to do that for yourself. Whatever emotions arise in you as a result of external events, they’re powerless until you pick them up and decide to act on them. Besides, most people are far too busy thinking about themselves (and worry what you are are thinking and saying about them) to be concerned about you.

[ I never bothered about what other people will say. And before I do something, I should know what other people will think. In that case I can avoid being hurt from unnecessary comments.]

7. Points. Stop keeping score. Numbers are just numbers. They don’t have mystical powers. Because something is expressed as a number, a ratio or any other numerical pattern doesn’t mean it’s true. Plenty of lovingly calculated business indicators are irrelevant, gibberish, nonsensical, or just plain wrong. If you don’t understand it, or it’s telling you something bizarre, ignore it. There’s nothing scientific about relying on false data. Nor anything useful about charting your life by numbers that were silly in the first place.

[Grades don’t define who you are. It’s what you do with those grades that affects other people. It all has to do with one’s choices in life and not what abilities or knowledge he or she possesses to be ahead.

Aside: I remember what my Econ102 prof said to me once, when you’re a UP grad… red 5s are overlooked. Tsk tsk tsk. Pretty bad assumptions.

Now that I’m in a different school, all that matters is the road I trekked to finish what I’ve started. This was my choice and I’m satisfied that I’m happy with it. ]

8. Plans. Don’t be concerned that your life and career aren’t working out the way you planned. The closer you stick to any plan, the quicker you’ll go wrong. The world changes constantly. However carefully you analyzed the situation when you made the plan, if it’s more than a few days old, things will already be different. After a month, they’ll be very different. After a year, virtually nothing will be the same as it was when you started. Planning is only useful as a discipline to force people to think carefully about what they know and what they don’t. Once you start, throw the plan away and keep your eyes on reality.

[ Keeping everything organized in a tornado is kinda hard to achieve. Based from experience, plans that acted upon can produce the biggest amount of stress. ]

9. User. Don’t let others use you to avoid being responsible for their own decisions. To hold yourself responsible for someone else’s success and happiness demeans them and proves you’ve lost the plot. It’s their life. They have to live it. You can’t do it for them; nor can you stop them from messing it up if they’re determined to do so. The job of a supervisor is to help and supervise. Only control-freaks and some others with a less serious mental disability fail to understand this.

[ Enough said. ]

10. Personality. Don’t worry about about your personality. You don’t really have one. Personality, like ego, is a concept invented by your mind. It doesn’t exist in the real world. Personality is a word for the general impression that you give through your words and actions. If your personality isn’t likeable today, don’t worry. You can always change it, so long as you allow yourself to do so. What fixes someone’s personality in one place is a determined effort on their part-usually through continually telling themselves they’re this or that kind of person and acting on what they say. If you don’t like the way you are, make yourself different. You’re the only person who’s standing in your way.

[That’s kinda sad that I don’t have a personality. I guess all it says is that people are always open to changes and they are just as unpredictable like women. Wink]

Tear Worthy Moments

Last Night

His text message goes :

….papakilala mo bf mo. ‘yung di lang sino sino. ‘yung marunong di katulad ko. ‘yung mayaman di tulad ko. ‘yung kaya mong ipakilala sa parents mo di katulad ko, at mamahalin ka, di katulad ko na hindi mo minahal.”

            I was bursting in tears after reading that. I didn’t know if I was glad he was letting me go. At the back of my head, I thought that this is it, we’re actually through. And it saddens me also we won’t be able to be friends after this.

            I’m so sorry I greatly crushed his ego and confidence. Those times when we fight, I have said the worst derogatory remarks. I was the reason why he is unaffectionate. There were times when our relationship was still young, that I refused talking about our feelings. I didn’t want his feelings for me grow because I wasn’t feeling anything for him. He knew that. I told him that beforehand.

            It was I who made the monster who he is now. Only to realize I was the incompetent one. My smarts and assets do not do me anything good at all. I was vile and inconsiderate. I was demanding. I am a complete asshole to him.

I couldn’t stop crying.

After this night,  I realized that this is the time I really wanted a drink.