When life hits you hard...it hurts.

Why does it feel like what often is nothing but a raindrop transpires suddenly into a storm?
It's swirling inside my mind, inside my life and I can't make it stop.
Sometimes, the raindrops are tears and my face turns into a light drizzle, other times it comes on all at once, like a monsoon.
Every day is different, sometimes I feel like I'm living in a hurricane and I'm watching pieces of my life float by me. Then just as I am going under, I rise to the surface gasping for air but relieved nonetheless. Those moments help keep me humble and make me grateful that I am alive.
Inevitably however, the debris from the circulating storm around me hits me and knocks me off course, yet again. I tremble and try to catch my footing and wait for a moment to come up for air.
As my eyes swell and my heart pounds profusely, I'm waiting for the calm. 

Get Real.

What's real?
What makes you feel?
What matters?
Maybe it's how much stuff you have.
How much sex you have.
Who loves you?
Does it really matter if you don't love yourself?
Who do you care about?
Are you just living for yourself or are you set out to help others better their lives as well?
7 Billion People.
Anyone can get lost in their own lives, undoubtedly we each have our own mission to fill, our own destiny to follow, a purpose. Life isn't meant to be selfish or shallow. Life IS deep.
Life is about everything, everyone, one.
Is life about survival?
Do we live to outlive others? Survival of the fittest.
Why are you superior to me, to him, to them?
Do we not bleed the same? Hurt the same? Feel the same emotions? 

Que pasa con el mundo que está tan inmundo

 Que pasa pregunto que pasa pregunto 

Pregunto yo que pasa hoy con el mundo 

Que está tan absurdo que está taciturno

 Que pasa que nada bueno nos pasa 

Y que la paz por aquí nunca pasa 

Que pasa que solo la guerra pasa 

Que es lo que pasa pregunto yo

Reflejando

Me enamoré de ti

Sin querer

Sin querer queriendo

De repente, me elevaste

Me caí

Sin conocerte bien

Sin razón

y con toda razón

No fue justo

No fue planeado

Me cambiaste a mi

Sin saber

Hasta más tarde

Sin saber

Que fuera posible

Creía con todo mi alma que nos reencontraríamos un día

Me invadiste

Casi me conquistaste

y llovía, llovía

Mi cuerpo se sentía inundado por la lluvia,

y el daño causado por la lluvia ahogó mis pensamientos.

Y de repente, me estaba ahogando por la tormenta de ti.

A veces sueño con la calma antes de la tormenta

pero, cuando me despierto, recuerdo que todavía estoy reconstruyendo la casa.

Y si me permito creer que en realidad nunca llegó la lluvia, que nunca sentí la fuerza de la tormenta, que no me sentía tan ahogada por la lluvia;

bien, entonces, también significaría que nunca fue verdadero.

Que cuando amaneció, aunque el sol y los rayos tocaban mi piel, no sentía el calor.

Tan magnífico, tan alucinante,

si sólo por un momento

el pensamiento de volver a sentir los rayos del sol en mi piel, si sólo por un momento,

me trajera alivio cuando empiece a llover.

Where do I go from here?

Sun. January 11th, 2015.

     Today feels sad and lonely. I am having a hard time finding fulfillment in photo editing. Too many hours on my computer starts to hurt my mind and my psyche. I don't know what to do to fill the void and I'm not sure how I can continue to photograph without committing myself to editing. It's like a constant buzzing, I'm becoming a robot. I took down the t.v. that was in front of my bed, blocking the window, it had always made me feel uneasy, but I'm starting to feel that it was without purpose if I have only replaced it with a smaller version. Nonetheless, at least I am able to open my blinds at full capacity again.

     I'm not living for myself. I know what to do, my mind shouts it: ride your bike, drive someplace real far, listen to music on blast, go to the open mic, take beautiful pictures, call up your friends, get out of bed, cook good food-or don't, write. The furthest that I get some days is the opposite end of my house. I make it here. I play my music loud, sometimes. Wtf is wrong with me? I think about switching it up. Drastically. Maybe I'll change it all, my hair, my name, get my passport and leave. I don't have the financial capital to do so. I thought that schooling would bring me to my life's calling. It has been 6 months since my last college course. I want to throw up at the thought. Finishing school was supposed to be the greatest accomplishment of my life thus far, a time of celebration, encouragement, fresh starts. You can be anything that you want to be. What do I want to be when I grow up? I'm still trying to figure it out... Happy? All I dream about is traveling. All I know that I want to do is explore. My dream of being a Photojournalist hasn't ceased, I just haven't done anything to pursue it professionally. Perhaps due to it being a competitive field, generally low paying and hard to break into.

     I got lost the other day, on the way to the Armstrong Redwood forest. In Tiburon, by the bay. I started a new Instagram page: 

CaliforniaWanderlust.

Love Atrophy

I'm not sure why but I hate myself.

Apparently I don't have enough love in my heart.
I didn't know that you could lose it, that love was something to be lost.
Is love like a muscle? You can gain muscle atrophy by not working out your love muscle.
I find myself becoming internally infuriated.
I feel my chest tighten and my teeth grit.
I have no fuse.
I lack patience and tolerance.
I do not know everything but yet I am so quick to assume that I know best.
I can have such empathy and yet not be able to show kindness.
I am sickened by myself but I do not know how to change.
Yesterday I was told that people often return to the temple in time of need, when they have gone as far as they can without it. I need salvation, refuge, a class in love.
But I laugh at your G-d. At your Jesus talk. I mock your spiritualism. But no one would know because I would defend G-d should you tell me that G-d does not exist. I have faith and hope.
I do not practice my love.
Or maybe I just wouldn't call it love. I do love. I feel love. I do feel.
I feel too much.
Am I feeling wrong?
I am heavy. All the time. I feel the weight of my body.
I am not necessarily self-conscious, yet I am conscious of myself.
Music, Reading, Blogging, Laying, Sitting, Walking, Driving, Cleaning, Making a mess, Microwave, Guilt, Analyzing, Watching, Staring, Thinking, Feeling.
"Am I of the state of talking," my mother asked me?
What a ridiculous question I thought. I laughed, "yes, I suppose," I responded.
However when I came to, I let it sink in. I am so difficult to deal with recently that you'd have to brace yourself to come around me. Ask, before you speak.
I hid in my closet the other day.
The only place in my house that is not inhabited by another.
If it was large enough I would clean it out and make it a regular habit.
I keep looking to the future to fix me.
When I have more money, more space, I will be fixed. I will be one with myself, again.
I used to love me.

Just like that, here I am, writing about my own internal struggle in this very moment and someone just came through my door that I had no expectation of seeing, that brought me more faith, joy and love than I would have imagined. Thank you. 

Lack of motivation.

Some days I just don't feel it. 

I have no desire to get out of bed. 

Not even to eat, get fresh air or pee. 

I just lay here, like a sloth, like a zombie. 

I reflect upon my actions, or lack thereof, searching for the answer to fill the void. 

It's not that I am like this everyday but it's hard not to notice the days that I am. 

Is this depression? 

My chest hurts.

But I'm happy. I believe that I am. 

I am content. 

Yes, I can 100% commit to contentment.

... 

What's next? 

I have not found IT. 

It. 

The force that makes you thrive, that gets you out of bed every morning, that makes you want to do better, be better. The reason for my purpose.

What is my purpose?

Sometimes I'll come across an opportunity and I'll take it, in desperate need of an objective, a project.

Give me something to DO, anything.

However, when you are the only one accountable for your actions it is easy to slack off, procrastinate, lay in bed, like a sloth, sitting, waiting for purpose to fall in your lap.

Girlfriend, opportunity doesn't come knocking unless you go out there and search for it. My self talk helps. 

Then I give up. On projects. You know, the ones I took just to do something, anything with my time.

Why?

Standards? Laziness?

I believe it's due to a lack of fulfillment.

I'd rather do nothing than something that doesn't fulfill me completely.

However, while I'm sitting, waiting, wishing that I'd find it, I'm probably missing out on all the things that will bring me to it. 

I suppose, here's to New Year's resolutions. To finding fulfillment and enjoying the journey along the way. 

What do I know?

      I sit here often. I wake up, reach for my phone and lose cognition of the world around me, it is but me, my mini-computer and my bed. I gaze at fashion items on Pinterest, delicious looking foods and ignite my inner adventurer with boards of travel photography. I force myself to read the news or listen on NPR, where I either end up submersing myself in it or slowly exiting after a few articles of overwhelming reality. I don't know if this is normal, I don't feel abnormal, although I do feel occasionally low, guilty even for indulging or better yet, obsessing.

       Last night I walked into the room where 4 young teenage girls were lying on the bed on their phones, my nieces or my bf's nieces and my little nephew who's only 8 wanted to play with them but they were ignoring him. I told them they were lame for being together but just being on their phones, not talking or playing. I found myself speaking quickly as I spurted out, you guys are 13 and aren't thinking about the same things that he is, you think about boys, school, selfish things and there's a big difference in age. When I was young I didn't have technology like this, I played with my cousins and caused trouble and messed with our parents, we talked and played. No offense I threw in, one of them spoke up and seemed mad at me for saying selfish, and said what do you mean no offense, you just called us lame. I continued to explain that I was thinking about myself at that age too and it's okay and not necessary for them to think about anything else but those things and themselves. I felt the dense air thicken and as I lay on one of the beds I could feel the girls staring at me from the other close by. I didn't know what to say or how to make it better, especially after saying what I truly felt. I talked with the eldest one and asked about school, the younger one that was mad at me asked me if I ever had a dream car when I was young and I slowly felt my heartbeat return to normal. I felt badly for the way that I spoke to them, I could have easily rephrased my words and had a more thought provoking conversation if I had given it more thought. I sit with them often, feeling like I know exactly what it is to be that young but maybe it is different, maybe time's are changing and I'm not in touch with their generation anymore.  

       

     They don't want to play in the dirt and that bothers me. I'm judgmental toward their use of technology because they never have known a world without it. I justify my use because I'm aware of it, take constant breaks and have known what it is to not have a smart phone or a computer or tv on pause. They're good kids actually, fairly normal and well behaved, but it's not just them I'm targeting with my frustration, frankly it's everyone. Sincerely, it's myself too.