I used to say I regret nothing, but that's not true. I just marginalized my regrets; I think one sign of a healthy life is that you always have regrets, they just can't outweigh the good times. If you never have regrets, it means you never had to make a difficult choice between two options that you both wanted, and thus don't appreciate you have as much as you do. There are exceptions, of course - but by nature of being exceptions, the vast majority of people don't fall under that.
Sophomore and junior years, for me, were miserable. Not miserable in the sense that I hated them as they happened, but miserable in the fact that they were filler years - a year, two years, of complete and absolute mediocrity, where I don't think I made a single real memory that I remember, or even any memories that I would like to remember. It's as if they didn't exist at all; and really, they didn't, just a mix of classes and missing them and mindless work and even more mindless games. It wasn't a complete and total waste, but it was far too hedonistic, I think, and I am reaping what I sow.
My grades have been in pretty much a downwards slide since the beginning of college. Not abrupt like falling off a cliff; just a slow, steady sinking from As to Bs to Cs to Ds to Fs, and only now do they show signs of improvement. Too little, too late in many ways, and it will reflect in my future, in my inability to get certain internships or even be considered for some jobs because my GPA is too low. And it is not insurmountable, but it is inconvenient. School has always been something I've been taking for granted, and now at the doorstep of graduation, I find myself coming out of it with a degree, but not much more knowledge. It is that loss that I regret the most.
Good is the enemy of great. Mediocrity is the enemy of excellence. And today, I am nothing if not mediocre. I was never great, I think, but I am less than that now. And the most troubling part - or perhaps the only troubling part - is the knowledge that I do not need to be mediocre, that I could rise above. And it is that knowledge that still gives hope; that knowledge teases and promises a future that can still exist, a future where the good Doctor works at a hospital and teaches at a medical school and writes a novel on the side.
There's a reason that Hope can out of Pandora's box; I don't think successful torture can occur without it. Hope is necessary for happiness, for perseverence...but it is also that which causes people to break, that leads to the deepest of depressions. Without hope at all, there is only fatalism; whatever happens, is meant to, and so there is no escape, and so there is nothing we personally can do to alter things. With hope, though, with the dreams of a better situation, a better world, or job, or life, then you can see the difference between where you are, and where that better situation is - and if you are incapable of bridging the gap, then you are only impoverished by hope.
It is far easier to disappoint yourself than it is to disappoint someone else; this explains why I am very good at my job, and very bad at school, and organization. Getting fired is inconceiveable; that would require disappointing or failing my boss, coworkers, and the users I help. But not going to class? Easy, when your professor doesn't take attendance and you have no friends in it. I do not excuse myself; I simply state what is. In this, I regret disappointing my parents, because that has happened, but they are too close to me. Perhaps it is knowledge that they will love me no matter what, or it is arrogance that I will eventually make them proud; if neither occurred then perhaps I would have disappointed them less.
The five stages of grief: Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression, Acceptance. I accept what happened and who I am, and that this situation is almost over with. I have lost most of the chips that I came in with, but maybe blackjack will be better for me than poker. The core problem - that of my motivation - is still unchanged, but I am moving to an arena that will mitigate the issue while I examine it more closely.
Self-examination is inescapable for me; the path away from it leads to chaos and darkness - or, in more literal terms, complete escapism, which is never productive. It's almost Confuscian, in a way; that I must constantly assess whether I am on the right path, and the lack of assessment itself, I believe, is a signal that I am not. The right path isn't necessarily 'the right path', in that it is a path that all 'good men' walk or the 'moral' path; for me, it's simply the path that leads upwards instead of downwards, or a path that leads me to be more accepting of who I am. Lack of assessment arises from the avoidance of it, which indicates that a negative verdict is likely to be reached.
Black and white; things...are not always. But my personal philosophy does separate most things into it, and furthermore, the grey that I walk tends to shade towards black. I am more a devil than an angel; I do not inspire through example but rather push forward by directive, by sarcasm, by hurt. But more complicated than that, I think I am inherently an internalist, and fulfill the standard model of reacting negatively to personal faults expressed in others. When there is a problem and a solution, and the patient is not moving towards the solution, my natural tendency is to be biting and act disappointed about why progress is not being made - which, by the by, is why I would not make a good psychiatrist - but the reason I do so is quite likely that I know my own solution, and yet I do not move towards it. Perhaps in getting others to go towards it, I believe I may redeem myself. Call me Constantine - he who walks the line, always saving others, if only to save himself.
Call me House, for people are not people; they are black boxes of input and output, always to be studied, perhaps to empathize with, but never sympathy. That is another failing and I regret it, though it is not deliberate, it is perpetuated by deliberate actions. When a moth does not actively avoid the flame, even though does not embrace the inferno, it is not taking the optimal path. My relationships are my greatest failing, for they are the epitome of modus operandus with regards to people; if there is one lesson to be learned, it is that hurt is the outcome. And that I regret deeply, most, because I do not mean to hurt people, I do not enjoy it, and I do not believe it is necessary to gain knowledge on the black boxes that we humans are...and if that is the only outcome, then I seek no more of it. There must be an alteration in the way that I approach it, but how? - asks the machine, unable to change its programming.
But there is error in my actions, even if it is not deliberate. I am drawn to the flame that is uniqueness...and more often than not, interesting means fucked up. Normal happy households don't make for interesting people; and it is adversity that tests people. Not to say that interesting people can't exist without trauma, but there is significantly less so. Those one standard deviation away from the norm rarely are interesting, and the problem is only compounded when other attributes are added. At the heart of it, still, is the issue that I fall for those that I consider interesting pretty much to the initial exclusion of all other factors. While the idea that I don't do it intentionally is a mitigating factor, the previous relationship of moth to flame applies - I find someone interesting, and so I'll ask more questions about them, and listen to their story, and get drawn in...which results, eventually, in falling for them. And then months later, my brain will decide there is little left to compute, and so my foundation is gone, leaving little behind.
I need to fall in love, a friend told me. Yeah, honey, why don't you just make that happen?
I am better of today than I was yesterday, and better off that I was a month or a year ago. I have a plan for hte future, and however it may go terribly (or not go at all) some sort of expectation for the future is better than none at all. Graduate here, work for two years at a Tech support company taking helpdesk calls, and then take classes without being matriculated to demonstrate competitiveness and intent, and then get into grad school. Political science is a possibility, as is some form of IT / computer science, though I don't relish the idea of programming, I appreciate its function and form. After grad school with a 3.7+ GPA, it should be med school, and then I'll be 30. So hey, that's the next ten years.
Nothing, of course, ever goes to plan, but for now...well, I'll keep slogging at how to debug myself, and in the meantime? Not doing too badly. I enjoy the company of the friends I have, am quietly interested in many fields, and am supporting myself. I would rather, perhaps, be passionate in one...but I will take a quiet interest in many over no interest in any.
That ends today's psychological
insights comments.
As a side note, I've always treated xanga like my journal that others can just happen to read; this post is no different. I believe that censoring because the readership might be offended is wrong (and plus, I don't have readership to maintain) and because I deeply believe in absolute total honesty. That, however, doesn't mean that this isn't up for discussion - comments, critiques, and questions are the heart of advancement of any kind, and this is no different.
Comments (2)
Hear hear, I know what that's like.
I miss you.
I wish I'd been here for you, and everyone, more than I have been in the past few months, years. The time kind of escapes me.
As selfish as it is, or was, however, I was discovering myself. I wasn't happy, and I had not been happy for several years. Sophomore and junior year and part of my senior year were the mirror of your junior and senior years. In addition to that, bad stuff was happening, and had happened, and I wasn't dealing with it, only suppressing it. I had to escape, to take several step backs and try to start over, or at least reevaluate.
And I'm better now, I've come out a better person. But while helping myself, I wasn't able to help others, like you or Maddy, if you would have even accepted my help. And I regret this, perhaps one of my greatest regrets. Because as different as I have come out, I will still put you, my friends, before myself. Always. That part of my self preservation hasn't changed. And if I could have helped you rather than myself, and done so consciously, I would have.
But I didn't realize everyone else's problems; I was too caught up in my own. And I'm sorry.
At this point I'm rambling. My original intent had been to tell you that I miss you, and I'm very proud of you. I don't know you well anymore (if I ever really did) and I'm sorry for that.
I once told you that you were too good for me. I still mean this, just in a different connotation. Not in a self depressed way (or rather, not much of one) but rather that you have the potential to be a great person, you always have. And to me you are a great person, and always have been. But my perspective doesn't matter; it's yours that does, and always has.
I doubt you'll ever see this, it doesn't seem as if you use this anymore.
But just know that I will always be here when you need me, and I love you.