Habits

I like routines. I like how making things into habits make me completely forget the need to force myself into doing things that I wouldn’t normally want to.

One thing that I have finally mastered in the past year or so is making a habit of meditating first thing in the morning when I wake up. Simply sitting there, relaxed, listening to my breathing, and being present has helped me tremendously.

I love how after I have practiced meditating steadily, my life seemed to have simply been satisfying and a blessing altogether. Just being here, appreciating all that I am, and all that I have – now.

With the quarantine in place and the extra time I got from not having the need to commute to work, I am slowly building a habit of painting on a daily basis. So far, I’m on my 15th-day steak. I read somewhere that it takes 66 days so I have a long way to go.

I am also planning to write every other day. This one, I haven’t yet started. I need to add a personal tracker for this as it keeps me accountable to myself seeing my daily streak.

How about you? What habits have you formed so far that have been most beneficial to you? What habits are you planning to build?

#blogging, #inspiration, #journal, #life, #meditation, #time

Whoah, It’s Been A Year?

It has been over a year since my last update. Time does fly really fast.

With the pandemic going on about and us still trying to find a way into this new normal, it seems to me that time has just slipped by the past three months.

How’s it going? I hope you’re at least okay. Wherever you are or whatever you’re into.

Sometimes I ask myself that too. One, because no one else really asks, two, because I don’t actually really know how to answer that at this moment.

Working from home since the middle of March this year has made it really hard for me to “stop” and pause if only to relax. Right now, I am actually trying to take my mind off things. There’s this big pull on me towards hustling on. I think that’s just my brain trying to trick me into “action faking” it when all I really needed right now is to enjoy this weekend.

I hope you’re healthy and well.

By the way, I plan to write more (again, after a year) if only to keep on practicing. I have always loved putting words down into paper (or medium, like this) and it’s time to go back again.

#blogging, #journal, #life, #mental-health, #time

Others

I had another major breakdown a couple of nights ago. My husband was out on a wedding party with his colleagues and I was alone at home. I felt terribly lonely and sad. I knew that days of not having deep conversations with anyone was building me up for this but I ignored it. I chose to be in solitude even at work, talking only when necessary to people around me as the work required me too.

I realized I was up for another breakdown the moment I found myself searching Google for answers to my questions like: “How much solitude is too much?”, or “I don’t have any friends.”

I totally alienated myself and it has kicked me back in my butt with this revenge.

Don’t get me wrong. I totally love solitude, but these past few days, I just needed someone to talk me out of the blues like how a friend did the past couple of years. I actually wanted to reach out to that friend again but what kept me from doing it is the thinking that I just didn’t want to burden him again or anyone for such nonsense like feelings of loneliness lasting for months now. It just gets old, you know? It’s like a stubborn weed that keeps growing no matter how I try to uproot it off my system.

And all along I thought I’m over this already when I decided to set bigger goals and set up a system for me to try to achieve them.

I bailed my eyes out almost all night long, while desperately hoping for an escape out from this life. I wanted to hurt myself physically too. But I didn’t because I’m a coward.

I found myself questioning how I got through decades of solitude without actually having a sole person to confide in. I wanted that back – those years when I relied on no one, when I craved for no company but of my own. Too bad I threw away all my journals when I cleaned out some space last year. I forgot how I did it back then. As far as I can remember, I didn’t long for someone to always talk to at that point.

I’m going to have a lot of digging to do. I can’t let this be a habit. Relying too much on others is not a good option.

#blogging, #depression, #journal, #mental-health, #people, #relationships

A Snippet

I was doing the dishes when he arrived. I was listening to a video about “What To Do When You’re Lonely and Depressed” in the background.

He smiled and puckered his lips playfully waiting for me to kiss him. I gave him a peck and continued what I was doing. Then he noticed the title on video.

“Are you lonely or depressed?” he asked. He was behind my back.

I didn’t answer right away but tears started welling up in my eyes.

I wanted to tell him how the past few months have been a struggle for me, how the dragging of myself out of bed may actually mean more than just burnout from working, and how losing a trusted friend I used to share these episodes before seemed to have brought me back to where I never thought I’d ever be again. I wanted to tell him that even though I still do the routines I have set up the past year in hopes of achieving goals I shared with him, these past few weeks, it all seemed meaningless to me. I wanted to tell him that even though I meditated and exercised and wrote on my journal regularly, they only seemed to provide me with temporary relief.

“Are you hungry?” I asked without answering his question. “Let’s eat.” I said as I faced him with a smile ready.

“Okay.” he replied. Forgetting his initial question.

I cheerily asked him about his day and started my usual lively conversations with him. He didn’t notice what I tried to hide.

My soul felt cold but I chose to be warm to him, I didn’t want him to worry. Not one bit.

#blogging, #depression, #emotions, #journal, #life, #mental-health, #relationships

Escape

I woke up today with a bitterness in my mouth and the realization that everything that happened to me is all my fault. All of a sudden I have this urging feeling of wanting to go away and get lost away from everyone who knows me. I want to run away from it all.

What if I just live in a place where nobody knows my past or who I am and I just get to live the way I really want to? Alone, free, and no other responsibilities but to myself.

I am dangerous. Even to myself. Most of all, to the people who I have let come close to me. I want no part of that. I want no one expecting anything from me. I don’t want to hurt anyone because of my decisions.

It’s funny how the aching sensations feel so real when you realize how much of what’s happening to you is because of your decisions, or the lack of it.

Maybe I ought to plan on my escape from this all the very soonest. Somewhere cold, maybe.

#blogging, #depression, #journal, #life, #mental-health, #people, #relationships

Scorched

I could feel the scorching heat of the sun across my face. I didn’t mind. Arms crossed across my chest, I stood beside the empty seats on the bus stop waiting for the next ride to arrive. My thoughts fluttered back to you. This weather was the usual weather we used to spend moments on long ago. It still seemed like yesterday to me, those hot middle-of-the-day moments when we used to shelter ourselves beneath the young cherry trees lined up outside the building as you blew air of smokes of cigarettes along the wind away from my face. Those hours we spent talking while you smoked almost two to five sticks in one sitting, while we barely noticed the time passing by.

Some days I wish I had never met you. Maybe my life would be much different from what it is now today. Maybe I would still be hanging out with people who viewed the world in a simple, less complicated way. But I did. And somehow, you and I clicked.

Everything that I wanted to talk about and not finding anyone to talk to, we talked about. It’s like you’re the soulmate to my dreamy, twisted, frustrated, secretly competitive mind, and a haven to my unquenched thirst to deeper conversations that I never dared explore with other people. You always seemed to understand.

You’re gone. And while I thought that I would long be over you in a matter of months, I never was. Maybe I never will be. We never get over those extraordinary connections, do we? To me, it seems like it created a wormhole-like longing for your presence because it just can’t seem to be filled with anything else. There is just no one like you.

So in solitude I crave for you, ever so hoping that I could find another soul who could ignite my mind the way you did.

For now, I’d cherish the solitude that I have chosen in place of you, enjoy the smaller doses of empty conversations with other people around me, only if to bring me a little smile or laughter once in a little while.

Maybe one day I would find someone like you again. Or maybe, I’d bask in this solitude until it becomes too much, scorching me like this midday sun, numb and barren to any more feelings and memories of you.

#blogging, #journal, #life, #moving-on, #relationships