Category: writing from college

those who never asked why

I brought up the concept of success with one of my friends the other day. Similar to many of the people in my immediate circle of friends, we both had internship offers for the upcoming summer at companies that would make both our parents proud, which is defined by the fact that our parents have, at least, heard of both of the companies that we have signed our offer letters for. The people in my life are incredibly lucky in this respect.

Regardless of how hard we have worked in our lives —  because there exist countless individuals who work hard in various facets of society — my friends and I end up accomplishing many of the goals we set out for. While there exist numerous opportunities to work hard, there exists very few for income mobility and social elevation. Capitalism without social safety nets tends to work that way in American society. Unless, of course, our lives had been defined by the privilege to have the opportunity to pursue careers that allow us to enjoy the fruits of our hard work. Opportunities such as growing up in an upper-income suburban neighborhood with a school that had a few thousand dollars of superfluous funding.

And because of the resources that we have defined our lives, we tend to think of our success outside of the context of our opportunities; the idea that there could exist an absence of opportunity is not an idea that crosses my mind via intuition. We both got into a college we wanted to go to, and because we have never encountered individuals who had fewer resources than we do, we thought of our success as defined through our hard work. All of our peers have the same stable childhood that we had, so how could we define my success outside of hard work, one of the few variable conditions that defined my childhood? Without a reason to do so, why would I question my success?

And within the context of the resources provided to us throughout our adolescence, we had been lucky. And now, because of the countless additional resources that were provided to us once we arrived as undergraduates, we are, once again, lucky. I have recently developed an interest in French existentialism, and if I want to read Proust’s In Search of Lost Time in context with detailed analysis by scholars, I could check out ten books in Van Pelt Library from the two bookshelves specifically dedicated to Proust. I have. If I needed help finding an internship for the summer, I have access to countless information sessions and alumni databases that most schools do not have. Is is a surprise that my parents — not I — paid for any of these resources?

But, although many aspects of my life have been defined through the opportunities that I have been afforded, I have experienced, on a few occurrences, experiences that have left me with a slightly darker conception of the world. Although I have an experienced an otherwise wholesome life, there are a couple of defining rejections and moments of hopelessness that I have experienced that leave me with a what I believe to be a more real outlook on the world. Because I have experienced these experiences, I approach each of my professional and personal accomplishments with feelings of inquisition. I question the nature of my success because I understand the limitations of my own capabilities in determining my future.

Why did my application get picked up from the pile of other applications? Why did the recruiter feel as if I deserved a first-round interview? Why do I continue on with the recruitment process? The answer is often not due to my efforts. I go to a school with a long tradition of on-campus recruitment. I have leveraged many of the professional opportunities I have received as an undergraduate through my extracurricular activities to embellish my resume. And when I seriously committed to the recruitment process as a junior to find a career that could both sustain my lifestyle choices as well as my intellectual interests, I had already developed a keen understanding of the system from the exposure I have received through information diffusion.

Now that I have utilized the privileges I have been afforded to the fullest extent I could at the time, I reflect upon my professional successes with a profound sense of irony. By the standards set through my privilege, I am by no means successful. By the standards set through my school, I am definitely by no means successful. But now that I have achieved some degree of material comfort for the next couple years of my life, I continue to ask myself why I deserve opportunities that I have been afforded. Without the resources and opportunities that I have been afforded until now, I am nothing. Although I have not “fucked up” in the context of the resources and opportunities I have been afforded, I find the act of returning to a state of humbleness through self-criticism to feel real.

But, in terms of those around me, I wonder how often the same students around me ask themselves regarding the nature of their success. How often do the count the number of privileges that they have been afforded in their lives? How often do they realize the impossibility of counting all the privileges that they have been afforded that led up to the success that they have convinced themselves they deserved due to their hard work? It constantly feels within our nature to constantly want more regardless of the context of opportunity. It seems that no matter how far we leverage the opportunities that we did not create for ourselves, the satisfaction we seek will always be at arm’s length. I wonder if that had been the source of my unhappiness all of these years: wanting but not appreciating.

Some individuals experience little rejection in their lives. They have their eyes set on certain goals, and — regardless of how deserving they are of their accomplishments — they accomplish their goal and move on to their next goal, which they accomplish with just as much ease as they have their first goal. Defined through the accomplishment of one goal to the next goal, the question is always one goal to the next goal. To live for the next goal to be accomplished because there has been very little reason to reflect on the nature of their success. Without significant rejection in their lives to humble them and allow them to relate to the vast majority of individuals who have faced rejected in their lives, they live a quite a weightless existence. Because the nature of continual success implies the absence of the continual deficit of success.

Ontologically.

There are certain privileges that make it difficult to question the nature of success. Having high socioeconomic status. Having an attractive face. Having a naturally good personality. The more privileges that permeate our lives, the more disconnected we become from the nature of our success. Although we all desire opportunity, it seems, in the face of constantly wanting more achievement, we forget to filter through the different types of success we desire. After all, not all success was made equally. There is some success that is dependent on opportunities that were given to us, and there is some success, although still dependent, less so. But desperation leads us to believe that there does not exist a spectrum in the purity of success. Between success entirely dependent on opportunity and success partially dependent on opportunity, one rings with more reality than the other.

It is not a surprise that the fact that the majority of our success is determined by factors outside of our immediate control. Individuals who believe otherwise belong in the category of those who have not asked why. Even though some individuals do not believe that their success is dependent on factors outside of their immediate control, it does not negate the countless opportunities that have existed for them that have not existed for others. They speak from an absence of experience, particularly of rejection, that would humble their conception of success to realize that achievement is, for the most part, not dependent on working hard. They may believe that they work hard, but from my experience, any student attending college paid for by their parents have not observed the lives of individuals that truly defines hard work.

I do not work hard compared the countless individuals across the United States who do not have the luxury of having a job that fulfills their personal and intellectual interests. I have been given comparatively more resources and opportunities than 99 percent of other individuals in the world, most of whom have very similar objectives and ethics as I. I have taken many measures to attempt to live an existence that is more authentic by keeping my excessive desires in check, but despite all of my efforts in attempting to realize the opportunities that I have been afforded throughout my life, I can only conceptualize but never truly understand my privilege. Despite attempting to understand the nature of the question why, I can only come to understand myself as a member of the class that has a reason to ask.

I will never understand — how some individuals can feel so entitled to their own existences. I cannot understand the individuals who feel as if they have a contribution on subjects they know little to nothing about or the individuals who feel a need to share an opinion when given the opportunity to do so. While, given the concept of inalienable rights, we all have the right to an opinion, it does not mean we should have an opinion, especially on subjects where there exists a multitude of experts who have significantly weaker sentiments because they can understand both sides. Those are the individuals who have experienced enough rejection in their lives that would introduce even the mere thought that they could be wrong about a subject. Without a source of humbleness, they feel as if their existence matters when it does not.

Those individuals who go to music festivals, who are willing to spend over $300 on a three-day pass to go to a concert to miss the majority of the artists, only to show up for the headliner where they can sing a couple choruses without understanding the meaning behind the lyrics. This does not include all individuals who go to music festivals, of course, but saying that music festivals are locations of high socioeconomic or racial diversity would evoke within me an eruption of disgusted and manic laughter. And from my experiences of going to concerts for some time now, I cannot imagine a group of more entitled and privileged group of individuals than the ones I have encountered over the two music festivals I have participated in. Needless to say, I do not have a favorable opinion on individuals who go to music festivals.

Even the mere act of living. Why do some individuals feel as if they are justified to living at all? My mere existence takes away resources from countless other individuals who need those same resources more than I do. My mere existence damages the planet in countless more ways than I can even bring myself to conceptualize. Especially coming from a high-income country with relatively extravagant consumption habits, even the mere act of living does an injustice to the greater balance of the universe. The only energy sustaining my existence to act in such opposition to the natural entropy of the universe is my will to live. Throughout numerous times during the day, I question my will to live because I do not feel as if I deserve to live, and I can never understand those who do not.

Some individuals have no problem living a hedonistic lifestyle. Although I see nothing inherently wrong with living a life of material excess, it seems like a life created from the inability question the nature of their opportunities as opposed to a life created for the sake of truly pursuing happiness. Although I have only limited exposure to meeting individuals within my geographic vicinity, I have never met an individual who simultaneously lived a life of excess while truly understanding the limitations of their own contributions towards their own success. To me, the two exists on opposite ends of polarity, and one cannot exist within the same container as the other in the same spatial and temporal specification. Individuals cannot be both materialistic and humble.

Of course, it is merely a difference of values. Objectivism, or whatever be the contemporary reinvention of the term. While I wish to live a life where I tame my experiences to those capped at a level of comfort proportionate to a corresponding level of deservedness, some individuals seek to maximize the accumulation of material experiences to the fullest extent that their resources could afford. Those are the individuals who have not asked why they are entitled to such a life of luxury when there exist infinitely more individuals across the world who work significantly harder than them without the same levels of excess. I simply cannot enjoy material excess when I know that there does not exist anybody who deserves the excess they create through the contributions they have made.

I cannot imagine a greater privilege than those individuals who feel as if they are entitled to living life the way they want to live. While it is a right that we live a life that we want to live, it does not mean that it is a right not deserving of questioning. The ability to live a materialistic life only implies the absence of experience that would cause them to humble their accomplishments relative to their opportunities, primarily, experiences of profound suffering. To me, seeing the truth interlacing the universe can only come after experiencing suffering. It also implies that without suffering, there can be no possibility of seeing the truth. And without truth, all we can create are our imitations, which are often created through the false idols perpetuated by the culture industry.

Some individuals

I do not understand. I will never understand. I cannot understand.

the romantic ideal of the wordless walk

The school of romanticism believes that the act of speaking words does the act of loving an injustice. The reasoning goes that love does not need an explanation, and whatever explanation that is created is inherently constraining to the ineffable nature of love.

I walk the streets of Valencia with my parents in search of a place to dine in the evening. The only sounds that fill the soundscape are the arbitrary conversations that come and go as we pass by people on our pursuit of the perfect restaurant that would satisfy our requirements for both authenticity and affordability. In other words, the only conversation that flows through our journey are those composed by others. I would listen attentively to the select words that I could capture and categorize within my mind, and then I would repeat until I have found another budding conversation to capture my attention.

My interactions with my parents have been like so for as long as I could remember. The silence is the only certainty I have come to know within my measly twenty years of existence, at least in context of the longest relationship I will ever sustain. Whenever conversations do incept, they revolve around an interpretation of my growth predicated on professional success. Such conversations inevitably devolve into a boiling simmer, as the friction caused by two misunderstandings would inevitably ensue; I do not enjoy being lectured by my parents on a subject whose views I consider to be antiquated, and my parents believe that their guidance is paradigm while my motivations come from ignorance.

Lately, I have become less inclined to have a conversation whenever I do not feel the need to have a conversation. Sometimes, my scorn for conversation would arise from a mutual incompatibility; differing perspectives on on fundamental truths about the world tend to result in quite a bit of conversational friction. Sometimes, the absence of conversation could be explained through the comfort derived the unconditional property that relinquishes the implicit condition of conversation within relationships. I often wonder in my day-to-day interactions on which of these dichotomies would explain my disdain for conversation at a given time.

In terms of personality compatibility, I tend to approach prospective friendships with the binary category of getting it. At this juncture of my life, when I have a degree of security within my relationships as well as increasingly finite energy to create new friendships, my optimal distribution of my time and energy becomes veered towards understanding and individuals as quickly as possible before deciding whether such a series of interactions would be worth further pursuing through investing more finite personal resources such as social networks and vulnerabilities. The more a friendship would progress, the more sacrifices it would necessitate. With each potential sacrifice, the decision arises whether to commit to making the sacrifice in furthering the friendship — or to pursue the infinite number of alternatives.

Among individuals who get it, silence can be tolerated. According to the same doctrine in romanticism, the optimal form of love exists in a state of silence, as there would not exist any words to pollute the sentiment. As each individual values different traits within a personality, the search of for those who get it is defined through its lack of progress. It would be naive to say that everyone in the world could be compatible with every other person given enough measures to ensure compatibility; the truth remains that there could only be a limited number of compatible individuals within each categorization of personality. Otherwise, individuals would have the capability to fall in love with whoever, but it is almost comical to say that an individualistic conception of love is inclusive.

For me, I cannot tolerate individuals who self-identify as a “happy” person. I used to sublimate my distaste within an understanding that sadness is truth and that happiness only exists among individuals who have experienced a tremendous dearth of sadness in their lives, but I have come to realize that my disdain arises from none other than a lack of understanding. A friend pointed out that perhaps my disdain for “happy” people arises from my inability to understand their frameworks.. I do not get “happy” people just as “happy” people do not get “sad” people. It is the fundamental incompatibility that arises from a difference in experiences that would fundamentally lead individuals to only have a select group of individuals that they would thrive among.

While the happy-sad personality types exist on a spectrum, the either/or categorization between “happy” and “sad” people represents the fundamental conundrum found in statistical learning where the training data set automatically loses its authority to be the testing data set as soon as it is selected to be used to train the model. Similarly, individuals cannot simultaneously exist as both “happy” and “sad” individuals because of the finiteness of the formative years of their lives that had created their personalities for the most part. The discrepancies could additionally be explained by the fact that experiences that would result in a “happy” personality are fundamentally different from those that would result in a “sad” personality. The distribution of formative experiences marks the personality within the happy-sad continuum.

Among “happy” people, I would have to explain my sadness. No matter how well I can articulate my sentiments, “happy” people can only attempt to conceptualize my perspective, similarly to how I can only conceptualize their perspectives through their articulations of their experiences. Among “sad” people, however, I would no longer have the need to attempt to reduce the complexity of my sentiments for individuals who would otherwise not be able to conceptualize my experiences. To articulate ideas and experiences among individuals and have them complete indigenous thoughts with complementary perspectives represents the act of getting it. And there is no amount of explaining that would allow individuals who do not get it to get it.

Yet, sometimes, even among those individuals who get it, there exist frictions in personalities that may or may not result in silence. While there can exist a sort of existential connection among individuals who have a similar conception of getting it, the concept of conversation does not exist on the same existential plane as sharing similar experiences that would result in similar understandings of the intangible fabrics of the universe. Conversation, unlike shared truths derived from common experience, revolves around the medium of language, which has been implicitly accepted to be imperfect, and conversation, unlike alignments in personal history, cannot be changed through the happenings of the world outside of our immediate observation.

We can be friendly with individuals who have an equal capacity to hold conversation as us, but we cannot become friends as defined through a shared conception of truth derived from a similar set of defining experiences. Even with language and physical barriers, conversation could be had given enough effort, but there is no amount of effort that would perfectly simulate the existential entanglement of shared experience. Although conversations could craft enjoyable memories defined through sharing unique thoughts, the love defined through intimacy can only be found through shared experience. In that sense, I am positing the notion that without the infusion of the action of getting it, conversation, no matter how often repeated, will never lead to love.

As for my parents, I can easily say that our absence of conversation is well within my current conception of love; after all, no matter how tumultuous the relationship, the connection between parent and child is always one of love. But I would also say that there are some aspects that are at odds. I will never understand their experiences growing up with a fraction of the luxuries that I can afford right now in the same way that they can never understand my experiences of constantly questioning my existential identity due to the comforts I have been afforded. The two experiences, in that sense, and incompatible, and I will never get them in the same way that they will never get me.

But, among my peers, I wonder. There are a few individuals who I consider to be those individuals who get it. How many individuals could I go on a wordless walk and allow the silence to become the purest form of love between us? The number could not possibly exceed three. Over a lifetime.

woe is it over the souls i shall never meet

These past couple months have been filled with experiences that have fundamentally shaped the way that I conceptualize the world. A series of diverse interactions among a diverse set of individuals who follow a diverse set of ideologies. I cherish those interactions. All the same, I am saddened that those interactions would live on in my mind to become isolated from the individual I shared them with. Because the pursuit of friendship will not fall within the optimal distribution of mutual existential resources, the prospect of pursuing more than a series of interactions will never come to fruition. Their identities, thus, will become lost as I continue to move on with my life.

I wonder about those friendships that I will never have a chance to cultivate. Those individuals who I have spoken to on occasion only to understand the full extent of my intrigue in their ideas and experiences, only to be constrained by factors that would allow me to never undergo the cycle of creation and destruction of friendship. I would never be able to share intimate moments because the experience of intimate moments only comes from a timeless cultivation of moments. Intimacy does not come through a couple of intense interactions that would supposedly accelerate the progression of a friendship. While the act of exchanging details about formative past experiences creates an air of relatability, it lacks the depth of connection that intimacy offers because intimacy, unlike conversation, does not arise through similarity alone.

Intimacy does not need to be shared among individuals who share the same framework for understanding their experiences. The act of creating intimacy is dependent on a multitude of factors that cannot be quantified through language. Even a mere attempt of understanding intimacy through words would do the nature of intimacy an injustice. Because, while we can experience the empirical manifestation of intimacy through feeling intimate with someone, our feelings are merely a series of chemical reactions that allow us to perceive the boundless existential connection that is true intimacy. As imperfect beings unable to conceptualize the true extent that defines our state of intimacy, all we can do is attempt to reconstruct our feelings through a rational lens.

I wonder about those interactions I have that do not progress beyond words exchanged by two strangers. Especially when I am studying abroad next semester, I feel a sense of reluctance when I reflect upon the connections I have made this semester. How could I hope to derive the intimacy that I seek when I am hopelessly constrained to limit the necessary time spent sharing experiences that serves a pillar towards cultivating intimate experiences? If intimacy is created, among other things, through time spent with each other, then how could I hope to achieve the level of connection that is intimacy without having the necessary conditions to pursue kindling friendships beyond a couple of interaction that only serves as a point of relatability. Without consistency, time shared with each other can only serve as a series of dotted points.

I want to create a line, to achieve another dimension friendship that a couple of points do not satisfy. Although I find beauty in the ephemerality of friendship, I can only view a friendship as beautiful if I am afraid to lose it. Only when I have achieved a level of connection that is intimacy within a friendship would I ever treat it as irreplaceable. While friendships can overlap in areas of identity that they create, there can never exist within the same plane of existence once intimacy has been achieved. Only through achieving intimacy does a friendship solidify its existence within our identity, and only when other aspects of the world other than ourselves truly live in our lives can our identity truly be broken.

I do not blink when individuals come and go in my life. As an integral part of the experience of aging, I do not fear those individuals whose existence relative to my existence is defined through a few sparse interactions spaced out between long periods of time. Without immediately perceiving those individuals within the context of direct physical contact, they do have a significant part in the creation of the self that had been the amalgamation of past experiences. Without representing a part of my identity, their presence or lack of a presence only serves an unobserved phenomenon within a chaotic system of countless other phenomena that do not go observed by me. Such is the reality of living.

It would be foolish to believe that all individuals in the world are compatible. If I were to assume that identities are the creation of a deterministic vacuum of casual conditions, then because we have all had different experiences in the past, it would imply that our differences in our environment and creation would necessitate that individuals could only relate to a certain other individuals with a set of equally compatible character traits that define the nature of compatible personalities. Because, despite what I have tried to believe all of my life, there exists a threshold of intimacy that is dependent on a set of initial conditions beyond what I could control. In other words, there only exists a finite amount of people in the world that have compatible personalities to each other.

I, similarly, follow the tradition in understanding that I only have a finite amount of individuals who I could relate to on an existential level. I, for example, do not get along with individuals who self-describe themselves as happy people, regardless of how compatible we are in other superficial parts of compatibility such as political affiliations and lifestyle choices. And so, I cannot help but be enamored whenever I meet individuals who complement my personality in ways that would allow me to foresee a future where I could achieve the level of connection that is intimacy. But, just as I cannot help but feel waves of excitement, I also lace my feelings with an unsuppressible bitterness, as I know that some interactions are destined to only remain to be sporadic interactions.

It would be naive of me to believe that all connections grounded in a sense of mutual compatibility are destined to become intimate. For one, feelings of mutual compatibility have to be, well, mutual. Even within the understanding of mutual compatibility comes with the intensity of the desire to create intimacy; given temporal and environmental constraints, both parties have to have a similar willingness to make sacrifices to achieve intimacy. Given the individualistic nature of modern living, which I am not an exception from, the prospect of achieving intimacy seems almost to be caused by chance as opposed to a willing effort to create. How many of our intimate friends had been caused by our effort? 

Especially at this junction in my life where I am constantly faced with new barriers to invest in my friendships given an uphill battle, I wonder about the prospect of ever achieving intimacy again. In high school, the environment had been conducive towards creating incentives to further invest in my friendships. Because I would spend time with my friends almost every day in school, the concept of furthering friendships seem all within the definition of friendship itself. Within the first couple years of college, the same incentive structure applied; after all, the existence of free time is one of the defining features unique to the time we spend in college. But, now that I am approaching the end of my college experience, the incentive in furthering friendships become less and less.

I wonder about those interactions I have had that fundamentally changed how I conceptualize my life. I wonder if there exists opportunities in the future to replicate those interactions with the same individuals. I wonder if those interactions would retain their status as defining because of the fact that they are unique in the true sense of the word unique. Because, now that I am approaching closer towards the end of the part of my life free from responsibilities, it seems that it becomes more and more difficult to achieve intimacy among individuals as opposed to sharing a series of meaningful interactions among a diverse set of individuals confined to only a few hours of conversation.

I would hate it if my life came to that. 

fall nights

I live for those gentle winds against my thighs as I open my balcony door towards the tranquil rustling of tree leaves. I let myself dissipate into the anonymity of the darkness, reflecting upon the time in my life when I had feared the murky unknown for its beautiful uncertainty. I set my speaker down on the wooden railing as I have countless times before, playing crash by EDEN from a playlist created after the quiet yet sharp fallout of another budding friendship.

I held a cigarette in my mouth and used my right hand to flick the lighter while using my left to create a barrier against the wind. I hold my cigarette up against the wind and let the ashes fall off the side of my balcony. I gloomily smile at the irony. Four years ago, I wouldn’t have even touched a glass of wine. I had not even been introduced to the idea that I could never achieve the dreams I created. But, here I am, profoundly changed from a couple of circumstantial events that had happened to me within the past couple of months.

I let the music consume my attention away from my more immediate stresses, paying detailed attention to every transition and lyric. I smile at the irony; the majority of my playlists comprise of artists that I had not even heard of two years ago. Sometimes, I would pull up a playlist I created a couple years ago, hoping that I could relive the moments that had motivated me to create them. In those same moments, I would be tempted to write about my past to construct some sort of closure for events that have not rushed past me.

It scares me — how fast the night changes. Every moment, I grow older. I continuously fill my life with reasons that make experiencing the summers more and more difficult, and I ask myself: is this what it feels like to be human? A natural propensity towards self-destruction? It seems so. I cannot imagine a more fitting attitude for approaching my 20s. I would live my twenties with a dim orange flame, dedicating my efforts towards finding fulfillment in my work but also to creating memorable moments with those that mean the most to me.

I find beauty in the silence. I am, once again, reminded of the indifference of the world. I am cherishing the bliss that nature and technology have afforded me, but I understand that I am not the subject of the elements I perceive. I can appreciate the beauty without taking part in the beauty; I can observe the pulchritude because I am present, but such moments exist infinitely without me there to observe. The world passes by, and I am only here for a finite amount of time to observe — not take part. The world lives on forever; I don’t.

The mosquitoes do not bite. The cold has killed them. Winter is coming.

so/still alone

It’s raining. It’s always been raining. I accept the rain. I walk in the rain. I have always walked in the rain. I see people playing in the sun. I walk over to join them in the sun. I am burned by the sun. I walk back towards the rain. I invite them to join me in the rain. Unfortunately, they don’t like the rain.

I seek out to find those who also walk in the rain because those are the only people who can play in the rain with me. In that sense, I do not have friends. I have never had friends. I will never have friends. The mere concept of friends bothers me. What does it mean to have someone in your life to share experiences with? What does it mean to genuinely trust someone with your life? What does it mean to have someone who takes an active part in your life?

I used to think that it was important to have friends. I used to convince myself that I had friends, or at least, I used to call some people in my life my friends. But it seems that the more I used the word friends, the more foreign it becomes. The more I think about the concept of friendship, the more unrealistic my thought pattern becomes. And it seems the more I try to conceptualize the concept of friendship, the more I am convinced that such a concept does not exist.

I am listening to Lana Del Rey like I have thousands of times before. I’ve never met Lana Del Rey in person; I’ve never even been to one of her concerts before, but her music is one of the few certainties that I have in my life. While friends come and go depending on a series of arbitrary circumstantial conditions, I can still fall back to the same couple of songs in the same couple of albums for some sort of stable grounding in my life. And as I continue to create and destroy more and more relationships with other people, I still have Lana Del Rey to fall back on.

Friends are supposedly a source of relatability, so why can’t I relate to anyone in my life? What does it mean when the only living people whose presence are directly accessible to me only have the ability conceptualize but never understand my experiences? There must be something profoundly wrong with me. Or, there must be something profoundly wrong with everyone else. Or, there must be something profoundly wrong with both. Through existing, I feel as if I have profoundly wronged the universe.

I walk on a country path. There’s nothing shining like a fiery beacon. I am walking alone, like I have for all those years in the past. It’s quiet. I can take for granted the vivacious sounds of thousands of bugs trying to find their sexual partners. I can take for granted the cleansing smell of mist at night that smears on my face when I walk past tree branches. I can take for granted the crunching of grass below my feet as I continue to walk forwards. Alone.

The only few people that I feel can genuinely relate to on a fundamental level are dead. Authors that could express my sentiments better than I could ever dare. Kierkegaard is dead. Proust is dead. Kafka is dead. Spinoza is dead. Everyone is dead, except me. I am living. “Living,” and wishing that I could articulate my sentiments in a way that would contribute to some sort of conception of the universe that could be accessed by others. But I cannot even articulate my own ideas to myself, so why should I believe that I could articulate it to others?

That’s just on a philosophical level. I can’t even bring myself to think about the countless people that have passed through my life, leaving only a remnant of experience for me to hopeless cling onto as the progression of time continues to wash me forwards. Those experiences I have shared. Those experiences I have not shared. I can observe all those happenings that occur throughout my life, except for those experiences that I will never have a chance to experience. Those experiences that could potentially alleviate the vacant cavern — would it be too much to ask to explore?

My loneliness overwhelms me and leaves me questioning my place in society itself. If we are “social creatures,” as Aristotle put it, then am I considered a social outcast? Is my ostracization a self-imposed source of self-destructive behavior? Should I be grateful for the various social opportunities that I have been afforded instead of creating suffering through wanting more? Probably. I create positive feedback loops of sadness by lusting for some sort of connection that would resolve my existential solitude. Is that wrong of me?

Through art, I have taken off all of my clothes. There are only a few parts of my life that I have deliberately chosen not to express through writing. Most of those sentiments can be assessed by anyone who wants to know. Some just exist through invisible sandcastles I create through conversations with people that come and go in my life. I have vulnerabilities, of course, but those vulnerabilities create my identity. I articulate those vulnerabilities through words on a page, and I patiently wait for someone to read beyond those words on a page. 

More than to conceptualize: to understand my experience.

i’m sorry, but i won’t make it to your party

Sometimes, I feel helpless.

I don’t understand how I could have a deep desire to create meaningful connections with all of my friends in one second and suddenly become washed with a profound wave of despondency in another second. And when I am in a state of melancholy, the only thought that passes my mind is to endure and live through the sadness.

There are plenty of aspects of my life that I cannot control. I cannot control what my interviewers think of me when they listen to me recite the same points I give to every other interviewer. I cannot control what types of friends and romantic partners enter and exit my life even when I consciously decide to allocate how I spend my time. And now, I cannot even control the set of thoughts and emotions that dictate my passing personality.

A couple years ago, I would have given everything to spend time with other people. I had been alone and without the friends I have now to offset my natural inclinations for feeling lonely. Back then, I had spent a great deal of time by myself because I did not have a choice otherwise; the options that I have to spend my time now had simply been nonexistent. Now that I have been given the opportunities that I did not have before, why am I not cherishing my friends before I return to another period of my life when I am alone without friends to compensate?

Part of my motivations could certainly be traced to my attitudes towards impermanence. Friendships, like every other aspect of our lives, have an expiration date. Sometimes, there is a distinct line drawn that marks the end of a friendship. Perhaps it had been an argument that had no placating resolution. Perhaps it had been the intense awkwardness that follows a sexual encounter. Or perhaps, it just dies out with the passage of time.

And precisely because my friendships have a termination date do I value them. I value the time I spend with my friends because I understand that, at any moment, I could never speak with my friends ever again. And equipped with the knowledge that my friendships could all end within one moment to the next, I have become less inclined to pursue friendships that do not actively create happiness in my life.

One of my friends a while back had described her relationship with her friends as an implicit contract of companionship contingent on mutual growth. At the time, I harshly disagreed with her. It seemed so sterile, and the feelings I felt for my friends had been nothing but passionate. I used to believe that I truly loved my friends, that I would deliberately sacrifice parts of my life as a series of selfless acts in the name of love. I believed in the permanence of friendship. I believed in my friendships because they were worth believing in.

I’m not so sure anymore. I’m not sure of anything anymore but especially regarding my attitudes towards friendships. It has been more than two years since I have come to college, and within that time span, I have gained and lost many friends, as one should when they grow up. After all, losing friends necessary for personal growth. I suppose my disillusionment has taken on the form of indifference, but how could I consider my friendships a part of my identity if I can wear my t-shirts longer than I can keep mos

Am I suppose to have faith in my friendships? Am I suppose to trust my feelings? I wish that I could allow myself to do so. But I feel as if my cynicism towards my own feelings has been the most insightful fruit during my tenure as an adult. Just as I cannot predict how I will feel within moments next to each other, how can I trust my own feelings of intimacy? After all, I am merely experiencing a series of chemical reactions in my brain, and there seems to be something acutely unreal about associating my experiences to set of arbitrary hormones. And if I cannot trust my emotions, shouldn’t I trust my logic? If I cannot depend on my feelings to give me insight into how much my friendships to me, and if the uncertainty of the true value of friendship causes me significant amounts of suffering, then isn’t a better lifestyle to just not put value into my friendships?

I made some logical jumps, two assumptions that I could count. But unlike logical jumps, I cannot will myself to jump the emotional hurdles I have created for myself. The overwhelming pointlessness of keeping friends scares me. Exhausts me. I can live my life with a bright flame, but how would I feel if there are no other flames to accompany me? Would it feel comforting that I can burn through my vitality without the warmth of others to accompany me? I suppose there is very little choice I have in terms of the people who come and go in my life, but it feels as if there is something profoundly wrong with my thought pattern.

So now, I can make the choice to spend time with other people who I may or may not speak to again for the rest of my life. There would be no way that I could know for certain. But in terms of the expected values I am operating on, I am approaching with the attitude that I am merely sharing time. I could spend time with others who will leave my life given enough time or I could spend time with myself who I will be with forever. I take a bit from those around me as well, and each person that leaves my life takes a little bit from me as well.

And now, as tired as I am, I can continue to let people come and go. I can continue to pursue social situations where I am constantly exposed to individuals fade in and out of existence. I can continue to expend my vitality in sharing conversations and experiences with others. I can continue to give and take. And give and take. And give and take. Until, I have nothing left to give, nothing left to take, and nothing left to live.

So, I suppose, I might pass on your party. Just for a bit.

i don’t get it

I am not successful. I am not happy. I am not thriving.

I am not the person that graduated from my high school — an aspiring pre-med student full of hopes and aspirations. I am tired. Relented. Every night, I smoke a cigarette on my balcony when I come back to my off-campus home. I take a melatonin pill right before I brush my teeth — not to fall asleep, but to stay asleep. I wake up and fill my metal thermal bottle with dark roasted coffee at Green Line Cafe on my way to campus. Rinse and repeat.

I am a mess. I am a failure. I am someone with a long list of unfulfilled hopes and aspirations. I am someone who graduated middle school without realizing my capabilities. I graduated high school without realizing the full potential of my opportunities. And now, I will graduate college without realizing the same opportunities I have been given. I have created an enemy out of myself. I have dabbled in self-destruction. I have come to develop a distaste for people who don’t.

I had been

Alone. Tired. Unfulfilled.

I am still

Alone. Tired. Unfulfilled.

And I will continue to be

Alone. Tired. Unfulfilled.

I envy those who do not experience loneliness on a regular basis. I envy those who can fall asleep without waking up at least four times throughout the night to intense feelings of self-hatred and contempt. I envy those who can wake up to their alarm without a continuous justification of why life is worth living, those who have not yet developed an affection for the bitter reflection of reality found in black coffee, those who can appreciate moments of happiness without constantly questioning if they deserve it.

I envy those who don’t get me — those individuals who feel as if my view of the world is “pessimistic” or “cynical.” I wish I could share their sentiment because I would not wish sadness for anybody. I wish I could take the option and enter the experience machine, where I wouldn’t have to continuously use different words to articulate my feelings to even feel some semblance of being human. I wish I could live my life without constantly creating new justifications to live, without constantly internally vomiting at the sight of happiness.

But I can’t. I ask myself, have I not experienced enough trauma to appreciate my life? Perhaps. I have had quite a comfortable living in the context of the privileges I have been afforded due to the socioeconomic status that I did not earn. Of course, like most people, I have had my fair share of conflicts growing up, but I have never experienced trauma. But why? Why do I constantly check my privilidges to even express the emptiness I feel on a regular basis? Why do I feel as if I need to have some sort of trauma to allow myself to feel the way I do?

I don’t get it. I haven’t experienced enough hardship in my life to get it.  I have had too privileged of an existence to understand what true sadness feels like. But I have read enough literature to understand that the world is composed of individuals who have experienced trauma that I cannot even comprehend within the limits of my imagination defined by my own experiences. So if I shouldn’t feel sad, then why do I? I have not experienced nearly the same intensity of suffering. I don’t have a right to get it.

I don’t get it. I get why I don’t get it. I don’t get it.

not enough

I looked at myself in the mirror of my friend’s apartment, listening to the pulsating beat of Pretty Girl playing at the darty happening next door — an event that I would probably never be allowed into throughout my entire life. I’m not particularly bothered by my lack of access; I have, after all, come to terms with the structural limitations that have been presented in my life. But it allows me to think about the limitations that are the result of my own capabilities. Because, while there are so many aspects of my life I have the privilege to change, it is those very aspects that bother me the most.

The sensation of moving into my college house, to me, is one of emptiness. I can move boxes to fill the vacancy of my bedroom, but I can never quite fill the sensation of loss that accompanies coming back to school. I feel as if the gleaming part of my personality has aged into a dusty, unpolished stone. The personality I have cultivated over the summer slowly hibernates once again when the leaves turn red. I realize that I am, to put it simply, boring, unlike my peers with their developed opinions with a strong personalities. I do not have such capabilities. I suspect that I will never have such capabilities. Because, in the end, I’m still myself.

I write myself with a negative connotation.

I wonder if I am being fatalist. I wonder if my sentiments are considered to be unrealistic or perhaps despondent. I wonder if I should continue holding the same standards for myself when I could perhaps abandon them for some solace. Because, only when I have arrived at school, do I realize that I am not enough. My personality is not enough. My achievements are not enough. My experiences are not enough. I come to realize that by no standards would I be considered successful, that I am just a short experience fished from the sea of individuals who have actually achieved something with their lives. I have come to realize that there exist individuals who lead a more interesting life than I could ever hope for myself.

And is that all I will ever be? A short flicker in an ocean of blazing infernos? I hope not. I certainly hope that the summation of my life experiences would create some sort of positive and meaningful impact on the lives of others. It’s the life that I hope I have lead for the past 20 years of my life and continue to lead for the remaining 60 years. I hope that I have exhausted the limitations of my capabilities in becoming a stronger and more vibrant existence. A flame that allows other flames to burn brightly. I hope the flame of my existence illuminates others the same way that others have illuminated me. But what is the use of hope when I can never follow up on the goals I have set for myself?

I hope. Not because I do not live a life I want to lead, but because it seems that the life I lead is constantly never enough. Because, no matter how much I feel as if I am maximizing all aspects of my life that I value, it constantly feels that I would never accomplish anything meaningful. Because, no matter how much effort I cultivate into my flame, there will always exists flames that continually burn brighter than mine. Of course, no one is completely satisfied with their life; it’s in our nature to create problems when none exist. But, sometimes, I really wish I had those problems instead of the problems I have with my own life. I wish I could be concerned with opportunity cost as opposed to the lack of opportunity.

But, alas, all I can live is through the limitations of my own existence.

washed with a passing desire

I came to college with a desire to change. I wanted to reinvent myself from the awkward high school senior who shaped the past 18 years of his life through the pursuit of a goal that was ultimately not his. I came with a set of dreams — for myself, for the world, for something that mattered. But after two years of college, all I am left with is disillusionment and a set of realistic expectations for the next five years of my life.

It leaves a bitter taste on my tongue. Realistic, as if the past 20 years of my life have not been real enough. I suppose I have been living in quite a dream, not because my past couple of years of my life have been blissful, but because the problems that had consumed me for such long periods of my life no longer obssessively echo within the caverns of my consciousness. In that sense, I suppose I have waken up. I have realized that the ghosts that have chased me for so long did not actually have any substance; they were just problems I created when I didn’t have any real problems.

I still look behind me to find the ghosts that have chased me. The meaningful moments I have shared with friends who have long been swept away from my memory always find a way to resurface during the times I wish I could forget the most. Like now, when my absence of understanding how I wanted to contribute to society seems to finally materialize in the form of professional failure. I wish I could plunge back into my memory from my reverie, when my problems could be summarized by a series of shortcomings I could still address with my capabilities. Because, now that I have awaken, sometimes I wish I could drown in this hopeless fountain kingdom.

I suppose I give too little credit to my friends and family. They have been and continue to be constitutional contributors to my development. And for that, I am truly grateful. I am grateful for the fact that I could contemplate how I wanted to dedicate my life in the serivce of society, a sentiment that most individuals do not have the priviledge to discover. But sometimes, I feel as if the overwhelming amount of choice that I have been given only serves to hurt me. Without choice, I would not need to think about the opportunity costs of all of my decisions. Without choice, I would never have been exposed to the concept of mistake.

Despite facing a substantial amount of rejection throughout my entire life, I constantly feel as if my stockpile of cover letters in my computer will never lead to anything substantial. I feel as if I am astronomically unqualified for almost every position I apply for, and even among the positions I have had the chance to interview for, I feel as if I could never fully exhibit the extent of my capabilities. And, a couple days later, I receive a short email, of which I do not need to open to discern its contents. And it seems no matter how much I prepare, I only have one barrier that I could never overcome: myself.

Because I have never relied on myself. I envy those who can. Because, in terms of all the problems that I have encountered throughout my life, I can never overcome myself. While the problems I have encountered throughout my entire life have revolved around my surroundings, the only problem that I have encountered that does not depend on external influences is myself. While all external problems can be addressed through internal means, there is no outlet to address internal problems. It is the final limitation between the life I want to have and the life I am leading. I wonder if it is going to be the last limitation I will ever face in my life.

I fear that I will spend the next 40 years of my life working a job I consider intellectually unfulfilling. I fear that I will spend the next 40 years of my life with people who I do not genuinely love with all of my heart. I fear that I will live the next 40 years of my life as a cloud that is compelled to exist by an arbitrary set of weather conditions and pushed by the wind without any underlying purpose. I fear that I will merely exist and not thrive. While I consider these fears to be real sentiments, it is also merely a symptom of an overaching problem that cannot be addressed. The scene of missed opporutnity can be overwhelming.

And, as I have always repeated before I go to sleep, I don’t know what to do.