(no subject)
So I'm moving, probably to Medeiros. Did I mention this already? If I did, that's because it's a huge hassle, and a giant freaking headache, and still hasn't happened yet. Meanwhile, I'm hella behind in all my classes, and I have an exam in logic tomorrow. Fuck.
Well, it's not that bad, since I know all that crap so well I don't really need to study, but what does bother me is econ. macroeconomics. The bane of my existence. Well, bane would be putting it pretty strongly, but I haven't as yet done any homework (it's all optional, but still), and I don't have a firm grasp on what was covered in the lectures, so since we have an exam coming up tuesday, I'm just a little . . . unnerved, shall we say.
On the upshot, all the disorder and utter chaos that has been preventing me from living any sort of decent life this semester has begun to die down, so hopefully once I get settled in my new room, and am able to get caught up in my classes, I can get other things to come together, too.
***Begin extra-personal introspection***
Things are so-so on the whole "quality of life" front. On the plus side, I have a brand new sense of self-worth, it's small, round, fuzzy, and changing my life. Okay, so it's not really fuzzy, nor small or round, but the point is I now feel more comfortable with who I am as opposed to who I feel like I should be. Or more accurately, what I think I should be.
You see, I think that what I was all about before was this kind of self-concept that wasn't really so much a concept of self as it was a bundle of my accomplishments/talents/personality traits, and deficiencies thereof. And one day, I was pondering the concept while on the third step from Roncalli Hall to Upper Campus, when it struck me that perhaps I have value not because of what I've done, or can do, or any sort of objective quality that's perceivable by other people, but by the sheer fact of being myself, the individual human being named Christian Allyn. For some reason, this made me almost break down and cry, maybe because it kind of struck home for the first time all the ramifications of that fact: that this is why people like my parents love me, why I can love myself, what I see in other people that makes them so enviously . . . comfortable. It's what makes these people lack the anxiety and uncertainty that I grapple(d) with as often as constantly as breathing, as another fact of my everyday life--not that it wasn't catching up to me. I feel like I was never really at home with myself, like the person I was inhabiting just didn't match up to my standards, although I didn't see that as a reason to despair per se; because I "knew" I could make it worthwhile if I could make it reach those standards, and I could do that if I just worked at it, just put in a little more effort, just tried the right way of thinking, just recognized the right patterns or met the right person.
But now I realize that that's all bumpkis, and that no matter what I achieve, no matter whether or not I'm famous, or admired, decently accomplished, or even very skilled at something, I won't be left with nothing. I'll have myself, and that's all I'll need to start over.
Now, I realize this all sounds awful self-centered, but that's part of the irony. This discovery of my self is something I couldn't have come across without being social, hanging out, connecting with people, putting myself out there and seeing what other people put out there too. And now that I have made the discovery, it's easier to do that: to meet people, and understand them, figure out where someone's coming from and what I really think of them, etc. I don't feel the desperate need to be understood completely by someone, or to completely understand them, I don't feel like there's some secret or epiphany or hidden meaning in life that I'm somehow missing, I don't feel so, in a word, out of place. I feel like I've just arrived in my life, and I'm diving right in.
Now with that said, there are some down sides to being "new." For one thing it's kind of like I'm going through adolescence six years late. I may have a new sense of self now, but that doesn't mean I know who it is, so in a way my identity is as fluid as it ever was, if not moreso. I also feel the intensified need to have role model, someone whom I can identify with, who won't steer me in the wrong direction or be wierded out by a mentor-style relationship, but can help me form myself, as it were. I don't need a permanent bosom-buddy, but I do need someone who can help me shape my tastes in music, clothes, movies, poetry, art; someone who can be the sort of steady tree I'll wrap my tender little tendrils around until I'm firm and steady enough to stand on my own. I guess that that kind of thing happens to people a lot in college (many people I know included) but hey, call me average.
So yeah, it's been up it's been down, but time keeps on slippin' into the futre, as they say. "They" being Steve Miller. Yup.
Well, it's not that bad, since I know all that crap so well I don't really need to study, but what does bother me is econ. macroeconomics. The bane of my existence. Well, bane would be putting it pretty strongly, but I haven't as yet done any homework (it's all optional, but still), and I don't have a firm grasp on what was covered in the lectures, so since we have an exam coming up tuesday, I'm just a little . . . unnerved, shall we say.
On the upshot, all the disorder and utter chaos that has been preventing me from living any sort of decent life this semester has begun to die down, so hopefully once I get settled in my new room, and am able to get caught up in my classes, I can get other things to come together, too.
***Begin extra-personal introspection***
Things are so-so on the whole "quality of life" front. On the plus side, I have a brand new sense of self-worth, it's small, round, fuzzy, and changing my life. Okay, so it's not really fuzzy, nor small or round, but the point is I now feel more comfortable with who I am as opposed to who I feel like I should be. Or more accurately, what I think I should be.
You see, I think that what I was all about before was this kind of self-concept that wasn't really so much a concept of self as it was a bundle of my accomplishments/talents/personality traits, and deficiencies thereof. And one day, I was pondering the concept while on the third step from Roncalli Hall to Upper Campus, when it struck me that perhaps I have value not because of what I've done, or can do, or any sort of objective quality that's perceivable by other people, but by the sheer fact of being myself, the individual human being named Christian Allyn. For some reason, this made me almost break down and cry, maybe because it kind of struck home for the first time all the ramifications of that fact: that this is why people like my parents love me, why I can love myself, what I see in other people that makes them so enviously . . . comfortable. It's what makes these people lack the anxiety and uncertainty that I grapple(d) with as often as constantly as breathing, as another fact of my everyday life--not that it wasn't catching up to me. I feel like I was never really at home with myself, like the person I was inhabiting just didn't match up to my standards, although I didn't see that as a reason to despair per se; because I "knew" I could make it worthwhile if I could make it reach those standards, and I could do that if I just worked at it, just put in a little more effort, just tried the right way of thinking, just recognized the right patterns or met the right person.
But now I realize that that's all bumpkis, and that no matter what I achieve, no matter whether or not I'm famous, or admired, decently accomplished, or even very skilled at something, I won't be left with nothing. I'll have myself, and that's all I'll need to start over.
Now, I realize this all sounds awful self-centered, but that's part of the irony. This discovery of my self is something I couldn't have come across without being social, hanging out, connecting with people, putting myself out there and seeing what other people put out there too. And now that I have made the discovery, it's easier to do that: to meet people, and understand them, figure out where someone's coming from and what I really think of them, etc. I don't feel the desperate need to be understood completely by someone, or to completely understand them, I don't feel like there's some secret or epiphany or hidden meaning in life that I'm somehow missing, I don't feel so, in a word, out of place. I feel like I've just arrived in my life, and I'm diving right in.
Now with that said, there are some down sides to being "new." For one thing it's kind of like I'm going through adolescence six years late. I may have a new sense of self now, but that doesn't mean I know who it is, so in a way my identity is as fluid as it ever was, if not moreso. I also feel the intensified need to have role model, someone whom I can identify with, who won't steer me in the wrong direction or be wierded out by a mentor-style relationship, but can help me form myself, as it were. I don't need a permanent bosom-buddy, but I do need someone who can help me shape my tastes in music, clothes, movies, poetry, art; someone who can be the sort of steady tree I'll wrap my tender little tendrils around until I'm firm and steady enough to stand on my own. I guess that that kind of thing happens to people a lot in college (many people I know included) but hey, call me average.
So yeah, it's been up it's been down, but time keeps on slippin' into the futre, as they say. "They" being Steve Miller. Yup.