nyxii's Blog

Easter.
I went out for dinner. Never been to [restaurant name] before, except once so long ago. Pleasant place; I like it. Bottomless coffee is incredible; I didn't decide on it this time but I'll keep it in mind.

The walk was lovely. Spring is finally making headway. the sky started lightening from a depressing grey, and some bright blue is sneaking through, even taking over.

I just love the trees. The way the branches curve and angle. Sometimes flowing, sometimes jutting. More so, or less so, individually. I love the lacey-like patterns at the tops as the trees branch out, stretching their limbs into the sky. Each tree is individual, yet part of a species of tree, and all of those species of trees are part of the umbrella "trees".

Potatoes, tomatoes, red & green pepper, cheddar & mozzarella shredded cheese, onion, salt, pepper, oil. Mushroom. Marble rye. Scrambled eggs. Ohhhh good:)

Cadet Nyxii's log, stardate [...].

Wow, this holodeck program is amazing! I almost feel like I'm really back in the 21st century!! I feel like I really am my great (x15) grandmother Nyxii, whom I was named after. Walking where she walked, experiencing what her life must have been like. The details are incredible! I'm very, very impressed.

I'm going to try to make the most of this and see what it was really like to be in her shoes. All the little things, even. This is just soooo COOL.

SO cool!
:D

I'll let you know how it goes!

Update 1:
It feels so weird to be typing to the Computer instead of addressing myself to it aloud, verbally. How primitive :S
Still a good experience.

Oh .... since she was known for making "11:11 Wishes" .... I wish to become a master at all the musical instruments she mastered during her lifetime. (Okay, okay, that's an "intention", not a "wish", but it's my first time!)

Computer, save journal entry.

Computer, save journal entry and close blog.

Computer: save journal entry and end Cadet Nyxii's log.

Oh!
Nevermind; I get it now.

At this university, sometimes people do it the old-fashioned way when advertising a summer sublet, and print out a piece of paper advertising it. They tape this on the bathroom walls, or inside a cubicle.

This time there was one which advertised "For Females Only". Not so unusual, except the mini-conversation among students, anonymously, which took place in pencil and in pen writing, on the side of the advertisement.

The first student wrote, "But I'm a boy!"
The second student responded, "Then why are you into a woman's bathroom?"
The third student thoughtfully explained, "Perhaps he identifies as male and society makes him use a female washroom."

This really made me smile. A spontaneous conversation written on an advertisement anonymously in a bathroom stall, and the third student found it to be such an issue that she (or he) took the time to find a pen in their knapsack and explain a basic idea about what it means to be a trans person.

I can't help it! :) I marvel at the situation.

I'd just made my morning coffee. The first coffee of the day.1

To my dismay, as I was staring into the welcoming hot cup of goodness, the contents - my coffee - began to swirl. Like a whirlpool. I couldn't believe my eyes, but it was right there in front of me. Bewildered, I stared closer and closer, my eyes wide in shock and dismay. I couldn't afford this to happen! This coffee was from the last few coffee beans in my cupboard, and there would be no more. I couldn't just dump this faulty one and brew a new one.

Staring closer and closer was not a helpful response, as it turns out. For, lo! was I sucked right in, pulled into that swirlhole.

Being so hot in that coffee swirlhole, and so dizzy, I grew incredibly nauseous and within less than a moment I'd lost consciousness.

Being outside, set on my roommate's glass picnic table, I wasn't in danger of being dumped down a drain into the sewage system, at least. (In fact, being the only one to use that picnic table in our lovely little backyard, it was unlikely that I'd be dumped out at all, even onto the grass.)

When the fresh air cooled everything down a bit, the vortex slowed to a stop and became still. I awoke from my brief sleep.

A curious squirrel wandered up and sipped at me a little. Pleased, he drank me up (a high compliment when a squirrel approves of my high-quality choice in gourmet coffees); and in being drinked up into the squirrel, so I became the squirrel.

The original squirrel's soul, or consciousness, was apparently not lost, and we cohabited its body.

Soon the squirrel's body was eaten by a bird of prey, so we became the bird of prey. A peregrine falcon, she insisted, though we weren't sure if she was telling the truth; for who would have told her what she was in the first place? How could she know unless she was told?

(To keep harmonious, and as there are times when there are higher priorities than to force the truth upon another when they are unready for it, squirrel and I silently agreed to maintain a spirit of courtesy. At least until our trust and togetherness were more established and we were safe to argue openly and honestly, without any of us feeling psychologically threatened.)

We -- the squirrel and I -- opted to share the bird of prey's body, three consciousnesses in one body. The bird of prey was agreeable to this and had, incidentally, been longing for the company, as birds of prey are inclined toward solitary lifestyles and consequently many do become lonely and depressed.

In time, we three became the closest of friends. In no time at all, it seemed. For, how much more intimate, how much more close, can three friends be, than if they share the same body?

In our togetherness we sought many things, and found many things. Among these were peace and joy, and a widening of our mental horizons - our paradigms of the world -  as we three were such of different cultural backgrounds and had such different experiences that we necessarily challenged each other's pre-existing, hither-to-unchalllenged versions of reality.

... First, I'd like to say: It's 11:11. Make a wish! *wink* Yes, I know that's silly, but I can't help it. It's fun to make wishes. It's a pleasant, child-like thing to do, to imagine something you want and pretend that making a wish will help you get it. It's also, more seriously, wise to take some time to think about what you really want. Not just what you're supposed to want, or what you're expected to want, but what you really truly want. Even if it changes from time to time.

I'm in much better spirits right now that I was over the last few days. I'm prone to mood swings and it seems to be picking up. True, I'm disappointed that a new friend of mine seems to be ignoring me, because it's rare for me to make friends with people (probably about my low self-esteem, dramatic mood fluctuations, fear, and definitely some degree of social anxiety... I'm just not a good friend). Oh well though. I hope they just don't like me, and not that there's something really wrong, like a car accident or such .... It's pretty easy to imagine they just don't want to be friends with me. I think I haven't been a very likeable person lately.
Oh well. I just thought they were nifty.

I did send a different friend a pen pal letter (for the first time) over snail mail a few days or a week ago. It took me longer than it should. I hope it gets there, though I've had problems with the mail system before ... So I'm crossing my fingers.  It's sure nice to feel wanted, even for someone who considers themselves an introvert.

I finished my April Fool's Day idea today. I don't usually play pranks, because I'm not fond of when someone plays a prank on me, but I'm sure this will be alright. Humour is really an important thing in our human lives. Humour is medicine; laughter is medicine. It helps relieve tension, it helps get your mind off overly-serious issues even for just a moment. It can even help you live longer. It helps with depression, and probably other health issues in an indirect way at least by reducing stress and combating negativity, anger, excessive worry, etc. My mother used to say that everyone should try to laugh at something at least once every day, even if it's just a silly comedy. We don't really value humour and laughter except for entertainment value, but it's important. It helps add value and meaning to life. If you can't laugh or appreciate humour .... I'm rambling though.

I took out some books from the local library today. I had requested them online, so they were on the Holds Shelf when I arrived. I was dressed up in a modest black skirt which reached my knees, a black coat & winterwear, very light shimmery pink nailpolish and some conservative makeup. My hair in a long braid. I feel good when I look my best, that's all. I felt like a modest, proper young lady. (I was just in the mood for that today.)
I just about regretted it though, because this jerk started talking to me. He was using a fake accent he apparently didn't think sounded fake, and it was variably somewhere between Irish and German. That disgusted me -- This isn't a bar, it's a library. The reason I don't go to bars is that I don't like feeling like men pursue me like game or prey. This jerk in the library, while I was checking out my books at the self-checkout, would not stop harassing me. Even his friend knew I was feeling pressured, threatened, and didn't do much to keep that jerk on a leash. I just want to be treated like a human being. I didn't lead him on, either. It's not my fault. I turned my body away from him, didn't look at him, I even immediately told him, when he asked about the books I was checking out, "Yes, it's my boyfriend's favourite so I figured I'd read it." His friend sorta snickered and said, "She brought up her boyfriend already," or something.

It made me feel very demeaned. Less than human. By the time they left I felt my personal bubble was violated, and they thought I was a joke, a game. I already have difficulty suppressing my unfair misandrist side. I wouldn't dislike the male gender as a whole so much if I were male, because I wouldn't be plagued by discourteous male human animals. Events like these leave a stronger emotional residue than the daily interactions I have with other individual men. I just have to remember that.

In similar future situations I will endeavour to be more rude. I will not give up my right to dress in a way which makes me feel pretty, though.

I was thinking about it. I couldn't  help it. Maybe that's why I feel more comfortable around less conventionally-attractive men, and men who are not my age.

I'm not even gorgeous. I'm sufficiently pretty, and I like my body because it functions well. It pleases me. But I'm not gorgeous. I wish people would just leave me alone.

I find myself saying that in my mind a lot. "I wish everyone would just leave me alone." But when I really examined that, it isn't that I wish people would leave me alone. Not at all. It's just that I wish the anxiety and/or discomfort would go away. It isn't people, or the presence of people. It's the inner response to them -- the emotions and thoughts -- that I wish would be different. That was quite a revelation for me. I am the problem; what goes on, on the inside.

It still doesn't help me solve the problem. I can't snap my fingers and become a charismatic extravert, unphased by social stuff. Cool as a cucumber, twice as slick. (Wait, that sounds like something sexual ... Does it? I didn't intend it to, at any rate.)

But whatever, right? Not a big deal.

I really like this new music I picked up a few days ago from the library. It's not like anything I've ever listened to before.
... Yes, I get my music in the form of CD's from the library. If I want to learn more about a certain group and what they play, I go to my library's website, reserve some of their CD's, and then later on I pick them up from the Holds Shelf. Sometimes they're scratched so I have to skip a song or two, or the entire CD. Especially with popular classical music, I've found. I don't  mind though. It's more about getting a feel for who they band/group/artist is, how they feel; getting familiar. I like the entire process. Besides, technology intimidates and deeply frustrates me. I feel stupid when I can't figure something out. So I'm going to keep doing it this way. Not to mention that my Zune's battery life is irritatingly short, yet my CD discman will last a really long time on just regular rechargeable batteries, so it's a more reliable technology for me. I don't want to go out and spend money on more technology right now either, considering how little money I'm making.
So this works very well for me.

I've been thinking lately, too, that I'm going to start learning a little bit about philosophy. It makes me a bit nervous, because what if I just publicly told you all that I'm going to learn about philosophy, and then I don't even finish one book about it? Yet that's kind funny because this site is anonymous so who cares, and anyway, I've not been a very noble or admirable person in tons of more important ways. So yeah, that's the topic these days. Philosophy. I'm not quite finished Willfully Blind yet (almost), but I picked up three books and an audiobook about Nietzsche. Hopefully by the time I can't stand that anymore, someone will tell me what to pick up next. Preferably a similar kind of thing (some other philosopher). I'm not very bright, studious, or ambitious these days, so nothing too daunting, please.

Hmmm .... Well, that's all for now I guess. I like being on this site because I feel less alone even in a superficial way; I can feel heard and pretend people care about what I'm saying.
It's probably true that I spend too much time on it and am somewhat addicted. But you know... I don't have much else going on in my life. There are many days that I'd probably just go right back to bed, even if I was too awake to sleep, instead of getting up in the morning. But the idea that maybe someone will have sent me an email, or maybe there's something interesting on EP, is something that helps give me the motivation to get out of my bed, have breakfast, and head out the door to the school or the library so I can check. It's getting me out of the house and doing something. In a way it is nurturing to me. It's nurturing my social needs in some way. It's a good and an evil ..... Anyway, I'll leave this at that for now. When blogs are too long I'm sure you guys get tired of reading them.

Feel free to comment on any of these, btw, even if I don't know you. Some of my blogs have over a hundred views, yet not one comment. I don't mind at all of course, but once in a while a feedback is kinda nice. Even though I'm psychotic ;p

 

Not too long ago I was in the habit of visiting a certain cafe in the evenings for a few hours nearly every day I wasn't working. I would write a little, but mostly read. Books from the library, of course. I dressed up nicely, like a proper young lady, and it was a lovely little outing every day I went. Comfy chairs, bright lighting, a cup of coffee.

As I was "a regular guest", the two cafe attendents became familiar with me. Over time one of them grew more friendly. I would say we were becoming friends. So I stopped going there and haven't been back for weeks. I never intend to go there again.

It makes me feel uneasy to face going there because, I think, I am averse to developing friendships and relationships with people in real life, even when I llike them. Plus he is a male of my agegroup. We did engage in some long, rather personal conversations. That felt a bit unpleasant.... At the time of course it wasn't exceptionally uncomfortable, but afterward (and to a lesser extent, during) I felt this was going further than I liked. I was encouraging it, I know, it's my fault. I couldn't help it, it was natural.

It was problematic to me because I feel stressed and anxious to be having conversations (or anticipating having conversations) with certain kinds of people. I freely confess: I have not one friend in my province, which I could phone up and just go out with somewhere, like to the movies or out to coffee or out for a drink at the pub. There's no one in my province I would have over at my house. Of course I've had friends in the past, and friendships. I wouldn't say they weren't worth it or they ended badly, but there are reasons I don't do them.

-----------------------------
Friday, 20:00.

When you think about it - I mean, when I think about it. When I think about it seems like there is something really wrong here. Even though there are plenty of cafes in this city to choose from. That just seems like psychotic behaviour, and maybe it is. Or. Maybe it's that Nyxii is shy of men and feels intimidated or lacks confidence that she won't screw up somehow in a conversation because it's an attractive young man, or just wants to avoid misunderstandings because she thinks her attention might have been misinterpreted. Nyxii doesn't think she's verbally fluent even in her own native tongue, and she identifies as someone who it takes a lot of mental effort to keep up her side of a conversation appropriately. She's being a bit hard on herself. She needs to be a bit more lenient and she's probably more normal than she thinks she is.

It could also be that she doesn't exactly know why she stopped going to that particular cafe, and it's more about being distracted from reading, yet not wanting to seem impolite. Not to forget she's introverted, and doesn't enjoy socializing as much as others seem to. It's not as rewarding to her. She interprets friendliness as a demand on her attention when she's not prepared for it.

I have this habit of becoming interested in learning about things other people I've personally befriended are into (or enjoy, or are involved with somehow). For instance, with my frst boyfriend his obsession with tranformers struck me as unusual, so I bought one and practiced on it over and over, transforming it from the robot to the car. (It was the black and yellow one, maybe it was called Bumblebee?) His interest in sci-fi (such as Doctor Who) made me interested in it too, and I never had been before. More recently, learning that a friend of mine knew how to knit, inclined me to take out a couple instructional dvd's from the library and buy some knitting needles so that I could learn the basics of knitting. (I was happy with it and made my doll a scarf, which I showed to the cafe attendent when it was finished.) Earlier another friend who appreciates Buddhism caused me to borrow (& read) some library books by a major Buddhist figure, and to later on take out some books on the religion of his relatives (from which he converted). There are just plenty of examples of instances where a friend's interest in something was enough to make me curious about it, and endeavour to familiarize with the basics. (Oh yes, mustn't forget about my last ex's affinity for Wiccan ideas, which prompted me to read a couple books about Wiccan philosophy and the origins & myths. I believe I know more about it than he does, these days.)

This time it was a poet. I had forgotten how enjoyable this kind of reading & casual research can be. I've taken poetry classes ("The Experience of Poetry", which I truly adored and always wished it were a class twice as long. It was like our class was discovering a great treasure trove buried under the earth in a forest, and we were excavating it like an archaeological dig, and our teacher was digging out more and more hidden treasures with us every moment -- and no class was was ever long enough for him to help us find EVERYthing there was to find, either), and I've taken other kinds of English classes, and have had to look up information in llibraries before, for presentations or essays or other writing assignments...

But geez, you know? It is WORLDS better to be doing this kind of research so very casually, with all the time in the world to do it, and determining yourself what you want to learn, and with absolutely no pressure to write/edit/present and knowing nothing you learn will be evaluated and you don't have to stress. It's just so relaxing and enjoyable to do it in a spirit of leisure. It's a sincere, almost blissful thing to be doing.

I'm feeling pretty uncomfortable with myself lately. I can't quite see what it is, either. This afternoon I sat in the university library, on the top floor, at a quiet, comfortable study-desk right next to a bright window. My city is even more beautiful up so high.

I watched the activity going on down below, and observed the view of the buildings, the sunlight landscape and still-bare treetops soon to be bursting into life. Above, in the bright-blue sky on this spring day, I saw one bird. She was soaring even higher than I was on that top floor. She could see a broader view, and she could see in more detail with her intense vision, and she could fly anywhere over the city and see all of it, putting it all together easily in her mind as a map of part of her world. Not only a map, but with the information commonly not seen on maps but still relevent, perhaps even more relevent than information included on maps.

I feel like that's what's going on. I want to be that bird. Metaphorically speaking, that is. I feel like I'm missing SO MUCH of the big picture, I can't figure it all out, so I try to make myself blind to it. Even if I don't try to make myself blind to it I am, anyway. I desperately want some clarity in my life and to realize all the major landmarks coherently, with awareness and supreme focus, taking in everything all at once, all the information together. So that I can correct the flaws, the exaggerations in my own thinking, the truths which have been so emphasized or de-emphasized that the sheer disproportion of them makes the once-truths untrue.

I can't put my finger on it with clarity. I don't have that bird's-eye view. There are things which are missing, areas of the map which are blank because I can only see parts of it at a time and I can't even see where the blank parts are so that I can acknowledge it and go about fixing it.

I'm not a very bright person. I do have my strengths, but I also have my weaknesses. Sometimes I can't evaluate these accurately because I am necessarily subjective about these things, and the disproportion makes my perception to be like eyeballs plagued by astigmatism. Anyway. I'm not a very bright person and I don't even see things the same way other people see them. My distortions are different from the typical "20 -something female in my demographic" 's distortions. (I do realize stereotyping such a broad group is problematic, though.)

I've just about given up trying to figure it out. I don't want to be like this. I'd like to at least feel stable, be stable, be the same SELF all the time. The same Self,  ALL THE TIME. (Except when I'm sleeping of course, and when I'm not sleeping or drinking, very minor temporary shifts would be acceptable.)

If I only had a MAP. (Now, geez, aren't upper-case letters empowering? Let's not get carried away though.) Even if I identified as part of a group, solidly, certainly, so that I could conform and obey and have absolute clarity about who I am and where I'm going in life, and how I'm meant to conduct myself, and the clear code for behaviour & decision -making processes -- For heaven's sake, I don't even care if I'm the poster-child in the proverbial sheep image (wouldn't that be poster-sheep then?).  That feeling of clarity, of identity, of being able to see a bird's-eye view and a map of my world, even if I only *thought* it was The Ultimate True Wisdom of Being & Identifying, but was really part of something .....

You know, though, I take that back. That is certainly NOT how I would want to be even if I could choose to. I would not wish to be blind and narrowminded, with a false groupthink vision of the world and my identity & role in it, just because it's easier and would give me that clarity I crave.
I would rather hope for the strength to resist that and keeping chasing my own truth.

It just sure is confusing and difficult when I can't see the big picture and every possibility taken together creates a mountain of such informational overload that the only thing my dull human brain can naturally do is to shut out as much information as possible and try to take it in in manageable chunks.

I can only process so much as once, and I have critical limitations I perceive others don't have. It does make me want to retreat to a comfort zone and blind myself to what I feel incapable of dealing with (in any number of ways). Some things are very emotionally expensive to me, and they are not to other people. Some things require more self-esteem and confidence for me, than for other people. Just about everything requires more time for me than it does for other people. And even conversations bumping into people unexpectedly can take a lot of mental energy for me. "Have a nice good." Stupid. Stupid. Who the hell responds to "Nice talking with you" with "Yeah, it was. Have a nice good!" Adjective adjective. Stupid. Then to follow it up with "I mean, have a nice day," effectively drawing attention to what otherwise might have been a foolish error completely undetected. Or "Have a nice night" when it's ten o'clock in the morning just because I'm accustomed to using that phrase on an afternoon-evening shift? Stupid. Whatever though. It's not like it's the worst thing I've ever done.

Um ... The End.

One of my friends here on EP informed me that they like to see what I've written when they come online, so I've decided to additionally share the better part of what I've written in my personal journal in the past two weeks. It wasn't originally for anyone to see, which is why it might seem unusual at times: it was not composed with an audience in mind.

Additionally, this is an experiment for my own sake to examine how I feel about exposing journal-entry-type material online to other people. The difference between this and my other material I post here is that journal entries are much more personal, they have an informal feel and form, and are even sometimes only fragments of ideas I wish to remember at a later date, rather than a complete sentence or paragraph. It is not a performance.

This is testing the water to see how I myself feel about this idea. If I like it, you can expect more of the same in the future. Not that it really matters if anyone reads it I suppose...

Square brackets [ ] indicate commentary.
Here goes.

Monday 28 January 2013.

I think I've decided to stop writing for the most part. I write in journals, on sheet paper, etc and later I go back to reread and it upsets me or makes me sad. No longer do I suppose it would be beneficial to record the past for the purpose of revisitation. Even as I write these words I feel released, to be making this decision. I'll write letters for the post sometimes still, however. It would be alright, that. I'll also write to-do lists, reminders, that sort of thing. I simply do not wish to allow myself to go back in my mind to a time in the past and have all the implications weighing me down; it does me no favours. Writing does, that is, but not rereading.

I've also decided it's beneficial, in a way, to dress in such a way which draws treatment & behaviour along the lines that I'm most at ease responding to. A certain appearance makes others interpret a person a certain way (people make a rough guess at a person based on what they look like) and I've changed my mind about how I wish to present myself. (For today at least.) For the most part I intend from now on to appear classy feminine.

Tuesday 29 January, 2013.

I've realized there appears to be a much higher volume of people on EP who are males who desire to be female/feminized, than there are females who desire to be male/masculinized. Perhaps the former is simply more vocal than the latter. I wonder what kinds of cultural shifts will occur on this continent within the next few decades. [...]

PEACE
GRACE
WISDOM
SECURITY
WHOLENESS
GRATITUDE
CLARITY

(not in a certain order of priority necessarily)
[Note: this came to me over a few days of meditating, not all at once. I believe these are a few, not all, of the values I have come to hold in this era of my life. I have a different set of values on my wall above my computer from a slightly earlier era in my life, though that needs to be re-examined because I'm not who I was at that time and consequently there is a possibility that, if I listen to my inner self, I will realize those values are not true priorites anymore, even if they ought to be and I could lie to myself out of shame.]

Eating properly, taking vitamins & herbal remedies, exercise. Thoughts, healthy attitudes, meditation & reflection, positivity gratitude.
Healing of emotional issues.
To "be really comfortable in oneself as a woman" [(Jessop, Carolyn. Triumph. The book is returned to the library already, so ... screw you, MLA format! :D How I relish saying that. That's the epitome accomplishment of my life of freedom, right there.)]
Feelings Buried Alive Never Die

Wednesday 30 January, 2013.

I like wearing skirts. [Long flowing ones.]
"An aura of perfect peace; radiated calm."
P191-2: power of forgiveness reread.
A vision of a better world & a better life. [Lost my lenses... let me know if you find them. & someone turn on the light, will you?]
"My reluctance to venture out of my comfort zone and experience something new had kept me firmly in my place."
The mind-body connection.
Every day: [...]

Thursday 31 January, 2013.

Well, it seems this café is becoming an evening routine for me. It's helping me hold onto my sanity, I'm sure. [All of these journal entries - which I had committed to abstain from writing ... *facepalm* - had been written at a little café I have since come to frequent weekday evenings for the purpose of reading whatever library book I had at hand.]

A young woman shouted out of her car at me: "Sexy!" Well... I'm wearing a winter/fall coat, and army boots (the only boots I own which don't injure), and my hair's a mess. It's dark. How can she still evaluate my attractiveness level/quality? I don't like that. Comments like that. Coming from a woman, and a "positive" term, I'm sure she intended it as a compliment though. Sometimes I wish I were not sensitive, and could accept reality more graciously. She didn't mean to have bad manners. She wanted me to feel good about myself.

"Even normal memory has gaps, but traumatic memory is even more discontinuous." (Jeffs, Brent W., and Maia Szalavitz. Lost Boy. New York: Broadway Books, 2009.) [Don't want to commit blasphemy against MLA format ... It's not enough to just give an author credit. I repent of my sinful errors, O MLA Deities.]

Friday 1 February, 2013.

Roommate gave me a ride today. Exceptionally nice of him. I love my roommates w/ gratitude. Very decent people.
How much I love reading. If everything in my life were to go wrong, today I feel my life would still be worth living because I was given the gift of literacy and material to nourish that gift. [Many people in the world are illiterate, and it's a privilege they wish they'd been given.]

Family.

To carry oneself w/ confidence.

It feels so good to move my hand to form letters w/ a pen.

Cleanliness & organization is wealth.

I'd like another skirt, a t-shirt blouse, dress boots and a laptop-style purse so I can stop wearing a knapsack.

Reading at this café [...]

It would be good, best if I use my time more wisely and do useful things on a kind of schedule.
Would be good to watch educational library videos & youtube videos more often.

& What about the crocheting?

There are times when it is appropriate to employ foul language (curses, swearing, shocking phrases). When it serves to express an appropriate level of emotion, and nothing else quite cuts it, or when one is in sudden physical pain (ex. stubbing your toe, hitting your thumb with a hammer). When the company you're surrounded by expects it of you and you're being tactful, matching their level of emotion or sympathizing with them for their severe misfortune ("that's f*****g shameful, what a sh***y thing to happen to a good person, eh?").

However, our overuse of these very useful foul phrases, and our lack of discrimination in our usage as to the appropriate situations, is depriving these words & phrases of their rightful power. It's like the word "love". We overuse that word and now it means so little, because we love these shoes and we love these pretzels and we love that television show and we love how that colour goes with your dress. Foul words & phrases are being similarly deprived of their drive & power, through overuse and misuse, and are already deep into the process of becoming no more than mundane, commonplace indicator of unclassy personality and a lack of civility.

What do you think of this?

http://www.stevepavlina.com/blog/2012/11/this-is-heaven/

It's about our power to choose to create our life experience. We are the creators, the authors of our lives. Of course it wouldn't be applicable to very severe cases, but for the average Canadian or American there could be some truth there, hm?

Let me know what you think.

My emotional state swings around all the time, but I don't take it personally because I know that's just what happens. I've learned that when I'm feeling rather miserable emotionally, I can somewhat detach myself from that and look at it objectively: "I feel like nothing is worth it and I'll never amount to anything and my life is just a waste..... But I felt like this yesterday too and a few days ago before that, and it only lasted an hour. So it's not the complete truth. I know from experience I'll be feeling alright again, I just have to wait it out." And then the opposite happens: I'll be feeling giddy and excited for something so very simple as just buying a bag of chips because I'll get to munch on them in a moment.

I recognize that my emotions are like the sunlight or the moonlight, or any kind of natural lighting, to my reality. Sometimes my reality is lit up with the sunlight, and sometimes it's dark but with the seductive mysterious playful quality of the moonlight on a friendly familiar clear night. Sometimes the lighting is dim and cloudy and frighteningly black. But I can't take it personally, because it's only temporary and it will change so very drastically and certainly in just a matter of time. I simply have to wait it out.

It's very difficult to make decisions when I know that a human being's emotions and perspective of reality influences their major decisions. You think it's "objective", but that's if Who You Are is relatively stable. It's difficult to feel so very, very certain about sometime one day, and then a couple hours or a few days later feel quite differently. Especially if it's with equal certainty. It's hard to trust my own decisions, even the ones I make with certainty, when I look at how I've changed my mind about this or that depending on who I feel I am, and how that changes.

I'm not complaining here, btw, just wandering through my thoughts. In a way I'm grateful to recognize the extent I change, because the severity of it forces me to understand I can't take personally how I feel about things.

How do you know what to do when your vision of reality changes? Well, you can simply do nothing and freeze where you are; ignoring it until your life makes the decision for you. (Inaction is still a choice, with time.) Another option is to behave the way you would if you admired yourself, even if it takes a stretch of the imagination. Sometimes you have to wait it out and accept tha you're not in a place to do anything useful right now. And when you do get in the mental place to do useful things, you have to take advantage of it and make decisions and do the productive things and make commitments because at this moment you know you're your "best self". It's best to make decisions when you know you're your "best self" at the moment, and even when you feel you disagree with it later, you stick to it because you know you can't trust your present view of reality.

Having a moral code helps too, because then you know what you're supposed to do even if you can't remember why you decided that should be your moral code. Sometimes it takes some imagination. Thinking, if someone admired you, who you behave like?

Today I feel strong. I feel like nothing is really a big deal, and I'm pretty chill. Complaining about things won't help, and neither will indulging in negative emotions -- about anything, even the repetition of Christmas music on the radio all shift long. So I'm deciding to be happy about the Christmas music, instead, for example. And to do what I'd do if I were a person I admired and respected, because my past is the past and that's not who I am. I'm choosing to be who I feel like being, and not take anything personally.

Maybe in a few hours that will change again, but it will change back. Climate is the weather pattern over time.

Yesterday I had the highest compliment. My manager asked me if I knew anyone else who was looking for a job. I had advised them to hire my most recent coworker, and they wanted to know if I had anyone else up my sleeve: "Someone like you."

That was such an awesome compliment. That they wanted my advice, for one thing.
And that they wanted their next hire to be just like me, ideally.

I take coffee in a number of different ways. Just like listening to the radio, I don't listen to just one station; I listen to whatever I feel like at the time..... Black, Milk, Cream, Regular, Black with Ice, Black with Sugar, Black with a Flavour Shot, Double Double (if I'm getting a hunger-headache), Regular with Flavour Shot. If it's excellent quality I usually take it Black. If it's instant coffee, like at someone's house, I usually need a flavour enhancer like Cream or Sugar.

My most recent coffee style, a Trinidadian guest at my establishment taught me. She said that people put some butter in their coffee if they're eating a muffin with it, instead of putting butter on the muffin. The butter melts, and sits on top, and you take a bite of muffin and a sip of the butter. I was shocked. I've been around coffee my whole, whole life (my life actually revolves around it in a very simple way) ... yet I was unaware of this apparently popular custom. (Then again, not very many Trinidadian people frequent my establishment so I never had occasion to chat about coffee customs or anything before.) I just had to try what she advised, and told her I would.

I really liked it. Now everytime I have it I'm reminded of her. What a woman. She had so much energy I couldn't believe she was almost sixty.

Hm... But actually, I think my favourite is Black coffee with Maple Syrup. Understandably no cafe around here offers that, but luckily I can cook my own coffee:)

The End.

I realize I've been participating in the Experience Project for exactly one year come today. Perhaps it's time to do a bit of telling you all who I am and what I'm about.

I didn't do a rough draft, such as in school, so this will mostly be free-form rather than an essay.

Ahem.

My name here is Nyxii, of course. I'm 23. I have two siblings, one of whom is one of my two best friends. I think she's the greatest gift anyone ever gave me (and I told my mother that, too!). My parents are divorced, and it's better that way. Sometimes people marry when they're so young that they aren't who they're going to be in a few decades, and as they change they become incompatible, or perhaps they never knew how to maintain a successful marriage for life in the first place, or perhaps they would have known they were incompatible from the start if only they had lived together for six months (a test-drive) first. Who knows? But they're both enjoying their lives better now. Sometimes the past pains both of them, and I do realize that my presence when I come visit either of them is only a painful reminder, but I do my best to comfort each of them and make them feel accepted. It can be wearing on me, but I do my best to remember that they each need my affirmation, someone who was there all along and can soothe the scars.

I read in a book that children of divorced parents are somewhat less likely to themselves marry, or to ever even want to. I consider myself a normal participant of this statistic.

I live a bit far from my family members. I left my city of origin to come to university to be educated. I've had the sense that I was abandoning them, but soon -- within the next year -- they'll be able to count on my support and my presence again. There are two specific situations I can definitely improve, and countless other little things. Isn't it everyone's desire to feel appreciated, needed, useful? In my own humble, selfish way, I believe this might be what I'm meant to do at this time in my life.

You may have noticed I mentioned university. I haven't graduated. I stayed for a few years, then found a job and worked off the debt I owed to the government. I'm still working that job, and I'm grateful. There are so many people around here (and everywhere) who don't have even a part-time job, and here I am in a five-days-a-week job in a nice warm place with a gigantic window where I can see the outdoors. I know what to do, I know what to expect, and my boss & coworkers are wonderful people to me.

Most would consider it a humble job, but I take pride in my work. I'm an excellent worker, and I always do my tasks well. The place is in perfect order when I leave. It's part of my identity to be able to take pride in knowing I'm a valuable employee and they're lucky to have me there, and I'm dependable and grateful for my job.

I do intend to seek a different field of employment, because I could see myself in a number of different positions in which I not only excell but which I feel spiritually & emotionally fulfilled.

Speaking of feeling fulfilled, I spend my leisure time on playing music, reading, journalling, visiting the library, having online conversations with a friend or phone conversations with family, looking after my potted plants, long walks, and sitting on my chesterfield drinking coffee watching the squirrels. I don't watch television, rarely movies, and I don't go to parties or to the bar. I'm rather introverted, and it seems I don't get as much out of being social like others do. Sometimes I even feel anxiety over the seemingly simplest kinds of social things, which naturally I'd like to avoid that emotion so I avoid those things. It's not a problem though, and I feel it's just part of what makes me who I am. It's a positive thing when someone can be alone and explore their own thoughts comfortably.

What else to include here? I'm in a yoga class. I like outdoor running. I don't run for its own sake much anymore, but often I run partway to work because I'm out there walking anyway and running just feels good. It's a pretty long walk, and running shortens the distance so I can get there earlier and read for longer before my shift starts. Walking it would take 50 minutes, a good clip. I've managed to reduce it to 36 minutes, hardly trying. The thing is, that I don't like to sweat much before social engagements, certainly, so I don't push myself. I think it's pretty cool that this body can run so easily even with a knapsack on.

I try to be a conscious consumer. I'm not obsessed with it, and I'm not aiming for perfection, but I think about things such as 'Were these apples grown in my country or another country?', and I'll choose to support my country's growers instead. I also think about the safety of what we apply to our bodies topically. Toothpastes, deoderant, mouthwash, shampoo, especially makeup. Makeups containing heavy metals or other toxins sit on your skin allll day and some of that is absorbed into your blood stream, or swallowed if you're applying lipstick/gloss, and they don't even always put the ingredients label on it and if they do, you don't recognize the carcinogenic substances anyway. Sometimes I do wear makeup still, but I'm a lot more conscious of things I buy & apply & ingest than I used to be.

I'm still working on improving in that category though. Especially my diet. I mean, it's true I'm vegetarian, but even eating cheese I'm being a supporter of an industry which promotes very unnecessary cruelty to animals. One day I'd like to be vegan; currently I'm not willing to put in the effort it takes to ensure I'm a *healthy* vegan. You can be healthy and vegan, and even healthier than most people, but I'm concerned I simply won't put in the effort and at this time I'm guilty of taking the easy way out. A compromise, of sorts.

What else would you like to know about me? Am I forgetting anything? Feel free to comment! or to ask me questions.

Sincerely,
Nyxii