Hey…
Yo!
Gurlllll
Kumusta?
Hi.
So, uhm, how do you prefer to be greeted? I’ll let you choose.
Have you made your mind, yet? Great.
I admit. That’s some weird-ass way to rekindle a friendship. But hey, we’re trying, right? I mean, it never went completely out of fire. Just frozen by peak awkwardness, I guess? I mean, I hope so.
I was trying to get back at writing again. Then I thought maybe I should have a sequel for the notebook that I left you guys, just so you can hear some words from me too. Not sure if that’s a good thing for you, but here we are. Part 2, folks! Took us long, but we’re here. Unfortunately, this time, I can’t fill up a whole page for each of you. Trust me, I find that cliche, too.
I can’t believe we’re on the verge of graduating college now. Still bizarre. Before going out there working our asses out, some of us found ways to hustle our way out of college. That’s commendable. Pretty cool to be honest. I’m sure all of us lost friends/lovers only to find new ones. And that we’ve all had tons of sleepless nights and restless days. Bet you guys picked up a lesson or two about life, hope you can share them with me too.
Since I have very minuscule experience about love that I can write in this long letter for you, I’ll just disclose some stuff that helped me, that could potentially help you too. Maybe that’ll help rekindle something inside of you.
Just a huge disclaimer though. This is all on you. I kind of stir away from giving out random pieces of advice to anyone. I guess I just don’t want the moral responsibility of giving out advice that can potentially ruin your life. So yeah, there’s that. If your life, somehow, becomes hella better after reading this then it’s all thanks to me! But if otherwise, don’t come at me mmkay? Lol.
HAPPINESS IS A PROBLEM
Was this too bummer for a first?
I hope not. Believe me, I also doubted when I first read this in Mark Manson’s TSAONGF. It makes sense though. Not in the “teenage angst-y” kinda way. But in the “holy crap, that’s true!” type of way.
I’m sure you all have read books, articles, online content, etc that promote the incessant chase to positivity and happiness. You know, all the “just be positive” banter that revolves around us all. I mean, yeah, that makes sense. After the long, hard, and dusty way to happiness. Some of us, well, a lot of us see this as the final destination. Which is, delightful, of course!
But happiness (whatever your definition of this word means) can also be the problem. We have all seen something about the premise that discusses how happiness is something stationary. But is it? And if it is, are we happy?
Here is an excerpt from Mark Manson’s TSAONGF:
“Happiness requires struggle. It grows from problems. Joy doesn’t sprout out of the ground like daisies and rainbows. Real, serious, lifelong fulfillment and meaning have to be earned through the choosing and managing of our struggles.
Everything comes with an inherent sacrifice — whatever makes us feel good will also inevitably makes us feel bad. What we gain is also what we lose. This is a difficult pill to swallow. We like the idea that there’s some form of ultimate happiness that can be attained. We like the idea that we can alleviate all of our suffering permanently. We like the idea that we can feel fulfilled and satisfied with our lives forever. But we cannot.”
People kind of stop being passionate once achieving a specific goal. Which is, again, not entirely wrong, but is excruciatingly scary. Tasting a bit of happiness becomes some sort of a gateway drug to procrastination, and without a word a once burning with passion you can turn into “yeah I can probably just enjoy the moment let me just rest a bit”. And without the struggle, there is no reward.
And I am not saying that happiness is sacrilegious or anything like that. The thing about happiness is that it should not be algorithmic.
I used to think that once I’m in my mid-20’s I will be happy. And I am (maybe?). But some happiness is bigger than other happiness. Our happiness is continuously expanding. Because of this continuity, we are regularly poured with a heavy dose of will and desire to continue in life. Despite all the peripheral muddle that we are forced to deal with.
As I grow older, I realize that everything kinda sucks, humans are flawed, and life is not always ponies and daisies; it’s otherwise. And that trying to ultimately make the world a better place only makes you suffer in the long run. Continuous efforts of trying to be perfect, and living an “always happy” life just do equate to the continuous building of inhibitions and walls of disappointment. Doing otherwise; accepting flaws, f*cks, and errors; facilitates a more healthy approach towards living life realistically without stabbing yourself with blades of unrealistic optimism.
Being an incessant happiness seeker is the virus that kills us all from within, and the only antidote is acceptance of non-happy parts of life, and living life with the undertone of flaws, imperfections, and failures.
LOSING HOPE IS FREEDOM
Have you seen Fight Club? I am thrilled to be finally talking about this film to someone. But I can’t, sadly. That’s like the 1st rule of Fight Club, and I don’t want to get on Tyler’s bad side so maybe you should just see it yourself. It’s on Netflix!
When I first hear this, I thought that oh! That’s depressing and cynical. But after finishing the film, and well, thinking about this line for a whole dang week, I think that this isn’t just right, but it’s actually cathartic.
The problem with hope is that it inevitably comes with a huge baggage of expectations. We all hope for a great job, or a sh*t ton of money. I bet you guys hope for a “paper-cut man” at some point in life. All of us hoped for something magically beautiful and perfect. What we don’t realize is that these “hopes” are what build a shackle that holds us accountable somehow.
Hope is so positively painted that it kinda blurs out the flip side of the coin. Hoping and dreaming are free, and it’s awesome that all of us can contribute to constructing an anticipated future for ourselves. But by doing so, we deprive ourselves of the bare minimum of living, to the freedom of just being.
And I don’t mean that we shouldn’t hope at all. But I am sure you guys have heard a lot of people saying that to dream big and hope higher. So, no, this time I won’t encourage you to hope for a humongous, extremely positive, and successful future. I encourage you to enjoy being here, at this moment, breathing air, scrolling through stuff.
I know we’ve been through a lot, two decades isn’t too short of a time living on this earth. So right now I want you to celebrate just being, and let go of the burdens of your future hopes. I’m sure you can get there. I’m sure we all can.
WE ARE OUR OWN NEMESIS
I learned this the hard way. I actually feel pretty dumb knowing that I’ve lived half of my life thinking that the world revolves around me resulting in restless days and sleepless nights filled with excruciating thoughts about how discouraging and disappointing I am as a person. Only to know that that is not the case AT. ALL.
We all have these voices in our heads that just seem to say the right things to bring us down. All the doubts and pessimism that these voices throw at us just seem to hit all the right places. It’s unfair — knowing that the enemy that we need to conquer lays comfortably inside us all. It’s scary.
And no, I am not telling this to you just so you can ponder on this uncomfortable truth. I included this here because I want you to know that as easy it is to hate on ourselves, we don’t think that you’re weak, or lacking, or ugly, or heavily flawed. We ourselves just tend to exaggeratedly hate on ourselves.
This is one of my favorite YouTubers and he shared some insights about this, maybe you’ll agree with him too. Here’s the link! https://youtu.be/at_cc5ZlWM0?t=567
YOU’RE WRONG, AND IT’S FINE
Okay, no. I am not saying that doing wrong things is fine. I absolutely hate people who use their “assholeness” as a personality. I despise them.
But some people just tend to find it extra hard to own their mistakes. Owning mistakes and actually acknowledging that they’ve done something wrong seems fatal for some.
I think we have this very weird connotation that being wrong is like some tattoo that can never be erased once you
AND THAT’S WHY YOU SHOULD ONLY GO FOR SOMEONE WHO’S A SIMP FOR YOU
Listen. This is weird because I literally don’t know what to say under this section. I almost don’t want to include this in my letter, but I figured I should also sprinkle in some love advice of some sort because it seems fitting for us [once a bunch of teenage girls]. So with my very minuscule experience with love, I’m gonna disclose what I think is the secret to a dope love story.
“I LOVE YOU”
I think it’s easy to say I love you but it’s hard to mean it. I love my family, but in my family, we grew up saying “I love you” a lot. And I know that’s good, but as a child, like saying it was just something you say. They taught you to like, when they say “I love you”, you’ll say it back saying “I love you”. But I don’t even understand what I was saying. And then I grew up and I understood it. But I didn’t have the same weight, of like, what it means to say I hate you, what it means to say I love you. What that means to someone. It felt like it lost its meaning to me when I was young.
- You’re Cool (we all are)
- Mind your own business (not a blanket statement)
- You kinda suck (it’s okay)
- Don’t be the monster you’ve sworn to destroy.
- It ends with us (I hope)
- deceived by the comfort of knowing why
Hey! Great, you’re still here. I hope this letter ain’t that long enough to bore you (is this even possible?). Now that you’re here I’m about to disclose things that I am not comfortable talking about in person. I don’t know but eye contact and proximity still kinda scares me. But staring at the laptop screen ain’t that bad, so I guess I’ll just pour out all these unheard stories of mine. So, just hang in there (not literally), okay?
For this to be less “boring”, Imma try to just answer questions that a hypothetical friend might be asking. I don’t know if doing so would be for the better or otherwise, but here we go!
What’s your biggest fear?
Frankly, the idea of no one showing up at my funeral terrifies me. I remember back then, in my elementary years when I used to celebrate my birthday I have this specific birthday I can’t recall what year it is. But I vividly remember crying that night.
My mom asked me to invite friends over to our house because they will cook stuff and do “celebratory rituals” like singing Happy Birthday handing out gifts. And they were so excited about it because we rarely invite people over. But I am not really close to lots of people back then, and the bullying was extreme at that time too. So I ended up just inviting this girl that I always hang out with.
After class, I asked her to stop by my house because a “party” was being held to celebrate my birthday. And she was so excited. She came, and I remember how sad my mom looked like knowing that I only invited one person. I told her that I only have this one friend whom I can invite to celebrate something with.
And I remember the feelings vividly, how bad I felt for my family for preparing a huge feast expecting me to invite lots of friends over. I felt bad for my classmate for being invited to a lame-ass party with only her as the guest. I felt bad for myself, not having the courage to tell more of my classmates to come, not having the heart to tell my family first that I only invited “a” friend, not having the strength to tell my classmate that I only invited her.
Don’t get me wrong, we were happy then. We pull through. But that night, I remember crying so hard because it hits me. I am so sad that I can’t make friends.
If I can’t invite people over to celebrate something “happy”, how can I expect people to cry for me when I die? So the idea of having an unattended funeral for myself terrifies me. And don’t get me wrong, it’s not scary for me. I’m scared that no one will be there to comfort and console my family. Especially my mom.
Funerals, I had decided, are for the living. — John Green
Since then, I go around telling random people that I invite them to my funeral. I hope you can come to mine too. That’ll be cool. And comforting. And you know, a very “friend-ey” thing to do. So what scares you?
