With Defectiveness, you feel inwardly flawed and defective. You believe that you would be fundamentally unlovable to anyone who got close enough to really know you. Your defectiveness would be exposed.

As a child, you did not feel respected for who you were in your family. Instead, you were criticized for your “flaws.” You blamed yourself — you felt unworthy of love. As an adult, you are afraid of love. You find it difficult to believe that people close to you value you, so you expect rejection.

Depression is something I’ve struggled with my whole life. I have so much baggage. So many mental issues. It makes me wonder, “Who would want to be with me?” I can’t see how anyone would want to deal with it all if they truly knew what goes through my head. The thought of it makes me more depressed, which makes me feel more damaged, which makes me more depressed, and everything gets worse and worse.

I’m trying to break the cycle, but I feel incapable of loving myself. It’s so much easier to love other people. And when I can’t love myself, I can’t see how anyone else could love me either.

I have to write this so I can admit it to myself.

I have to write this because I can’t think of anything else nowadays, except for how hard it is to get out of bed in the morning.

I’ve been reading a book my therapist recommended to me a long time ago, the one that deals with lifetraps. In one of the first chapters, it goes through each lifetrap by first explaining a “core need”, which is something a child should have in order to thrive. It goes through examples on how we should have been raised, and how a healthy mind will grow from that. Then it explains how the lifetrap may develop if that core need isn’t met, by giving examples of destructive childhood environments.

And for almost every lifetrap in the book, I saw my own childhood in those examples of destructive environments, such as the one about “Self-esteem”:

Self-esteem is the feeling that we are worthwhile in our personal, social, and work lives. It comes from feeling loved and respected as a child in our family, by friends, and at school.

Ideally we would all have had childhoods that support our self-esteem. We would have felt loved and appreciated by our family, accepted by peers, and successful at school. We would have received praise and encouragement without excessive criticism or rejection.

But this may not have happened to you. Perhaps you had a parent or sibling who constantly criticized you, so that nothing you did was acceptable. You felt unlovable.

As an adult, you may feel insecure about certain aspects of your life.

When I was reading that, all I could think of was one specific incident from my childhood. I was young enough that my mom would bathe me, and she would do it in the en suite bathroom of the master bedroom. One day, she came to dry me off with a towel, and both the bathroom door and the bedroom curtains were open. I told her to close the door, because I was self-conscious about being seen naked by the neighbours across the street. I was really upset about it, and instead of walking two feet to close the door, she laughed and said, “You’re no Tom Cruise”, and left it open. From that point, I’ve had this irrepressible feeling that I’m never attractive enough for someone to even be interested in seeing me naked.

And that was just one example. My childhood was filled with so many such memories, each one branching into other lifetraps.

I’ve never wondered why I have self-esteem issues. I fucking hate how self-conscious I am, because I know the extent of that self-consciousness isn’t normal. I’ve struggled with issues like that my entire life, and I can trace everything back to my parents. It fills me with rage to know that they damaged me to the point where I feel so overwhelmed by my flaws that sometimes I’d rather be dead.

If I were ever to commit suicide — and at this point I feel like I can’t rule out the possibility of this anymore — I’d say that my parents would be 55% responsible¹, with my mom sharing more of that blame than my dad.

I hope she reads this one day. I hope my entire family reads this. I hope all my cousin’s moms read this, because they usually try to defend her. I want everyone to know that if I die by my own hand one day, I blame my mom more than anything else in the world. I want parents to know that they have a responsibility to their kids because they’re people too, that they have to treat them properly, and that I was an example of what happens when you don’t.

This is starting to sound like a suicide note, and it’s scaring me. Good thing I’ve always been a rational person, and I still recognize that suicide is an irrational decision for me at this moment. Sometimes, I watch suicide videos just to shock myself into realizing how final, irreversible, and horrible that decision is.

I’m at a lot better than where I was two years ago, before I went to therapy, but I’m still far from being fixed. I can admit that to myself now.

1. The other 45% being my own inability to deal with these things, but I attribute that to temperament, which is inborn and hence not their fault. [↑]

While I’ve always been very appreciative of what we did have, sometimes I wonder about what we never had the chance to do.

Sure, I bared my soul. I surrendered. I gave her the songs I don’t share with just anyone. I told her how profoundly important, wonderful, and remarkable she was to me. I let her in like no one else before.

But there were parts of myself I never gave up.

It wasn’t because we hadn’t reached that level of trust. It was a way for me to protect myself. To feel as though she didn’t have all of me, so I wouldn’t be left as open and vulnerable when the end finally came.

I regret it now. Not because I think it would have changed anything¹, but because I wonder what it would have been like for someone to know me completely. To feel vulnerable and safe, all at once. Even knowing I’d be heartbroken eventually, it would have been worth it to share what I’ve always saved.

I’ve been keeping all my girlfriends at arms length to protect myself. I can’t go through life holding things back anymore, constantly worried someone’s going to hurt me. That’s always a risk, no matter how stable a relationship is.

I have to put myself out there. I have to make the first step, even if it means feeling uncomfortable, because the more you share, the more comfortable you become, the more you share, and so on.

I can only go forward now, as a wiser person, a stronger soul, a better lover.

I suppose I’m feeling nostalgic, or missing her, as is my wont when the seasons change.

1. Cause it wouldn’t have. [↑]

My therapist has the curious habit of pushing his lower lip into his upper gums when thinking. He also has a very particular way of talking, and sometimes I wonder if I could imitate him.

I went into my session feeling great, and left with a little more modesty than when I started. I may pride myself on my self-awareness, but he’s always there to remind me that some problems are rooted in my subconscious. While my feeling of emptiness has disappeared, there are still a few underlying issues, such as why I started to feel that emptiness in the first place. He said that when we meet again that it should be on a regular basis, and I shouldn’t wait for a crisis to begin fixing issues. I agreed, but wanted to give things a chance on my own first, armed with this new-found enlightenment.

He approaches my situation from such a perpendicular perspective. It’s always a view I’ve never considered before. When I first went to see him, it was for my anxiety attacks. Not for the other deep-rooted emotional problems I had (and was unaware of). Sometimes, I wonder if we’ll ever get to the point where he’ll say to me, “You know what, Jeff, I don’t think you need to come here anymore.”

I’ve been living the strangest existence lately. It’s been a life without structure or meaning. I wonder what I’ll think of this phase of my life when I look back in five years.

Some days are easier than others. Sometimes, it’s a struggle just to find a reason to exist.

I have to admit that every pain, every sadness is inspiring. It may make my fingers bleed and my lungs ache, but the pure emotion that comes out of it is worth it, because that means I’m feeling something, instead of the numbness that scares me most.

My one mistake was trying to forget someone, when instead I should have been trying to forget life in general. I’ve always had the habit of thinking too much, and not doing enough. I’ve been trying to set goals to get somewhere, when it’s working toward those goals that’s the important part.

I made an appointment with my therapist again¹, because something is definitely wrong with me right now. It feels like I have the world at my fingertips. I have so much time and opportunity on my side. I laugh at the right jokes. I dance at the right songs. It’s all staring me in the face, but everything still feels empty.

I’m not looking for answers. I just want to stop asking questions.

1. I haven’t been back since last October [↑]

I’m getting a haircut today. I tend to look a great deal frumpier when a month has passed, which is also around the time my hair starts to piss me off, in a “WHY WON’T YOU STAY LIKE THAT?! NO, LIKE THAT. AAAAARGGGHHGH” kind of way.

My last one was on Christmas Eve, in the middle of a rushed holiday schedule, and I remember exactly the frame of mind I had when I went for that haircut. It feels like I’ve been through so much since then; emotional changes, personal epiphanies, and life experienced. It’s only been a little over a month.

Sometimes, I wonder if it would be scary to be my friend or lover, because of how much transformation I can go through in short periods of time. Julie once said I had changed a lot in the year that I knew her at the time. I wanted her to quantify that for me, but I didn’t, hoping it was generally for the better.

I can only hope it’s always an improvement.

(I love these entries.)

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First: listen to this. Some days I feel exactly like this song. Those days are pretty good.

I remember reading the blog once of the guy who said that his aunt was Nancy. She was a Canadian woman who suffered from mental instability and killed herself (“It seems so long ago/Nancy was alone/a forty five beside her head/an open telephone”), and Cohen read about the story in the newspaper, and penned this song about her.

Anyway.

I like him. He’s very unbiased. He doesn’t try to coddle me or side with or against me or force me into thinking anything. He offers perspectives that no one else can give me.

I wasn’t sure where to start, so I just tried to bring him up to speed on my life in the time that passed between us. It began briefly with how well I was maintaining the progress we had made but quickly drifted to the relationship, and that pretty much took the rest of the session.

(From here on out, I’m going to refer to it as the relationship. Just cause I’m tired of writing “half-relationship” or “relationship” in quotes like that. I’d say that two people as involved as we were would certainly be considered to be in a relationship.)

Continue reading

(Thank you, Rachel, for giving me yet another title)

I’m going through a sort of re-evaluation phase right now. I’ve been feeling peaceful and serene, maybe because things have been going well lately, so I’m left trying to figure out what I really want. Whether I can sustain this happiness, and how. What is important to my existence and survival.

I have an appointment with my therapist in three days. I haven’t seen him in over a year, but it doesn’t seem like that long ago. He says he still remembers me and remembers where my file is in his cabinet. I’m glad we didn’t sacrifice our patient-doctor relationship for a friendship (as I asked him about once) cause otherwise, I wouldn’t be able to see him like this, and I’d be trying to find another therapist. Instead of feeling like I need to be fixed this time, I’m just wondering where I go from here. A follow-up appointment of sorts, that my work is covering through the health plan.

I suppose the reason I want to talk to him is really that I need to hear myself talk, and I generally don’t talk to anyone about this stuff. Probably because I don’t know what the hell I’d be saying. John’s the first person I turn to when I seek guidance, but conversations with him are somewhat forced because he’s terrible on the phone. He needs to talk for a reason or purpose, and I could never explain this feeling to him. My therapist, on the other hand, has always given me a guiding hand, pointing me in the right direction so that I can start to figure things out on my own.

I have a feeling this long-weekend, while mostly spent alone in my house, will go by sooner than I’d like. My artistic endeavors have taken a back seat to paying-work lately, and now I have the chance to spend some time doing what I want, for me.

I almost did something stupid crazy exciting adventurous tonight. But I didn’t. Maybe it was too last-minute. Maybe I was feeling too shy and introverted. Maybe I’m complacent. Maybe I’m too comfortable where I am right now.

Sometimes I wonder when the scales will tip that balance. When — if ever — will I be unsatisfied enough with things to step out of my comfort zone and take those chances?

When will I catch that ride?

Sometimes I question whether or not I really know what suffering is. Reading back on my last entry, it struck me that in many ways, my life wasn’t that bad.

A Hero Of Our Time was written during great military conflict, where people were frequently “exiled” by being sent to remote places along the front of the Russian-Circassian War, where Russia had already been fighting for over 40 years. Some may argue that I don’t truly understand suffering, because my culture hasn’t been through something like this, whereas such pain is already in the blood of Russians. Even in popular culture, such as Babylon 5, the Russian character Susan Ivanova (whom I quoted in this tweet) seems to follow this stereotype.

If you look at Aya Nagatomi’s performances of Chopin, specifically her interpretation of his Étude Op. 10, No. 12, you can tell that it’s technically amazing — certainly a virtuoso in the making as she’s only 19 in this video — but you don’t feel the rubato with which Chopin intended it. As such, it sounds like it’s being performed by a computer. You have to wonder whether it takes a certain degree of hardship experienced to do it justice, perhaps going through the political turmoil of the November Uprising in Warsaw that inspired Chopin to write this Revolutionary Étude.

Could Leonard Cohen have been able to pen a song like Famous Blue Raincoat without having suffered through a few lonely nights in New York City? I think not.

I don’t know enough about Chinese history to know what my ancestors went through. The relatives I know of in previous generations escaped the Cultural Revolution — where they would have been subjected to unbelievable hardships — to Hong Kong. Maybe it’s not in my blood, and I’m just drawn to the idea of Nihilism on a superficial level, never truly understanding it any deeper.

But a long time ago, I remember reading an entry by Tina where she felt disturbed by other people’s opinions on how jaded she was feeling, as they were saying she had nothing to feel bad about. I told her not to compare herself to others. That one person going through heartbreak is a different kind of suffering than a person going without food, and that one can’t said to be more “painful” than the other.

I may have been well-fed, healthy, and from a middle-class family in my childhood. But none of things mattered to me because it was the emotional connection that I was seeking, but could never find.

I’ve always had the bad habit of comparing myself to others. I should probably just follow my own advice and enjoy the comfort, beauty, and inspiration that Russian literature gives me.

After all, if I can acknowledge that my suffering is my own, no one else would truly understand anyway!

On the last entry, my Uncle Joe posted this comment:

You’ve changed a lot. More mature, more stable, more tolerant. 5 years back, you paid more attention to your appearance, now you care more about what you do, what you observe. Now you’re a bit sloppy …and I like that. Your spending habit is so much different.

I don’t know what caused all that…work experience? Parents’ divorce? Love life? Tai Chi and Taoism?

The causes of my changes were too big to cover in the small box, so I said I’d cover them in their own entry. Here goes.

Therapy

One of the significant things my therapist helped me with was the ability to not sweat the small stuff. It took a few thought records for me to realize that there are things out of my control. I used to be really moody, where if a small detail didn’t go right, I’d get really grumpy. Now that doesn’t anymore, although I do occasionally have to remind myself of this idea, as it’s not a completely natural reaction (yet). This is probably what Uncle Joe noticed as me being “sloppy”, as I’ve stopped worrying about things going wrong, so a bit more carefree when it comes to details. Even Bronwen said she’s noticed the change.

I also had intimacy issues, where I’d push my girlfriends away if they got too close. I’ve since learned to let someone in, even if it means it may hurt me in the end, and there’s a great comfort to be had in knowing this. In figuring out what went wrong, and being given the hope that my future relationships won’t end due to my old intimacy issues, which I’m sure was buried in my subconscious before.

Taoism

Taoism has given me the same rough mindset as therapy, in terms of letting go of the little things that don’t go my way. But it wasn’t just due to the fact that things are out of my control, but also the idea that things don’t really matter. I’m still working on other tenets, like spontaneity and wu wei, but what I’ve been able to understand and apply so far has helped a lot.

When I’m having a bad day, I can go to the Tao Te Ching, find a verse that’s appropriate to my situation, and for some reason my heart finds such contentment in the words. Perhaps it’s even more than the individual tenets, and the fact that I now have something to believe in that brings comfort, stability, and happiness. A non-religious opiate, if you will.

Relationships

Having been through two good relationships with two good people, especially with the memories I have now, has given me a lot of satisfaction. Sure, they may have ended, but I never thought I’d be in a good relationship, probably because of my childhood with my parents, along with confidence issues. I think some people go their whole lives without ever having the sort of love that I did, or being able to experience the same wonderfully intimate moments. This has given me a contentment I wouldn’t be able to find anywhere else.

A reader recently sent me an e-mail. This was the last paragraph:

Lastly and please don’t take this as being bold, I want to keep reading and one day read that you are nothing but happy and fulfilled. I would never post a comment because I am too shy and also pretty prone to being embarrassed by people who are cooler than me (and I consider people who blog as people who are cooler then me), but many times when I read your entries I feel like I am watching a protagonist in a favourite movie or re-reading Siddhartha. Does that make any sense to you? I’m cheering you on and I’m in your corner.

It made me wonder: if she wants to read that I’m happy one day, does that mean that I’m not happy now? It forced the realization in me that the answer is no. Obviously no. Life isn’t great. But do I only write about the bad stuff? I’ve always believed that you have to suffer to create. I’m one of those, so maybe this is the case. I imagine it’s the opposite with my Tai Chi or table tennis partners, who must think my life is perfect, because of how happy I am when I’m doing those activities.

It also made me wonder how much of myself is revealed here. Someone once told me that she sees two different sides of me: one who is serious and intimidating from the things I write, and another who is easy-going and relaxed over the phone.

So what comes through in my words? Certainly not everything. But it’s the same as anything else, because it’s hard to get a total picture of someone, unless, perhaps, you spend an appropriately uncomfortable amount of time with them.

The about section of my site has always remained somewhat spartan. Even though blogging gurus say you should have a blurb about yourself so your audience can “identify” with you, it’s always seemed pointless to me.

I’ve never been one to describe myself. I prefer to let my writings be my description, especially since I’m evolving all the time, and it’s reflected even more in the changes to my writing style. In English class, you learn “say, don’t tell”. So instead of writing, “Tim was scared”, write something like “Tim’s forehead tightened as a bead of sweat fell across his trembling face”.

I also tend to write without explaining things. Like the fact that Dolly is my cat (although I don’t think many people are named Dolores nowadays), or that John is my best friend. Entries are a stream of thought, instead of stopping to make sure that new readers are caught up. That means anyone who follows me here is jumping right into my life. Sure, it’s probably hard to follow without all the context — like trying to watch 24 by starting in the middle of a season — but I’d rather assume that people already know what’s going on.

It doesn’t make me very accessible, but the things I say probably aren’t that accessible to begin with.