Into Dust

There are so many metaphors for depression. The most common one I’ve heard of is: it feels like you’re drowning while everyone else is breathing. But since my depression is more on-again-off-again, I experience it in a different way. Since I was born with mine, it never really goes away. In high school it was worse, but now that I’m in college, I only experience it about 2-3 times a month. What it feels like for me is that you’re climbing a really tall mountain and at the top is happiness, but with one misstep, you could slide back down to the bottom (depression) in a matter of seconds. It’s like a switch in me, it just happens without warning. Along with sliding back into depression so easily, I also get a flood of negative thoughts, which is like trying to build a dam. You keep piling up logs to keep the depression (the water) away and if it rains too much then the water will just break through the logs (the happiness) and come flooding back in with no control. My depression, especially, is a lot of negative thoughts. I wouldn’t say I’m suicidal because I’ve never tried to kill myself, but every time I slide back down that mountain, I just wish I could stop living. I feel so worthless and don’t want to continue living with such unhappiness.

Now-a-days, my depression usually lasts only for a few days. But they are just the worst days of the month. I feel so helpless and literally hate myself. But I can never escape myself so it’s like living with someone you hate for the rest of your life and not being able to get away. Over the years, I’ve tried to become a better person (so I would hate myself less), even to reinvent myself to a more likeable, happy person. I just wish I knew the secret to being happy. I’ve heard a million times over again to just “be happy”, but to someone with clinical depression, that’s like saying “just be a millionaire”, it doesn’t happen overnight. You have to work your ass off to be happy. I’ve found a few outlets that I personally enjoy when I slip such as music, writing, watching TV, or just driving. I also have to be alone while doing all of these things. I am going to have to live with this for the rest of my life, and I just hate that it’s something I can’t overcome. Every time I thought I have beaten it, it comes back. I definitely think the root of my problems boils down to other people: not having enough people who love/care for me. Which is fucked since that leads to another problem I have.  I feel like I’m living with a cancer and I’ll never know if/when it’s going to kill me.

 

P.S. I just got some bad news so fuck me even harder..

 

"I could possibly be fading.."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vO30b_SxLzE

The Voice

This post is named The Voice because that's the show I'm watching right now...
But also I want to talk about how I'm trying to find my voice in this world.

I've always been a very opinionated person. I either hate something or love it. Sometimes those two even interchange because I'm a very indecisive person. I'm changing my mind and my life all the time. I'm attending my third college at the moment, and I will be studying my third major this coming fall. One thing that I do admire about myself, though, is that when I find the thing I want to do in life, I, right away, figure out how I'm going to achieve this goal. When I wanted to be an actor/model, I took acting lessons and signed with a modeling agency. When I wanted to become a fashion designer, I signed up for apparel classes at Iowa State University. Now, after many, many potential career paths, I've found one (or a few) that I think I was meant to do.

This fall, I'm going to become an English major with a minor in psychology. I'll never forget the moment when I realized what I truly want to do with my life. It was on a road trip to Mall of America with Shannon. I was driving and we were talking about our futures. We talked about how all we really want to do in life is travel. So from then on, I was determined to find a career I could do from my computer and be anywhere in the world. I'm still debating on whether I want to be an online teacher or a freelance writer. I might even do both. Just as long as I'm always travelling and life is never a routine.

Whatever I really end up doing, I want to change lives. Either by teaching or by inspiring or even the occasional charity work that I might happen to stumble upon during my days abroad. I want to help make the world a better place, even if that's just encouraging future generations to be better people.

By the end of my life, I hope to say:
"I swear I lived."
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3k009TIxQc8

Same Love

Looking back at old photographs of how towns and cities used to look is a special thing. It’s mind-blowing to compare them to recent photos and see how far the world has come. America is one of the most changing and revolutionary countries in the world. We are always looking towards the future and wondering what’s next. That’s at least what should be happening. Instead, there are quite a number of citizens who have a mind-set of the 19th century. Back then, white men were better than everyone else. Women and African-Americans were somehow thought of as lesser beings. Here we are, two centuries later, stumbling upon those views more than we should be. With people like that, will America still be the land of opportunities like it always has been?


Not until 1920 were women allowed to vote in national elections. That was less than 100 years ago. Multiple countries gave women the right to vote several years before the United States caught on. Not until the 1960’s were African-Americans treated equally as white people in everyday life. If anyone has ever taken a history class, they know how hard African-Americans worked to receive equal rights. It is hard to even fathom the idea that people back then thought whites were better than blacks, considering how many highly successful and skilled African-Americans there are today, like athletes and our president. It is hard to understand how anyone could still think that way.

Growing up, my teachers drilled into my head how much of a “melting pot” America is. I grew up knowing that America is filled with people of all colors, shapes and ways of life. If people can’t accept that, then maybe they shouldn’t be a part of a country where everyone is treated equal. Oh, but that’s right — that’s not actually true. Not only are women still considered less intelligent, or not as capable, but now that there is an established gay community, we can’t treat them equally either because they aren’t a straight, white male.
After seeing how horrible people have been in world history, I would have guessed everyone could learn from the mistakes of others and try to make the world a better place. But giving gays the right to get married seems to be impossible for America, as a whole, to accomplish. Once again, other countries are realizing how to treat everyone the same earlier than America is by allowing gay marriage. As the great Thomas Jefferson wrote in the Declaration of Independence, “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.” However, it seems Americans like to refer to the Bible to run America more than America’s own rules written when it was established.
So what happened to the separation of Church and State? How can people still be quoting Bible verses to control what happens to people who might not even be Christian? And why doesn’t the American government realize this yet? I am disgusted to say I live in a country where folks are more concerned about the possibility of getting their hunting rifles taken away. If we can’t do something as simple as grant marriage to everyone, then how do we expect to control something as widespread and controversial as gun control? The government seems to have its priorities mixed up.
“The American Dream” is a concept known around the world, but little do people know, you have to fit a certain criteria in order to be accepted in America. We’re supposed to be the land of the free, yet people are afraid to be who they are. Religion, gender, race and sexual orientation are all reasons which may constitute for you not being good enough to the average American. There should be bigger things to worry about, but if something as easy as gay marriage can’t be passed in America, it’s only a matter of time before the hate becomes greater than the love in the world and that is when the world will fall miserably to its knees in defeat. When the power of love overcomes the love of power, that is when the world will know peace.

-Written for iowastatedaily.com

"No freedom 'til we're equal; damn right I support it."
"A certificate on paper isn't gonna solve it all, but it's a damn good place to start."
"Underneath it's all the same love."
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hlVBg7_08n0