When you're on a roller coaster ride, when it goes down all you wanna do is screaming on top of your lungs right ? Similiar to life in general. When you hit rock bottom you just want to screaming out loud, except it's not an automatic ride like an actual roller coaster where you'll go up again in no time. You need to figure that shit out all by yourself to go up again.
The last time I wrote this blog was around 6 months ago right ? I dont think I have to give you a reasonable excuse of why I'm not constantly update my blog like I used to. So heres the thing. I want to talk about something different, and no, its not about gundam, or any of that happy and joyful. I want to talk something thats more REAL.
Hey dov...are you okay ? you're not about to have a mental breakdown right ?
Yes and no, I just want to let everything all out, I'm sorry if this is going to be dark. like REAL DARK. I just saw all my facebook posts from 2014 and wondering why I'm a lot darker now.
Ok, so lets start with how everything has changed since I stepped into the real world, and by that I mean graduated from college and got a fulltime job. Life is getting real. as simple as when I thought about something that's never gonna happen in my life, happens. All what I feared when I was a kid, happens as I progressively growing up becoming an adult. For example, when I was a kid, failure was something that I feared and avoid the most, now as I grew older I FACED all the failures whether its from my fault or others fault that affect me. I remembered the very first time I made a major failure in my previous office, I went home and cried real hard in front of my parents, at that time I was 24. By the time I wrote this I'm one week away becoming 27.
As you grow up, all your problems are getting way worse. When you were a kid, and your friend called you faggot, you felt really sad and wondering why your friends did that to you. Now when people called you faggot, you don't give a single fuck about it, sometimes you even embrace it, because you have bigger problems than that, like doing all your many many responsibilities without having a full blown mental breakdown. I was a kid with severe anxious thoughts, and its hard growing up living with anxious thoughts. I'll give you a tiny example of how my anxiety works : My teacher told me that my recent Math test got a D- & I need to do better the next time I took the test or I'll have to repeat my current grade. My anxiety thoughts could reach to a point where if I keep getting a D- on math I will not provide a good life for my future family That thoughts were often experienced by me when I was a kid, a KID. Now Imagine me as an adult with that kind of anxiety but with even worse problem. Thats how my life now.
Stress are your best friend as you becoming an adult, whether it's from your career, family, or personal, or when you're lucky enough you could get it from all of it COMBINED in 1 day. Theres no way in hell I made through a day without feeling stressed out, that's also one of the top reason why I started working out and running. Working out is the best medicine for me to make me feel better about myself even if it just for an hour or 2 hours a day. You know other things I did when I was feeling too heavy in my head, I played every 30 Seconds to Mars songs on my iPod while singing loud in my car, screaming and singing just to get rid all the stress in my head. Too Dark ? You know what else did I do when I was in my car feeling slightly heavy in my head ? Singing and dancing at every britney spears songs on my iPod, how many of them ? 1 album of her best singles. Now that's a lot DARKER. You don't wanna see it.
I don't know if it's just me or any other adult felt it too, but as you grow older, you're starting to slowly abandon your hobby that you used to enjoy it so much, in my case...building and experience things with gundam kits. There was a moment when I thought that maybe it was just me who cant balance it well between work and hobby. But no, as I grow older I know what I should prioritize, and it's insanely ridiculous if I answered "My hobby, duh !?" and also you don't have as much time as you used to when you're a kid, the first thing you wanna do as you went back home from work are either sleep, scrolling your phone, or watch youtube. Sleeping well is a luxury for me and other adults.
Being an adult means you have to give a good example to younger people. Now, I'd like to talk about how social media sometimes are toxic and destroy us. When we're on social media all the good things are often seen by us and sometimes it made us jealous. Like for example seeing your friends hanging out with others, on a party, or on a trip to an exotic island, then cut to you sliding your phone on your bed while digging your dirty ass nose. We adults sometimes post that on purpose so people can see our "brand" as a happy person with less problems in our life. Why did I know that ? because I also did that. Back to giving a good example. Being adult means you have to give a good example to a younger people around you, posting photos of happier version of you with an uplifting status on social media are one of many attempts to give younger people perception that being adult means you're a liberated, wise enough, and mentally prepared to take over the world straight up without knowing what's the darkness behind all of it & what we've been through. All I can say is, dont believe what you've seen on social media. everythings are all made up, or at least you dont know what's behind all of it.
When it comes to relationship (calm down, I'm not dragging any of my previous partner, or did I ?) as you grow older, you're starting to wonder if your current relationship will last long enough through marriage. When you were young, you're dying for an attractive looking girl/guy. Now that you're older you reconsider everything when you're going to find a life partner, and it's very complex. I'll give you an easy example ; You're on a hunt to find a life partner, your current criteria are girl/guy with super attractive face and body of a model. Ok, maybe a kissable face and hugable body. You got it. Now you're in a relationship for 2 months, something terrible happened to you and made you really - really stressed out to a point where you just want to die in an instant. Your partner for 2 months just text you and said "Hang in there !" and thats it, nothing more or less. Do you really want that ? do you really want to sacrifice your mental health just so people can see your "achievement" ?
Now let's talk about career in real life. This is going to be a long one. Your career journey starts when you finished your thesis defense and nailed it. The first thing you wanna do is to find a job you loved or a company you've been dreaming to work at. Ok, so like anyone else did, you applied to that company, hoping to get a job in there. There are 2 possibilities in this scenario, 1. You got the job and you proud of yourself for getting a job you really want, 2. your application got instantly rejected by a company you've been dreaming to work at, not even an interview call. Let's talk about the last one first because I experienced that too. I used to have a dream to work at a certain company, mainly because I used to contribute at that company back then, plus I have a connection in that company, an important person. Ok, so like any naive fresh graduates I applied there, took the test, got an interview call, everything seems smooth, and the next thing you know you got rejected. I remembered my heart was shattered the moment I read the rejection email from the company. I can say that my mind at the time was a bit snobby knowing that I have a connection & used to contribute there so I thought I definitely got the job. But no, thats the reality I had to face. I got rejected, and later I got a job where the office was so far away from home.
Now fast forward to years after that, I got accepted by a company that I grew up knowing it well, I really love working there, the working environment is good, I have a good relationship with my boss and my co workers, everything seems like a happy ending, right ? But then I started falling down into a rabbit hole of career anxiety like, will I keep doing this for the rest of my life ? Am I going to stay in this company forever ? Am I going to reach my goals if I keep working there ? Oh my god is this even the right career path for me ? Ah...the beauty of adulthood <3
The last thing I want to talk about is about role changing in core family. As you becoming an adult, you're slowly replacing your parents role in the house, especially when you're a guy. You're starting to realize that time goes by really fast. Your parents are getting older, weaker, and you can't rely on them anymore in every aspect so you have to slowly take control of it. It's both great and stressful situations. It's great when people in your house are slowly starts to rely on you, and you felt needed, have roles, and purpose in life. What made it stressful and sad is when you think that you're not ready for this, what made it even worse is when you made a terrible mistake on your family related task to a point where it involves someone in your family's life.
BUT YOU KNOW WHAT ?
After all the dark things I've been through, there's always a bright side behind all of this process of becoming an adult
Today, failures has become part of my life, and no it's not a bad thing. Failures are what made us adult a better person as we learned from previous failures we made, and no I did not expect to minimalize failure in the future, there will ALWAYS be a new failure and new mistakes to come. Failures mold us into a better person.
Sure, as you grow up all your problems are getting way-waay worse than when you were a kid, but you know what gets better ? your tolerance for bullshits (I quote that from Shane Dawson). You will not give a single fuck when people told you look slightly fatter or skinnier because you have more important problems than thinking whether you should go on a latest diet trend and torture yourself just so you can look as what people wish for. You own your goddamn life.
Sure, life is getting harder and harder in every aspect as you get older. But that's life right ? Theres no way in hell you will always stay happy forever, that's some fucked up bullshit.
All I'm trying to say to close this long post is...live your life in every moment. Because every moment matters. When you're sad and hit rock bottom, you need to always remember that it's only a moment and not forever, and you know what you got from all of that ? A stronger & better you as you learned from all the terrible & dark moments you previously experienced. On the flipside, when you're happy, enjoy it, live it to the fullest while you still can, cause we never knew what comes next, & that my friend is the beauty of Adulthood.
