eat me henger

it took me around a decade to acclimatize to a life of surplus. earning your own money changes everything but feels like nothing at the same time. your lifestyle gradually upgrades, better quality, higher quantity. it's fun for a while. but my present happiness isn't too far off with the happiness of a poorer version of myself. the only real difference is that i don't feel desire as much as i used to because i can afford the things i want now. granted, there are things still out of my salary - particularly, multi-million purchases like a car or a house. however, i'm not convinced that even if i could buy them now, i would be significantly happier. i'll drive on the same roads. i'll breathe the same air. i'll deal with the same people. there is value in desire because it gets you to a better destination. but perhaps i'm just doing it the wrong way. my desire for the past decade has been manifesting in amassing more from fear of running out. so now i have ...

there's a point where i don't want to deal with people altogether. i hate inefficient action. i hate when i catch myself doing it. i hate it even more when i'm forced to play along with other's inefficiencies. i'm to blame for not communicating enough. but that has a lot to do with growing in a household where parents are dictators and disagreements are prohibited. when you disagree, they guilt you into feeling sorry for making them feel bad. it's manipulative and i hate it. emotions and rationality should never mix, and when winning an argument is based on "who is most rational" and then winning conditions turn to being "who is most hurt", it makes me want to act on my own emotions and physically beat the tears and blood out the other person. i think it's only fair to fuck things up when others are throwing rules out of the window. if it has all along been about winning and not about cooperation, then i'm more than willing to leave a...

i'm not entirely sure whether age simply is just a number. every phase of my life has been markedly different depending on the circumstance. time has a lot to do with it. i've been too young or too old. sometimes, i've spent too many hours or not enough. the only linear certainty is that my body degrades. saggier skin, blurrier vision, brittler bones. my mind works differently, however. despite not being able to recall every bit of knowledge learned or wisdom gained, i seem to have a better intuitive sense of how to carry myself through life. i don't have to remember how and why, i just simply know what to do. most of the time, it works. i don't always win, but that's the point. it's not always about winning. i used to have more physical energy and mental enthusiasm. i wanted to win all the battles i had a shot at, but victory after victory felt vapid. there's the thrill of the chase and the high of the triumph, but so what? i don't feel i'm in a...

in the decade i've been working, i've seen communications become more prevalent. it used to be that i was receiving actual sheets of paper for formal communications. it was letters or memos sent through actual human messengers. email was already a thing, and so was the fax machine. i though dial up returned, it was just the fax tone. it's only recently that instant messaging platforms had seen more use. when i had started, some of the people in the office were still using yahoo messenger, when whatsapp was already a thing. but now i'm just overwhelmed with the amount of inane information sent through messages. i don't have the sufficient bandwidth to deal with all of it. this stream of words from everyone that barely matter to me is such an unwelcome part of the workplace. i need to own my phone, it shouldn't be an extension of the office. maybe i could force it by being just as superficial as the messages have become, but i don't want to betray my sense of ...

privilege is a luxury i sincerely share with a few. in the current social climate, any form of comfort arising from advantages is disparaged. i don't blame them. those privileged are raised with book-based knowledge that desensitizes from on-the-ground realities. for the vast majority of people, success and prosperity are not relatable characteristics. winning presents a duality of losing. the victory of one indicates the failure of many. we celebrate triumphs momentarily, but we perennially cheer campaigns, especially of underdogs. privilege is perceived negatively. i'm privileged. i've had success. i enjoy prosperity. unfortunately, these are defined by relativity. i'm never as good or as bad i appear to be. very rarely am i on the same level as someone else. that's why my sentiments are always suspect. i'm always assailed from an assortment of angles. it becomes an unnecessarily exhausting argument rather than an enlightening discussion. i'm just tired of...

the present is always a gift. i need to take a step back and look at life as a whole. of course, i'm not gifted with a decent memory, so i can't clearly remember what had happened to me in the past. but i can at least spend time with people at different stages of their lives to simulate what i used to be and what i could become. everybody has a different perspective. there is foresight to gain from sharing the same lens of both the young and the old. right now, i'm in a bad place. waking up marks the misery of my day. i have to force my way through a series of required encounters that fail to spark my enthusiasm. somehow at sundown, i still don't want to fall asleep because my backlog of to-dos my past self prepared remains to haunt me at present. but thankfully, it all ends when my body tells me to. but in the past, i yearned for my present position. i wanted the wisdom, instead of pretending to know anything. i desired the power to decide on bigger things, instead of ...

i'm a shell of my former self. i used to find meaning in what i did. i used to be passionate with what i brought to the world. now i'm just cruising along. nevertheless, i maintained the absolute level of effort when i want to do something productive, but those opportunities became few and far between. nowadays i'm forced to do good rather than be given an environment i'm motivated to be good. i've been trying to be more authentic lately, and i don't have it in me to give in to the self-serving agenda of others. i prefer inaction rather than being compelled to do what i disagree with in principle. perhaps in the past, my morals were more malleable. i can stomach misdeeds given promises of reward in the future. my present shows no indication of any remuneration. so my life was a lie. finding future benefit wasn't a good motive to allocate appropriate energy. it pains me to rebuild again. after all of the hard work, the persona i built for myself. but the pres...