BooksandTrees

Congratulations on 6 months. This is such a huge goal to achieve and I hope you reach 1 year and more. You've not only made it this far, but also been a valued member of this community and help many others through their own issues, including my issues. I hope you are proud of not just the number of months, but the effort you've contributed to this community. It's a place where so many of us find freedom and protection to write such vulnerable pieces about our lives and it takes a lot of care to adhere to their words and help. Thanks for being here for the past 6+ months and keep it up.

The past couple weeks have been tough for me. They've been tough for all of you as well I imagine. I don't want my emotions regarding love on this post to be analyzed. This is just here to read. Loneliness is polarizing. It's like entering a cave with no light. This cold tunnel that seems to go on forever. As you walk deeper into the cave you harden both physically and emotionally to maintain your mental composure and taxing wear of the landscape on your body. A pin could drop a mile away and you'd hear it. I think there's a benefit to being stolid. I just think it's more of a fossil fuel of our emotional states of mind. I see it fading from time to time within me. I wish to find love. It's how attention, adoration, love, affection, company, companionship, partnership, conversation, and so much more is at the heart of why I face gaming and porn addictions. I just want to be noticed. I want to be noticed by a woman. I want to know that one woman could possibly hold me so deeply within her heart that I felt its warmth every time it beat. I think that's what we all want. But I don't care about what we all want. I'm tired of that. I care about knowing that I'm a treasure to her. I don't need it to be shown through pictures, gifts, or anything generic or superficial like that. I care that she idolizes me. I care that she couldn't go on without me. I care that she cares about me. I care that she's so interested in me that she finally starts to understand thoughtful ways to surprise me, converse with me, show affection and attention, and make me feel special. I care that she cares that I'm with her. I'm not a side piece. I'm not a toy. I'm not a prop for her social media accounts, I'm not a bottle of water to keep her hydrated in a desert of self pity. She looks forward to seeing me. I make her happy. I am smart and she can't wait to tell me something so she can hear what I have to say. I'm unique to her. She finds me interesting. She depends on me. She gives me responsibility in her life because I'm accountable. She doesn't need it. She's independent. But she trusts me because she knows I'm responsible and she wants me on her team. Because I improve her team and she improves mine. We don't share all of the same hobbies. She doesn't have a stupid voice. She's not a bigot. She's fair. She doesn't look like every other woman with the same blonde hair highlights, white shoes, jeans, northface jacket, brown boots, and instagram account glued to her. She's not obsessed with viewing other people's vacations and making them her own dreams. She has her own dreams. She dreams of career goals. She dreams of life goals. She dreams of hobby goals and pursuits. She dreams of visiting places that matter to her and improving herself. She dreams of me. She is not vague or generic. In fact, she doesn't give a shit about what most people think unless they've earned her respect. Earning her respect doesn't include kissing ass. It means people proved themselves in ways that she respects either through their character, actions, work ethic, job, skills, humor, personality, or maybe just their own dreams. She doesn't test people to earn respect. She sees leaders lead by example and believes in it. This is the woman I want. I am lonely. I am tired of generic people. I want to feel special by a special woman knowing how unique I am and wanting to include me in her life. Not because she needs or wants me. Because she knows I'm a benefit and knows how important I am to her. She respects that and respects me. She makes time for me because she wants to see me. She contacts me first not because she's lonely and pathetic, but because she views me as her number 1 plan or views me as someone to include in her number 1 plan like a hobby after work or a place to go so we can be together. She doesn't want to get married because her friends are getting married. She wants to get married because she wants to get married to me. I complete her. She completes me. Women talk about men only asking for sex. Yet this is all I've ever seen from women. I've met women online, yoga sessions, sports, work, bars, etc. I've been used for sex or emotional cheating so often. It's such a one-sided, hollow existence. I'm not a sex object. I'm not a tool for you to use. I'm not your escapism. I'm not your tool. I'm not here to serve your self-centered life so you can feel better about yourself at my expense. You are not worth that. I'm a genius. I'm the funniest person you'll ever meet. I can speak with you about anything. I'm the best team player you'll have on your team. I have a willpower that is unmatched when I have a cause I believe in. I want someone to recognize this. I don't want stupid. I don't want generic. I don't want useless. I don't want lazy. I don't want apathetic. I don't want pathetic. In this cave the only thing I'm walking towards is the warmth from outside of the cave. I dream of that warmth. I dream of your hugs, laughter, comfort, eyes, and love. I believe I'll find this. I believe in me and I believe you're out there. I believe there is a woman like this who is out there and she is looking for me. Unicorns don't exist, but Mustangs do exist. I'm tired of running into donkeys.

i'm touring a house on wednesday. I have been very depressed the past week. I haven't really wanted to write in my journal. This quarantine is getting to me. I've destroyed my sleep schedule, eating habits, etc.

Thanks. I'm not looking forward to it, but we'll see what happens.

Glad you're enjoying the books. I might try those markers. Good job avoiding the masturbation. I've been failing at that this week with 2 or 3 times, but it's not 3 to 5 times a day like 2 months ago.

Thanks guys. Today was a little annoying at first but finished well. I was very tired after a night of poor sleep combined with ther snooze button. It was not my most productive day, but I still got a few things done. I think I was burnt out this week. I didn't get to exercise much, but still losing weight. I'm a little annoyed because I have to find a new apartment in 3 weeks. I think I'm going to try and rent a townhouse. I want to do this to see if I'd enjoy a townhome. I have the option to buy a home next year. I could buy now, but I'll have many more options in 2021 after a promotion later this year and my car payment ending. Plus, the market always changes during presidential elections. I don't want to panic buy now. If I buy something because I didn't wait 5 months then I'm stuck for 30 years with it. I'm just stressed because I want a home one day. I don't think it's smart to buy especially since my exam is rescheduled for October and I gotta start studying in 2 months. The stress of buying a home would be negative. I had more voice and video chats today and that was good. I'm 3d modeling tomorrow with my friend and looking forward to it. Today I'm grateful for my job, family, friends, hockey, and myself for not getting depressed today after a slow start.

Dude, those are gorgeous. What are you coloring these with? Coloring seems fun and relaxing. Try doing more around the house for yourself over the next few weeks and see if you keep enjoying the responsibility. If you become self reliant then the apartment could make more sense.

Today was nice. I had more video chats with friends and we had a great time. We did some trivia together and told stories after. It really made me happy. I then made some pork chops and have enough for 3 more meals. Hunter x hunter is almost over and I'm relieved. It's so drawn out. I keep complaining, but I'm almost there. I didn't exercise today because I had a bad headache/neck ache. I could not do a single ab exercise without pain so I decided to forget it for today. I feel better now though. I watched porn today unfortunately, but I had no interest in watching more. Today I'm grateful for the birds, my food, my friends, my landlord, and myself for not getting upset about someone hurting my feelings today. I chose to just ignore them and move on instead of stewing like I had mentioned many times before.

I'm trying to relax more also and I just feel happier. I'm gonna 3d model this weekend, but it's so important to relax. I didn't realize.

It's happening, but Pantera wrote a great song about times like these called 'Yesterday Don't Mean Shit' that always gets me focused on the next day. You got this and we will support you. The virus has people in the same situation with people gaming. It's ok! Be brave and be kind to yourself through this.

Did you know when it started? Did you yell or anything? I know when I had severe heartburn my voice would cut out sometimes and it would hurt. I thought I had larynx cancer for some time, but after I lost my stress I felt better and it never came back.

Today was a good day. I got more work done, I slept very well, I sneezed a lot from allergies, and spent a lot of time socializing after work. I had a virtual happy hour with 2 friends, called another friend after and did another virual chat with some friends after that! Very social and it made me feel great. I am happy. I am doing something similar tomorrow. I have forgiven myself for the video games now. It has been a huge step in my recovery. I hope you reach this soon. Yeah, it's not worth believing any of the stuff until it's proven and accepted by multiple nations, the CDC, and WHO. Until then it's just traditional medicine and care. I think it's a 2 year thing as well and will wait as long as possible. I don't feel comfortable returning to work or anything until a vaccine is derived. I don't like cities either. I think it's just a frustrating life. I like where I am at now. I also agree with the being positive and calm approach. I've felt a lot better over the past few days just being happy, calm, and not trying to be too goal oriented. You can be goal oriented all day and after a few days of it you get worn out. Today I am grateful for my friends, the bird outside my window that I whistle to throughout the day, and myself for continuing to be calm and adapt to my new life.

I think I waver between reading for focus for technical documents and codes at work and then can't do it later because I'm tired. But reading a chapter for fun puts me out.

I agree and haven't done this in almost 2 years. Deleting social media helped. I removed all of these people from my life by simply not initiating conversation and none of them have initiated with me. It reduced a lot of stress.

Today was a lot better. I woke up at 7 and was determined to do well. The only issue was it was impossible to fall asleep at 11 PM after falling asleep at 330 AM the night before. So I settled for 1:30 AM. I was more productive at work today and also took a nap. I ate well again and I also worked out for 15 minutes and showered. It felt good. These are intense workouts so they don't need to be super long. I'm still losing weight and have lost almost 30 lbs this year! I meal prepped again tonight. I found a really good potato recipe so I think I might make some eggs and potatoes tomorrow morning. I had a really good session with my therapist and we talked about my loneliness and drive for being productive. I think I'm starting to find some balance. I was trying to 3d model for 4-10 hours and that's not real. I've cut it back to like 1-4 hours per week tops unless I'm really passionate about the project. Some days I was forcing myself to do it like I was in the office at work. I also contacted my website host to try and cancel my hockey website last week. I ended up keeping it up and am going to take a new approach. I wanted to write about hockey, but building the website took over 40 hours and I was not close to being done. It really pissed me off. I didn't want to build a website, I wanted to write hockey articles. So I found out because I chose Wordpress I made it more difficult on myself as that's the one with programming and more options. It's not all programming, but you have the option. It's too customizable for what I wanted to do. So I realized I could just use Weebly and make a simple website and just write my articles. I will attempt to do this soon. My goal is to be able to write hockey articles once a month if I feel like it, animate a few hours per week if I feel like it, rock climb, tennis, hockey, Bruins, reading, exercising, biking, cooking, and some tv shows. I'm slowly building a network of activities for balance. It just takes some time. Today I am grateful for my therapist, my friends, my family, my food, the community, my apartment, and myself for being understanding of my needs over my wants.

I also got up at 7 today after waking up super late the past 3 weeks. I feel better and I'm starting to get tired earlier as well. Maybe this is a good thing.What is making you avoid exercise? I know the time commitment was killing me so I found an app that let me do a full workout in like 10-20 minutes. It's tough but good.

Are you trying to go deeper into self improvement to not only fix yourself, but subconsciously try and fix your girlfriend? It seems you are afraid to talk to her about some of these issues. I could be wrong and not trying to prod a potentially touchy subject since you both are depressed, but is there a way you both could feed off of each other and build off of that strength? It seems like she is really being a heavy anchor right now and you're trying to raise the anchor and put it on a ship that would sink if it held the anchor. (anchor is yours and your gf's issues and your boat is just yours and not hers).

Thanks. I think I focus too much on the negatives lol. I hear myself cutting people down in my mind or cutting myself down and it's all I hear.

Congrats on 8 months! This is so exciting. I am glad you had your surgery and are recovering. I wish you a speedy recovery. I also hope your chemo goes well. It will be a tough ride, but I hope your lymph nodes become cancer free. You are doing a great job!

It only has like 50 episodes on Netflix, but Myanimelist says it has over 150. This just seems like such an ordeal. I get so frustrated by the cliche anime shonen style where there's a stupid guy who has the amazing ability to be the strongest and he's the most special and fights through everyone. It's too cliche. I think Hunter x Hunter tried avoiding some stereotypes by changing it's plot a bunch, but it still carries the same theme. I also get pissed how there's so much explanation of techniques. Oh my god. This is tetzu. Now move your hands like this and focus your aura. This is zetzu. Now get angry. This is nen. Now eat shit, this is shtizu. It's so annoying. Just fucking fight or uncover a plot or something. At least Full Metal Alchemist Brotherhood had a good plot. This is just redundant.

I have contingency plans and everything. I just kind of got stressed because I don't know how to relax is all. I am still trying to balance fun, productive fun, work, relaxation, and strong essential habits like eating right, sleeping consistently, exercising enough, etc. I don't like wasting time and that prevents me from doing a lot of what I am looking to do. It's an interesting conundrum.

I think I just have such high expectations. I feel like a failure if I don't get things right and I have some sort of expectation of success upon completion that will make me feel better. Once again, this could be another form of escapism in a productive way. My therapist once told me there are people who are addicted to the gym and while many people would say that's better because they're not morbidly obese or anything, they still are not healthy at all. This could be similar with productive vs lazy. I don't like unproductive people because it reminds me of the person I used to be. Just being lazy and avoiding responsibilities. Not only does it remind me of myself, but it reminds me of many of my former friends in real life who do absolutely nothing and just want to play games and avoid responsibilities. It pisses me off. I want to surround myself with accountable people so I don't have to pick up the slack. I get very annoyed when I have people tell me the same problems every day and do nothing about it. I think they're a waste of life if they do this for months on end and don't make changes. It really pisses me off. That's why I think I'm kind of cutthroat. I take time to empathize with them and understand what's holding them back from making the change. So I do my due diligence before labeling someone a waste, but once it's there it's there for good until proven otherwise. It's a deeper seeded thing also because both of my parents were like this. I'm the only person in my family and one of my only friends who takes charge and leads the pack. I've just had to deal with so much of it and I'm the only one who changed. It bothers me. My therapist said I'm insightful and that took lots of pain to achieve and not many others are willing to do that.

I've never made curry before and always wanted to try. My old roommate used to make good curry, but whenever I asked for the recipe he'd just say it's easy and do it myself and then lock himself in his room all day and play video games. Kind of put me off lol.

Why do you have to leave your room?Is it too thought provoking and disrupts sleep?

Work was slow again and I got very little done. My computer was malfunctioning and we needed IT to fix my programs and that took several hours. I get nervous during times like this because I don't like to look unproductive. If I talk shit about people being unproductive then I imagine I look like a prick if I don't back my words up. But I doubt that's happening. It's just me being paranoid. When situations like this occur I just think the worst and become defensive because deep down I'm a very angry/cut throat person I feel. I'm trying to practice forgiveness and gratitude and it has been working a bit. I made a really good meal the other day and it has motivated me a bit. Although, I've been eating some junk food the past few days. Not all day. I'm still under my caloric maintenance intake. It's just that I try to sneak in a cookie some days. I didn't sleep well last night and I watched way too much porn to clear my mind. I'm getting sick of porn again. I think it's so difficult to quit porn when i'm isolating. But I guess everyone is struggling. Many of us have been relapsing and playing games or trying in moderation. Don't beat yourself up. Be kind to yourself. You went back to play for a reason. This is the time to understand what you're trying to game for and improve your life if you don't want to game anymore. Is it loneliness, boredom, lack of achievement, competition? What is it? Let's talk it out. Tonight I'm not touching my computer, phone, or TV past 1030 PM. I keep falling asleep at fucking 3 AM and it's so annoying. Porn doesn't help. I watch it before bed, get stimulated, then browse the internet, then watch porn again and fall asleep due to exhaustion and then wake up late feeling like shit the next morning. I'm going to try reading again tonight. That worked before. I'm grateful for my family, job, food, apartment, nicer weather, myself for making it through another day of not sleeping, and my friends.