Life=awesome

I hope you can relate. In a week, school will be done, papers will be getting finished up, and summer will feel just around the bend. < 3

Breathe in, Breathe out

I feel like I should be happier. I have everything. I have a great job, an awesome girlfriend, classes are going fine, I've gone surfing this past week. I think I miss feeling as relaxed, alive, and connected with things as I did in Florida. I think surfing has shown me how unconnected I am. I saw a friend yesterday I hadn't seen in a month or two. "I thought you'd be out of here and back in Florida by now." I feel like maybe I should be. I told myself I'd only have a year of school to finish when I came back, but I was wrong. It's longer. And I'm stuck here, in this city. There are good things to this, like going to open mics downtown, and being around college friends. But it's difficult to be in touch with nature. It's difficult to feel relaxed. I feel like I forgot what relaxed is. Relaxed isn't sitting in front of the T.V. playing xbox. It's sitting on the beach, or sitting on my surf board watching the beauty of the ocean as it surrounds me. I know part of the reason I'm feeling like this is because I've had a weird sleep schedule this week. This is something I need to work on. But I guess I feel like there are other things I could improve on/ would like to see changed: I wish I had a surfing buddy. Someone that I could share this passion with. Go out with, talk about it. Someone that will get it because they experience it with me, ya know? I feel like I'm just going through the motions in regard to classes and school. What's odd about that is I feel like I don't have as much of an urge as I usually do to just up go on an adventure. I think this has to do with a girl, and change takes time. I need to clean my apartment. Like hardcore clean it and organize my room. I will probably feel better after this is done. I said last week that I think I want to go back to counseling. Mainly because of this new job, and so I can have someone to talk to about stuff with the job. But I think there are other reasons and things that made me say this, and I'm not really sure what they are. I think I need sleep. Especially seeing I'm working 16 hours tomorrow. Good night world. <3

Real Life

It's difficult to come home and feel like all of your friends are out drinking when you just left working at a place in which alcohol has hurt the lives of so many.

I'm so nervous for next Friday. I want to be so fucking good at this job. I want to have a huge impact. I want patients to remember me, because that's how I'll know I'm doing a good job.

<3

I forgive you

These are words that I think I need to say to myself. As I lay here tonight, in the bed I grew up in, I realize some heaviness in my heart. I've improved a lot with learning to be okay with spending a night alone. But it's still a little difficult. Today I wrote things and felt really good about them, actually inspired by them. I wrote words that had passion in them. I think this is what is a little difficult about coming home for me, I don't have a lot of distractions here. It allows me to reflect.

It's been months since I've lived in Florida, yet I still don't know how to describe my time there. I'm focusing this more so on my summer, after the internship. The summer which I lived alone. I had never lived alone before that. It was new and scary as fuck. It was a huge challenge, and in some cases, when push came to shove, I failed. I fucked up. I've been very mad at myself and still have some guilt inside me. So here are words I've never said to myself I need to. I forgive you. I forgive you for being a shitty friend, for not being responsible with your money, for the strip clubs, for letting lust and desire lead you to doing things that should never be done. For spending a few too many nights just getting drunk, for breaking hearts, for not reaching out and asking for help sooner when you needed it, for calling the cops, for pushing away someone who was trying to help, and more than anything, for having a hard time forgiving her. Because hey, if you're reading this, I forgive you too. And that doesn't at all mean it's all your fault. But damn it, you're still on my mind, and I think about you, and I hope that you're doing okay. I love you. I don't ever want to be with you again, but I do love you. Something tells me that last sentence shouldn't feel okay, but it does.

I was young and dumb. I was learning and living. I still am young and dumb; learning and living. Life happens. It's okay. It's okay to let out the negative feelings I have about myself. It's okay to cry and not even really know why. I love myself. I do love myself. That's what matters most. Tomorrow, I can now walk through the day with less guilt than I had today.

Here's a water toast to everyone not getting wasted tonight. Cheers.
<3

The strongest inspiration comes from other people

"Slow down Quinten. You can see it all if your finger whispers on one word. Slow down. For in a world of fast faces, I'm looking for God everywhere. Trying to figure out this little thing he made called a man."

I'm trying to slow down and speed up both at the same time. I can be very spontaneous, random, and adventurous. However, for the amount of time alone I spend, I wonder if I do enough self-reflecting.

There's a million good things. Time's a million. Squared.

Sometimes it's nice to just let good thoughts flow through your mind, and just lay back and smile. Sometimes we don't need to write nor share them, and that's okay.

If I didn't have the amazing friends I do, I wouldn't be the person I am today. I'm thankful for it all. I'm happy and I'm tired. I'm going to go let my thoughts flow through my mind as I fall to sleep.


Laughing is the best medicine.

<3

I want to be good

Duh, we all do. Right? But I think we forget sometimes. I think sometimes things become confusing, dark, grey, and we just seem to not care. It's important during those times to have basic rules, ideas, principals, and beliefs which you can fall back on. I think that's on of the reasons I have this blog and write in it.
I'm reading "What makes a Life significant" by William James right now for my philosophy class. I'm feeling alive today. I saw the newest brief Kony 2012 video, and I feel like I'm a part of something and reminded that there are shitty things out there, but there are also good things I can do about it. What James is talking about so far in this paper, is how we need bad things, and our lives are simply the process of trying to make bad things good. Always. When we aren't doing this, we are bored. Improvement is what makes us feel alive. It's funny how I read this and I feel like there are many of his ideas that I have shared with him before even reading this. This is a famous American Philosopher, the founder of Modern Psychology. I feel like I can be someone and do things. That's simple and broad, but there's a reason for that.
I feel alive today. I'm being productive, I'm doing things so I can feel accomplished, and I'm trying to surround myself with good and beautiful things. Because when I do this, it allows me to acknowledge the less beautiful things in life and try to make them a little more beautiful. I simply want to be a good person. I think it's good to look in the mirror sometimes and say that to myself.


Now, back to homework.

<3

I just learned another reason why I want to go to Africa

So I'm sitting here reading Loving Each Other by Leo, and I'm learning a lot. He is talking about happiness, and how the happiest people are those who would still be happy if you took everything away from them, because they are just happy about life. And that's something I want to experience. If I know that my happiness is inside me, and can come from nothing else but myself, then that has a HUGE impact on my life. That can allow me to be more sure of my own stability, and thus allow me to take more healthy risks, to be more confident in myself, and to share my happiness with others even more.

This is another reason why I want to go to Africa. I want to see if I can be happy with nothing. If I can not have many of the material things that I am use to, yet still be content with life. I think this is a good thing. I also don't think that I need to go to Africa to do it. I just need a good amount of time away from average American society and the technology in my life. A week or two.

On a semi opposite, and possibly contradictory note, I'm changing. NO SHIT! WE ALL ARE ALWAYS CHANGING! But I'm understanding a way how, and that's always exciting! I'm becoming more interested in American society, and in focus the good things about it. I think this is coming from American Philosophy, and I think that I need to remember, explore, and learn about all the great things that this country has, and is made up of. There is a history here, and there are good things. I want to learn more about them all. I want to know of the good things happening. I wanted to have enough knowledge that will allow me to say and mean the statement "I am proud to be American."

Random thoughts. If you're reading this, I hope you can take something from this. Commercials tell us we aren't happy without products numerous times everyday. Fact: we can only hear something so much until we start to believe it.
Here's the counterpart to that: You don't need any sort of materialistic possession to be happy. You don't have to look like someone on TV to be considered attractive. You don't have to allow sexual desire to impact your decisions. You WILL be okay. You just need yourself. I believe that it's okay to trust yourself, and I encourage you to. You are amazing. You are awesome. I want to write a dictionary just for you and put your picture next to every positive word in there. Not only are you going to change the world, but you're doing so right now. You are powerful, and that doesn't have to be scary. It's okay to be happy. It's okay to love. (I wonder if these things don't come from putting effort into them, but simply not allowing things to influence you otherwise). It's okay to be you. Please be you. Maybe that's the only thing you're meant to do in this life.

<3