random

Listening to lil peep and red hot chili peppers.

Wondering about How deep can one actually love someone else.

If we break all the components of love as given to us by: Dewald:

understanding, trust, & acceptance.

How deep can we delve into these in our personal relationships  & romantic relationships.

If i can gather my thoughts here.

communication is absolutely vital, and the ability to express yourselves  preferably in mother tong or otherwise. Where information or consciencous flows with the least resistance... this is a great space to be in with another entity... human god... etc.

express (in any form) without the fear of judgement is freedom & paradise.

Loneliness & Addiction

 Diagnosed with Bipolar type 1 in 2013.

Bipolar I disorder is defined by manic episodes that last for at least 7 days (nearly every day for most of the day) or by manic symptoms that are so severe that the person needs immediate medical care. Usually, depressive episodes occur as well, typically lasting at least 2 weeks.

This blog is purely for my own therapy but may be of enjoyment/help to others. My writing will be terrible, at first of course.  

Another reason for this blog is for me to recognise triggers to my drug abuse as it seems to fluctuate in terms of severity. 

I will use drugs regularly some weeks and other weeks I will go without or with very little. Although very few days go without at least a bit of alcohol.

People with bipolar are generally  prone to risky behavior e.g. sex, drugs, high speed driving etc..  Anything to get them out of their head.

I have found this to be true. 

Cure to addiction

Apparently the cure to addiction is connection. This is something I have learned from Brandon Novak, an ex drug addict and now sober living guide.

I speculate that my drug use will lower with more connection with the "right" people. I use benzos when attending parties and always have  a drink.

Recently I have been doing exercise and cold water exposure. This seems to help as a good replacement to drug abuse.

But ultimately the cure to addiction is connection. Connection to other people. i.e. not being lonely.

We are social creatures by nature, but how to we  create and maintain meaningful relationships with others?

Creating connections

Finding the right people - new friends or romantic partners.  When I say right people these are people that are a net positive in your life. This is something that can be gauged in various ways. although I think a gut feel is probably sufficient.

Connecting with people. By definition that is talking, communicating with some manner.

information transfer from one entity to another.  

So let's take an example. A lonely person in New York in an apartment. How would such a person connect with new people.

Why I quit my job to pursue game development full time

 So in August 2020 I quit my software job as a website developer.

Truth is I wasn't happy making websites, it brought money. But my life was just okay, I wasn’t passionate about my work. I would go to work, come home and drink and play video games. 

So that’s an okay existence, but I want something more out of this life. I want a job where I’m excited to go to work in the morning and excited to stay up late and work. I ask myself this question, if I had 3 years to live how would I spend my time.

So I’ve been developing a video game, which is also software related but of course there is a lot of art involved as well. This includes animations, a narrative for the game (story and script writing), voice acting, sound production sound effects, background music.  So I see this as the perfect blend of creativity and logic. My goal would be to make game development my job someday, or at least something creative.

Now the money, the chances of making it as an indie developer are slim and you need a bit of luck and a lot of hard work. You also need financial backing, because I you to eat and a place to sleep.

So currently I stay with my parents and I do contract work for cash. So currently I'm earning about half of what I earned before I quit, but I’m much happier because I love what I’m doing.

Staying motivated is a problem for me though. It seems like a trend among bipolar people like myself, that they start big projects and then move on to something else very quickly. 

Now this has happened to me recently, after I quit my job in August I started working on the video game full time, like 10 hrs a day 6 days a week for 2 months. The end result was quite good, I think I have progressed well, but I stopped working completely at the end of Oct and have been taking it easy throughout November, I just don’t feel motivated to continue working on the game. 

I will work for like 30 minutes a day and then just move on to something else (contract work or writing material for this YouTube channel). I struggle with motivation, but I believe in this which I learned from another indie game developer/youtuber (Game Dev Unlocked): Never have a 0% day, also progress on your project even if it’s just one small change or upgrade or one extra paragraph of dialog etc.

I believe I’ll regain my motivation soon, I just need some time to get used to being unemployed. Recently I had a bit of a quarter life crisis and extreme anxiety about my future.   I see my peers moving up in their perspective fields and making more and more money, this is disheartening, but at the end of the day I know I will regret it if I don’t give this game development my absolute best shot. I owe it to myself, for my happiness and my sanity.

How lack of communication destroyed my relationship

 So I was in a relationship for 4 years from 2013 - 2017.  

Nearing the end of my relationship I remember being very closed off from her. I’ve heard that a couple should chat for at least 90 minutes per week. 90 minutes of heart to heart conversation. Like no BS small talk.

So, I didn’t really talk about my feelings or my fears.

Again I wasn’t vulnerable, for example I never spoke about my social anxiety and how it prohibited me from making new friends.

I didn’t really ever engage with her family because of my social anxiety, meaning I would stay away from her parent’s home. I would constantly make up excuses not to go there.

Also, and this relates to my mental illness, I never spoke about my depression, or things that hurt me. For example friends that hurt me.

Or why it hurt me.  I was open about my bipolar so I was an easy target for some people. Comments like “have you taken your pills today” “are you still on your meds”? Those cut deep, but I never communicated that hurt to her.

I never spoke about my vices. For example: Things that I was envious of, people that I envied and what specifically I envied about them.  

When I started working after college I started drinking a lot more, I would drink everyday after work. This is something we never spoke about,  because at college I never really drank much. I started partying after college really. I only got into the substances in 2019.      

Crybaby - its ok to cry

“A wild heart” and standing alone in the wilderness.

For me this is particularly my struggle with mental health and what it has taught me about the world. My struggle with drug addiction. And most importantly sharing these vulnerabilities, these sins, with people around me. Showing vulnerability, which is a big part of Brene Brown’s research, has changed my life for the better.

So I want to get into my journey to self acceptance and how I got to a point where I was ok with being different. So I’m bipolar type 1.

 

To summarize bipolar type 1: I have periods of bad depression and then sometimes periods of natural highs or  (mania). With type 1 the highs can get so high that you can lose contact with reality (kinda like a bad LSD trip, but for like days/weeks) which is what happened to me in 2013… A period that changed my life forever. And something I may get into later. 

In highschool I was always the awkward quiet kid who didn't really fit in anywhere

I was a hard working student and graduated pretty decent marks. Highschool consisted of playing call of duty and doing school work.

Went to college in 2012. Studied engineering, but dropped out in 2013 when I had my first manic episode.

I didn’t share the fact that I had bipolar with many people, only close friends and family knew this. I was manic so it was quite easy to see that I was not all there.

Now 7 years later, I’ve finally gotten to a place where I’m ok with being different.

And it’s been mainly due to work from Brene Brown and a lot of Carl Jung and Jordan Peterson.

My room is filled with drawings on the wall... I’m scared that people will potentially cast me out, but that is something I let go of. It’s something I can’t control so why bother.

This is my chaos, but I’m so at home here. Sharing your vulnerabilities with friends and family is very difficult but it’s even more difficult to share it with your enemies. Now this is a step that I am yet to take…

Love your enemies and all that.. Now loving means being vulnerable as well. Being vulnerable to your enemies, that sounds crazy.. And maybe it is.. Let’s see what happens.

Anyway, dare to be vulnerable... peace out!

RIP Peep.

His music keeps me going:

"Oh im a lonely boy she made a lonely boy"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=inocgEraxo0&list=RDMEWbXgL171c&index=5&ab_channel=LilPeep

A broken man

Excuse the grammar. I'm not a writer, I'm a madman. This piece is an attempt to save myself and some might relate or/and learn from this.

So in Revelations there is talk about the keys of death. Jesus mentions this in the Gospel of Thomas, mentioning that those ones will not taste death once they seek and find.

But first let me tell you about myself. Diagnosed bipolar 1 - 2013. AKA batshit insane hehe. After the diagnosis I got involved in spiritual studies - mostly Christian, occult, Gnosticism Satanism all the good stuff.

Particularly Carl Jung's work was extremely profound. And it lead me to this alchemical dictum: In filth it will be found.

So filth... my filth would be: lazy, selfish, crazy, drunk, drugs, bad influence on others, irresponsible.

So those things are aspects of me (shadow) that I keep away from the world. Vulnerabilities. (Brené Brown does a lot of good work in this field. Check her work out)

Once I started sharing these vulnerabilities with close friends and family I started to connect on a different level, the more vulnerable I became, the closer I became to them - the richer my life became. There were no more lies, I was naked figurately speaking, but it was freedom. Now, this is not something that is easy to do and most days I still fail to show my filth, my vulnerabilities, but it sets me free.

The truth is often times ugly, but your filth is no different from the next person on the street. We all have filth. We are all filthy yet beautiful in our true self and we must learn to love that self. we are all one

Somewhere in the bible it mentions: “Whoever among you becomes little will know the kingdom”. Now little could mean like a child: Not self aware, doesn't really give a fuck, says whatever they wanna say, draws on walls, is fascinated by the stupidest things, gets lost in imagination, and ultimately lives in the moment. They don't think about yesterday or what will happen tomorrow. Is brutally honest and generally does what they want to do. Somewhere between the ages of 7-10 we grow self aware and then enter hell.

This life is so short, do what you wanna do, fuck what the rest say. What you choose to be you will become. I think that's Jung paraphrased. “Above all else love each other deeply” And one can only do that once you love (trust, accept, understand) yourself.

Jung: "No tree can grow to heaven unless it’s roots reach down to hell."

Check out The Alchemical Mind Podcast, his work is amazing.

https://twitter.com/MindAlchemical?s=20

I have a youtube channel where I will discuss this further:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=103WU7JYi88&feature=youtu.be&ab_channel=FrankduPlessis

Some photos of my room, the chaos: