This Isn't Over!

I’m just stopping by to say hi! This isn’t over.

This is Robocop signing on after a year or so (you do the math) of no-show darkness.

It’s been a while since I’ve posted, and maybe I can try to make this a weekly thing. Who knows? I’m actually just writing this to see how it goes the first time around, and if the post doesn’t suck and I am able to get some emotional release, laughs, or some small wisdom nuggets from writing my inner self onto paper, I’ll continue!

So hello, hello to our small world of subscribers! It’s been months, if not a year, since my last update, and things have been up and down all around. I’m wiser in my approach to life and its uncertainties, but I still have so much more room to grow and so many more challenges to revisit at school and abroad.

I’ve gotten wiser from being stupid in the same way over and over again, and being stupid and stubborn seems to be my default, so shifting my train of thought from negativity over to productivity has been extremely difficult, but an eye-opening experience.  This is summing it up deceivingly neatly.

It’s been a little bit more hellish than suggested by the light, shiny post I’m throwing up right now. Maybe, I’ll delve more into that later when I’m feeling up for pouring my heart out, but for now, this suffices. Later, gators.

-Robocop

I'm Unemployed Again!

Another day and another meeting with HR about how I am getting let go. My three weeks on wondering when I was going to let go after hearing a rumor from a coworker finally ended today.

I really do not know how to feel about it. On the one hand, this sets me up perfectly for moving to Malaysia, as I will be able to draw unemployment pay. On the other hand, it hurts my pride and confidence to know that I was not able to make it through a year at yet another company.

I have to admit that in hindsight, it was a mistake to join this agency. I never really gave myself a chance to succeed, as I hated it from day one since it lacked everything that I loved about startups. The people were there for a paycheck, the work was uninspiring and coupled with the fact that I was on a team that I really did not have an interest in, made it all the more of a clusterfuck. I disdained the agency all the more as it kept referring to itself as a startup and was in the business of building products, two things that they were obviously not. Everything just felt so damn fake all the time.

My work was suffering as I was not used to working in such detail with spreadsheets. Then I was randomly put on a performance improvement plan by the COO, even when my own manager told me he thought the whole thing was BS. After that episode, things really went downhill as I felt betrayed by the company and unable to trust any upper management.

I started trying to be as fake as the company, but I guess I was not very good at it since my superiors cited a "lack of passion" as a reason for me being let go. Little did they know  my "lack of passion" went as far as telling my fellow peons how much of a shit show I thought the whole place was on a daily basis. The best part is that my coworkers agreed with me on most of it.

As time progressed at the agency, I felt more and more like I had been lied to during my interview. The COO promised me great training and instead I just got a bunch of menial tasks as the people who knew what they were doing were too busy to teach. Worst of all, many of my most prized skills such as curiosity, creativity and copywriting were regressing. I did learn a ton more about excel, so I guess that is the one thing I was able to get out my stint there. I was told that the culture was great, but all I saw in my department was a lot of backstabbing and bad mouthing. Great culture to the exec team, was apparently just having a bunch of people who drank a lot and kegs in the office. What a let down.

After all this bitching, I guess the question that I have to answer is - What's next? This is of course, if I do not move to Malaysia and start that instant noodle ecommerce company. If not that, then is it startups again, which I miss dearly, or do I try to work at a big company? Do I retrain to become a developer?

I feel a bit lost, but I'm excited for the possibilities ... and unemployment insurance.

Wish me luck,
muffinman

So I had a girlfriend...

...her name was Roshelle and things fell apart quite terribly about three weeks ago in a hail of fuck you and I hate you. At this point in time, she never wants to see or speak to me again. That's the end of the story.

Let's rewind back the story 9 months to the first time I met Roshelle, in a Mexican restaurant where unbeknownst to me, Shelly, a mutual friend had conspired for us to meet each other. At the restaurant, we sat on opposite sides of the table and didn't speak at all. Only after dinner, when we went to a bar did I started talking to Roshelle and at that point I was too drunk to care about what impression I was making. When the topic of vibrators came up, and Roshelle brought up that she had one, I spent the night out trying to convince her to tell everyone whether she used it or not. Apparently, this was not very becoming behavior and after I left, Shelly profusely apologized to Roshelle about introducing me.

The next day, Shelly informed me about how embarrassing I had been, which made it a bit awkward because I had to see Roshelle again that night for Shelly's birthday party. As I walked up the stairs to the bar, I wondered if Roshelle would give me the cold shoulder. It threw me off guard, when Roshelle greeted me incredibly warmly, it actually felt like she was happy to see me. Perhaps it was the dress or makeup, but this time around, Roshelle really caught my eye. I ended up spending the whole night talking to Roshelle because I didn't know anybody else at the party, and when it came time to leave, I awkwardly asked for her number.

Over the next couple of days, we started texting almost everyday. As we communicated, I started getting more interested in Roshelle. I guess that Roshelle is most probably interested in me as well, because no normal girl would text a guy so much unless she was somewhat interested, right? The week that we start texting, I invite Roshelle to one of my Friday dinners that I do with friends every week. Something got lost in translation and she thought it was a date, so she took the time to dress nicely and put on makeup. I, on the other hand, treated it like just another Friday dinner and showed up 30 minutes late in my hoodie and jeans straight from work. Needless to say, Roshelle was not impressed, but for some reason, she still continued texting me and my interest in her continued to grow.

Things reached a tipping point on my birthday, when I held on to Roshelle's hand and she didn't let go. We kissed and I fell asleep in her arms. In the morning, Roshelle woke up with big doubts about dating me, but she came back that night and decided to give me a chance. After couple of months of dates, one day in bed, I asked Roshelle if she wanted to be my girlfriend and she said "Yes!" One piece at a time, the relationship just fell into place.

The ease of it all would spell trouble for our relationship down the line. Roshelle felt like she didn't get the chase that she deserved, and as a result felt insecure about how special she was. On the other hand, I wasn't committed enough to correct that problem. More cracks in our relationship appeared as I realized that we had some very big value differences. There would be massive fights over such things as whether artists provide as much value as doctors to society and if mainlanders are ruining Hong Kong. These arguments would leave a bitter taste in my mouth and make me question if I could be with Roshelle. Some days, I would look at her as we cuddled and think "I can't be with you" because she embodied so many of the values of people that I despised.

However, I kept the relationship going because Roshelle was just so damn great on paper. She was going to med school, spoke Cantonese, sweet as can be, doting and smelled great (my own weird little thing)! What's not to love about all of that? Despite having all the boxes checked off for "ideal" girlfriend, I never felt that spark with Roshelle. In fact, the whole thing felt like settling, though settling for a very good deal. To make myself feel better, I started convincing myself that things would just work out if I stayed with Roshelle long enough. As if time would generate the chemistry that had been missing and one day, I would just wake up and be completely in love.

Of course, that's not how love works and as the frequency of fights with Roshelle increased, it became harder to convince myself to stay with her. Towards the end of the relationship, I could not have a phone call with Roshelle that did not end with her bursting into tears over some small comment. Talking to Roshelle felt like walking on egg shells, where one small word or comment could break dams that held her tears back. I became hesitant share my thoughts with her, and this just further confirmed to me that the relationship had a definite due date.

That date came after another fight about something stupid and this time, I was just too tired of it all to keep the relationship going. I ended it that night on the phone.

Immediately post break up, I felt great! There was now so much time to do everything! However, as the weeks pass and doing everything lost its excitement, I have actually thought more and more about how things used to be. Wondering a tiny bit, if this was all the right choice. This is the complete opposite of how Roshelle, has handled the break up, where she was distraught at first and now content with piling on as many activities as possible before the start of med school and forgetting about me.

Being single isn't bad, but I am at that point now where I remember why I wanted a girlfriend in the first place. Reflecting on all of this, I am not sure what to take away from this relationship. I certainly learned a lot about what to do in a relationship, so I'm sure I'll be a better boyfriend next time around. A part of me feels guilty for having hurt Roshelle so much and for not treating the relationship as seriously as she did. Another part of me can't be bothered to care about what happened, which scares me as well, as it makes me wonder if I have become so independent now that I cannot care for someone anymore.

Only time will tell how this relationship will change me, and whether there is girl out there who can get me to
really care again.

-muffinman

Pooper Scooper

Muffinman says that depressing posts are a part of collective energy of an honest blog, so here goes nothing.

At what point do a certain set of thoughts become your identity? And it doesn't have to be thoughts, it could also include habits. A collection of habits and recurring thoughts feed into a cycle of existence (at least for me).

So when did my thoughts and behaviors lead to the personality and lifestyle that I have today? How did I get here? This is a question I ask myself a lot as I look up at the night sky on a night much like this one.

Somewhere along the line, I let the negative, critical, and perfectionist mentality that fed so much of my earlier success tear apart so much of what I should have kept sacred and fiercely protected. I guess an easy two word expression for that would be  "my confidence". Confidence is way over-hyped nowadays, so I'll use something that may border on the spiritual and lend it more weight -- "faith". Turning my critical eye inward from doing well in school to my identity and personality has left me somewhat devastated. I have good and bad days like everybody, but the intensity of my bad days are far from normal in that they are likely to leave me feeling hopeless and seeking isolation from everybody. The problem was from the very beginning that my inner critic was always rewarded when it came to things that warranted a grade; I could focus hard enough to get the desired result, and there seemed to be no downside to this approach other than a few sleepless nights.

When I shifted my focus to more introspective pursuits, the circumstances were not the same. Picking apart who you are, why you do things, and why you can't constantly be the "best" (whatever that means to you or meant to me) in every social situation leads to an insane deconstruction of who you are, and this may eventually (although rather slowly and painfully) lead you to some truth about your identity. Or it could end up wearing you down. I think that is what has happened to me, and I may be more confused about who I am than when I started this journey.

My mind now seems plagued with ridiculous notions, fears, and insecurities about everyday living, and they've only been amplified by my insane, seething quest for some uncovering of who I am supposed to be and what the world should get from my living. I feel trapped by the thoughts I can't seem to shake and run away from.

So, how do I move forward? There are a lot of days when I attempt to answer this question, and I grasp for straws--more things that can sustain my desperate mind. Sincerely though, I have no idea. I think the secret at this point may just be to soldier on and have faith that any newfound positivity wherever it may come from is something that I must absolutely incorporate into the new "self" that I am building in the wake of my self-imposed deconstruction. Basically.. stop thinking so much. And just live?

What a concept.

- Robocop