It’s been long overdue since my last post and I wish I could say that I am now able to concentrate more on my blog, but the truth of the matter is I still have one more paper to finish, so I will write to my heart’s content and resume writing on my last and final paper! Hopefully afterwards I will be able to concentrate more on bi-weekly postings. I won’t be formally defining any terms for today’s post, no, today’s post will be more of an introvert’s insight into herself followed by of course, her endless questioning. So here it goes.

Let’s start with a random exercise, one minute on the clock to list a compilation of words in no particular order or for any particular topic, theme or subject – words that come into mind. Ready…? Begin:

emotions, sadness, life, love, desires, wants, dreams, life, death, hardships, patterns, poignancy, desires, rationale, logic, reason, patterns, desires, reasonability, connections, life, loneliness

I’ll come back to this later…

Have you ever had those sporadic moments in life when absolutely everything and nothing made any sense at all? Or have moments where certain words, phrases, actions, visual stimuli or just STIMULI in general, that you have encountered simply struck the wrong nerve… or maybe it was the right nerve; whichever the case the point is that it struck a nerve.

From time to time I am sprung into a state of disillusionment, disillusionment in every sense of that word. My desires, wants, reason, logic – my life, in a spontaneously timely manner, will rupture. I wish I could say that through repetition it becomes a better experience every time it occurs, but on the contrary, it feels burdening and rather restricting for my emotions, yet in another sense liberating for my obsessive nature and ultimately desires, to constantly analyze. But then I have to ask myself, “Exactly which emotions am I restricting?” and that’s where the story begins… Which emotions? No, it’s more like what emotions, or in other words to put it more bluntly, where exactly are the emotions?

Emotions, a word I hear far too often, not because of excessive exhibition but rather for the lack of. What is suggested when a human being is unable to express emotions? Okay wait, maybe that’s unreasonable, or for those who know me, it’s unfathomable as I do have emotions – happiness anger, depression, joy, etc… What I mean to say is that there’s an immense disconnect with my emotions. If one were to think of a person as having a balanced, or semi-balanced relationship with rationality and emotions… well then I believe I am having an affair with my rationality. Sometimes I find myself avoiding others simply for the sake of wanting to be alone which is attributed to a rather bizarre kind of reasoning – watching others engage in establishing connects is to some extent… well for a lack of a better word, different. If I may say so – well I suppose I just did, I would like to think that I am pretty good at reading body language and at assessing my environment. Maybe it’s because of years of practice with my dysfunctional family, or maybe it’s just in my nature as an introvert that I often engage in mental note taking of my social environment. Regardless of the reasoning behind why I engage in such activities, the point is that during my engagement in such an activity I find myself lost and confused, my being in a mere state of observation and not interaction – embedded in the social but also disconnected from it. I find myself unable to replicate these processes of establishing relationships that I have observed for so long, but why?

Maybe some people would term it as anti-sociality but no… I’m not really that as I do very much enjoy being around people and to engage in conversations, and although I like to retreat to my solitude sanctuary, I think everyone at one point or another withdrawal to take time out for their sanity. Some may also call it introversion and yes, I know I am that, but again, that doesn’t quite define my condition. So what else can one label this condition? I guess the relationship that I have with emotions is one defined by the following words: disconnected, a stranger, peculiarity and to some extent envy. Back to rationality; let’s back track and find the origin of the problem.

The earliest account of such a behavior can be traced to my younger years of development. Unlike the external environment in which I was heavily embedded in – school, sports, work, etc.., my home life was not filled with physical or verbal expressions of intimacy (e.g. hugs and kisses, ‘I love you’, expressions of emotions felt). No, quite the contrary, at school and with friends those types of behaviors were acceptable and quite norm, but within the confines of my own home, well let’s just say any type of happiness that was expressed, well, it was expressed in its most modest manner and anything connoting to sadness was internalized and ultimately dealt with at one’s own discretion. On the other hand, expressions of anger in relation to the other emotions were quite frequently displayed. This isn’t to say that there was “no love” or affection within the family, but rather these expressions of affection was implied via means of our relationship as family members. I remember going back home – back to my country of birth, I tried to express my affection towards my mother’s family by giving my grandparents a hug, rather than reciprocating, they were taken aback as designated by them taking a step back. It’s not so much that they didn’t want to, but rather the gesture in itself is not a norm. The examples are infinite; I’m just not sure if I personally want all the skeletons I’ve hidden to resurface.

When one has spent so many years suppressing one’s emotions to the point where discontinuity is manufactured, how does one re-engage with it especially when the disconnect is gargantuan and nearly impossible to repair? I’ve resorted so much to analyzing and rationalizing that to some extent, emotions become an unnecessary and undesirable discomfort. And the only emotions that I do welcome are those that I am most familiar with, pain and sadness. Yet, ironically enough although I find comfort in such feelings, they simultaneously function as the negative undesirable state in which one tries to remove themselves from. It’s in the midst of this paradoxical state of being that I find myself at an impasse.

Let’s return to the initial ‘one minute on the clock’ exercise. What was the point of doing that? What initially sparked this entry on being a stranger in the familiar was a 12 minute video clip I watched from a friend’s Facebook page. The video titled “SIGNS,” has no direct dialogue, just a series of symbols and signs that connote love and life. I believe the clip is exemplary of finding “true” love when one least expects it. I put “true” in quotations as the clip is only 12 minutes long and the ending is suggestive but not conclusive. Having watched the video on several occasions, I found myself analyzing each frame in addition to an unexpected surfacing of emotions. The emotions are unexpected and rather unusual as I felt the clip to be quaint but also superficial and unrealistic, a kind of false advertisement – the spectacle embeds within the spectator an idealization of what “love” ought to be or how it ought to occur. This random 12 minute clip then sparked me into a state of contemplation and rationalization in which I found myself in a state of envy, wishing that I could even for a single second buy into this fabrication and feel an emotion of happiness rather than being sprung into a state of contemplation and rationalization.

Why are such fairy-tales about love so intriguing and mesmerizing for the masses? Does it suggest that each and every one of us realize the perpetual and unavoidable loneliness that resides in every living creature? Does it give us hope that we are capable of encountering and maintaining an idealized notion like love? Then why, for even one brief moment can I not be sold on this fantasy? With that, I continue to leave my heart stored away for another day when reconciliation is closer to sight.