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A yearly check-up in a journal
10 months ago
December's here. Means it's time to make a quick recap of the year again.
In general:
Admittedly, I've been unusually reserved this year around. At least I feel like I've been, though I think this is mostly the last two months that's been testing me.
Start of the year has mostly been nothing special, even during my birthday. With me living in "day at a time" -lifestyle, each day comes and goes with little sticking to my memory as not much of changes happens or anything exciting occurs. If there were, then most likely it was the usual stress of the life itself that comes bothering me, such as trying to find a job in this economy or having to overthink about the events going on internationally and how they effect one another. Another additional form of worry comes with my health: given my diagnosis I will have to live for the rest of my life with and try and manage it my best that I've written about before, I have to implement changes and make sure I get better - which has been a slow progress full of ups and downs. By the latter half of the year I was more than aware that I've been fumbling in that regard as I started indulging perhaps bit too much with my diet, but thankfully it hasn't gone off the rails as it had before. Still, I have to steel up a bit better.
Summer, however, was personally the best time: not only due to visiting the local LAN-convention that's held over here every June appearing again and enjoying it, but also for visiting my sister after years of not seeing one another. Tampere was definitely a wonderful place in the summer and the landscapes.... woh, no wonder it has the tagline of being "Summer City of Finland", given the landscapes you can see for kilometers and miles on end. Traveling there was expensive, even as I got the tickets on hand months before visiting, but it was worth it in the end. Got to meet her and her fiancé's new dog as well: such an overactive fella, though has a bit of a habit of biting to test us out. My forearms were in bruises for days after, something they're trying to teach him out of. (Still a pup of nearly 2 years at the time, so that can be excused - but when the dog is a mixed breed of german shepherd, belgian malinoise and couple of others, the sheer pulling and biting strength they have is even MORE absurd.)
Still, couple of memories of new locations and events were formed and I'm happy about that.
Autumn was perhaps the warmest I've ever experienced, as the late summer weather extended all the way to the second week of September, which is unusual. As much as I did enjoy being able to go outside with a T-shirt on and nothing else, it did made me wonder how much of an effect our species has made, even as I try to remind myself that there are occasional weird weather phenomenon also going on that comes every so often. During this time, one of the meetings I had at the local work and employment office meetings came to a head as the lack of finding a job was becoming quite difficult, no matter how much I've attended to different programs the folks there had suggested and how much I've tried to reach out different places to no real advances, so it seemed a change of plans was in order. At their behest, I was suggested to seek out if I could advance my options by studying again, to which I agreed to try. My client info will be transferred from one end to the other, so I'm hoping that whenever it starts, it'll be worth it: it would definitely help me to try and figure out a bit more about myself what is it that I'd like to do, something I've been struggling for far, far too long.
Admittedly, it's also during the autumn-winter phase when I've started to realize that I've become bit more anxious, to the point that in October-November, I had been experiencing more anxiety-attacks than ever before. Both having to think when programs would start, the constant waiting time I have to do whenever I've taken part of a program or even waiting for appointments to come when arranging a visit at the health center... around latter half of October I started having strange sensation in my body that slowly turned into a case of very slow-blooming common cold with symptoms of heartburn that felt rather new, so much so that I ended up creating more worries in me that most likely exasperated and exaggerated some of the symptoms more due to stress. Overthinking, especially whenever a worrying feeling kicks in, tends to amp up things for me.
Fortunately it seems that whatever was affecting me for two-three weeks has now died down, but it still made me worried. The inevitability of me becoming older is kicking in.
Art-wise:
This has been the worst year when it comes to me uploading my drawings. On this site alone, I only ever uploaded three pictures.
While I have been drawing and doodling, I've realized that most of the images I've drawn that I have not uploaded were done under certain reasons/excuses:
A) Drawings and doodles done in Discord chats and streams that were only for the eyes of close friends and acquaintances, so showing them to anywhere else would create unforseen problems
B) Practice sketches and doodles that wouldn't be "interesting" to look at, let alone not "good enough for me to upload", so I never post them.
Some of the drawings and doodles I've made fall into the former, but looking back, why shouldn't I upload them? Perhaps it's just that I fear when I draw things for friends, it'll cause people that I don't know come at me asking for free requests or commissions, something I've not been mentally okay enough to do for a long while, so it'll create a cascade of more stress that I have to escape from. The ones that do land on the latter, perfectionist tendencies still do sort of kick in where I (or part of my subconsciousness) demands the kind of image or quality I see in my mind's eyes, in my imagination, but haven't been able to create it exactly (either due to getting tired, frustrated or otherwise unable to finish the image in a way I want to), so I don't post it up at all.
When in fact, I should post them anyway - it's a delight in general, so why should I neglect and dry people who follow me from the things I do? Why do I have to be ashamed of myself or demand too much out of myself, when "done, not perfect" -rule is more important than making another unreasonable demand of myself?
Afterthoughts
2024 is/was the Year of the Dragon. Something I wanted to sort of celebrate because I do like me dragons. A lot. Yet ultimately, the year turned to be mostly neglected due to me not doing much of anything, and at worst became a case of where I was really trapped in my own thoughts for far too often - and it visibly affected on things I could've done.
When Dragoneer passed away earlier this year, it further cemented some bittersweet and downright disheartening sensations that overshadowed the positives. The year has been also stressful for many people and having to be able to only hear them and try giving them some words of wisdom and HOPING that they'd have some effect made it feel even worse, since I often felt like I couldn't provide more than that and even then fearing those gestures were ineffective at best. Doesn't really help that I have a habit of becoming very reclusive and drawn back whenever something bothers, stresses or infuriates me. Like a tiny animal that retreats back to it's nest whenever something threathening comes along the way.
With Christmas coming, I can sort of see what I need to do and have an understanding of some kind of it, but I often worry that I don't have enough strength to push through without feeling like I have to dip out either because "I don't feel like it" or "I don't have the energy for it". It's a thing all of us have to endure, so I'm not the only one in this, but it often feels like a burden of an individual.
I suppose that in the end, I just need to take my lessons from these events and try and do better - preferably in ways where I don't demand too much out of myself yet not too leniently so that I just twiddle my thumbs around. Just have to take my time and the occasion to do something different. It's not all doom and gloom, even if the events make it seem like they are.
Kind of bittersweet way to end this note on, but there's always the tomorrow to look up to. One step at a time, after all.
In general:
Admittedly, I've been unusually reserved this year around. At least I feel like I've been, though I think this is mostly the last two months that's been testing me.
Start of the year has mostly been nothing special, even during my birthday. With me living in "day at a time" -lifestyle, each day comes and goes with little sticking to my memory as not much of changes happens or anything exciting occurs. If there were, then most likely it was the usual stress of the life itself that comes bothering me, such as trying to find a job in this economy or having to overthink about the events going on internationally and how they effect one another. Another additional form of worry comes with my health: given my diagnosis I will have to live for the rest of my life with and try and manage it my best that I've written about before, I have to implement changes and make sure I get better - which has been a slow progress full of ups and downs. By the latter half of the year I was more than aware that I've been fumbling in that regard as I started indulging perhaps bit too much with my diet, but thankfully it hasn't gone off the rails as it had before. Still, I have to steel up a bit better.
Summer, however, was personally the best time: not only due to visiting the local LAN-convention that's held over here every June appearing again and enjoying it, but also for visiting my sister after years of not seeing one another. Tampere was definitely a wonderful place in the summer and the landscapes.... woh, no wonder it has the tagline of being "Summer City of Finland", given the landscapes you can see for kilometers and miles on end. Traveling there was expensive, even as I got the tickets on hand months before visiting, but it was worth it in the end. Got to meet her and her fiancé's new dog as well: such an overactive fella, though has a bit of a habit of biting to test us out. My forearms were in bruises for days after, something they're trying to teach him out of. (Still a pup of nearly 2 years at the time, so that can be excused - but when the dog is a mixed breed of german shepherd, belgian malinoise and couple of others, the sheer pulling and biting strength they have is even MORE absurd.)
Still, couple of memories of new locations and events were formed and I'm happy about that.
Autumn was perhaps the warmest I've ever experienced, as the late summer weather extended all the way to the second week of September, which is unusual. As much as I did enjoy being able to go outside with a T-shirt on and nothing else, it did made me wonder how much of an effect our species has made, even as I try to remind myself that there are occasional weird weather phenomenon also going on that comes every so often. During this time, one of the meetings I had at the local work and employment office meetings came to a head as the lack of finding a job was becoming quite difficult, no matter how much I've attended to different programs the folks there had suggested and how much I've tried to reach out different places to no real advances, so it seemed a change of plans was in order. At their behest, I was suggested to seek out if I could advance my options by studying again, to which I agreed to try. My client info will be transferred from one end to the other, so I'm hoping that whenever it starts, it'll be worth it: it would definitely help me to try and figure out a bit more about myself what is it that I'd like to do, something I've been struggling for far, far too long.
Admittedly, it's also during the autumn-winter phase when I've started to realize that I've become bit more anxious, to the point that in October-November, I had been experiencing more anxiety-attacks than ever before. Both having to think when programs would start, the constant waiting time I have to do whenever I've taken part of a program or even waiting for appointments to come when arranging a visit at the health center... around latter half of October I started having strange sensation in my body that slowly turned into a case of very slow-blooming common cold with symptoms of heartburn that felt rather new, so much so that I ended up creating more worries in me that most likely exasperated and exaggerated some of the symptoms more due to stress. Overthinking, especially whenever a worrying feeling kicks in, tends to amp up things for me.
Fortunately it seems that whatever was affecting me for two-three weeks has now died down, but it still made me worried. The inevitability of me becoming older is kicking in.
Art-wise:
This has been the worst year when it comes to me uploading my drawings. On this site alone, I only ever uploaded three pictures.
While I have been drawing and doodling, I've realized that most of the images I've drawn that I have not uploaded were done under certain reasons/excuses:
A) Drawings and doodles done in Discord chats and streams that were only for the eyes of close friends and acquaintances, so showing them to anywhere else would create unforseen problems
B) Practice sketches and doodles that wouldn't be "interesting" to look at, let alone not "good enough for me to upload", so I never post them.
Some of the drawings and doodles I've made fall into the former, but looking back, why shouldn't I upload them? Perhaps it's just that I fear when I draw things for friends, it'll cause people that I don't know come at me asking for free requests or commissions, something I've not been mentally okay enough to do for a long while, so it'll create a cascade of more stress that I have to escape from. The ones that do land on the latter, perfectionist tendencies still do sort of kick in where I (or part of my subconsciousness) demands the kind of image or quality I see in my mind's eyes, in my imagination, but haven't been able to create it exactly (either due to getting tired, frustrated or otherwise unable to finish the image in a way I want to), so I don't post it up at all.
When in fact, I should post them anyway - it's a delight in general, so why should I neglect and dry people who follow me from the things I do? Why do I have to be ashamed of myself or demand too much out of myself, when "done, not perfect" -rule is more important than making another unreasonable demand of myself?
Afterthoughts
2024 is/was the Year of the Dragon. Something I wanted to sort of celebrate because I do like me dragons. A lot. Yet ultimately, the year turned to be mostly neglected due to me not doing much of anything, and at worst became a case of where I was really trapped in my own thoughts for far too often - and it visibly affected on things I could've done.
When Dragoneer passed away earlier this year, it further cemented some bittersweet and downright disheartening sensations that overshadowed the positives. The year has been also stressful for many people and having to be able to only hear them and try giving them some words of wisdom and HOPING that they'd have some effect made it feel even worse, since I often felt like I couldn't provide more than that and even then fearing those gestures were ineffective at best. Doesn't really help that I have a habit of becoming very reclusive and drawn back whenever something bothers, stresses or infuriates me. Like a tiny animal that retreats back to it's nest whenever something threathening comes along the way.
With Christmas coming, I can sort of see what I need to do and have an understanding of some kind of it, but I often worry that I don't have enough strength to push through without feeling like I have to dip out either because "I don't feel like it" or "I don't have the energy for it". It's a thing all of us have to endure, so I'm not the only one in this, but it often feels like a burden of an individual.
I suppose that in the end, I just need to take my lessons from these events and try and do better - preferably in ways where I don't demand too much out of myself yet not too leniently so that I just twiddle my thumbs around. Just have to take my time and the occasion to do something different. It's not all doom and gloom, even if the events make it seem like they are.
Kind of bittersweet way to end this note on, but there's always the tomorrow to look up to. One step at a time, after all.
That's exactly how its been for me, except its been going on for years :<