It's over Alice!
No, it is not the starting of another sappy break-up story. It is more of the end of a great and unexpectedly long era of indifference which sadly marks the beginning of a not-so-awesome period for me. Confused? Well, that's my normal state of mind. Let me try to explain in some detail.
The last time: After the abrupt end with P, way back in January of 2018, it took me a long time to recover from the aftermath and be okay. For a very long time, I was holding on to false hope, waiting for P to "come back to her senses" and realize the mistake she had made (that was then; the current me does not believe that it was a right or a wrong, it was just a decision and it did not go in my favour). Why should I beg and plead, I rationalized with myself, I had done nothing wrong after all. Again, let me clarify and highlight that I currently do not have the belief that how things turned out to be was right or wrong, black or white since I only experienced it from my perspective, a very selfish one at that. Anyways, (digression and rolling off on tangents is a very common way of existence for me) I don't remember whether as a choice or because of the hurt caused from this experience or simply because I was always bad at interactions and a "bit weird" (as 225 keeps telling me), I decided to draw up walls all around me and stop caring about people or interactions.
Another side note: I avoid general conversations that normal people seem to frequently like to have, talking about people and their behavioural idiosyncrasies and how it would annoy them (take note of the fact that this assessment would be purely biased and opinionated in general and nothing more than gossip). Note, I specifically choose to avoid it, which means that when I actually end up in such conversations and people pass some remark about me, I tend to overanalyze it and let it get under my skin. What's even funnier about this situation is that I am unable to take with the same indifference the snarky remarks I so often make in most conversations that I am a part of ( 95% of my conversations are banter filled).
Two statements made a few days ago by two people still lingers in my head, 72 hours on:
Statement 1: "There are days that you are the jolliest fellow around and then there are days that you mope around with the most foul of faces and moods ("saru" is the exact word used)".
I still can't put a pin on why it got under my skin the way it did. Mostly because the first question that I asked myself when this statement was made was whether I was supposed to always be "happy and jolly" to people around me, regardless of what I was going through? Obviously my understanding tells me that this is true in a professional setting where personal anguishes need to be kept aside and work needs to continue. However, being a human (somewhat?) am I not supposed to have bad days or am I supposed to just pretend to be happy all the time? Do they not realize that this would be a fake front and all it would ensure is that all my interactions with people are at a superficial level and never at a meaningful level?
Statement 2: "Everyone knows you are a bit weird" - Maybe this got to me because I was trying to covertly impress the person that made this statement. Funny thing here again is that on any other occasion and with most other people, I would actually wear that "weirdness" with pride and shrug off the implied negativity in the same way we dust our pants when we get up from sitting on the playground. However, being the over-analyzer that I am, that generalization to "everyone" hurt me. Plus the fact that this statement implied that that person agreed with the assessment on some level. I would any day agree that I am weird, but being the typical hypocritical self that I am, I don't take it well when other people tell me the same thing on my face.
How it stands: As it stands, it has gotten to the point, I don't know why though, repetition probably, that I cannot tolerate small talk or frivolous hang out sessions where there is no outcome to be gained. Yes, just like it sounds, it is very selfish and greedy but I don' like just not getting somewhere. Although I would be remiss if I didn't clearly point out that this drive is nowhere near the level it used to be when I was in my prep time period. I keep going back to it as the high point in my academic/ work focus/ growth/ execution focus because I had clear cut goals, clearly defined motivation to achieve the end objective and a path that I stringently followed in getting there. It did not matter to me whether I failed on a per day basis or not, as long as I put in the time and the effort. I look back at that time and the clarity of purpose and the no holds barred singular focus level of effort put in becoming better is something I hope I can find in my life again. Sadly, I also know how hard that level is to reach and how I will probably never be good enough or as focused as I was at that time. Although, I would also like to write as a self-disclaimer and a heads up that I hope more than not getting to the level or mental focus or clarity that I had during cat prep, I actually don't get complacent and start slacking off in life. I really hope that I do not become the person who has big shot plans that are drawn up when going through a good time only to fall apart at the slightest inconvenience.
Persistence is something that I hope I can inculcate as this has been my biggest takeaway from MBA: You limit is as high or as low as you are willing to push yourself. There is no real barrier against learning something other than the barrier we create for ourselves in our head. In today's day and age, anyone can actually learn anything, but the fundamentals remain the same. What is our motivation to learn something and what do we hope to gain by learning that thing are the two questions that need to very clear to us right from the start. No, peer pressure, herd mentality and the trendy things to do is not the right answer. We need to understand our personal reasons, expected outcome and how we are going to get there. If these questions are not clear, they will never act as a rock to steady our ship in turbulent times and we will fall over.
Hating the hurt: I am pretty sure I am not the only one who hates being hurt or being in limbo/ going through heart break. The longing, the moments spent obsessing over how the other person, who by the way, has no clue about such feelings or even the existence of one, would take the admission of such feelings and how we will go about integrating our lives with them or get over this feeling when this ends.
The worst part is trying to judge when our emotions are playing with us and when we should act upon them.
