Just my thoughts 27.09.25

 Most days I struggle with the overwhelming thoughts and tangents that cross my mind at any given moment. I am mostly anxious, always worried that I am not doing enough, that I am getting complacent (which is true), that I am slipping and sooner rather than later, I will lose it all. I have a lot of good people around me to be grateful for. But I have also lost a lot of people when it comes to personal relationships.

My mistake has always been to equate my worth in any relationship with the amount of effort I am putting in or the things I do for them. Inherently, I do not feel like I have any worth. Even with family members I struggle to just exist and not do anything. This leads to simmering frustration and resentment in familial relationships, which I am working on to fix through deliberate and hard talks with myself.

What's worse is that it leads to being used and discarded like plastic in friendships and partnerships. I am not sure if they do it deliberately, but this appeasement and easy availability leads to being taken for granted, leads to being played like a fiddle. 

I will also call out my own bullshit for pretending to be the victim. It is not like people pleasers (including me) do not understand when they are being used. It is just that they have not had enough good instances of healthy relationships and boundary definition to give themselves the permission to draw a line before it is too late. 

Thanks for the memories RC

All in all, it was pretty good. Other than the ending. Which was bad. Mainly because it ended and less so because it didn't go in my favour. The person deserved better anyways.

Awesome excerpts from Anxious People by Fredrik Backman

Page 207: ...Anna-Lena replied without thinking at all: 'You love each other until you can't live without each other. And even if you stop loving each other for a little while, you can't...you can't live without each other.'

I have pondered many a time Alice, if I seek company out of loneliness/ desperation or genuine interest. I still don't have a concrete answer to this question but at least I can admit that I actually believe in the above. The idea. The loyalty. I have seen hardships in a relationship firsthand. I know how hard it can get.

...most of all, I have been lucky to see people get over the hill to the other side where despite all this, people stick together. I hope I can find the same one day. By no means am I an easy person to share space with, but I hope I work on it and get better.


Page 208: 'You don't fall in love with a gender, Anna-Lena. You fall in love with an idiot.'

I don't really get people in some ways. They claim maturity and wisdom and then go on to judge people by their words and not their actions. They claim being able to judge for the future, yet look at data points that are shallow and immaterial in the long run. They can't really get past what is right in front of them for what awaits beyond. 

 

I like being an idiot. I know I can fall sometimes, but all I need is to have the tools to get back up and see through the situation when required (or at least I hope I can develop those in myself). Everyone is a hero till the battle comes to their doorstep and sacrifices need to be made. Even I am not sure if I will be able to step up. But I am sure to give it a good old try.

Page 216: When you are a child, you long to be an adult and decide everything for yourself, but when you are an adult, you realize that's the worst part of it. That you have to have opinions all the time...you have to make choices and be chosen by others, every second, the whole time...

Writing an opinion on the above sounds ironical, doesn't it?

Page 240: 'We can't change the world, and a lot of the time we can't even change people. No more than one bit at a time. So we do what we can to help whenever we get the chance, sweetheart. We save those we can. We do our best. then we try to find a way to convince ourselves that that will just have to ...be enough. So we can live with our failures without drowning.'

I still struggle with accepting the things I cannot change about myself and let my insecurities take over. I hope I can learn to accept the parts of me that I am ashamed about (and is not possible to change).  

Page 243: One of the most human thing about anxiety is that we try to cure chaos with chaos. Someone who has got themselves into a catastrophic situation rarely retreats from it, we're far more inclined to carry on even faster.  We've created lives where we can watch other people crash into the wall but still hope that somehow we're going to pass straight through it. The closer we get, the more confidently we believe that the unlikely solution is miraculously going to save us, while everyone watching us is just waiting for the crash.'

Page 246: ...Because the people we argue with hardest of all are not the ones who are completely different from us, but the ones who are almost no different at all.

Page 247: 'Boats that stay in the harbour are safe, sweetheart, but that's not what boats were built for.'

A better day today

Lights out Alice!

Been having a pretty rough couple of months. Thankfully, today is not one of those days.

Driving, in the golden dusk hour, passing beautiful fluffy clouds adorning the sun, a weather phenomenon that is as rare in gurgaon as humility and kindness in the people living here.

Slowly, I think I am getting there. I have accepted the loss. Accepted that she is gone. Accepted the fact that it was all one-sided. 

It was ALWAYS ONE-SIDED. I had gotten it wrong.

I don't know how much healing power blue skies, fleecing clouds and shimmering sun have, but they help me out and work on me. 

Driving in a leisurely manner, on a highway, no traffic, no rush to get anywhere, going to sector 14 market, an old haunt, with no particular agenda. The moment reminded me of what my brain already told me but my soul was rejecting. 

Life's okay. There is little point in fighting the loss. What was never meant to be mine can never be mine, especially when you add the fact that it is a person and not a thing to be had. 

In this moment, there are a lot more things going right than going wrong. 

In this moment, I have parents who are in decent health to be grateful for. 

I am grateful to be around my sister and my nephew.

I like what my job entails, even though my people skills are lacking. The fact that I get to use my noggin' is not what a lot of people can boast of.

I definitely need to work on my next growth area and stop waiting on it to be the perfect one. I need to stop fighting what I am as a person. I like being engaged, picking up a lot of things, learning interesting stuff and then fail at executing any of them properly. Maybe I will always remain a failure, but at least I like the process of learning and I need to let go of the approach of selection first and directing energy there.

I think I need to let go of the chase Alice, to let go of whatever awesome fun I used to have with/ because of that person. That's over now.

Time to work on levelling up. Hope I get better soon Alice!

How I need to amend my SOP - 4th Sept 2025

Key takeway: Why am I rotting over someone who found it so easy to get over this?  - largely because they never had anything and they are just "users", a term I am loosely coining to depict people who are only friendly to you because you are useful.

It is fine really, I got it all wrong. I was the shitter in this. It hurts pretty bad though and I end up lashing out even though the plan is to forgive and move on. 

What I need to ensure and haven't been able to do is draw boundaries on what is acceptable and what isn't.

The loop is because my brain keeps going back thinking surely all of this can't be a dud? The late night walks, the laughs we shared, the statements where she claimed to be "truly happy". Just like the ones before...they really don't mind throwing it all away in one fell swoop. Maybe I was giving access away at a throwaway price, leading to them in turn taking things for granted or discarding it like trash.

"We looked at each other a little too long to be just friends..."