Finding God

My journey with/about God has been nothing short of turbulent, one in which religion lost to spirituality and as a consequence, i haven’t been to any church for years now, at least from the “I’m going to worship him from that place” perspective.

As a child i grew into/around a strong Catholic indoctrination. I knew there was one almighty, omnipresent, all-powerful God. But even as a small child when i went to church i looked around and wondered “why so serious?”. Church was always this solemn place where people went to meet God, and he was one helluvan ominous(threatening not evil) being! But it was for a moment because my brother and i usually got into a lot of mischief little ways into the service.

Still, was a diligent christian child; started catechism, even though it was conducted in Kikuyu, a language i hardly had spoken control of(still don’t up to now), but i could memorize the syllables and verses well enough to pass, and even aspired to be an altar boy. Had my first experience with cliques…the altar boys were a clique! You know…noses up in the stratosphere, thinking they’re the shit and nitpicking at your attempts to do something to make your mum proud… While I’m not one to hold a grudge, I make a point of never forgetting the face of anybody’s who’s ever discriminated against me for whatever reason.

I became an altar boy later when i was 10, for 3 mass services, before realizing servitude to the church is not one of my inherent virtues. Even told one of the other altar boys to go fuck themselves once when they ordered me to go and serve in church, coz I was needed at a certain Easter mass. OK, I never said “fuck”, seeing that it hadn’t yet made its way into my vocabulary, but i used an equally obscene and demeaning phrase. After that i got no more requests to serve the church. Ironically I was the one that made it to seminary, albeit a junior one.
Seminary was the next step in defining my relationship with God. I may have lied my way into it by faking religious fervor, but it still ended up helping me anyway. There was theology, i got to read the Quran, the Bible(more than 10 times), got exposed to Buddhism and many other religions.

I started questioning religion and the role of clerics in determining our destiny with God. I questioned God, why was he so manipulative and vengeful in the old testament; why was he still kinda manipulative in the new testament with Jesus… I mean if Jesus was God’s son, why would death scare him or even hurt him in the long run?  His dad is God goddamnit! In fact, Jesus should have been looking forward to the release crucifixion and death would bring, to return to his true form! Nevertheless my faith increased, i believed we were all here for a reason and ignored the obvious bias that becomes apparent when you apply the logic that God makes everything happen for a reason…what about the children/people who suffer and are killed even before they even get a feel for the joys in life and living?

After seminary my faith was eroded steadily. With some things you never notice. Your faith gets steered in a particular direction and you never realize it till something significant happens…or a series of events. My episodes always erode my beliefs, whether religious, spiritual, secular or emotional(even now). I judge myself by how I recover from that. My spirituality was almost completely gone by the time i had my meltdown(triggered by other major factors other than religion). You can’t have God without being spiritual. Running to religion when you don’t have any spiritualism in you is like spitting on molten lava…pretty useless. Yeah, i was fucked.

I was hopeless and lost, and not willing to see a shrink because they’d have used my lack of spiritualism as a reason for my breakdown yet i knew it wasn’t. It was just a side of me I had ridden on luck, especially knowing that my mind was made for questioning and i wasn’t exercising that where my beliefs were concerned. I had to fix myself at least some way…the basics at least, financially, emotionally etc…the works. Emotionally was hard, went through a period i was apathetic to even the immediate family as i bonded with them from scratch. Ok, not scratch scratch, but you get the point. Financially, socially, and spiritually too. This entry is about the spiritual aspect.
I knew days of darkness, went full atheist, then tried at the whole worshiping mother nature angle, but as usual my mind was grasping at something at least halfway logical to believe in. And even when i denied the existence of God, there was still one thing whose existence i couldn’t deny…mine. “I think, therefore i am” ~ Rene Descartes.

You never realize the importance of such a statement till you’re faced with the question of your existence. So I dropped all the bullshit of looking for God in the church, and expecting clergy and religion to fully guide me. It has been an interesting journey so far.

I believe in God, I believe all the scriptures speak of the same deity regardless of the religion, and ideally, all the teachings are supposed to lead to one eventuality, a closeness to God and a full productive life with everyone around you. {You know the way in a coding language like java or javascript where you have an array or object and when you pass it into a function, the variable the array is assigned to within the function is just but a reference to the original array… I think that’s how religions (should) work} Religions all refer to the same being.

I believe no religion is incorruptible and many people confuse that corruption with the image of God, not realizing religions were created by mankind as paths of enlightenment to understand God better and get close to Him. While the forebears may have had good intentions, their descendants not so much. They chose to litter the pathways with obstacles and occasionally set up shops to assist the weary travelers…at a cost of course! As the conniving religious people grew, they introduced the concept that it’s ok to be poor or give up your basic rights and some comfort for the sake of what they made you believe is waiting for you in heaven….nirvana. To be frank, what they’ve done is convince people that they convert material wealth into their heavenly equivalent, but no they didn’t stop there. They have convinced many people that it’s actually ok to suffer because it makes what is waiting for you in heaven even sweeter! That that’s why even Jesus suffered, to show you it’s ok to suffer and that God actually wants you to suffer! That is raw description of most religions, and poor people are willing to believe in them because they are looking for an explanation, or rather the silver lining for their suffering. The danger in all this is that there is still resentment towards the well to do, just that they’re rarely voiced…unless a revolution happens!

To understand God, you have to accept just one fact, that you can never understand God. The baseline should be: no understanding of God is absolute and every attempt should be taken as an individual’s effort to create a relationship with a being whose manifestation is neither obvious nor directly observable. It’s all purely faith! Questions like “if there is a God, why does he let some people suffer so much while some are always born to never know the feeling?” are the obvious firsts and you will have to ask yourself that at some point too.
I’ll tell my understanding of that.
It’s hard to tell the reason why things happen to some people and not to others, but when you look at it critically, it’s always as a result of other human actions…natural disaster are negligible when you put suffering as a result of people and suffering as a result of nature side by side and even then we’d most probably be referring to natural disasters as a result of climate change. So we’d be down to earthquakes and volcanic activity as the contenders for significant natural disasters that humans don’t have direct or indirect control over; and even in the case of some earthquakes, it is debatable.

I believe the Bible was written by people inspired by God, but they wrote it explaining and describing their “visions” and experiences based on how they could effectively tell it or express it. Nowadays we have audio/visual aids to express or even reproduce observation but even then we can never effectively project the original. That’s why it’s prudent never to take the bible literally, maybe their culture involved a lot of symbolism, and we also have to remember the bible has been translated several times. And context! The bible is a collection of books, some literature was deemed fit for a book of God while others were dropped, so even in terms of context I’m not convinced we have that part complete. Maybe some books were perceived as too extreme for that culture…we may never know. Every culture has that content that is censored because it may not comply with the current moral yardstick. While the scriptures are cryptic a lot of times, one message always comes through, not a message about morals or imposing your beliefs on others, but to look out for the well-being of your fellow human beings. Simple! That has been the universal truth, from the Bible, Kabbalah, Quran…etc… All(most of) the suffering we see, most of the time, is a direct result of intentional misinterpretation of the scriptures and making your doctrines prevail!

All we ever think of is ourselves and satisfying our selfish immediate needs. We have managed to convince each other that the resources are too few, and that their distribution can work only one way…the pyramid structure…small apex, large(big fucking!) base. That once the human beings at the top of the food-chain are satisfied then the access of the resource moves to the next level and so on. This would be ok had we been looking at sating the needs of the special/disabled first since they probably need special attention. But no, the apex represents the needs of the upper echelon, who in all essence aren’t even that special, just extremely lucky. And…and, combined they make less than 10% of the total population, and the needs being taken care of are of unnecessary extravagance!…and use up the same amount of resources as the rest of the populace!

 I don’t like capitalism that much…sometimes i think if it was agreed we give up property rights until we came up with a more “fair” market/governance system, we could actually stem the way we’re misusing resources, then crying at how little they turned out to be. Then again, when i think of putting some things in the hands of people with so much vested interest and shameless lack of integrity i shudder at the thought of that unknown alternative. Plus that would be expecting some higher force to intervene and solve our problems…much the same way we expect God to do it for us, then curse and deny his existence when he doesn’t do as we bid. The solutions to our problems lie within each individual, getting rid of the selfishness and jealousy that convince us that we have to one-up everybody else to feel happy or content…and actually be of service to people other than ourselves.

Another question I’ve faced as a theist would be the relationship between Jesus, the holy spirit and God. Some people ask it with a smirk expecting you to falter. It is kind of annoying, when somebody, rather than ask you the question to trigger a healthy debate, asks expecting you to show a chink in your faith and then they’d feel better about themselves. What they gain, i don’t know.

Like i said before, no knowledge of God is absolute and my ideas of him are mine, maybe influenced in one way or another by others. When i think of God, i think of him as all knowing and omnipresent, but what about Jesus and the Holy spirit, what is their place with God? For me it all boils down to semantics. The Holy books were written long ago, describing the same thing thousands of years later we are expected to understand in the same light. The Bible, for example, has undergone numerous translations since then with each translator trying to stay as true to the words contained as possible while at the same time creating sensible literature that could be understood in the evolved culture. Let’s look at English as an example, the English spoken and written in the Victorian era greatly differs from what we use. While future generations will benefit from detailed audio/visual examples, ours doesn’t have that luxury, in usage of past material.
I have started to believe that, the concept of Jesus as the son of God developed because there was a need to  illustrate the relationship in a way the people at that time could understand. Had it been a matriarchal society I’m pretty sure Jesus would have been a woman. Maybe it was God’s way of reaching out to the people, using the relationship between a man and his son to show how strong the bonds between him and Jesus were. By explicitly saying “I am Jesus and Jesus is me” the people would probably have responded with a “God sed wha…?” and the whole meaning of the sacrifice would have been lost to history.
And maybe the Holy spirit is the collective of what is good in us which is a part of God. It is God and it is us. We are individual and independent in awareness of self, yet the same before God. Maybe that is what he was trying to say when he said we are in his image and we dumbly assumed he was talking about our corporeal existence and lordship over the other animals.

My point is we try too much to make God into our image. We impose our idea of him on him, and what would make us happy into the image of what we’d expect heaven to be like, we think of classical music and running through fields with neither jutting rocks, thorns nor entangled grass to trip us.  If i was to use the same beliefs i’d say that my idea of heaven is one endless never-fading orgasm! See, we think of heaven as we would perceive the most satisfying event/place/moment to us. We try to impose the same image on others who don’t believe the same as us because we want them to see as we see, but spirituality is something you go into without edging or nudging, and it’s something you should never force on somebody else, especially children! The only thing i pray is that even though i may not be able to visualize heaven for what it is, at least let me be with my loved ones, with all the good in them.

If i believe in a superior being above me, what is there to prevent there being another being above him, and a superior being to that…kind of like a reverse of the old saying “Great fleas have little fleas upon their backs to bite ’em, And little fleas have lesser fleas, and so ad infinitum…”. Simple actually. It would imply that our understanding of God is so far off tangent that the argument is rendered moot…what sense would there be in debating an all knowing, omnipresent God if in fact he answers to one above him? Would have our references to a superior God be linked to the actual superior God or to the one the debate partner is inferring to? See, it goes in nonsensical circles.

So far I am happy my faith in God is holding up! Science doesn’t scare me, neither do i resist it, and more knowledge and belief in science(physics) doesn’t destabilize my beliefs, rather it brings me into awe at how yet complex the structures are that came together to bring me into my corporeal reality; and my ability to change the world around me by simply being.

What people don’t realize is how special they are, how they believe in God or whether they believe in God at all. As long you value other human life the same way you would your own you are on the right path. According to physics you are the not so random result of impossibilities, as is everyone around you. According to the scriptures you’re still special. Just choose what defines you wisely and don’t go shoving your beliefs on other people. Let them see you and if they find you worthy they will follow. You don’t have to change the whole world for it to be better, change your world. The world appreciates no matter how infinitesimally small the positive change.

Keep well

~ben~

30 and counting

This will be one entry filled with my raw thoughts. i.e. little has been edited out.
 If I could count the number of times I’ve had that feeling that I won’t live to see 30, I guess I’d wish I’d saved a penny for each instance.[ I’ll have to qualify that statement by stating, no, I’m not having a cycle as I type, to the best of my knowledge]. When I say that, I’m not saying it as a premonition, just a feeling; ill placed, I always pray to God.

Whenever I’m asked about long term life plans like getting married or having kids I usually say, “I’ll do that when I’m 35, let me enjoy my youth and set up my life”. Saying that comes naturally to me nowadays and it’s only recently that I realized I have never pictured myself getting old. I joke about achieving immortality a lot but not once have I considered myself getting old.

So, am I scared of dying? The answer to that is a bit more complicated than simple or definitive yes or no. I have morbid thoughts sometimes, a lot during my lows. The shrink had been worried because when I went to see him the first time in 2011(after a referral from another shrink who didn’t think he could handle my case) I had covered a lot of ground concerning morbidity and mortality, for the wrong reasons. While I know I can lie and twist facts as far as a psychology is concerned, for once in my life I chose to open up fully to somebody and just see if they could help me. He was able to help to an extent. See it works this way, the more his methods helped me heal, the more I became immune to the methods he used; either his methods were becoming predictable or my mind was learning as it healed. But that isn’t the topic at hand.

Am I scared of dying? My spirituality and beliefs tell me I will still exist even if it’s outside my body. I find that comforting, that I’d be able to see my loved ones even if I died or see them again. But I wouldn’t want to die because I wouldn’t be able to interact with them, at least directly. And how would I feel seeing them come to terms with my death and move on, remember me less and eventually replace me with other things, people and activities, and only remember on the anniversary of the burial.

This is where kids come in. Many people have them and say that’s how you leave a legacy and conquer death. That’s how lazy (poor?) people leave a legacy. By reproducing like rabbits in the name of leaving their genetic material all over, yet genetically we aren’t ever that much different, unless you have a mutation. But here I’m thinking x-men type mutations. If you left those types of kids then we’d remember you. If your brat can shoot laser beams then I’d remember you, and probably hate you.

While children are the future they can’t be your legacy. Can you be your parent’s legacy or just offspring? Personally, I believe kids conceived even after their parents used contraception, properly, are the special ones because they managed to cross some sort of Darwinian barrier (no, smarty pants, that’s not a brand of diaphragm or condom ), more than kids that are planned and/or fertility drugs taken to enhance it. Adopt a kid, damnit! If you want a child so badly you will love an adopted one just as much! This thing where we segregate ourselves using blood ties is part of the reason there is so much war and suffering. We have dwindling natural resources and too many people wanting to leave “a legacy”. History remembers you for your kids right? That’s why Einstein’s father comes to mind immediately when you think about the theory of relativity.

I don’t hate children per se, I prefer them when they are other people’s responsibility to raise and toilet train. I’m not saying that if I have a direct biological offspring I wouldn’t love it or do things like raise it and prepare it to survive in the world by itself! I would, with every fibre of my being. That kid will probably perfect interstellar travel, and generate and stabilize wormholes, basically have the potential to do something amazing, extremely useful and memorable, judging from the odds she’ll have overcome just to get to the point that she was conceived. Unless it was the smallest sperm with the least amount of useful genetic material that was able to slip past the barrier. If I adopt I wouldn’t love the child any less.

Told ,you. the answer isn’t definitive. Yeah, i would love to leave a legacy, i would love if the whole world gained from something i’d invented and everybody would remember me for generations to come. But when you look at it critically, many of the most famous and memorable inventors(legacy leavers) never set out to leave a legacy as their agenda. They stumbled on it. So, my life can do without the stress and pressure of consciously wanting to leave a legacy to continue after me when I’m gone. I’ll live with the same intensity I’d have if i knew i had, say, only 3 more weeks to live. That way if i die anytime between now and a few weeks from now, death would have stolen just a few weeks at most, of a life not lived, from me.

While i have to meet my body’s biological needs, when i satisfy them is where the similarity to animals ends. That is just something i absolutely have to do and without that part i can’t do other things. That’s the obvious bit. When it comes to other aspects like how i do it, the only criteria i have to satisfy is i have to like the “how”. So if it’s making money to pay for the food and house, i have to love the job. If i get bored, i have to move on as soon as possible even if it means starting a new career from scratch. Maybe that explains why sometimes money doesn’t mean that much to me and i’m sometimes frivolous with it. I can’t afford to make my life to be about it. It’s just a means to one end and people sometimes try to use it to control you. If you don’t give money that power over you, other people can’t use it to get power over you, at least through direct manipulation.
Yeah, i know my life isn’t about me, it’s about other people as well, human beings being social beings and all; it’s also a big reason why i lived to write this, but that is a story for another entry. I try to treat my family(immediate) with a lot of affection, not disgusting pda and all that, God no, but emotional all the same, and while I can’t always tell them i love them to their faces, i show it through my actions. When i have nothing and if my philosophy fails me, in whichever way, i’ll end up in their hands whether dead or alive.

I handle relationships much the same way, minus the last part. That’s why i’m very careful who i get involved with. Sifting the wheat from the chaff has made me a few more but insignificant enemies, but it had to be done. In friendships i try to leave out cynicism. Life is too precious to waste fixing something that broke because you took it for granted. While i have a limited capacity for love…in that i can count them all on one hand. Strong emotions are destabilizing for my mind, so i keep love relationships very few and rare in-between. Having residual feelings left for somebody does not necessarily mean love. They’re just normal almost filial feelings. If i fall in love, I love like it’s the first and only time I’ve ever loved, and don’t let past memories taint it. A fuck-what-the-world-thinks mentality. The setback is being left vulnerable and exposed to the person they’re directed to. All i ever hope is they don’t try take advantage of that. Am i scared of that? Nope, it’s a risk worth taking; people have this habit of giving you pleasant surprises if you give them a chance, which was the point from the onset of the relationship, right? Plus i’m not rich so what would there be to take advantage of?
And again, not being stupid nor particularly capable of falling for just any lady i encounter, I can’t waste my time being scared of feelings i can barely control, chances are extremely high my instincts were right!
I have touched lightly on friends, and before i move on i have to state that anyone i date has to be my friend first. The relationship is a perk given to just one of them, i guess. I value my friends, because i have so few of them, and that i can rely on. Couldn’t imagine where i’d be without them. The policy is simple, take advantage or screw me over, or show unmistakable signs of it and we become acquaintances or nothingness again, but this time permanently.
I don’t really care about people who would brand me as their enemy because I don’t have enemies(haters?); with friends and living to attend to, who has the time to keep track of them?

So you see, even if i don’t make it to thirty, to me, i made the years up to the present count, so it would still be described as a life well lived, and i’d want it described that way! When you say somebody had potential, the whole potential aspect is a chance thing that unless achieved is just a hypothetical concept or at most a wish of what you’d have wanted to see somebody do. Life is not cast in stone, we all have choices we make and we are never particularly sure of the eventuality of our choices. So beating yourself over what was probably a wise, well calculated choice, from your perspective, when you made it, is just being silly. It’s doing what makes you happy that matters in the long run, as long as you’re not some kind of sadist. If you find happiness through making others happy, that counts big time! voluntary service to others/nature is satisfying and if heaven is real you will also have earned major points to get you there.
So the final answer is, yes, i’m scared of death, if it was because i killed myself mid a low or because i was unnecessarily reckless. And no, if it was something i had no chance of averting. But even then, up to the point it happened, i’d have achieved my full potential for that time. Though sadly then the only lives i’d have touched positively are the ones immediate to me not the whole of humanity in general.
All life is precious, whether fleeting or extremely extended. Look out for it.
Keep well

Death to Santa V: New Hope

Another year finished above ground! Yaay!  This year’s note is going to be different; can’t manage humour this time since there was little to smile about.
It has been a year with loads of tragedy and a little but significant good fortune.
Lost two people, I’d known all my life, within a few months of each other which sucked donkey. I feel regret because I never showed them that they meant a lot to me; I let apathy run my relationship with most people which I’m starting to realize leads to a lower quality of life. The ode I wrote to them at different times still lies in my drafts to forever remain unfinished (I pray not).
Got off the bipolar medication and stopped seeing the psychologist completely; mostly because the sessions had become monotonous, repetitive and predictable. Going off the meds was necessary because I’d developed memory lapses, emotional disconnection and my creativity professionally and personally had reached an all-time low and kept going down! It was the hardest thing physically, getting off them, because I realized, soon enough, that there are medicines you don’t just get off cold turkey. So it took about 4-5 months to be completely off them. As expected the episodes began to show up again, but later, but they aren’t as crippling as before and I do my best to handle them and keep them from ruining/ending my life. Had a close call, a really really close call, but I survived and it didn’t make me  better person or improve my ability to handle it, but bottom line is, I’m still alive and loving it!
Still on that, 2012 is the year I can say I almost completely overcame the damage that 2010 had put in my life, my emotions are almost stable and my interpersonal skills are slowly coming back as I overcome the paranoia that I had developed towards everyone. Slowly breaking down that wall that keeps me emotionally indifferent towards new people, which is a big win!
Personal life wise, my emotions are still stabilizing and maturing, this is taking note that strong emotions like love for people who aren’t my immediate family, are recent to me; this taking into consideration that before 2009 I never could have definitively said I’d ever been in love with or loved anyone. Sucks, right? For the longest time I thought there was something wrong with me, but time teaches you that everything has its own time. While I like to assert that I have control of most facets of my life, there are those that I have to leave to fate. Besides how fun would life have been had we been able to predict everything? Anyway, I’m no longer a newbie to love and my (romantic) relationships seem to last longer now. Which I believe is good because I am happy. To be frank, I’d never date somebody who isn’t my friend first, that’ll segue me to the next section…
When it comes to good friends, I seem to have many of those. Plus my friends from my previous life have come back! Guess it’s a sign that I’m practically fixed! Or that I’m slowly reverting back to what I was *shivers*, but I doubt, the cynicism is practically all gone and I have recovered most things I lost or gave away. My new friends make me happy and are loyal to a fault which I automatically return in kind. By ‘new’ I mean people I’ve developed friendships with in the last year or so.
Career and financially I’m still not where I was but it’s ok, there are encouraging signs of that happening. Guess it’s the only aspect I haven’t fixed completely. But the one thing I’ve realized is that even in programming there are backstabbing bastards. The one thing I wonder is why people don’t stick to their lanes. The moment I realize intentional (yet unnecessary) aggression towards me, just because you feel threatened or insecure, you leave me no choice but to make you realize that I can do your work better than you while you can’t get even close to what I can do. By trying to jeopardize me, you are in fact setting yourself up for a world of hurt and regret. Why would you try to mess me up professionally yet you have no leverage or clout to protect yourself?
2012 is also the year I did something shameful. I got into a fight. The reason I’m sensitive about such things is because I have always known that while my capacity for good is wide, there is the alter ego side which I never want to encourage. And I like to believe I control my instincts and reflexes. I’m not the textbook definition of a nerd or geek, neither am I a fighter. I’m trained for fighting for the very same reason I am adept with various other skills like programming, swimming, cycling etc., in that I just want to push my brain’s capacity to learn and pick up new things/skills/concepts, and master them, to their limits, simple! I never learned it to use it to beat up people.
 I find fighting unnecessary where diplomacy would suffice, but there are those idiots who are the exception. I can’t say their problem is age because even when I was younger I still thought fighting as unnecessary, because we aren’t animals. I believe to be human is to be able to suppress primal instincts. There are those people that manifest their insecurities through unnecessary aggression and bullying. I don’t know whether it stems from having a small dick, having an overshadowing/controlling father figure, low IQ, not being able to sexually satisfy their partner or just plain stupidity. They live among us and I really don’t get it, violence will never solve any problem, it just makes it worse, that’s what most people don’t get. Why do you even need to assert dominance over another person? I find trying to achieve inner peace and harmony with nature more satisfying. But if you are going to pick an unnecessary fight, at least make sure you‘re all in. Don’t hit somebody then run to daddy the moment they defend themselves. Your daddy never told you to go around hitting strangers that are, at most, neutral and indifferent to you, whereby, you may as well be that insignificant pile of dirt next to a murram road. Even from a legal standpoint you as the aggressor are in the wrong. So thanks to some a-hole I almost ruined my pals birthday party and almost screwed up the total inner harmony I’m trying to achieve to find my bliss. Will finish that chapter with a little gem…

“I promised you, dad, not to do the things you’ve done.I walk away from trouble when I can.Now please don’t think I’m weak, I didn’t turn the other cheek,And papa, I sure hope you understand:Sometimes you gotta fight when you’re a man”

As i look forward to 2013, i’ll try to change a few things. Will try to be a better person and i’ll do my best to prevent life from corrupting that which i struggle to keep clean. It’s the year my bi annual professional cycle comes around and i have to assess whether i’m happy with what i’ve gained in the last two years and decide if sticking to this career is good for me. Yes! i’ve been a programmer/developer for less than 2 years and i get to decide if i want to retain that title in 2013.
I also plan to going back to writing as a regular habit and need to put my emotions back into it. I have to admit i became too detached from writing in 2012 and never had the follow through needed to finish articles/entries i’d started. My draft section is enough reminder of that. That changes in 2013.
While i don’t want to revert personality-wise to what i was pre 09, it is important i return to the path my life had taken then/was taking, in that i need to be more assertive about what i want. Somehow i’d lost that.

My general plan for 2013 is simple, since we all know that saying about the best laid plans of men and mice, to stay true to myself and what i believe in. That has been my mantra for years now and it gives me anchoring through times of torment and mental terror when my mind becomes a hazardous environment. And to lose the flab, since it’s a remainder/after-effect of my dark days.

Happy 2013 people! Regular posts this year. Personal for this blog, and kinda techie ones for yulemsee.com

The year that was: twitter

Oh no, not another blog entry about twitter. Yup, it is. I know right? I’m also ashamed to be writing about twitter when so many blogs, albeit useless(most of them), have done it; but I have about 20 drafts on other topics that I have to get about to finishing before I can post them, and this topic was the easiest to start and finish without any research needed.
This isn’t the first time I’ve written on the topic but it’s most probably the last. Really wish I could provide a link to the other entry but I did it last year and don’t have the bandwidth to go through my past posts. I’ll update here with the link when I finally get the time. The first entry had been a general overview on how to use twitter, a newbie handbook so to speak. This one is more of a recap.
Twitter like any other social network is a dynamic entity and much as I have nostalgia about the days when twitter was still very new (to Kenya) I have to accept the reality that is the twitter of today. So much negativity that before refreshing the page I have to brace myself for the filth and hatred that sometimes spews from it. I’m not the most saintly of people, but damn, people really outdo themselves, there’s really no limit to how low you can go.
When it comes to content I generally enjoy Tuesdays although most of the stuff on there isn’t that much different from what I have on my hard drive, but it is refreshing to see I’m not the only connoisseur for some things. But on a side note my hard drive tops the timeline in the HD, variety and that it’s motion area. In my books, porn is ok, the whole women being objectified angle is just propaganda from some feminist that was pissed her imaginary boyfriend refused to keep her photo in his wallet.
Bullshit and porn aside, when did twitter become the haven for attention seekers? It used to be an open forum where we’d say whatever was in mind and social interaction was peaking positively. We’d attract each other through our minds where like-mindedness and mutual interests brought people together. Reasons to follow would arise from coming across interesting things from a person then going over their content and liking it then following. Nowadays a person just joins twitter does not so random follows then tweets “@fucker #nf”! Which is just a prompt asking you to return in kind.
I have done several avi induced follows but with time you come to realize you get eye candy material but most of the time little else. Which is why I rarely put up my photo, I may neither be ugly nor that good looking but I prefer to be followed through the content of my tweets rather than the image on my avi. When it comes to followers, I treat it the same way I would my resume, I’d rather have a callback based on qualifications rather than face the bias that comes with showing the…umm…face. Who even puts a photo on their resume (modelling/tv exempted)? Anyway as long as the majority of my tweets are my thoughts and opinions with little to no attention seeking, I can sleep easy with the printouts of the retweets I get, under my pillow. When they are enough I shall shred and use them for padding in the pillow.
The worst trait, for me, about the anonymity that comes with social media would be the cowardly settling of vendettas. I have used the collective “social media” because this includes blogs. When you start a blog with the intention of tarnishing somebody’s reputation while hiding behind the veil of anonymity, you are just being cowardly. The prose in some of those blogs is sometimes so fucked up it actually counts as mind rape too (and I wish the PC crew would also add mind rape to that list where according to them saying “Merry Christmas” is offensive to people from other religions…and atheists), reason I stopped automatically checking out some links. But here’s a rule of thumb to assist you when using social media to settle scores, if (theoretically?) you can’t say it to your target’s face, even with a glass wall or chain-link separating you so that at least they know who said it, don’t bother saying it; because then you’ll just be a little whiny bitch and you’d have done the world a huge favour by having waited that one out and come out in a wet dream.
Nowadays I avoid tweeting where I am because events on the timeline have made me wary of meeting new people through twitter, which wasn’t the case little over a year ago. This is sadder considering how many of my good pals I met through twitter and facebook. Haven’t used foursquare or activated specific location in my tweets in a while too!
Basic etiquette dictates that should a photo of me be taken using a device belonging to a third party and the said third party isn’t in the frame then the third party isn’t allowed to publish the photo onto any social/public platform where it’s available to many people, without first asking for my authorisation. Simple! Furthermore, since you are not in the photo, what right do you have to publish that photo on a public platform, regardless of the fact that it was your capture device that was used!  Hell, even if the third party is in the frame, the fact that I’m also in it means that for the photo to be used in any public forum its publishing should be authorised by all parties clearly visible in it. This isn’t about being politically correct it’s about privacy! While I may have willingly posed for the photo, the act didn’t carry implicit authorisation for publishing!
Sadly privacy is really a thing of the past as it seems more than a considerable number of people have taken tweetups as an opportunity to dig dirt on strangers they met online. I don’t really understand why you would want dirt on me yet you barely know me and we barely ever interact both professionally and personally. If you sincerely just wanted to meet to confirm whether the personality projected in my tweets matches the live me that’s cool since I’d assume you want to know me better, but you have no right to try use things I told you in confidence against me online. Here I’m referencing the numerous tweefs. We should really respect each other in this area. You are allowed to use anything I published in a public forum against or for me but anything I chose to keep off, you aren’t allowed to post on my behalf…it isn’t really that complicated, is it?
Anyway here’s a list of the top tweeps in different categories I came up with:
Do I look that bored?
And finally, there’s this new breed of “social media experts” who have ambition. This section is specifically for you. Please join me in camera 3. (Blame Jon Stewart for the previous sentence)
So, you have a few thousand followers, a somewhat well-known (kinda biased/one sided/ screams “SNOB”) blog and have a vision of heading a motivated department into the future and beyond… Where the head drives a Veyron, has an Olympic size swimming pool filled with Courvoisier circulated and replaced every few hours to keep it from going stale, the poolside padded with a mat woven from the pubes of ten thousand virgins, and you rejected Phelp’s application to be your lifeguard and hired James Cameron and his sub to stay submerged and pull you up if you stayed underwater too long…because you don’t know how to swim….ok, this metaphor has dragged for too long…
 Ambition is great and is vital in an increasingly crowded, competitive yet highly rewarding sector namely digital; but before you delve into that world please leave your ego at the door. In professions like medicine and law you can afford ego because they’re time tested (the professions, dumbass) and have well setup guidelines that if you excel in you pretty much earn the right to brag.
For digital you’re dealing with dynamics like people’s preferences in usage of social networks and other digital architecture, and fads. Something may be relevant today then obsolete the next day with no defined timeline or prediction [read MySpace]. Remember the internet as we know it i.e. the www with hyperlinks and all that is relatively new, and blogs and micro-blogs are even younger!  You can’t really claim the information on their behaviour/reason to be time-tested.
You as the person making a pitch on use of digital media to investors are equivalent to the weatherman, you will make many confident predictions but few will actually pan out. More so on profitability. Your role at most should be ceremonial but in the same way everybody still needs an idea on what tomorrow’s weather will be like, the investors may decide to stick with you; so you just make those educated guesses and just cross your fingers. Remember humble pie tastes better if you were modest to begin with, especially when much of the interpretation of existing data came out of your ass.  You really don’t set yourself apart by making a presentation to digital professionals and repeatedly stating “content is king”…really? The fuck do you think they get paid for? Chiselling models of computers in soapstone then selling for profit?
And the most important thing in digital, you have to make your services available to as many people as is technologically possible! This can never be stressed enough! The minute you make it a class thing…well…you’ll barely make it through the door.
Take this advice from a not so savvy person exposed to a lot of social media ish but-can’t-refer-to-himself-as-an-expert-yet
Finally,
Overall, I’m thankful for the few people I meet through social media (read twitter) that make it worth staying on for a little bit longer. It’s the few gems hidden in the dirt that are so valuable that you don’t mind digging a little bit more if only to find more like those.
A pal is getting married in a few hours so I gotta dress up and get going.
Peace mes amies.

Mental health

That’s a big issue. So yesterday a minister’s kid killed himself, which raised the ugly topic about suicide on twitter. It really was more of a one sided affair with people castigating those who contemplate or commit suicide. At first I was angry but later I guess I felt sorry, sorry for the level of ignorance and sorry for the number of people who will continue to suffer and/or die because mental health is not highlighted enough.
I’ll use myself as a living example. I’m not ashamed to admit I have been to that level where I contemplated suicide; to the point I knew the how, among other horrible things. Though I guess there’s nothing more horrible than taking your own life. And I am among the lucky few.
I’m not really that sure where to begin or how to go about this. I won’t be that comprehensive, I’m not a mental health pro but I guess I expect after reading this, you might have an idea what goes through the mind of a mentally ill person, and you go out and learn more about mental health. I’ll cover only what I know well, and/or have experienced and get you on the journey that will hopefully result in more awareness and will get somebody in need the help they require.
There are several types of mental illnesses out there. I’ve experienced two; bipolar disorder and depression. These are the ones I’ll cover because they’re the most common and I have some semblance of experience with them.
I’ll start with bipolar disorder. For the most part this blog has been about my day to day experience with bipolar, since I started it(coincidentally though) right about the time I was informed that I might have the condition. As regular readers already know, that was confirmed last year i.e. stopped being a “might have”. Will make it as short as I can. Basically bipolar is a mood disorder characterized by elevated moods, the highs referred to as mania, and the downs just known as lows. It’s not a constant thing and may occur once, twice or several times a year. Untreated, this is incremental, meaning once you get the first episode, there will only be more. The mood cycle mostly begins with a feeling like euphoria or awesomeness that may last from a few hours to a day or two, followed by the low which basically feels like a period of reduced self-esteem and low confidence.
The reason it took me so long to get treatment was because I loved the highs and the occurrence of lows was negligible. Plus I used to get stoned and drunk a lot and therefore couldn’t recognize whether it was the drugs talking or the sick me. Some of the things I did, I don’t write about because my colleagues read this blog and even though I try to live my life as openly as possible, there’re facets of me I’d rather keep for my inner circle. I was lucky in my old job because my boss valued my input (and was my friend) so had tolerance for some of the stunts I pulled in the middle of such episodes, but more of that later.
With time I started to accept the whole ben-might-be-bipolar thing so I was able to observe my moods and have reasonable control over myself. Writing helped too, because I could compare the mood in the text with what I know as my normal self. I can’t tell at what exact point the lows turned to full blown depression and incidentally I didn’t know that till I met my current shrink.
 The mechanism behind depression is really really complicated. I remember in primary school we skimmed over depression, most probably because we were too young to comprehend this extreme form of sadness that just sucks the joy out of life. According to my shrink, depression is really more common than we think, it’s just that in most people it’s recognized too late to help them effectively. Depression is many times triggered by stress.  Be it from work, relationship and other external factors. Simple as it may seem, getting out of depression doesn’t simply involve “sucking it up” or shrugging it away.
In the brain there is a chemical called serotonin. Serotonin is a neurotransmitter. Fluctuations of this chemical affects moods. In bipolar disorder the brain is not able to regulate the amounts of this chemical so sometimes it’s in excess resulting in  mania and when it’s a little resulting in the lows. Mine is mild bipolar so my body pretty much got things under wrap most of the time. For depression, the body is producing very little serotonin. I know, right? How can such a stupid little chemical do so much damage!? Anyway that is basically it! Genetic predisposition means some people are more vulnerable to depression than others.
Umm…so what do I talk about now… Oh yes, how depression affects a person’s life. You have to remember this article is just about sating the curiosity about what the fuck goes through a depressed person’s mind, it’s not an article you can quote because the experience might be different for somebody else, but there are professional journals about all this.
When you are depressed you are in a dark dark room in the most remote recesses of your mind. You may have things going for you but you can’t notice it. My self-esteem was low, although I tried to fake it. When I got home after work all I wanted to do was be by myself and I’d beat myself up about why I couldn’t hold a relationship, why I’d become poor, why at my age I was still living with my parents while many of my age-mates were having families. i would cry to sleep many times and I’d hate myself more for doing that because I’m a man. Generally I knew my life sucked.
I would have trouble sleeping and when it was morning I didn’t want to wake up, I just wanted to go back to my sleep to the sweet peace that is unconsciousness. This way the brain is conditioned the Pavlov way to associate the darkness with good and consciousness with bad. I always thought about death a lot all that time, but I was like “noo, what about my mom and sister. What will they think?” Mental reasoning is all screwed up (but you don’t realize that), sane reasoning is eroded over time because I started to think, look at the way they’re always sad because of me. Wouldn’t they be so much better off without me, at least they’ll be able to focus on more important things, their lives. See where I’m leading?
Eventually you come to the conclusion the world is better off without you. I am catholic so I also thought about hell, but realized I was living in one. I would drag myself out of bed, and go to work but I would wonder why the heck I was bothering with that shit. I spent over one year in that routine till I forgot what happiness was. Mind you I wasn’t depressed all the time, I had happy days, but when I got depressed, it would catch up from where it left off the last time so each time I would be lower. I’m seriously considering publishing some of the extreme things I wrote during those periods, if only for the sake of awareness, many of them were mostly goodbyes and a conclusion of a life “well lived”. Oddly enough my dependence on alcohol reduced and I stopped taking weed completely, to this day I never understood why because in many cases of depression the opposite is the rule. My shrink can’t tell me why either. I guess I wanted to enjoy my last moment as myself. Oh, here’s something to note, when a depressed person seems to suddenly come out of it and seems happy again; that is the most dangerous point because it is indicative they’ve come to a decision.
No, not the decision to seek treatment and suck it up “because life is hard for everyone anyway”. It means they’re at peace with themselves and their decision. It is that final moment when that voice/instinct of self-preservation finally dies out and there’s no inner conflict. I would know; I was almost at that point, right at the cusp. Oh I wanted to die alright but that voice in me hadn’t given up yet, I had to try one last thing before coming to my final decision(morbid huh?)…I wanted to see a psychiatrist. He is good people, wanted me hospitalized immediately because he thought he wouldn’t see me again. Yeah, hospitalization is just my nice way of saying Mathare mental hospital. Nah, I kid, they have private mental institutions. He didn’t charge for that session and I think he wanted to pay for my hospitalization, I kid you not. I didn’t have any money when I went there. I hate being confined so obviously there was no way I was going to let anybody hospitalize me. But I used all the money I had and bought the medicine I’d been prescribed and…here we are; more than a year later. I’m no longer depressed and have full control of my life. I know I stopped taking the medicine without consulting the doctor, but it came out he was going to take me off them anyway. I’m only being treated for the bipolar which is a breeze compared to depression.
Anyway, getting out of depression isn’t as easy as it seems, but my family and girlfriend were a big help. The girlfriend because she is the only other person who can really understand the shit-storm that was my mind, having gone through it herself (not bipolar). We broke up several times but eventually it was all good as I healed and had more control over my mental faculties. It had to end though. Pathetic, huh? You go through years of hell and when things are finally good…but that has been covered, I guess. But long story short, I love my family and they have always been there for me and really helped me especially in making me realize I was loved regardless of who I am; but Shae was the one who made me realize I could get out of it and be happy for once. She was my rock and for that I’ll forever be grateful.
My point is depressed people can’t do it alone. Most of the time you have to reach out to them to make them realize they are sick. Believe me, they don’t know that that is something that can be treated through therapy and medication. The worst thing you can do is judge them because you make it worse. I used to think being suicidal was cowardice too (the times before I was depressed, obviously). The only reason I got out of it so fast was because I knew I had a problem. As far as my doctor is concerned, I’m not out of the woods yet…fyi. I was depressed for a whole year before I got treatment, most people have gone longer without knowing and in them the damage is much worse and you need more patience.
It takes a lot to convince a person they’re ill. Depression is a disease no less like AIDS or cancer and the most important step is to make the depressed person come to accept it as such. It’s not shameful. Being taken to Mathare is not shameful, I know we make fun of that place a lot but I think it’s about time we stopped stigmatizing mental health treatment. Taking antidepressants isn’t shameful, seeing a psychiatrist isn’t something to feel shy about; when you need a doctor, you need a doctor.
Most importantly, even if they don’t want to talk about their feelings with you, don’t feel bad, they’ll get there, just make them feel your world is a much happier place because they’re there, whether they appear “damaged” or not.
One last thing, treatment of bipolar and/or depression is freaking expensive. If you know a friend is having difficulty paying for it, help them or find a way to help them. The treatment is really important. I’m lucky insurance started paying for my treatment; I had actually stopped for a couple of weeks because of financial reasons! Went to a pharmacist and the cost of the medicine was 18k! Really fucked up, huh?
I guess now it’s time to give the list of symptoms to look out for:
·         People become withdrawn no psyche in life
·         Decreased productivity at work, decreased energy
·         Hopelessness/pessimism
·         Sadness
·         Suicidal thoughts
·         Jfgi
 For bipolar I’ll just let you google it. But I don’t think bipolar is that serious especially in its milder form. Regardless, I’m having it treated and doing my best to stick to the medical regime assigned. But I really hate popping pills every day and I long for the time all I’ll need is the psychiatric help alone. Bipolar is really cool though when you think about it, right? It’s like FREE BOOZE, no hangover, no liver damage. Anyhoo, I’ve digressed. I tend to contradict myself a lot when it comes to bipolar. It is rather a double edged sword sadly.  You get this really awesome designer drug for free but dangling on it is a disclaimer “side effects may include: loss of job, loss of savings, loss of relationship, STI, death from the God-syndrome, depression etc…”
And those who make it a habit of judging people for thinking about suicide, nobody appreciates life more than the person that almost ended their own because only they know how close they came to going off the edge and how helpless that feeling is! I know you say those things out ignorance and mean the best, but fuck you. You don’t know!
Anyway I have done my part in showing you what it feels like to be depressed. Your part now is to find out more about it. I’ve only scratched the surface. On Wikipedia there’re over a hundred mental illnesses listed; chances are, somebody you know is suffering from one of them and doesn’t even know it. Do your part. Nobody ever died from knowing too much…unless you’re working for the mafia or a drug baron, in which case, good luck.
As a footnote, I know there are group sessions for people with mental illnesses which may be helpful if you think you are suffering from a mental illness or know somebody suffering from it. It really helps to talk about it with somebody you know has gone or is going through the same. If you need the contacts hit me up on twitter(@iz_ben). I’ll confess I’ve never gone to any because I don’t need to talk about it; I write almost all my experiences which is therapy enough (and remember I had a girlfriend that had gone through the same who helped a lot), plus i have a professional psychiatrist, which as far as I’m concerned is enough. Sorry, stubborn is in my nature.
Keep safe and look out for your physical, emotional and mental well-being, and of course those of the people close to you. Cheers.

O is for Obedience

HAVING AN OBEDIENT WIFE and kids who flinch and hide in the corner of the room when you come home is the hallmark of a successful family. Since having a well tempered wife is essential to asserting one’s manliness, here is a quick guide to finding and training your new wife.
WHERE TO FIND A WOMAN Bringing a woman into your home is a life-altering decision that requires careful consideration. Before you make the financial, social, and time commitment to adopt a woman, ask yourself if you’re ready for the ongoing responsibility. Once you’ve decided that a woman is right for you, the first step is to find one. Here are a few places to start your search:
MALLS
Most women can be found in malls—large shopping establishments that can be found in most major cities. Malls are rife with idle women ready for the picking. You can find women of different builds depending on which area of the mall you look in. For example, looking in trendy or novelty clothing stores will yield a younger, valley-girl type of woman, whereas if you look in the food court, you will usually find a larger breed of woman with thicker thighs that are more suitable for birthing.
SCHOOLS 
College campuses are a great resource for men in the market for women who come fixed. Females on university campuses are likely to be in heat, in good health, and anxious to leave the confinement of their self imposed academic prisons. Since stock models of these women come sterile, they’re ideal for men who are looking to avoid undesirable sexually transmitted diseases(namely children).
BARS/CLUBS
If women are like steaks, then the big greasy chunks of gristle that are left over after you finish the meal are what you’ll find in bars. Fortunately, there is a way to separate out the high-quality women from the low in bars and clubs. When you stand near a woman, listen for a faint whistling noise coming from between her legs, as if wind were passing through a large, hollow cavern. If you hear this sound, your prospective woman may have a condition commonly referred to as “whore.” Be wary of these women, as clubs tend to harbor many of them.
TYPES OF WOMEN Once you find an establishment with women, the next step is to choose a woman that’s right for you based on your level of commitment. Surprisingly, not all women are the same; that is, women can vary greatly in intelligence, body type, and personality. The following is a list of the most common classifications of women.
BLONDES: This type of woman is energetic and enthusiastic. These personality traits will wear thin after a couple of minutes and will transform into another personality trait known as “annoying.” Blondes love to laugh, drink, and hang out in bars, and as such have a propensity to be loose. Women with blond hair tend to have overtanned skin and blue eyes, which are seen as desirable physical traits by some men. This desirability is fueled by the music and television industries; so this type of woman is greatly sought after. Some analysts believe that, due to overvaluation, the market for blondes is about to burst.
BRUNETTES: As a rule of thumb, brunettes are more meek than their blonde counterparts, due to the higher perceived value of blondes. This underlying devaluation will occasionally manifest itself as “low self-esteem,” making brunettes more easily attainable. Unfortunately, not all brunettes are desirable, and the exceptions can be tragic. For example, the brunettes with lighter skin tend to sport especially noticeable moustaches, due to the dark color of their hair follicles. This type of woman may require a high level of maintenance to keep presentable.
REDHEADS: Redheads require a very assertive owner due to the trying natures of these women. For instance, most redheads are very combative with other women and even some men if you allow it to happen. The dominant nature of this breed may be undesirable to men with flimsy backbones.
  NEW OWNER CHECKLIST After you select a woman, it’s important to go through the following checklist to make sure she is right for you:
• Is the woman’s body clean and well trimmed? Are her upper-lip, shoulders, and lower back clear of hair?
• Any unusual smells? For that matter, any “usual” smells?
•Any excess baggage? This could be fat, kids, or psychological issues.
• Does she have black fingernails, nappy looking hair, scar tissue around her wrists, bags under her eyes, or creepy pink thigh-high stockings? (All these say “head case.” Be wary these women can be exhilarating at times, but you’re just as likely to have your penis cut off in your sleep.)
• Are her shots and vaccinations current?
• Does she walk with a limp?
• Does she look like she’s been bred more than twice?
• Did you check to make sure she’s not wearing flip-flops?
BRINGING YOUR WOMAN HOME There are several preparations you need to make before bringing your woman home. This is done for the safety of your property and belongings, as well as to prevent any unexpected medical bills due to accidental ingestion of drugs or toxic substances that may be in your home.
THE KITCHEN 
If left unsupervised, you will find that most women will naturally find their way to the kitchen. Although your kitchen may appear to be safe at first, there are several potential risks that you need to be aware of. The most common accidents occur when pot handles are left hanging over the edge of the stove. Make sure to turn the handles toward the back of the stove, where she will be less likely to knock them over while she’s mopping the floors.
THE BATHROOM
Make sure to keep medicine and supplements locked in cabinets. Some women have occasional fits of depression and may attempt to get attention by swallowing half a bottle of Tylenol. While this rarely poses a threat to the woman’s safety, Tylenol is expensive. One exception to this rule can be made with Midol, which you should leave in a candy dish in plain sight at least once per month. This will help keep your woman’s irritability in check. If you find that your woman is not consuming the Midol, you may consider mixing crushed tablets into her food.
BATHING TIPS: It’s important never to leave your woman alone in the tub, lest she slip and drown. Always stay with your Woman while she’s in the tub; you may even consider joining her. A long day of cooking and cleaning will make a woman filthy, so make sure to run an extra hot bath or shower, and scrub behind her ears and between her breasts-especially between her breasts. A woman’s chest is the filthiest part on her body and needs extra scrubbing to clean. Sometimes scrubbing isn’t enough, so you must use your mouth on her nipple pores to thoroughly clean your woman.
EXERCISE AND DIET
All women require some level of exercise and diet to keep fit and presentable. How much exercise a woman requires depends on several factors, including her body weight, frame, chest size, and self-esteem. For example, a woman with a low self-esteem will tend to overeat, causing her more weight gain than a woman with higher self-esteem.
Women with large busts require a type of exercise that consists of jogging, skipping, or jumping up and down on a trampoline. These types of exercise will help you determine your woman’s chest pliability. Some women with breast augmentations may show signs of discomfort while doing these exercises, in which case you should promptly exchange her for a natural model that won’t suffer from boulder tit syndrome.
Managing your woman’s diet won’t be simple, but can be accomplished by giving her less food. If your woman seems irritable with less food, try supplementing her meals with unflattering comments about her hips and thighs. Failing that, you may need to bring another woman into the picture; nothing makes a woman shape up like the threat of another woman vying for your attention. With practice you’ll find that a woman’s jealousy can be used like a tool to manipulate her into doing all sorts of things to gain your praise.
It’s also important to feed your woman high-quality food to prevent infections and other undesirable effects such as upset stomach, diarrhea, and bitching. Feeding her filler foods (i.e., Taco Bell) may cause parasites to invade her body. If you suspect that this is the case, have a stool sample checked for worms by a qualified physician.
HOUSE TRAINING YOUR WOMAN
Upon bringing your woman home, house training should be one of your top priorities. The key to effective house training is implementing a reward-counter reward system to encourage good behavior and discourage bad behavior.
A great deal of supervision and patience is required while training your woman to relieve herself properly. She may complain about finding the toilet seat up, but she will eventually learn that she can put the toilet seat down with a fraction of the energy she’d expend complaining about it.
You should reward her good behavior by giving her treats such as flowers (keep your eye out for half-off sales, or if you don’t mind carnations, stop by a cemetery), TV allowances that she can use to watch her favorite shows when you’re not home, and if you’re feeling particularly generous, you could let her take you out to dinner instead of cooking for you.
If an accident should occur, you must exercise care not to overdo your punishment while still sending her a message that this is unacceptable behavior. Make sure that whatever command you say will be simple enough for her to remember easily. These tips taken together will help make your ownership experience a good one.


Of life lessons and other stuff

Hell is still overburdened, I must stand and wait in line. Seems I have commitment treason; all I have sacrificed, led to nothing.
This is one of those blog entries that stay for weeks without being published because when i read them later in the drafts I wanna change a lot and probably take out chunks of it, but i have to fight it since it will ruin the general vybe i had at the time of writing. 
It has been little over a week since I got off the bipolar medications, not because the shrink told me to, but because I said so (said with a lisp); my body, my rules! I can choose to go back to doing drugs and shit and nobody can do jack about it, not my family not my friends not anyone. Funny enough I miss having conversations with myself, because in the long run you realize the only person you can really ever trust is yourself, those voices in my head that I stilled, they were never wrong. People will always pretend to be your friends (or soul-mate) and stab you in the back, people will try to change you, yet Mother Nature intended us to live free and wild. Now, in the current societal norm, that has to be within certain boundaries I guess; you know, my freedom to throw my fist anywhere ends where the other person’s face begins and that type of shit. I long for the time I can afford (figuratively and literally speaking) to let out my inner demons to roam free the way they were meant to and desire. Good guys ALWAYS get fucked! That’s one life lesson you gotta take to heart.
Anyway, getting off the medications isn’t a walk in the park, as I came to realize (ok, I already knew). Since I got on them my body started to rely on them just like narcotics and it seems, like a hooker leaving her pimp, you don’t just get to walk away. Let’s start with the headaches, dear Lord they’re freaky and painful, unlike regular migraines these ones have more oomph in that I feel like somebody is electrifying my brain every few seconds, it’s kinda hard to describe the sensation without shuddering. But I can take it, been through worse shit and lived to tell the tale. I have to take the occasional pill when it gets really unbearable, but I’m able to stay off them for increasingly longer periods.
So why am I getting off the meds without telling the doctor? [He will know soon enough, right about the time I publish this, and we’ll save the insurance company thousands] From of the top of my head: I came out of the depression that had plagued me for little over two years, in that all the negative stimuli that caused it has been removed from my life i.e. I’m no longer stressed, I’m no longer bankrupt  [ok I’m netting way way less than I used to, but I’m not broke], I no longer trust people in general, I changed friends and got rid of the stupid friends, and the number one reason: I finally took control of my emotions! Feelings are stupid; they get you vulnerable, used and hurt. I love my family and all, but that’s pretty much it, rather, as far as I will let them (the feelings) go from now on. In as much as the meds helped take away my depression, they really reduced my creativity. The irony is that the random patterns of thought that gave me all the symptoms of being bipolar, the mania and all that [excluding the lows] made me more creative.
My life has always been an open book, not because I want people in my life, but because I don’t give much of a crud about what people think of me to hide anything. When I was confirmed to be this…you know, the b-word, I didn’t hide it, even if it was a bitter pill to swallow, I took it in stride. If I was gay I wouldn’t hide it [but I don’t push my right to be straight down anyone’s throat or expect a celebration, gays take notice]. So just because you know shit about me doesn’t mean I care(d) enough about you; it just means my ability to give a fuck is so little you can’t even blackmail me, because what you may presume is a dirty little secret is everyday information to everyone else. So, even in the instances I learn of people talking about me behind my back, I just shrug it off. Amazingly enough, I’m not even curious who it is, or what, or the context because that is how much I give a fuck! That is just what life made of me.
If there’s one thing I have learned over time, it’s that people care too much about perception by others. Too many times we’re so busy looking over our shoulders to check if anybody has seen us or is looking that we fail to notice the next step we’re about to take. I guess I’m just recently learning that the one thing I did right before in my life was not caring about what people want me to be. If I had just continued to ease my life into the contours of my desires I would be in a much happier, better place. And that is what is wrong with our society. I am what is wrong with our society.  We want so much to live the lives of others that we forget we have our own desires. We don’t all want the same things. Frankly, that is why we don’t seem to have enough resources. We have been conditioned to think we all want the same things. Call it capitalism, blame the media or whatever you want, bottom line is we have affixed ourselves to such few fixed options it was only natural that they wouldn’t be enough and we’d break down into castes i.e. the haves, could haves and have nots; also leading to the buildup in sensationalist bullshit where we have this inexplicable interest in celebrities and royalty. Ok, I digress. Never meant to talk of capitalism, sustainable development, resources, celebrities and all that in this entry; I’ll cover that in more detail some other time, plus I need to do more research before I cover such topics as an expert[actually I am an expert on sustainable development and resource management ahem], but you get the gist.
My point in all this: be yourself, eat life with a big spoon. Follow your heart and never be afraid to explore your desires. And most importantly, people will always have an opinion about your life whether you’re good or bad, the important thing is not to listen and live your life. I’m avoiding the word “haters” but most people bitch about others because they (the bitchers) aren’t really that interesting; really in the long run what matters is what you think of yourself.  Just remember not to step on peoples toes unnecessarily, remember that thing I said about where your freedom of expression ends. And by living with these tenets your life will be so much happier.  If I have committed any fallacy, consider it intentional.
Keep well mes amies.

Of reasons for writing and what to reveal

That’s why my breath is felt by the deaf and why my words are heard and confined to the ears of the blind. I, too, dream in color, and in rhyme, so I guess I’m one of a kind in a full house, cuz whenever I open my heart, my soul, or my mouth, a touch of God reigns out

Was going through the blog and noticed the posts are rare and far in between. I do a personal post about once every 3months but that doesn’t seem enough, the blog has not been getting the love and attention it deserves. Guess it’s because it’s hard to find the time, what with all the work.
Coding is a hard mistress to tame or please and she insists on getting all your attention, especially if she is the one that pays all your bills. But i love her all the same. She helps me escape and keep my sanity in the midst of the disaster that has become my personal life.
As I have mentioned in passing before, the thing about a blog like mine is finding a balance on how much of my personal life I should reveal. How much is too much? For example, many of my co-workers, some of whom are my friends, know about who owns this blog, so I may write something and the next day they may go ‘damn dude, we didn’t know you went through that’ or “dude, you sounded hurt”. So the loss in total anonymity adds more limits/restraints on the how much is too much to reveal issue. Personally I don’t really have qualms about revealing details of my life, but I have to respect the privacy of the people I write about whether we’re on good terms or bad, plus I hate discussing something I’ve written. The reason I wrote about it and not talk is because I don’t want to talk about it. Revealing names is a no-no, unless I’m talking about public figures, and I always make sure to avoid unnecessary extra information that doesn’t really lend weight to the topic at hand; social media etiquette so to speak.
To say the truth, writing and swimming are the only truly complete doors to my soul. There are things you will read on my blog that i would never reveal in person, no matter how emotional or drunk; I’m stunted like that when it comes to interpersonal relationships with other human beings. And I’ll hate you if you insist on trying to get it out of me! That is why given the choice, I would desperately cling to the veil of anonymity offered online. There is the option to write and not publish, therefore stay completely invisible, but then again, what is the use of writing if you can’t share it with the world? Through it we can strike a chord and see eye to eye better since I’m letting you more into my life through a couple minutes of reading, what would have taken us years through normal interaction. Maybe by chance I hit on a topic that applies to you so well, you realize you’re not completely alone in this cold unwelcoming world. That makes writing, and in extension blogging, worthwhile.
One of the more common setbacks I face would be finding a topic to write about. I write for pleasure, and for other reasons I’ve already presented. Unlike career bloggers, who earn from their writing, hence have to take advantage of search engine optimization, and jump on every topic currently trending to make hits, I write because above all I love it. I don’t have to meet a monthly/daily quota and really don’t give a shit about how my blog is indexed on google, or the number of ad impressions it makes (btw i think that part is broken, haven’t made a dime in ages). But I still have to make sure the grammar is proper, the typos stay to a minimum, except where i choose to use slang, curse only when necessary and try to keep the English as basic as possible. I’m beyond trying to impress anybody with vocabulary. I got a ton i could throw at readers but really it would just give the blog a pretentious feel to it.
So readers, i have let you a little bit more into the mind of the author, now you know why he writes.
Shallom my friends.

Things diatribe, and why women cheat

It has been quite a couple of weeks for me. Emotionally trying, to say the least. My last entry and a couple of facebook updates may have come out hateful and biased against women but I’ve realized i gotta clear the air.

I love women, they have soft boobies and some of them have working brain cells. Ok, i kid. To say the truth I love and respect women. My mom is a lady and i love her. My sister is also female (like duh) and i love her to bits. Some of the things many of you have to go through is hard enough to comprehend as a guy and i respect their(your) resilience. We live in a patriarchal society and i believe women are short changed and deserve more than they get.

Whenever I see a man batter a woman i get incensed, to say the least, and i believe women batterers deserve hard labor and to be punished to the fullest extent of the law. True, women also beat men, but i think the reason those stories are more prevalent is the sensationalist nature of a guy actually getting beat up by a woman. Which adds on to the admirable strength of a woman, to be able to calmly take all the blows and not say a thing, admirable but in no way ok.

That put to rest, I’ll cover the diatribe evident in my previous post. This time a post written calmly and without bias.

Interpersonal relationships form the pillar of our human society. The human as a species’ quality of life is determined by the value of the relationships between individual units, the people, and also with the environment, but that is beyond the scope of this entry. In within the different social interactions we have romantic relationships.

A romantic relationship is the pillar of a couple. This means when two people decide to be a couple they admit they’re emotionally tied to one another. No relationship can work without at least a lot of liking, and in some love eventually develops. A relationship works like a set of cogs. For it to run smoothly the gears need constant oiling(on a side note: they found oil in Turkana, yaay Kenya, true story!) lest they become rusty. To say the least there is a high level of trust the parties to a relationship attach to one another because of the emotional endearment. To continue with the gears and cogs metaphor, oiling a relationship includes spending time together, sharing how your day went, telling each other sweet nothings etc.

Cheating ruins relationships and destroys trust. It is a generally accepted fact that men are the most likely to cheat in a relationship. There’s a saying that states a man is only as faithful as his options. What does this mean? It means that the more women around that are sexually receptive to him, that’s how faithful a man will be. My girlfriend (ex) used to tell me that cheating does not necessarily involve sleeping with somebody else. It could also mean sharing emotional experiences, which are supposed to be directed at your partner, with somebody else. This is why it becomes difficult to have a best friend of the other gender who is not your partner, since it eventually becomes difficult to distinguish the feelings for your best friend with those for your partner. That’s why it’s easier for single people of different genders to be best friends, but becomes hard when one or both are in pre-existing relationships.

From my personal experience when i got into a relationship i reduced the intensity of friendliness with my female friends. (According to one of my friends, that is wrong. But that is a story for later). Male-male friendships rarely threaten a relationship. Anyway, i reduced the intensity of my interaction with female friends, some understood, others disappeared altogether, but i was doing it to give my girlfriend the peace of mind that I’m unlikely to stray from her no matter the temptation. The hardest thing to give up was my best friend (female) of years and i made my girlfriend my best friend. Things were initially hard especially with my mood swings, since i had untreated bipolar but she stuck through, till i got medicated and I had to give up the elevated emotions for good. Elevated emotions are AWESOME by the way, most people (me included) only seek treatment when the depressions become overwhelming.

Anyway, where was i, yeah cheating. Men cheat, a lot, as I’ve witnessed, but the reasons they do so are covered in that article i wrote last year so no need to repeat. But reason or not, it’s never ok to cheat on your better half, no matter how badly they piss you off. If a relationship is on its death bed you can both agree to start seeing other people, and maybe after some time you can revert to the friendship you had before you decided to get involved. 

Anger is never a reason to cheat. I admit i was pissed off at my girl several times, sometimes really super pissed, but if there’s one thing my momma  and shrink taught me is to never make a decision when I’m angry. My shrink was categorical, since I’m a writer, i should stop lashing out at people immediately (i used to do that a lot before the meds, therapy and mind tricks started to do their thing), i should type out why I’m angry and what i want to do and when i cooled down enough, read it and see the damage i would have done had i reacted angrily immediately. And it worked, the relationship lasted for more than a year and i didn’t fuck up with my job(my current boss is not as understanding as my last one). Ok, i admit the previous article was done in a fit of anger, but as a rule i never take down something I’ve published.

The thing most women don’t realize is there are a few of us out there, men who would do anything and stand by their women. The reason i don’t hit you isn’t because i don’t have the strength to do so, it’s because i respect women and think there’s something ugly about a submissive woman. The reason i (we) don’t cheat on you is because we choose to give you the security to know there is someone to safeguard your emotions. There are literally tens of women on social networks willing to give it up for nothing! When a man tells you he loves you, and to extend it letting his friends know you’re “The One”, it takes nothing short of guts! So women remember, when a guy does things for you, a lot of things and never complains, it isn’t because he’s a wimp, it’s just that you’re his world.

Anyway, why do women cheat? Women may cheat when they are disgruntled and want nothing to do with the relationship they’re currently in, but don’t have the guts to admit it to their partner. Or maybe they are disgruntled but are so used to the security of tenure in the relationship so that they don’t want to risk it out on their own by calling it quits. 

Women also cheat when they suspect or know they’re being cheated on. I don’t have to mention the health risks involved in cheating. So instead of confronting the guy they decide to do it themselves to even out the score. As long as you are in a relationship it doesn’t matter whether the other person is doing it, it’s still cheating. And you’re really a fucked up couple and probably need to have a shrink check out what the fuck is going on in your tiny tiny minds.

Another reason women cheat is if they are emotionally or physically attracted to somebody else. It is understandable to be attracted to somebody who seems better off than your partner. We are attracted to other people all the time, but it’s called “commitment” for a reason. You chose the person you’re with, but if that isn’t enough you always have the option of leaving your partner amicably and you can pursue the higher interests. Something people don’t realize is sometimes heartbreak can be avoided if you resolve your issues in a straight forward manner.

Women also cheat to spite their partner. This is kinda rare, so I’m led to believe. But a characteristic hard to avoid is that the woman tells the partner immediately after the deed to make the partner feel the pain. Like i said before, this is really stupid. After you’ve cheated this way, what next? A more than likely scenario is you regret it, since it was probably done in a fit of anger. As a result you lose out on what would have probably been a lifelong partnership.

A woman may also cheat because she wants to advance in life. Assume for a second, that this couple has financial problems and maybe the woman wants to get up through the stages in life quickly or get a job. I admit, we all know a lot of women who’ve advanced through life by “assuming the position”. So she sets her eyes on somebody who offers her what she wants and goes for it. Even if she does it once, she will forever, in the eyes of her man, be no different than a slut. Only difference is she pretends to have class. Whether it’s worth it in the long run or not is up to debate. But you should realize, the guy you slept with to advance your position now owns you! I’m sure you allude yourself that you’ve attained the independence you wanted, but you are no different than a sex slave. Anytime master wants sex, you have to give it to him else you’ll find yourself back where you started. I guess it’s a no-brainer which one is better, work towards your goal slowly but surely and be in charge of your fate, or skip stages and always live in the perpetual fear “master” will find a younger better looking slave and leave you out on the street on stage 1. But i guess it all depends on our individual definition of “independence”.

Another reason women cheat is, the sex sucks. Ok, i didn’t mention this one on the why men cheat entry, but it applies for both. When the partners aren’t compatible sexually but get really well emotionally, chances are one of you will stray. Most likely the partner that knows they’ve had it better or can have it better. Still, as i will keep insisting you have the option to call it quits and SHOULD always use it. 

If you’re going to cheat, please make sure you’re able to handle the consequences which more or less results in the loss of the relationship. Friendship is rarely retrievable in such circumstances. Anyway you had the option of breaking up amicably and you chose not to use it.

I believe I’ve absolved myself of the bias that may have seemed to be directed at womenfolk in general. Ladies, believe me. the only reason most people do a 9-5 is to have enough to please you and make you happy. Whether the ulterior motive is to have sex with as many women as possible, or to be able to have enough to please their partners, or attract a new partner, the world runs because of women. And i appreciate that. Now i’ll finish with a quote from Quagmire on family guy(surprising it’s him huh?):

A woman is a strong beautiful vibrant creature; a woman embraces life; a woman makes choices to make her life better
And with that i go back to my secluded little world of binary poetry.

Keep well my friends