tsuki

I always thought that my love life in my teens was so lackluster. That I haven't explored nearly enough. I judged myself for not knowing how to flirt with women and "pick" them. As it turns out, I had more unrecognized relationships with men, then I had with women. I was just blind to them! HOW CAN SOMEONE BE BLIND TO THAT?! And my relationships with women were so weird! I mean, they were perfectly understandable given just how emotionally closed my mother is, how difficult it is for her to show affection. She was a police officer specializing in sexual crimes! And my sadism makes SO MUCH SENSE RIGHT NOW! My wife just spelled it out for me today, it never occurred to me with so much clarity before that I just wanted her to be interested in me! HOW INSANE IS THIS?! A child can subconsciously pick EXACTLY what to become so that its mother takes care of it. I don't remember EVER doing this deliberately, like I did some things just to hurt my parents. It must have happened so early in my life! I don't think so, not in this sense. Having recognized my bisexuality, I now see that I had some friends that are definitely straight and I did not have this kind of relationship with them. We were close, friends, but it was never anything beyond that. We grew apart and they don't come up as thoughts/voices in this manner. They don't "haunt" me. My "masculinity" makes SO MUCH SENSE right now. The fact that it's so eerily juvenile sometimes and has this childish fascination with brutality. I was SHOWING OFF and hiding in plain sight! And I had such an ambivalent relationship with it. I loved and hated it at the same time. I was cruel and loving/affectionate at the same time. Completely blows my mind. I'd chat you up, hahaha. You're my type .

I'd say that admiration is the mental component of attraction. Attraction is also physical. I never allowed myself to have an erection when thinking of a man, but I had symptoms such as waves of heat and a racing heart. Moist and pink come to mind when I think about that feeling. Think about having a crush. You admire this person so much that you idealize them. You think that they are perfect for you, that your life is fixed now and will never be complete without them. This is love in infancy and is driven physiologically, "chemistry". When it's more mature, it's also about looking for intimacy, sharing your vulnerable self, and being partners for life. It's about feeling accepted and creating a home, a place where you can be yourself. Even if you grew apart and interact sporadically, you still think of them as someone special and precious. There is a longing for them and a certain kind of sadness that it didn't work out. It's especially shocking for me because I had these full blown platonic relationships with men I never even recognized. I though that this is how friendships work and I though that I'm a weird, overly intimate friend and I'm like that because of my childhood. That I was so desperate for attention that I don't even care if it's coming from a man, or a woman. I even flaunted my wife in one of my "friend's" face on one occasion and it haunted me for YEARS. I couldn't understand why I did that! I though that I was teasing him because I knew that he hated when couples held hands in public. I was jealous of him having so much success with women, I thought this was rivalry, but I never suspected that it was women were my rivals. I make much more sense to myself now, but it's still very difficult for me. I'm suspecting myself for really being gay and hating myself for it for whatever reason. I do love my wife and I can't even comprehend how well she's taking all of this. She probably suspected as much because she's been attracted to gay men before and she's also bisexual. Life is so weird.

I'm a bisexual, feminine, man raised by demanding parents in a hyper-masculine environment. I hate my own femininity. Over my adolescent years, I had 5 male friends that were not merely friends to me. I'm just starting to acknowledge the feelings I had for them. During my trip I realized that I'm not afraid the world in itself. I'm afraid of people's judgement. I'm also afraid of homelessness. I was always homeless. The only home I will have is the one I will create. Home is acceptance.

We just started watching shrek 2. We're 5 minutes in and I already know that it's the best couples' therapy session.

Home is acceptance.

Aaand I'm also bisexual. Everything suddenly makes much more sense.

This is the weirdest thing I have ever learned about myself. I modeled my adult self after a character called smuggler. Smuggler was an editor of a polish gaming magazine called cd-action that I used to read when I was a small kid. He used to reply to fans' letters in a section called action redaction. I remember reading a lot of that stuff when I was raising myself. Smuggler was a guy nobody could find, there were memes in that magazine about fans trying to meet him in the office, but he was a recluse and would never meet them. He even started spreading rumors that he does not exist, etc. Few years ago I heard that the head editor of that magazine came out and said that smuggler was his alter-ego. Today it struck me that probably many of the fan letters in that section were made up as well and I was using THAT as a basis for my adult self. I literally gave birth to someone else's figment of imagination. I learned that during today's LSD trip.

I'm better than ever, but still going through a lot of pain. At least I know where it's coming from and decided to take good care of myself. Me and my wife are mostly spared from the pandemic related panic because we were never into TV. My mother is getting on my nerves though, this situation is driving her nuts and she's crossing people's boundaries "for their own good". I'd say "fuck her", but I've been through my own childhood and I wouldn't wish it upon my potential sibling. The government decided to limit the amount of people allowed in shops, so getting food is a pain in the ass. They also forbid us from using public bikes so I had to give up on that in favor of my car. I really enjoyed riding to my new workplace. I love programming and I'm really happy when I'm not criticizing myself for being impractical and too abstract with my approach. The office is half empty and I'm pretty lonely, with nobody to talk to. I do like my new colleagues and one of them is a potential friend. How are you guys doing? Does it get more difficult in smaller towns?

I just picked that book and "randomly" opened it at chapter 12. Spot on.

@liamnewsom202 If you're trying to wake her up, you are effectively acting as if you knew her better than she knows herself. Try being her companion instead and letting her make her own choices, even if you disagree with them. She will not be on the exact same journey as you are, but paradoxically, this is the only way to feel less lonely. I would also like to share a sentence that I picked up somewhere and is helpful to me in difficult times: Remember that relationships are not here to make us feel good, but to make us more conscious. Have a great day and the rest of your life.

@silene I don't identify as a perfectionist, but I see that I'm sometimes possessed by this personality. It usually happens when I'm emotionally overwhelmed. Typical enneagram type 6 behavior.

Oh shit, I'm smiling!

This week was very tough on me. I'm mostly alone in the office and I'm working on an ambitious project. I'm very critical towards my own work and it makes me unhappy. I'm in a cycle of being content with what I wrote when I'm heading home and re-evaluating it later, to the point of re-designing what's already been done. While the designs are more universal, with cleaner separation, I'm beating myself up for not making enough progress. I'm thinking to myself that I'm re-inventing the wheel and I could have done it faster and better if I used existing libraries. The problem is that I have a vision for what I want to do and these libraries make design choices for me. I'm compensating these thoughts by reminding myself that I'm building a base for communicating with the rest of the system here so I need a solid networking layer with enough flexibility. In the meantime, I'm also beating myself up for not sticking to my promises. After biking home, I'm tired from all the thinking and not particularly interested in cooking, laundry and cleaning. I'm not preparing my meals in advance and not eating enough vegetables. I'm filling the calorie gap with carbs. Thankfully, I'm still stretching from time to time to relieve my neck/back pain. My sleep is shallow, but I managed to go to bead early yesterday. I gained about 6 kg over the past few months and I'm very displeased with this fact. My wife is kind enough to reassure me that she doesn't mind, but I think that all my effort to lose weight is lost. Emotionally speaking, I'm a mess. I see that I'm controlling towards my wife and I'm thinking that she's distancing herself from me. I don't know how she manages to stick around me when I'm having trouble with that myself.

@Gnosis What I was trying to say, is that I experience having something impure within me as perceiving the world conditionally. If I were struggling with myself, I could dislike the fact that there is red in Jesus' rainbow and miss his presence entirely. So the only one that can unconditionally love you, is you. If you don't, then no amount of cheerful winks are going to help you out of your predicament.

What would the experience of meeting an "unconditionally loving person" be, when something that needs to be purified comes up within you?

I'm so pissed!!! I just found out that my wife has been reading my journals and reacting to them! I'm trying to work through my beliefs about her looks and now she's all in tears. Hey @Nahm, I've been thinking about switching to encrypted journals on the PC. So far I've been writing them by hand, but that's not an option anymore. Do you think that there's more benefit to writing them that way? I'm also getting passionate about emacs which I use at work for programming. I love that editor, I'm gonna write on PC!

Thanks @remember. How are you doing lately? I made a commitment today that I will sit down every day during the week and journal privately. I will do that even if I can't think of anything to write, even just a few words to build a habit. I had so many emotions bottled up today. Got pissed at my wife and we even had a fight two days ago. I sat down and wrote for half an hour, probably 3-5 pages and I feel soooo much better. Being in the range of contentment instead of rage is a such a big difference! This needs to be my priority, especially because I'm learning at work so much and I used to use the computer to escape myself in my childhood.

I've been letting myself down lately. When I'm stressed out, I get into the work mode and I'm not taking proper care of my needs. I've been neglecting myself for the whole week. Today I'm teaching the kids. I wonder how will that work.

@Martin123 You're awesome, keep on rockin'.

I thought that as well, but it seems like people here understand how difficult it is and give each other space to explore, learn, etc. At least that's what I'm experiencing right now and for these past two days I haven't heard any of the stuff that would happen at my last work regularly (screaming at employees or downright degrading them). Yesterday I realized that I was so tired because I was in my headspace for the past two days and my emotions were bottled up. I started journaling and felt much more at ease. Couldn't contain myself yesterday. Why would I ever behave as if it was necessary to do so in the first place?

Funny should you mention emotional dreams. I just had one today. For whatever reason I was absolutely mad at my mother, totally enraged, throwing things, yelling, screaming and generally demolishing the place. I was acting this anger out because I wanted my father to help me calm down, but I was so mad that all I could do is just scream. My wife woke me up because I was moaning (screaming?) in my sleep.

I'm so tired when I get back home that I have zero energy left to think. Not thinking is so awesome. Just sitting in my belly like that. I'm so happy. As an added bonus, I started to ride a bike to work. Love it, even the fact that I got wet on my way back home twice!

Absolutely love the new workplace environment. People are relaxed and I'm actually interested in what I'm supposed to do for a change. Super excited for tomorrow.

First day at the new work, I'm excited and hopeful. The people seem genuinely nice.