The Timmy Manifesto, Version III

The more I think about this New Plan of mine, the more I realize it’s what I intended the Old Plan to be. A veritable statement of purpose, of self. I spent most of my youth looking for rules to live by. But, they were rules that restricted and repressed my emotions and actions. I intend to propose general guidelines that serve to inspire emotion and inspire action. Instead of putting on a coat, I intend to take off my pants.

There is to be no more emotional masochism. It is okay to feel sad. It is okay to feel depressed. Or angry. Or hurt. Or anxious. Or nervous. Or impatient. Or jealous. Or excited. Or happy. Or frustrated. It’s all okay until I take that emotion and turn it inward. To stab myself saying “How dare you feel that way!” or to cut myself and say “You are worth less because you feel this way.”

No. Emotions are just feelings. They exist. They have causes, but that doesn’t mean we should feel bad because an emotion has a cause. While the event and the feeling are definitely causally related, that doesn’t mean we have to treat the two the same way. No feeling should ever make us think we’re less of a person.

Emotional masochism leads to a series of negatives. There is to be no more “I can’t”. I’ve spent a lifetime creating excuses for myself, thinking I just “couldn’t” do something. I once said I’d never restore my foreskin, for reasons I probably pulled out of my ass. I’m restoring my foreskin now, and that fills me with pride. I once said I’d never do DDR. I forced myself to try it, and ended up loving it. I noticed a strange correlation in the past where the things I feared ended up being the things I enjoyed doing, whether I realized it at the time or not. I’m sure I once said I didn’t like being social. That’s changed, as well.

That’s another negative, “I don’t like that.” If something gives us a negative feeling, of course we won’t like it. But sometimes it’s merely our perspective that’s keeping us from something we COULD enjoy. The example foremost on my mind is exercise. My excuse used to be that I didn’t like exercise. And because I told myself I didn’t like exercise, I felt uncomfortable ever showing any positive emotion for it. But why didn’t I like exercise? I’ve come to realize that I never believed I’d be able to be physically strong. As such, exercise was a reinforcement of this judgement of myself. Removing the judgement (of myself) and seeing exercise as completely different has changed my perspective.

I am going to feel good about myself. That’s just how it’s going to be, what I decided, and what I’m bent on. I will not discount anything I do. I will let myself feel accomplished. I will let myself feel proud. I will go forth and do those things I “didn’t think I could do”, just to show myself that I can. I can.

We can do whatever we want. I used to get caught up in that statement, feeling bad because I didn’t think I “wanted” anything. The want part is almost secondary, the want comes with feeling accomplished. Over time, we’ll pick whatever has consistently given us the most fulfillment. It makes more sense to just say “We can do whatever.”

I have made progress, whether or not I fully see it. There’s been a hesitancy on my part to feel good about my progress, out of fear that I’ll regress. Our of fear that if I said how good I was, I wouldn’t be “allowed” to feel vulnerable again. I am changing. I am becoming better. I am triumphing, even as there lies many more triumphry to be had in the future.

This is my New Plan. This is my Plan. This is my Manifesto. I will continue to knock down the walls I built to protect myself. I will walk with my head high, knowing that I am attractive. I am intelligent. I am confident. I am resourceful. I am resilient. I am funny. I am caring. I am loving. I am loved. I have nice hair. I can spank computers. I am open-minded. I am accepting. I am sardonic. I am sexy. I am logical. I am emotional. I have beautiful eyes, hands, lips, and many other body parts. I am good at video games. I enjoy being outside. I am handy with my digital camera. I have good taste in music and movies. I can write poetry. I can write essays like nobody’s interest. I know math I will never, ever need to use. I can express myself well in text. I can hold a conversation, whether it be in person or on the phone. My opinion deserves to be heard. I matter. I am worth something.

I move forward with the knowledge of how much easier it is to break down walls once a couple have already been decimated. On the other side, I can see the outside of the fortress I built for my mind, and see what it is I was protecting myself from. It’s a scary world, but nothing I can handle it. I can handle the world. Yes. I can handle the world.

When I was in High School, I once heard someone say, “If I don’t know it now, I won’t know it in five minutes.” This was right before a test, and in that context, it made sense. But it is not a universal truth. There are tons of things I’ve learned in the span of five minutes. A thick page of a textbook. Five minutes? In five minutes, you can learn something, whether it be “Oh, so that’s what cramps during a girl’s menses means..” or discovering, “So I am capable of buying food at CCM.” Five minutes can lead to answers, which can lead to more questions. Which lead to more understanding.

When I first started writing on this site, I wanted to be an inspiration. I wanted to prove that males were more than all the things females accuse them of being. I wanted to try and find the answer, the series of statements that are the reason we live. The irony is that those were the things that kept me from initially changing. And only now that I’m more psychologically healthy and far from those initial conceptions am I able to really be those things. The end is the beginning. I feared I was changing into what I promised myself I’d never be. In reality, I’m changing into what I always wanted to be, but could never conceptualize.