Timmy Manifesto IV.

Of a rather quiet resolution I made a while ago. When, I’m not entirely sure. Sometime after New Years. Of something I was told to try two years ago. “Why don’t you spend an entire day being nice to everybody?” Just an example, the point isn’t specifically social etiquette. The point is expressing positive emotions.

For years, I simply haven’t felt comfortable expressing positive emotions. I’d disclaimer myself, “This feels corny.” I’d humble myself, “I don’t want to have a big head about myself.” I’d flat out feel uncomforable, “I don’t want anybody to make fun of me.”

If whatever you’re currently doing isn’t work for you, try something else. So I decided to try letting myself feel positive emotions. This endeavour was a combination of things. Catching those self-disclaimers and apologies, and having a follow-up to let myself feel. Take my physical self. To swat any thoughts of, “Oh, somebody might not like that picture.” or “People will think I’m vain.” and to simply allow myself to feel positive emotions rather than all those negative ones all the time. It’s almost like a fear that the negativity will go away. That if I’m overconfident, I’ll never recognize how flawed I am. Probably just a matter of perfection, never thinking anything good enough.

I am good enough.

It’s watching how I describe myself. One critical rhetoric trick is to put all my issues in the past tense. I was shy. I was apathetic. I was feeling weak. To put all the negativity aside and bring to the front the good things that have happened. To talk of the strength I’ve been able to gain, of the confidence that is still growing. No doubt, talk of my issues will pop up now and then, but they should only be at the end of a lengthy, in depth conversation where the focus is the progress I’ve already made.

And really, why should my so-called issues be in the forefront? Because they aren’t. There’s an internal dialogue over the challenges ahead. The mindset is more of, “How will I tackle this?” as opposed to, “WTF’s wrong with me again?” A drastically huge difference there, folks. I’ll never forget that feeling when I was told to seek therapy. Feeling completely and utterly helpless, not even knowing anything about myself. A stark contrast from now to then, two and a half years ago.

Let me tell you what being The One feels like. (No, it’s not like being in love.) The basis is awareness. Self-awareness, absolutely, but also external awareness. Harnessing the perception I’ve always had but never fully actualized. I’m not really sure if everybody’s capable of the perception I have. Some people just seem.. dense. I no longer believe everybody has the same emotional potential. I’ve been repressed most of my life not because I had no emotions, but because they were so strong. Some people have no emotional pulse even when they’re flying all over the place externally. I digress.

Being The One is being calm with yourself. It’s walking and absorbing scenes before you as both a participant and observer. To be in a conversation with one or more people and notice the emotional implications of things said, of your instinctive emotional reaction to things said, of the difference between how you feel and your response, and the innuendo implied between people. There is no focus. Focus implies specificity. It’s openning your bandwidth. I can’t say it’s something I ever planned or intended of myself, but it’s definitely something I’m enjoying.

I used to feel only paranoia from people, in broad social situations. At the time I thought I was being judgemental. I told myself to give people a chance, and to stop being so introverted. I’ve come to realize, in fact, that those people really sucked! No wonder I didn’t want to spend time with them! People I trust end up being people who put me at ease. Gee, what a surprise! I just have incredible instincts about people.

Such irony, when I get accused of having a bad memory and being spacy at times. Heh. Maybe it’s a balance? : D As I’ve said before, I don’t read/hear words. I feel them. I reconstruct events based a lot on emotional interactions and states. Isn’t that how most people are? We do remember things that have a high emotional quotient, anyway.

But, the point. If my third manifesto was a declaration of the acceptance of my emotions, then this fourth manifesto is an encouraging of positive emotions. You can only accept your negative emotions as they are for so long before it’s time to try and cultivate a happy brain. *smirks* I glanced at my second manifesto, as I had forgotten what it was about. I quickly remembered. A doctrine of taking control of your life, one small step at a time. I don’t believe I ever explicitely stated it, but that’s the feeling I got from it. See what I mean about feeling words? This is how I have an uncanny ability to take large amounts of text and reduce it into a few sentences. Well, sometimes. Hard if the text isn’t actually saying anything. *smirks*

It’s a matter of emotional maintenance. It’s foolhardy to believe we are victim of our own emotions. To victim stance is to resign yourself to your situation, your circumstances, rather than try to change those circumstances. Cause and effect. Determinism. Only a fool believes emotions are random. Even on a chemical basis, there’s a reason. You know how if you GOTO a doctor and say, “It hurts when I go like this!”, the doctor will say, “Then don’t do that.”

There’s a reason nobody likes someone that does nothing but bitches, moans, and complains. In some parts, they’re called “trainwreck diaries”. Simple laws of physics dictate that if you do two similar actions, two similar outcomes will happen. Though, I wasn’t intending to get into a lecture on identifying emotionally harmful behavior and rectifying it with healthy alternatives. I’ve digressed again.

There’s a difference between being a slave to routine, and cultivating a reliable pattern of things you’ll have to do anyway. If my mood swaggers, the first thing I do is a Me-Check. Think of Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs. Take care of your basic needs before anything else. When I get depressed, guess what, I stop eating, sleeping, and showering. If I’m stalling about leaving the house, I take stock of the little things I’ll have to do before I have to leave. By the time I dress myself and do some other mandatory things, I stop feeling as bad.

The point is to create positive situations for yourself. What’s that phrase said about the Devils? “They give themselves a chance to win every night.” If you’re nothing but bad habits, no wonder you’re depressed. If you berate yourself, no wonder you never feel good about yourself. It’s easy to be diswayed by the delayed action that positive thinking has. Affirmations take time to believe. They take positive circumstances and situations. What matters is when those really positive things that you’d previously feel too corny to feel, you can eventually celebrate with a smile and no apologies.

It’s not an overnight thing. We can no more love ourselves overnight than we can anybody else. But if we take it day-by-day, bother to emphasis those positives we create (regardless of number) rather than pounding out the negatives, eventually, it can feel real. To think it’s a matter of simply “being happy” is to miss the point. Emotions don’t exist in a vacuum. They are reactions to what is around us, and inside us. Change a few words you say to yourself, add a few healthy coping devices, and maintain balance with all the factors in our lives, and anything is possible. What are you reacting to?

Manifesto II.

Manifesto III.