Existential crisis 👌

 I'm currently finishing my first semester of college. 

 I'm currently finishing my first semester of college. 

 I'm currently finishing my first semester of college. 

 I'm currently finishing my first semester of college. 

Woah

Anyways,

Today was the last class of my required religion class called "Problem of God", to my surprise, we don't only talk about theology. My mind was drifting a lot today; I mostly thought about drama, the amount of work I have to do, the pages I have to write, and how excited I am to have a break from school. 

We talked about the notion of "being yourself". Something that's constantly promoted especially within our generation.  I mean, I hear it all the time and feel like I've always done a pretty good job. I'm at the point where I feel confident in my style, my interests, and most of my feelings, and I definitely try to be honest about anything and everything. But today, when confronted with this topic. I didn't feel like any of those examples were enough. 

In came the existential crisis: am I not myself? will I ever be fully myself?

Is there even such a thing as a self?

short answer: yes

long answer: no

conclusion: I have no clue

I believe that this depends on how you define your "self". There's the expressive self. Here's mine: I make music, I love art, I love philosophy, I secretly love musicals, I love having true friends, Sometimes I'll wear the weirdest pieces of clothing cause I think it looks cool then regret it, I stick up for what I believe in, and I try to be positive but sometimes I'm an absolute bitch. I have brown hair, I'm 5'7.5 but say I'm 5'8 and sometimes feel 5'10. and the list goes on... but, in expressing that, I feel like I consider myself someone who accomplishes the "be yourself".

On the contrary, these are all decisions, passions, and behaviors that have been cultivated by every experience, interaction, sight, sound, feeling, or anything that I have consumed and perceived. And after that, all of these perceptions and consumptions are products of society (people who have laid these out before me).  

Woah

Incredibly nihilistic. 

Self is another word like love, trust, or good, that just can't be defined. Even worse, it can't be categorized. You can't pick and choose the things that make up a "self". It's kind of like a general consensus. But it's falsifiable; we find new attributes, we change our behavior, and this won't stop, even if you've reached the point where you're like "I'm completely myself". 

It's uncomfortable to think that it's impossible to achieve that salvation in your life, but at the same time, it's beautiful. All the interactions, knowledge, passions, etc., that you've collected in your brain since you were a baby add up to create how you interact with the present. 

The sucky part about that is that to gain that, you also have to lose some things. Think about babies. They don't get what they want, and they cry. They get hurt, and they cry. They fit a ball in a hole, and they are happy. Babies express their "self" unconditionally. Whereas as we grow up, we're taught to repress these emotions or learn to live with consequences whether they're stupid ones like judgment, or beneficial ones like, I don't know, jail if you stab someone?

We grow more and more conscious of the systems in place in society, whether it's the normalized social things, prejudices, ideals of success and accomplishment, or generalized ideas of being "good" vs "bad". I mean take accomplishments, for example, a baby could fit a ball in a hole and feel like they're the best person ever. I, on the other hand, finish a 10-page essay after reading a 400-page book and it's not satisfactory; I always know there's more for me to accomplish, "better" things, things that are deemed worthy of celebration. And even when that's done, I can do better, I can push myself. And its accomplishments are seen as accomplishments by society and are something that I've learned, through other people, that can be considered an accomplishment. Even in how we behave, there's this common idea of "it's the right thing to do" or "there's a beneficial purpose in acting said way". But ultimately you've learned that this is "right" or "beneficial". 

Why are we so focused on finding an end to experiencing things? 

I'm not sure. 

To be honest, I'm really sad about the ending of this semester. I really loved this class and especially my professor. I love when my teachers make me think. I love when a teacher makes me question everything especially when I feel comfortable with not finding a conclusion. 

So that's what I will say: I don't know if there is such a thing as "being yourself" and I am totally comfortable with fostering this existential crisis. 

The City Left Me before I Left It

I’m back in DC… Again… after a wonderful return to my home&heart New fricken York.

I saw friends the first couple days I was back, but I mostly was excited to just be in my space again, with my family. It was so peaceful and sweet. 

Something about the city just makes me anxious now. I don’t know if it’s anticipating seeing a familiar face or embarrassing interaction, but it kind of reassures me that it’s good that I got out of NYC for university. I think Ive outgrown it for the time being.

On my last full day in New York, I went upstate with a friend of mine. We kept making jokes that we’d get a matching tattoo that said “11/27/22 BEST DAY EVER”, but, in all seriousness, I honestly wish I had something more tangible to appreciate this day. 

I love upstate New York. Specially Woodstock and its neighboring towns. Woodstock, yes cause I’m a classic rock-groupie + nostalgia-junkie, but mostly cause I find a bit of comfort knowing I won’t know anyone where I am, especially when I’m comfortable with an area. As I’m exploring the world, this is one of the few places I could see myself growing old in. It moves slowly, unlike the city. I feel like I can keep up.

I’ve been finding it a little discouraging but also useless to pursue my art as a career. I love music, I love other formats of art, and I will continue to practice all of these for the rest of my life, but my sureness in pursuing these as a career just separates me from my love for music, etc.

I’ve mentioned this before, but there are a few reasons why. I get incredibly anxious when releasing music. The process of releasing music easily separates me from my initial goals which are to explore my talent and basically, just create a piece that is true to me and that I love. It just turns into worrying about numbers, listens, and all that lame shit. Another reason is that so many people are making music these days, as it’s become incredibly accessible to not only everyone (which is amazing) but to people with social media platforms that are trying to suck every possible opportunity out of it through multiple expressive mediums. 

It smashes the little artist. 

Although a few examples of these people are completely well-deserved, this whole situation just reveals how tedious it is for us, the media consumers, to see a new song release every time they swipe. Which inevitably, leads to the ignoring of these advertisements. I’m so guilty of it too but, in releasing my new song, I've been conscious of the growing weakness of being an independent artist on social media.

While I was upstate, we walked into somewhat of an antique market. There was a live band and just a bunch of older people dancing. Carelessly. There was even a couple, dressed in matching plaid shirts, dancing as if no one else were around them- enthralled by only one another. It made me feel light in my shoes.

Suddenly, a woman came up to me, without hesitation, asking if she’s seen me before. Her name was Viola, I had never met her before. We got to talking about how in love I am with this area, and its energy. She then told me she also lived in New York and spent most of her time in the Lower East Side - somewhere I find myself most days and nights. 

I asked her, “Why did you leave?”

And she said, “Well, the city left me before I left it.” And shrugged.

How could I relate to someone so much. As a fellow artist, feeling so unsatisfied with the environment I find myself in, that memento hit me like an 18-wheeler on a highway. 

I couldn’t stop thinking, and can’t stop thinking, about that comment. If I love my craft, is it the environment that’s hurting me? Has New York left me? 

I will say one thing, Art is dying in New York. Not completely, but it is. There’s a lack of identity in the artwork being made. There’s no urge for personality. And even at that, our generation is fed so much of that impersonal artwork, that our cognition is bored!!!

Expressiveness is important, but is social media aiding human’s expressive nature? Or deteriorating it? 

The reason I bring up New York is that it’s the hub of this catastrophe. The clubs, the restaurants, the stores, the shows; why wouldn’t any 20sum-year-old person want to live there. Specifically the downtown, a place known for inhabiting some of the world's best-struggling artists. 

Maybe it's the struggle that's gone. There's "art" but it's missing something. It's missing agony and emotion because surely the production of art and fashion is still there and heavily accessible, it is just not the same.