*exam week*

Will get back on track soon :)

05- How to chase depression away

Today, I had a friend asking me if i had ever been depressed.
"I mean like it's beyond breaking down"

And that really made me think.
Have I really been so depressed that I went BEYOND breaking down?

For the past few months I had been feeling down here and there, crying till my eyes swelled and feeling miserable for a few days. But I had never gone Beyond that point. I realized that at the end of the day, I would start to pick myself back up again and look in the mirror and tell myself that I am indeed strong.

I used to think that I am depressed and weak. I am alone and no one would understand how I feel because I just don't how to make the words come out without blubbering like a whale. It's just that.. It's just.. blurgh.. bugh.. *sobs!* burghh...!!

But I am strong. I am able to pick myself up and see a direction in life. I know that I have great things to achieve and that I can always choose to occupy myself with great productive things (although actually doing productive things depends on my mood because I'm a lazy bun-bun. Haha)

So being the strong person I believe I am, I decided to give some advice to that friend of mine and luckily for me, I managed to make that person feel a little better despite going through some rocky roads. So here are some polished up modifications with regards to my ideas on how to chase those blues away!


1. Have a direction in life.

Ask yourself this: What do I want to be in the future? What are some great things that I want to accomplish that I can start slowly with? Don't go crazy mode on this and start with "I WANT TO BE A FAMOUS ROCKSTAR". That kind of thing is near impossible to achieve (unless you are absolutely persistent and you believe in your rockstar capabilities, then be my guest! )
Start with something simple like: I want to learn some video editing or some photography skills. That would totally look good on a resume.
Or something like: I want to learn latte art so I can make coffee in the shape of a peacock to impress my boyfriend.
Or maybe even: I want to draw something everyday to improve my skills slowly.
Tangible attainable things like these would definitely keep your head occupied with motivating activities that will make you excited to experience a new day of learning.

If you haven't seen the move rock star, I highly recommend that you do (:

2. Do what makes you happy

I know this totally sounds cliche but it's true. The things that are of interest to you will be constant reminders of what makes you happy and what defines YOU. Once again, don't be all crazy and start breaking the laws as an excuse to happiness. One does not have to rebel to be happy.
Take up a hobby like video games and guitar playing or hardware hacking. Find some cool things to be interested in and go for it! Don't be afraid of being judged. Maybe your friends would think that you are a total nerd because you enjoy going to museums to check out art exhibitions. Well.. shame on them for being judgmental! There are always communities and opportunities for you to nurture your interests and hobbies and you are never alone. Don't feel like the odd one out when you want to do things. There is always someone out there who does have the same hobby as you!

3. Give

This is one thing that always makes me happy when I feel down. Someone just came up to you asking for a stick of cigarette. GIVE. You see an old lady selling tissue paper near the MRT. GIVE. A frail old grandma genuinely looks like she needs to sit down in the train or bus (walking stick and all). GIVE. A bunch of students are standing on the sidewalks with a tin can asking for Red Cross donations. GIVE.
Heck, you don't even have to wait for such opportunities to arrive. You can even actively do it on your own. I donated two huge bags of stuff to the Salvation Army during New Year's Eve, after a really sad day I had experienced. And it really liberated me a little, giving me a sense that some burden had been lifted or something. It does make me feel better that someone out there somewhere will receive my bundle of love and appreciate it. Someone out there will have some nice clothes to wear thanks to me. Or that they will have a nice meal thanks to  me. If you are a "Sims" character and you have a meter that shows level of social compassion, level of depression, level of happiness, that social compassion meter and happiness meter will rise dramatically. And your depression meter will lower down even if it's a little. fo sho.

4. Company

This might be tough on some people who prefer to hide away in their rooms and lock themselves up, not wanting to talk to anyone. But once you find some company, things feel much lighter. It's great to have someone to talk to. To pout out and spill that baggage of emotions. However, do take into consideration to factor on privacy. Although it's tempting to just spill everything from A-Z, one should consider the feelings of others when one talks about others. You should not reveal nasty things about someone and bitch about them. That's not cool. Perhaps just rationalize your thoughts and think about what's really happening (unless that person is really a horrible person and beats you up or verbally abuses you, then yeah. take some action)
See, it's quite complicated because you don't want the negative energy to be leaked and spread across other people you come into contact to. (Like a toxic disease)
Company is great, but perhaps it would be best to keep the whale blubbering to a minimum and focus on getting yourself up and going.

5. Exercise 

I seriously cannot express how  much this helped. Refer to my previous post about endorphins to get a sense on how much I'm addicted to jogging. XD



I only have these suggestions in mind as of now since these are from my humble experience. Perhaps if I find some inspiration, I could add more.

I hope this helps anyone out there.

04- Friends!

So this week will be the last week of college for me.
At least in terms of lectures.. (I still have an essay and finals to tackle!)


And I am already seeing people taking selfies with each others and capturing the moments before they graduate and move on with life.

It is indeed scary. To let go of something so familiar..
The rush of getting to lectures on time.
Sitting next to your close pals and distracting each other during lessons.
Having lunch at various places around campus and just talking about everything.

I'm no longer going to have the privilege to do any of that soon because I will move on to the real world. No longer sitting down passively and listening to theories and stories our professors enlighten us with. No longer just writing essays and regurgitating what is being told. No longer taking exams and worrying about grades.

No... There are bigger things in life than a great GPA or excellent co-curricular activities that would look good in testimonials. It's a bigger rat race now. The rat race of the working world is going to be bestowed upon me. The real world. The great outdoors..

I have been very much sheltered under the comforts of my family and home. It scares me to have to face adulthood on my own.


But looking at it in that perspective is wrong.


Because there are people out there with the same predicament as me. And they are my friends.
Some may be more lost than I am while others definitely are going places and shine bright with their killer personalities. Some have great networks while others will take a long time securing their dream jobs, much like I will..

But I have faith that I will have the comfort of great company in the future. Even though we may not be able to meet each other around campus anymore, it's the conscious effort of keeping touch with them that provides one with the key to great opportunities.

Because friends are networks, you will be able to find that doors may open and close with their help and guidance.

So make a friend! It's never too late! (:

03- Gratitude

 Our greatest glory is not in never falling, 

but in rising every time we fall.

Confucius

So I passed by the great Confucius during my jog around the park(:

In order to pick myself up from yesterday's painful experience, I decided to dry my eyes, get a glass of water and head out to the beautiful parks near my home for a good, good run. Before I headed out though, my ears were just tingling with negative energy early in the morning from my mother's bickering. Telling me about how ignorant and un-filial I am. About how I am not good enough. Telling me the same things I have heard since I was 18. I used to get affected by them and try very hard to please her. But it ends up back to square one when she decides to take out her anger on me. I guess everyone has these AnA monsters in them at some point.

Thus, I decided to just let it slip my ear drums and let go of the negative things she has been feeding me over the years. I will just put on a straight face and not let her words affect me and I will not let my monster get in my way. So I went out and ran.

I ran along a canal, through a park connector, to Jurong Lake Park and finally ended up at the magnificent Chinese Garden, where I decided to take a leisurely stroll instead. And man was it GOOD. It feels great to release my endorphins and just feel happy naturally! I took about an hour and went home feeling grateful that I live within the vicinity of such beautiful natural flora and fauna (I usually see pretty birds and huge lizards around here). I'm grateful to have the health and energy to be able to run and exercise. I'm grateful to have this alone time for myself and feel calm.

I'm grateful for endorphins! With high endorphin levels, we feel less pain and fewer negative effects of stress. Endorphins have been suggested as modulators of the so-called "runner's high" that athletes achieve with prolonged exercise.

So yes, guys. When you feel depressed, go out there and run! Run fast, jog slow.. Run on a treadmill or be one with nature like how I do it. It really does take your mind away from the grudges or negative emotions from the day before.

Maybe other forms of activities besides running could be yoga? You know what, let me make a list of activities to do to feel better after a particularly stressful day!



1. Jogging! This is my favorite because it really makes you feel physically healthier, and kind of makes me mentally feel like the negative toxins are released!

2. Yoga. I'm no expert at this but if you are willing to learn, I'm sure it would be a fruitful way to focus your mind on your muscle stretching tasks!

3. Pilates. Similar to yoga! But it looks more vigorous to me.

4. Zumba! or any type of dancing for that matter. I'm not sure if zumba is still the trend among ladies in the 30s and 40s but it really looks like a fun way to work out!

5. End it off with a good Guided Meditation coupled with aroma therapy. I recommend guided meditations from "TheHonestGuys" from YouTube. The narrator's voice is really soothing in my view and it drifts me off to a calm state of mind. I would even drift off to sleep!


So that is my list of things to do to release some good energy and keep your mind away from past bitterness!


Continuing on with my day,
He and I made up after being able to cool down for the night and we made plans for dinner and ice-cream. Thankfully, everything went smoothly and we enjoyed the rest of our night together before I had to go to school and he has to go to work the next day. He even surprised me by telling me that he bought a pair of new running shoes for me! (He knows that the rubber parts at the soles of my shoes were falling apart)
It was really heartwarming to have a good 'date' and a cute surprise after our mishap. It really made me feel loved and that is of course another thing I am grateful of! To have him in my life to make things better and make me smile despite the hurt was great enough for me to know he is the one I will treasure.

So I am grateful for a lot of things today and I have learnt from Confucius (whom I passed by during my stroll around Chinese Garden!) that it's okay to fall. It's okay if things are rough and rocky in the beginning. Just don't give up and keep getting back up and things will be better. (:

02- Suicide

I have set a new rule: I plan to write one post each day (or every other day at least). Why?
Because my fingers are itching to write and pour out my feelings. So far.. Progress has been bad.

Today, AnA the monster had taken upon herself to show up and blurt out nasty pent up feelings to someone. It made him angry and things got pretty ugly. We had our second half of the day ruined when the first half was going perfectly alright.

AnA was self-centred, annoying and bitchy. She thought about her feelings without thinking about how it would hurt the feelings of another. She was erratic, spontaneous and dim-witted. Eager to say her point out loud and insist it was right. I regretted letting her take the lead and caused a domino effect of painful consequences.

Illustration of what ANA looks like in my mind. 

...
And there I was... crying like a baby for four straight hours. (my eyes are still sore)

Things just get out of hand in the end and everything just felt like an Indonesian soap opera with tears and walk-aways..






I know it sounds like a horribly bad start towards a happy peaceful journey..
I know it sounds like the end of the road for me...

But contrary to popular belief..

break-ups, bad arguments, painful mistakes  will NOT BE THE END OF THE WORLD

I used to think that way, though..
Every break up I went through, every bitter fight with mom or dad, every epic argument..
It used to make me feel so depressed that I wanted to just end my life.
"Cut my wrist as black my eyes" as Hawthorne Heights says it..
I tried it all. Slit wrist (got scars to prove em). popped pills. Starved myself. Tried to stay awake (the last one was the most epic fail.. I can never stay up late!)
I almost died to be honest. The monster in my head told me there was no reason for me to continue if I had been such a useless mess-up.



but for some reason, I Lived.
I lived on and saw the world and realized that things really do get better.
I realized that there are things that invisible beings up there do that we don't understand that eventually work for us. Life is just an endless roller coaster and no matter how low it takes you, the cabin WILL go up again.
It's hard.. very hard.. to pick yourself up and move on. But it would definitely be a better decision than suicide.

So during that moment of grief in the evening as I watched him walk away and take the cab..
I had to stagger myself to the stoplight and cross the road to my house. Huge buses were right in front of me. Some of them were seriously fast.

AnA got me to picture how it would be like if I were to quickly jump infront of one bus and imagine my limbs decapitating and a pool of my blood and splatters of them all over the road. It would have been an ugly sight.
But I eventually managed to shut AnA up and cross the stoplight safely. It felt good though.
When I got home, things cooled down with him and we managed to say what we feel properly (after all, I have always been just a typer.. Not much of a talker, me)


It felt good to be bathing in hot water and looking at a pool of soap suds instead of a puddle of blood.
It felt good to insert a toothbrush in your mouth and brush away the pieces of meat stuck from your lunch this afternoon instead of inserting needles into the veins of your wrist and gas masks on your mouth.
It felt good the hear the baby noises my nephew makes at home instead of hearing the sirens of the ambulance.
It felt good to hear myself cry... Instead of hearing your loved ones cry..


So this is it. My journey towards happiness is a rough one. Definitely was not a great start I intended for it to be. But I did learn a couple of lessons.
Be sure of what's the right thing to do and say. It's hard, for any human being to be great at this but I am willing to try.
And I know I will never do anything to hurt or disappoint my family. My family is forever. They are the most important things to me and it will always be that way.

and to anyone out there trying to hold on, Never let suicide by the answer no matter how tempting it gets.

01- It Starts Now

Today, I have made a massive life realization. 

I have been a walking time bomb. A one-man angry mob. A tiny jalapeno nobody thought would be spicy but when you pop that innocent-looking jalapeno in your mouth, you suddenly acquire dragon breath. You get the drift. I have just been angry.. Angry at the world, angry at the people around me. Angry at myself. 

And it has been limiting me from my potential to grow. I know it has.
I miss out on a lot of things because I proclaim myself to be anti-social. I tell myself that I am too negative to be around with. I blame a lot of things on my anxiety and depression. My lack of interest in joining any school activities. My lack of interest in having lunch with people. My lack of interest in sitting next to anyone in class. And I blame myself for being so small and afraid. I have been afraid for far too long.. I have been repressed for far too long. I have been ANGRY for far too long. 

But it has to stop. 

I don't want to go on living my life in fear. And I certainly don't want to go on picking a fight with the entire world. I used to think it was me against the world:
Lynn the teenage rebel. The fighter. The anarchist who would gladly show a scowl or two to random strangers who would step on my toes (sometimes literally!) I may have by anxieties but when my rage rages on, I would gladly speak my mind. 

As my taste in music grew more intense and angry as I grew older, my negativity grew more intense as well.  
I would sing along to the emotional lyrics of Good Charlotte when I was 10 years old. "cause I'm young and I'm hopeless!! I'm lost and I know this! I'm going no where fast that's what they said!!" I used to be the goth/emo girl.

And I would jam the songs of Arch Enemy at the age of 20.  Those words full of strength and character. I used to be called the metal chick.

We walk this earth
With fire in our hands
Eye for an eye
We are nemesis

We are with you
Countless vicious souls
Fight, fighting for freedom
United, we stand, we stand

We are a legion
Voice of anarchy
This is revolution
Creating new disorder 

(nemesis: Arch Enemy)

But I'm 22 now and things have changed. I am no longer in a metal band, nor do I aspire to be in one anytime soon. I have a loving boyfriend whom I have been with for over a year. (and been friends with for over 3 years) I have a great family who loves me no matter what. I am going to finish college soon and I'm going to start a new life with a new career. 

I can no longer be the angry teenage rebel screaming about anarchy and fire. I cannot be angry at the world. I cannot be negative and show my vulnerability. 

It's a difficult feat because ALL my life I have been living a silent angst in my heart. The toxic combination of both anger and anxiety.(I shall call it "AnA" if I ever have to use this term again) 

For the sake of my elderly parents and my boyfriend.. I have to mellow down and take it easy. I need to learn anger management and I need to cope with my anxiety. For the betterment of my future, I need to be confident and sociable. I need to grow. 

Which is why I am documenting my journey towards happiness. 

I will not procrastinate because it starts now. I cannot decide upon it tomorrow and assume my negativity will wash away overnight. "AnA" had been a monster dwelling in my heart for the longest time ever. It's time I tame the AnA monster inside me and treat it well. This negativity monster has really been affecting my relationship, causing a lot of misunderstandings and arguments. I can no longer bear to let this monster affect me and my loved ones any longer. Which is why I need change.

And it starts. Now.

I hope this will be a fruitful journey full of learning experiences and advice which I can share with the world and even show my kids when I'm older. 

So what's going to happen is that I will devote one day of the week (preferably Saturday) towards a new topic that will be able to deal with negative vibes and encourage positive vibes in. The purpose of the blog is to let in the good and shoo out the bad by talking about first hand experiences and providing epiphanies towards positivity in  my everyday life. 

So my epiphany for today would be to start now. If you want something to be done and for it to be done right, START NOW. Attempt it yourself and don't hesitate. It may seem scary and uncertain but it's absolutely exhilarating when you just "go for it". 

So yes. 
May this be a start of a beautiful journey.