As I reflect the past several years of my life (which I have been doing quite a bit lately and maybe I am going through an introspective phase in my life), but I found myself consistently feeling depressed, emotionally and even physically drained, guilty, and just gut wrenchingly…sad. Then, out of the blue last evening while taking my evening shower after the gym, I realized that this is okay. They are just passing emotions and thoughts. The key is, I just have to allow them to simply pass through me and learn to not let them consume me alive, as it have been for such a long time. Constantly gripped with fears, insecurities, doubts, self-induced let-downs, and frustrations, it is no wonder I have been so depressed.

It is okay to fail. Life is not meant to be all about success. I pondered about the word and definition(s) behind “success”. It is very subjective in that it is defined on an individual basis, yet we tend to strive to be like everybody else and/or those who we deem to be “better” or “superior” than us, whether it is intellectually, physically, spiritually, emotionally, financially, career-wise, and so on. Is this a cowardly perspective on success in that I fear success, thus I rather not strive for it? Absolutely not, and I say this with conviction. Rather, I am redefining (for myself) the ideas, the notions and philosophies behind success and failure.

I find myself oddly at peace with the reality (not just on a conceptual basis), but actual reality that it is absolutely okay to fall down over and over again as long as I keep finding the inner strength to pick myself up again, continuing to dust the painful remnants off, and move forward, all the while learning and taking in every life experiences that comes my way (the good, the bad, and everything in between). I have been so hard on myself that, ironically, instead of staying disciplined, I ultimately lead myself to self sabotage all the time.

There is something strengthening, liberating to be more self aware; to look within myself and realize that I am just growing; that pain and all its encompassing depressions, the pitfalls and failures, they are all meant to be part of our growing. Sure I’m challenged beyond belief at times, but I find that I am my own worst enemy and I am my own biggest challenge. The question is, do I choose to falter from the challenges or face them head on and grow from them?

Until the day I take my last breath, I am continuously learning, making mistakes, learning from those mistakes, falling down frequently, but also celebrating accomplishments and success (defined within my own terms and expectations), and keeping in mind: everything is okay.

Is it possible to transform the idea of “failure”; the word “failure” itself? Transform it by not allowing failure(s) to ruin our lives or discourage us, instead strengthen us? How else would we know our strengths without our failures?

For me, it literally boils down to the very last hour, the last minute, the last second, the last breath I take before I finally fall completely asleep. My self-induced battle with various addictions, with ego-driven synergy behind it all, my own misery drives me a bit mad, yet I trudge on…albeit wearily, my soul diffused quite a bit, frustrated and angry and simply tired, I still trudge on. I move forward. What use is there to fall backwards, to reflect on the past or even occupy myself thinking about the prospects of the future. The key, I believe, is to at least attempt to engage my consciousness, my being into the present moment; whether the present moment evokes pure emotional pain or absolute ecstasy, my goal is to be fully present nevertheless, stay within the present moment, and sustain it as much as I can. However, the conditioned mind, the ever present ego strains my energy and I, honestly, fail miserably at times to do just this. I find myself ever so preoccupied with the past and I do find myself wondering about the future, and when I introspect on this conflict, I realize the pettiness, the ignorance, the uselessness of it all…why have I become so conditioned to the point that I cannot live in the present moment?

Day by day. Hour by hour. Even seconds becomes a challenge for me. The urges, the compulsive aspect of my addictions, the emotional/physical/mental destruction that ensues, how frightening it is to know that all of these are constructed, created, conjured, and thought up completely from the confines of my own mind. How scary it is to acknowledge that everything that conspires in my life is a manifestation and reflection of my thoughts, my own goddamn mind.

There is a saying that we are our own worst enemy. We create our own misery. We interpret reality, the world, our lives through the distorted lens we call our “mind” and, yet, many of us do not take the effort to acknowledge this handicap. I live through illusions, I continue to live life daily in a semi-conscious level and I feel horribly stagnant, spiritually and intellectually. If happiness, harmonious balance, peacefulness is inherent within us, why then is it almost impossible to tap into such a state for an extended period of time? Everything, everybody, every moment is fleeting, we live in a constantly changing world and, yet, I find myself stagnant…stuck…emotionally immobile. Why? What is it that I am not accepting?

My alcoholism continues to pervade my life and continues to be a huge hurdle. Probably the biggest hurdle that continues to exist in my life. How and will I ever relinquish this problem?

The contradiction that I live is that I do not like the feeling of loneliness, yet I still promote a lifestyle of loneliness because I suppose it’s my way of guarding my ego, my heart in a strange, twisted way. I think I figured as long as I keep myself detached to a certain extent and not allow anybody to get too close to me, I’m still in control. Ironically, this cannot be further from the truth, obviously. I do not want to live in an illusory world, but I am…

The greatest enemy is our own perceptions, my every own ego. The more control I think I have, the less control I really have and, eventually, I hang myself (figuratively).

The Ego, she has all the good tricks up her sleeves.

As Krishnamurti has encouraged us, “Be the Observer” of the mind. I shall observe my own Ego. I want to be a free person, to awake from this long, prolonged, miserable, self-loathing dream.

I refuse to allow the Ego to continue to control me through my own fears, insecurities, anger, impatience, anxiety, depression, low self-esteem, negativity, loneliness, emotional dysfunction, etc.

The saying goes >>> The biggest con that she has ever done is to make you believe she is your best friend. You never think to look inside yourself to look for your worst enemy.

Old patterns, old habits, recurrent cycles and problems >>> manifestations of the EGO

Insanity is doing the same old thing over, over, and over again and expecting/hoping for different results. This is madness, the working of an insane mind.

I have been simultaneously trying to free my consciousness of thoughts and allowing thoughts to simply run through me…this act is contradicting each other, thus, I have been feeling quite conflicted and confused. Frustrated, a bit.

“Truth is a pathless land” (Krishnamurti).

I have been grappling with this philosophical perspective, rigorously trying to figure out what this means AND I also have been trying to really understand this; not just merely and superficially analyze/concretize this specific point of view. It is inspiring, these words, because to ascertain that my “truth” cannot be found by following a certain decree, dogma, religion, spiritual path, words of the wise/guru, books, etc. I can only come to see the truth within me and only through myself. This implies independence from everything and everybody external to myself…but aren’t I being influenced by Krishnamurti? Or am I simply being motivated to move into myself for once in my life?

Does my mind view Krishnamurti as my “guru”? My spiritual savior? Or am I truly doing real work on my own? I intentionally have not been reading too much of his material because I want to be able to come to my own realization without instructions, influence, the effect of his words. After all, Krishnamurti encouraged us to think for ourselves, to dig as deeply as one can; to challenge ourselves immensely and to not give up on ourselves because to do so would mean we’re giving up on our very essential nature.

The more I observe silently other people around me, I see more and more clearly the subtle misery of which they all seem to live in, perpetuating their own misery cycle, living in a cloud of illusory, ego-driven unhappiness. Everybody seems to live inside their own heads, creating a life based on the inner dialogues and thoughts their mind have incessantly created for them; it’s almost as if we’re living our lives to merely appease our Ego. We derive our sense of worth and sense of happiness largely through superficial means if one really, truly think about it. We tell each other and try to comfort each other by saying we love one another and care for each other…but…do we really? How do we love another when majority of us cannot truly love ourselves? The fact that this world is in such disarray, chaos, negativity, violence, misery, depression and so on, isn’t this a very clear indicator and proof that our internal conflict is reflected and manifested externally, hence this world being in the state that it is???

Krishnamurti adamantly pointed out that if we cannot transform and change ourselves from within, we can NEVER change the world, anything external from us. Everything has to start from within yet we concentrate so much on the external gains, the external means to everything, the external outcome. Everybody seeks happiness yet most of us are extremely unhappy. Why??? So, wouldn’t it make sense to change/alter our course in life? To really question, investigate, inquire, explore, delve deeply (not superficially) our own mind, our motives, intentions, perspectives, opinions, drives, and become more open to other possibilities? Alternative means? I believe most of us limit ourselves because we are bound by our own mind created fears, insecurities, doubt, negative emotions, etc.

(continued from Krishnamurti) : “So there is this tremendous energy to answer the question: why is there this loneliness? I have rejected ideas, suppositions and theories that it is inherited, that it is instinctual. All that means nothing to me. Loneliness is `what is’. Why is there this loneliness which every human being, if he is at all aware, goes through, superficially or most profoundly? Why does it come into being? Is it that the mind is doing something which is bringing it about? I have rejected theories as to instinct and inheritance and I am asking: is the mind, the brain itself, bringing about this loneliness, this total isolation? Is the movement of thought doing this? Is the thought in my daily life creating this sense of isolation? In the office I am isolating myself because I want to become the top executive, therefore thought is working all the time isolating itself. I see that thought is all the time operating to make itself superior, the mind is working itself towards this isolation”.

“Now the problem is: can thought realize that whatever it does is limited, fragmented and therefore isolating and that whatever it does will be thus? This is a very important point: can thought itself realize its own limitations? Or am I telling it that it is limited? This, I see, is very important to understand; this is the real essence of the matter. If thought realizes itself that it is limited then there is no resistance, no conflict; it says, “I am that”. But if I am telling it that it is limited then I become separate from the limitation. Then I struggle to overcome the limitation, therefore there is conflict and violence, not love”.

January 9th: If I impose something on thought, then there is conflict.

Every single thought is based on “memory”. In discussion with myself, I realize that “loneliness” is created by our thoughts.

If I have to run after it, it is not love.

8:31 PM:
What is implied in loneliness for me? Loneliness exist because of my attachments. I realize now that there has always been extreme attachment to “images” of what I perceived as love (in reality, they were images of pleasure, attachments, of comfort, desire, etc, not “love“).

What does it mean to be lonely, for me? What thoughts surround the notion of loneliness? For me, words such as insecurity, fear, rejection, isolation, internal conflict/struggle, ongoing battle with my Ego, all of this encompasses the word “loneliness” for me.

I am beginning to notice that by battling my Ego and trying to destroy it, I am essentially destroying myself because I am my Ego and vice versa. I am not separate from my Ego. I know there has to be a way to dissolve my Ego, however. What is behind this motive? To get rid of the feeling of loneliness and continued sorrow and suffering? Yes…that is why I have been diligently trying to rid my Ego, but I am perhaps going about it the wrong way.

Is there a wrong way? A right way?

I’m confused.

Today marks Day Eight of sobriety.

So, it is my very own thoughts derived from my own mind that are creating loneliness for me. Loneliness is not inherent, it is not instinctual according to Krishnamurti. Thoughts are always fragmented, isolating, limiting, and perhaps ego-driven. All thoughts are based on memory (I’m obviously reiterating what Krishnamurti has pointed out).

I’m trying to have all of this soak into my brain. I’m trying to figure out how to process all of this and ingest it wholly.

So many images
So many familiar faces
The same old experiences
The accumulation of 29 years of my life
All wrapped up in my head–
Is it a wonder why I feel haunted?

I am inquiring. Investigating. Self analyzing. Questioning: what are my motives, where do my thoughts stem from, why do I harbor so many fears, what kind of fears do I harbor, who am I, what or who is my Ego, what is my truth??? How do I separate reality from illusions? Inside looking outward, they both look intertwined. How do I go about weeding through the illusions to see more clearly my Truth? Why and how has it been obscured? Obscured from layers and layers of my thoughts…

What has been challenging for me to fully grasp is the fact that one cannot search for the truth; truth comes to us when we are ready to receive it. Truth is within us…so why the hell is it so hard to see it? The question of the century.

THE PSYCHOLOGICAL REVOLUTION.
I SHALL NEVER FEAR THE TRUTH, I MUST EMBRACE IT.

So I am prompted through my own self investigation to ask myself: what are my attachments? What or who am I attached to? Am I attached to the actual objects OR am I attached to the images and memories of the objects? Do I derive my sense of worth, security, happiness, pleasure, excitement, cessation of boredom and sexual frustrations from my friends and lovers? I have. Hence, the misery that continues. How will I ever surpass this handicap if I derive anything that are stemmed/originated/constructed by “thoughts”, “memories”. After all, my motives, emotions, interpretations, perceptions, feelings of experiences are all derived from my thoughts. How do I not consume myself from thoughts?

Every new experience I encounter, all of my emotions follows the continuum of the old thought patterns because my mind only knows of the “known”. My mind, out of habit and repeated patterns, always attach to the “known”; the “known” for me consist of fears/rejection/insecurities/addiction/anger/emotional pain/etc.

Break the chain.

Still…the longing, the cravings, the desires, the superficial clinging and addiction…they are all still there, here, within me. No matter the extent of my intelligence, my heart still finds itself aching at times.

Extraordinary loneliness.

I am not afraid of the truth. I am definitely not afraid of the light.

FIXED GHOST. The underlying behemoth (beast) resides cunningly in the creases of my mind.
Its tongue slithers with subtle harmony
And my ego wraps around the sharp edges of reality
As if to protect her master from the pain that awaits
Only to find herself shielding from the truth
The fixed ghost of relativity and time,
Lives vicariously through my thoughts and
My confusion only fuels the fire from within
Rendering me useless as my confusion obscures
the truth, sauntering about, my mind is alive
And stupid
Ruthless and vigilant

January 10th (Monday, 8:56 PM): Day Nine.
Superficial contemplation? I wonder. I wonder if the internal evolution is subtle for me. I wonder about my mind. I’m curious so I prod along, observing each thought and sometimes, out of habit, I try to shake off the painful ones only to realize that this would only reinforce them. Acceptance is key. Thus, I must accept my thoughts, my emotions run through me like water. I cannot allow them to boil; the spillage is what wreaks emotional havoc for me. Acceptance. Amazing, have I not been accepting of myself, my mind, reality, the truth all this time? Does it get easier? Observing the mind, researching oneself, self analyzing, reaching for the revolution of ME…does it? I hope so. At this point, I am not sure which direction I’m heading towards to, I don’t even fully know what I have embarked upon. My mind constantly seeks for a destination point, some kind of reference, keeps trying to reflect from the past, but I’m moving away from this, moving forward (trying not to look back and trying very hard to not look ahead). Stay in the present moment…how? I don’t know, but I can. I must. I will. I have.

My superficial mind is feeling very weary, tired, frustrated, sad, and lonely. However, my spirit keeps me moving, encourages me to keep moving along. Move along where?

To explore the depth of one’s mind, thoughts, the Ego, consciousness, all of this requires tremendous energy, enormous amount of patience, and resilience must accompany me as well. I vaguely sense a slow transformation within myself, within my soul.

Have I created loneliness for myself. Of course I have. One can never underestimate the mind. The mind, the accompanying thoughts have killed millions, murdered innocent people, caused tyranny all over the world, created poverty, utter despair, wars, unfathomable things…so yes, my mind and the thoughts created by my mind is what have caused me tremendous suffering, emotional discontent, restlessness, utter loneliness, depression, sadness, extreme waves of anger, various addictions, attachments, and so on.

Could it be possible that my very own mind and thoughts can lead me to my own spiritual demise, my own internal destruction, forever obscuring the truth, the beauty and love within me? This is a question I pose to myself and this is the very question I can answer through myself, within myself. This is the question only I can answer, know how to answer and must answer intelligently.

I imagined that when I hit the 90-day mark, I would be in a more celebratory mood or at least feeling a whole lot more uplifted that I am feeling now, but…nevertheless, I’m still feeling good about myself, my achievement. I guess I just settled on the month increments to track my sobriety progress. In reality, it is still a day-to-day process for me. As I have mentioned in my previous post, it doesn’t get any easier with time as one would imagine/assume. Remaining sober has actually become more difficult as life throws more challenges, trials and tribulations at me. On a brighter note, the temptations are just that…a subtle-to-moderate urge based on the memories I have of drinking and its effects, but I have just enough self-control that I allow the urge to intensify and simply pass through my mind.

I kept reiterating a few phrases from Krishnamurti and Pema Chodron through my mind, they act as a form of bizarre comfort blanket for my weary mind. Some of the key phrases I keep recycling inside my mind are: “One has to stay on that shaky, uncomfortable spot in order to surpass it”, “Truth is a pathless land”, “You have to learn to be alone in order to really love yourself”, etc…

Truth is a pathless land. This is an interesting, complex quote from Krishnamurti. My mind has yet to fully grasp the meaning of this. We’re bred to follow a path or several paths in our lives. It’s either this path or that.

So, what I have been doing is following myself versus following others. Does that even make any sense, I wonder. Let me try to rephrase that. I have been following my own mind and bypassing what I’m told or what others have been following. I want to cut myself from the mainstream and challenge myself to follow my own instincts, intuition, my own truth. There aren’t any specific paths, routes, directions, rules, etc. What’s weird for me to grasp is that, everything I have been seeking for (eg. happiness, inner peace, universal compassion) is already inherently within me…the “trick” is to really see this. How? No clue, at the moment. Ask me tomorrow.

It’s Halloween eve on a Saturday night and I’m home alone. A huge departure from what I was doing last Halloween. Made me realize how fast the year has gone by.

Tomorrow will mark my 90-day total sobriety. I thought/assumed that it would get easier with time but, in reality for me, it doesn’t and hasn’t. Ironically, it seems to get a bit tougher. Temptation comes and goes intermittently. There has been quite a few moments when I contemplated how it would feel to drink again…an ice cold, good quality Vodka on the rocks with a chaser on the side. I actually miss drinking and its inebriating effects. Just being honest. Alcohol was my best friend for years…my ego was absolutely dependent on her for many, many years. My ego seems to be still going through a grieving stage.

I have been feeling like crying the last few days. Haven’t yet. Maybe I should. Probably will make me feel better. I feel this pent up ball of energy just coiled up inside of me, around my stomach region. Feels like a weird knot of sort. My chest feels heavy and I have been feeling a bit…sad. Alone.

I’m literally, not just figuratively, cursing the shit out of my ego. I’m investigating as to why I continue to suffer from loneliness. What is it that I am not accepting? What are my true fears? What is in my way of my happiness? I know it’s me, it has to do with something within myself, my mind…but what is it? What the fuck is it? I’m getting frustrated. More accurately, I am extremely frustrated.

I’m definitely in a shaky, uncomfortable spot at the moment…I’m pushing through.

This sobriety thing is no joke. If anything in life is easy, to me, it means I ain’t doing something right.

What I am learning about my internal process/transformation/self-actualization is that the notion of “revolution of the mind” for me is more subtle than anything. The inner experience of looking inward and simultaneously still searching for that “something” externally has undoubtedly been contradicting my desire of internal, genuine, enlightening happiness.

However, I have walked the talk, so to speak, meaning I have truly, indeed, put in hard work towards the process of my own revolution…revolution of the mind…wow, this is such a crazy, brazenly tough shit to work through, to reach. I don’t see it as a destination, I’m trying to engulf myself into a self-induced, symbiotic relationship between my mind, my consciousness and my ego. To completely detach myself from my ego is, to say the least, a process that will probably take a lifetime for me. Who knows. As I have referenced earlier, it is not the destination I am focused on; it is the journey and the transformative process that bears so much significance for me.

What I am truly surprised about in regards to my sobriety is that…I find myself still extremely attached to my ego, still harboring incredible insecurities about myself, still feeling lonely (actually lonelier than ever, but just not depressed), still carry addictive personality traits and habits, and feeling…empty, still…and this is because I am still searching outside of myself. I guess I was gullible to believe that sobriety would, somehow, be my miracle cure-it-all for me and quickly realized that it takes more work than just being sober to find that inner peace, calm, happiness, and the restoration of one’s spirit. I’m still a mess, honestly, who am I kidding? Not kidding to myself any longer. I happen to be just that much more acutely aware of how much honesty, work, effort, perseverance, and self-love it takes when you’re sober…instead of trying to hide under the blanket of liquor-derived haziness and mental fog, it’s actually quite painful to remain sober, 1000% coherent, present, AND trying to weed through the series of inner turmoil I continue to harbor. What a tedious process. BUT…I don’t resent the process one iota. I love the challenges being thrown at my face and loving the fact that I know I am strong enough to prevail and work through every single challenges.

Revolution of the mind. My revolution is slow…imagine a slow, churning burn…bubbling underneath my consciousness. I have been in a long slumber after all. To awaken fully, I imagine, will take some time. The real inner revolution, for me, has no beginning or an end. It’s a continuous phenomenon and I embrace all that comes along with it, including the ugliness of loneliness and solitude intertwined with the beauty of gaining mental and emotional strength, self-reliance, inner peace, and so on.

Sometimes…sometimes, once in a blue moon, I find myself on the verge of “what the fuck is this, really?” moments, but then quickly remind myself that it’s the process that matters, living through the moments, not the end-result. Once the end comes, where do you go from there? I want to live my life as if I already had died and I want to die knowing I truly lived.

Do I love myself? My life? I must…or I wouldn’t care and fret so much!

I have been working rigorously hard in getting back to shape and improving my overall health. I have been feeling a bit fatigued, but this may be due to over-exercise and lack of calories. I’ve been hitting the gym roughly 5 days weekly, averaging near 10-12 hours per week doing pretty hardcore workouts consisting of weights and moderate-to-high intensity interval cardio. I have lost around 10-12 pounds since the end of July.

Sobriety: This coming Thursday will mark a two-month sobriety checkpoint for me. This is absolutely fantastic! I am truly and really proud of myself. I have never in my life accomplished what was initially an extremely daunting, nerve-racking, almost impossible feat. Though I still think about alcohol almost on a daily basis, I no longer have any physical relationship to alcohol.

I have never been sober this long and I am determined to continue on this wonderful sober path…hopefully for the rest of my physical life. This is, in essence, one of THE ultimate goals for myself. I have never felt so clear-minded, emotionally healthy and strong, confident, and at peace with myself ever since I have become totally sober.

There has been an ongoing issue still lingering in my life and has become somewhat pervasive, and that is loneliness. It is a dominant theme in my life and I’m still trying to be at peace with “loneliness”. I have become quite acquainted with it, but I have not yet embraced it as I should. I still find myself longing for companionship.

There has been an unfortunate but, on the same token, a liberating circumstance that came about for me not too long ago. I lost a friend. I have given up on him. I no longer have any attachments to him and…well…I believe, in my heart, that this happened for a legitimate reason; a good reason. Now, I can move on and not look back.

That is the very dominant theme for this year and for the next: DO NOT LOOK BACK, just keep moving forward…

I would be lying if I were to say I didn’t feel like a small dagger have cut through my chest cavity and through my heart…but this kind of pain, it’s not seething and it’s not the kind of pain that leaves a bad taste in my mouth.  My heart and mind just feels intertwined with simple sadness and a sense of loss, like somebody who is still grieving a loss and, in all reality, that’s exactly what I have been going through…though it’s been over 2 years, I realized that I have been grieving a loss and has manifested in ugly, negative ways for me. However, with sobriety by my side, I know I must move on, move forward, and try not to look back…anymore.

So today marks a sad day for me. A sad day but, in a way, maybe a day of liberation as well. Today, I will neatly collect all the pictures, cards and miscellaneous notes, and discard them…not with contempt nor with any inkling of resentment or negative emotions, but just to mark a day (metaphorically) that I’m ready to finally move on from him; that I’m ready to finally release him from my heart, my mind, my thoughts. I’m ready to move on from him.

It’s so hard to not glance through the letters and cards one last time. As I type this entry, I keep glancing at the pile of love that have accumulated for years and wondering to myself…how did I get here? I trust myself enough that I have already embarked on a journey that may leave me feeling emotional at times…but…I just need to bite the bullet and keep moving on.

Take a deep breath. Exhale.

All I can say is that I feel good. My health is back, better than ever…and my journey has just begun.