CHAPTER 37/52: MEMOIRS OF A FORLORN LAD

Good morning!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I wake up a lot of mornings wishing for today to be a lot better than yesterday. Every night I close my eyes with a hope that tomorrow will bring something new and something better for me. Tomorrow’s gonna bring changes!!!! Just thoughts, in reality however, things just continue from where I left them off yesterday.

A lot of times I wanna wake up feeling much stronger and beautiful. However, I do slip into the depression mode early in the morning sometimes.

I hate it, but can’t help it. It’s like a grip that I cannot free myself from. Yes there are times when I feel good about myself. I’d be honest, I do feel good about myself quite often, especially when people come to me, talk about my work (read writing here!!!!!!!!!!), I can’t help but feel proud of myself then. I really do!!!!!!!

Then why this feeling keeps hanging around me???????????????

First of all I want to say I am NOT doing this for attention neither am I writing this to get any kind of sympathy. I am writing this just to get everything off my chest and be done with this once and for all. I’ve kept it inside for too long and it’s time that it all came out. People say it helps and honestly, right now I am everything possible to help myself. I’m desperate to find a way from this stranglehold and free myself.

This is not how I planned my morning, but the feelings of being lesser to others never seem to leave me. In other words experts call it “Inferiority complex”.

Everyone, at some point has it; I know that is for sure, I however am not sure how many of you actually live with it most of the days. I DO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

No matter how much I try. Or is it that I don’t try hard enough???? I don’t know, but I know one thing for sure. It doesn’t feel great to be in this situation and sometimes I feel I am being a bit too harsh on myself, but again, it’s just me!!!!!!!

You all may not know me and this might not interest you. However as I said, I am not doing this for attention. I am not even sure if any of you can relate to this. If you can relate to this, well………. Then what else can I say???? Welcome To My World!!!!!!!!!!!

I have been waging a personal battle inside my mind for a long time, and there are a lot of times when I have submitted to a defeat. Shocking??? Yes. I do give up more often than not. Sometimes I just refuse to fight, knowing that I would never win.

Yes I admit I suffer from low self esteem, intense insecurity, inferiority and the fear of not measuring up to others. This has been a problem with me for a long time. I tried to seek therapy for this at some point; however I thought it was a bit too embarrassing and I was kind of ashamed of what I was going through. So I never tried and never bothered to take it, thinking that it’d be fine someday. Time passed on by and things just got worse each passing day.

It’s been years now and I am still fighting it. I wouldn’t go as far to say that I am depressed but yes, there were a lot of time when I felt ashamed and resorted to confining myself in my room.

I was at a point when I almost gave up on everything. I stopped everything I loved like painting, singing, playing guitar, football I mean everything. Things went from bad to worse for me with time and after a while I just stopped going to churches, attending social programs and hanging out with peers. All because I didn’t like it every time I looked in the mirror. A bit too much for such a trivial thing!! Isn’t it!!!!

That was one of the worst phases of my life; I don’t recall it with fondness. Never do I intend to look back at it.

In all honesty however, it was kind of a blessing in disguise. During these periods of my solitary confinement in my room, my mind showed the first glimpse of what it can do. This was when my thoughts first started drifting far and wide and this how the thought process started and after a while I realized that I need to put my thoughts to paper and that’s how I found the cure for my disease, well, at least as of now. Writing!!!!! Yes, it all started with journals, I wrote about 20 of them. I would go on writing for hours in a day without stopping. I started writing about every little thing that slipped into my mind. From depression, sadness, loneliness to slightest hint of elation, I wrote about them all. Sad though, that I burnt everything, after reading back what I had written, I realized they were a bit too disturbing and depressing. They seemed to break me more than to comfort me and I thought it’d be best to just get rid of it. They no longer had any place in my life. So for the best, I just burnt them and I don’t regret it, to tell you the truth.

As I said before, sometimes encouragement comes in the least convincing but realistic circumstances, so it did. Writing kind of gave me hope that I can fight it and most of the times when I am writing, I really don't think of anything else. I guess that’s why I keep on writing even after realizing that I am not good at it. But I couldn’t care less about what I wrote as long as I derived pleasure out of it.

Things have changed a bit now, especially ever since I took up writing. It has helped me kill a whole lot of time. I mean, now I spend most of my time writing and thinking, instead of just drowning myself into the sea of my low self esteem.

It’s been almost two years now, though I still evade making public appearances as much as possible, I do sometimes go out and try to enjoy in the best way I possibly can. Not because I am all confident now or I have casted my doubts aside, but because with time, comes wisdom. With wisdom comes an understanding that at one point of time I need to fight back, a realization that I can’t live my entire life like this and I cannot let these feelings win.

So I started reaching out to people, at the same time however keeping “My feelings” to myself. The more I spoke with people; I realized that I am not the only person to feel this way and it’s okay to sometimes feel the pain of being lesser to others, after all I gotta realize that I am not the best neither am I the worst. I am human and I feel it’s okay to bask in my misery sometimes, that however doesn’t mean that it’s alright to obsessive about it.

However for quite some time now, I have been able to create an invisible wall around me to protect my sanctity and as long as I am inside my wall, no one and nothing in this world can do anything to me. Yes!!!! Honestly, it’s like I lie to myself and these lies works as my protective invisible wall. Lying is not the best thing to do, but I guess I could be forgiven. And the best part is that it helps me!!!!!! Not sure though for how long but right now it’s really working for me and I intend to make the most of it while it lasts.