june 4

 I met Michael today after taking a lunch break around 2 PM. He needed a lighter and then I asked if he had any water in his bottle and he said no but he'd get me some from inside. That was very nice of him. 

We ended up sitting down and he told me he was a writer and that he was writing a novel. We got to talking about the writing process and he said told me about a writer, who I forget the name of who journaled daily. He would start writing about his day and the emotions he felt in specific situations the next morning instead of at night. He said it helped him process it better. 

What really got me thinking is when he talked about describing the day and describing the emotions he was feeling in that certain situation. I told him that I feel like I would struggle to remember those emotions and to be honest, I do as I'm writing this now. 

I'll try my best to recite things. I think the main feeling I was having when we met is do I like this guy. I feel like I never know if I like someone or not, I'm looking for something that will kinda turn a switch. Like, if he said he likes soccer or tennis, even though when that happens, it doesn't make me instantly like them.  

Now that's true of everyone I've been talking to recently. 

After work I went down to the common area in the dorm I'm staying in for the summer. They have a pool table, ping pong, and TV's. We watched the Heat Nuggets game 2 which was fun. To sidetrack a bit, every time I watch basketball I don't really get it. It's cool what some of the players can do but scoring is so common and there are so many time outs that I can't get into it. When I watch soccer I feel like there's so much more going on. You really can't mess up cause it's gonna cost your team big time. Whereas in basketball it could but you can take a timeout and refocus. Also, I have a negative connotation of it because of all the advertisements and the general United States aspect of it all. 

Teams can't get relegated, it's all a business. 

I guess I still don't know how to feel about it and now that I think about it, playing it is very fun. 

Anyway... after the game I played ping pong with this kid from Connecticut named Jordan. Just like anyone else I've met that same feeling comes up. It's almost like do I like this person enough to form a bond with. Right now I feel like that's not a good way to look at it cause I'm looking for something I don't even really understand. 

I'm also very hard on myself and expect things to be a certain way quickly. I don't give things time, I think I try to fight against time. 

For example, I expect to make friends and become best friends with people instantly. So there I'm naturally not trusting that time will sort things out. So in every situation, I try to do my best to control what happens, thereby controlling the natural time of things.

I really want to understand how to let go and be okay with waiting. 

Just to give another example too, my job feels extremely stressful to me. I think the main problem is that I want to be in complete control of my responsibilities. This again is going against time and how the world works. Things change and it's good to be prepared but you can only do so much and if you try and control everything you suffer. 

I'm sitting at my little desk in my dorm room, I'm wearing my blue denim jacket which I love and it's about 12:10PM. I'm thinking about how control is at the root of most of my problems. I had a hard time with my Mom and even talking to her because it felt like I couldn't control her problems. She shouldn't be talking to me about those things regardless but it's a desire of mine to fix those problems. 

So, what I do is try and take control and do the best I can. But now I'm just taking on another's responsibilities and it's hard. 

I kind of put myself in the same position as my Agents, they ask me to do things and I fix their problems, I honestly go above and beyond to fix their problems. It's more than they expect of me but I expect more from myself.

I've always expected more from myself and that's hard. 

Expecting is wanting your control to pay off or it's control in and of itself. Why do I expect things to turn out a certain way in general. School kind of teaches you that hard work pays off but at the same time, you could work extremely hard for your job and clients cancel, or another circumstance arises where you fail.

I was gonna end it here but I thought of some more things that were going through my mind today. 

This is related to friends and making new friends. I've been thinking that if I can identify some true values then I can learn to see those in others and that way determine if it's someone I want to connect with. 

In a way thats kind of like wanting control and or "rules" so maybe I shouldn't look to deep into it. But actually, if I just do it for myself and don't think about it while i'm talking to people then it's fine. 

I believe that everyone is kind and that everyone should be kind to each other. I try to live by that for sure and that's the main ideology I've had for a while. Coming to a big city helps too cause you meet people from all over the world which provides an insane perspective. 

The next thing I want to learn to implement into my life is to give up control.