Not welcomed anywhere.

Sense of belonging is really important to me. It's the reason why I'm one hell of a patriotic Singaporean and why I (or at least used to) see myself as a decently loyal person. It's why I love all the communities on Tumblr. Why I love fandoms.

A little touchy and personal, but I don't feel like I belong in my own family. I feel like a fucking lone wolf. Both sides of the extended family hate me, and immediate family members like to fuck around with me and my feelings. As soon as I let my guard down, something reminds me to let it back up and trust no one. I have severe trust issues.

I leave a social group as soon as I get any of the slightest hints that I don't belong and they hate me. It's uncomfortable. The fact that I have no secure sense of belonging makes me feel uncomfortable. I don't belong anywhere. I suppose this is insecurity. And I hate it. As much as I enjoy my own company, I hate not having a home to go back to.

I don't belong anywhere. For now.

My social life.

Remember how I keep talking about envy? I suppose I'm a really envious person. And my envy for others is one reason why I decided that I would 'meet new people' during my first year in NYP. I see a lot of people with social lives and the thought of attending a beach party or a pool party or any party at all is just weirdly appealing, in a relaxed kind of way. I enjoy people and I enjoy the vibe of company. But I've come to realise that interacting with a large group of people is not my forte.

Whenever I tell someone that I genuinely enjoy my own company and I love being alone, they look at me like I'm a fucking psycho. But I do. I go for hour long walks at night on my own, I can't sleep without spending time alone with myself first, and I love running errands alone because it gives me a reason to get out of the house and spend some time 'alone'. What I mean by that, is that you could be surrounded by people but still be alone. Because you're not interacting with anyone or connecting with them on a deeper social level. And I find that very calming somehow.

But this isn't good for the portfolio/future résumé that I'm trying to beautify. I'm guessing that NYPSUJC is only recruiting extroverts with their own definition of leadership. I'm most definitely not an extrovert, and neither do I have charisma.  It's something I don't have much of. Knowing me, if I have something about myself I want to improve, I'll go find a way to do it and get it done. But do I want to be more charismatic? Yeah, sure. It'll make it easier to make friends, I think. But charismatic is something I'm not, and I treasure that fact sometimes. Do I want to change that? Who knows.

FOR FUCKS SAKE WHY AM I SO USELESS

You know, as much as I stand by the fact that the phrase 'Jack of all trades, master of none' is missing out the 'but better than a master of one' part, I'm still not satisfied with myself.

I've come to realize that I really am a perfectionist through and through. I hate it when things go wrong and I can't fix it. I spend extra time and effort making sure everything is perfect. Just last Friday I was doing a set of review questions for programming, and I got 10/15 right. But no, I wasn't about to just leave it at that and go about with my academic life. I needed the 15/15. The teacher suggested that while it was a multiple attempts review test, the system would only take the first score. But I still went ahead and didn't stop until I got my perfect score anyway.

I like to think that this somehow relates to my frustration that I'm not 100% good at anything. I can knit, kinda. I can play music, kinda. I know music theory, kinda. I can cook, take photos, code,  journal, analyze people's minds for fun- but these are merely just things I'm interested in, know a bit of, and never got anywhere with it. What's ironic is that I specialize in neither self-hatred nor self-love.

And yet all I do is complain about it. <-- Justification of my self-hatred

Weird mental health thing.

Everything is weird. It's like a flu that keeps coming back. I'm tired of this on and off thing. I'm tired of not having my thoughts straight. I'm tired of being two extreme versions of myself and switching back and forth with multiple flicks of a flu switch. I'm tired of not being able to access proper help like I used to.

Last night I wrote in my actual physical journal about how much it scares me to not hate all of this weird mental health thing. But one thing I do hate is anxiety. I hate worrying about things that don't matter to everyone but me. I hate worrying about people. People scare me and as much as I try to repress that feeling and put myself out there, it comes back.

Everything is weird, I'm tired, I hate everything but also not everything.

Envy, part three.

This is post-depressed me talking about envy. Also yes I've started writing again, because fortunately I don't feel like my brain is being constantly gnawed on anymore, though the tiny bit of self-hatred still lingers. ANYWAY.

While we're on the topic of self-hatred, it explains this new kind of envy I'm experiencing. I've never felt this before- being attractive. I come across countless pictures of pretty girls whom I not only start to get physically attracted to, but I also start to envy their level of attractiveness. And no matter what other people say, I still see myself as a fatass. It's my stomach. It's my thighs. It's wobbling fat that makes me pant every time I climb a single flight of stairs. And not only do I hate how fat I've gotten from binge-eating, I also hate every other physical flaw I have. I'm not gonna name them out because these are just plain embarrassing. These are flaws not many people have. And I absolutely hate them. I try to fix them, but nothing's working.

And despite this self-hatred, I'm still being reasonable. Everyone has their own insecurities and flaws, no one's perfect, blah blah blah, but for some reason I can't stop worrying about them and being self-conscious.

So there's my life right now. I'm glad I've gotten better though, I'm actually able to force myself to be productive now. Otherwise the next semester is going to absolutely suck.

Sense of belonging.

I used to think that I needed to be constantly obsessing over something for me to be happy or be productive. But I've come to realize that I just want a sense of belonging. I've always been proud of any community I've ever been in- be it being a Singaporean, a fellow YouTube fan, my sexual orientation, religion, or *cough* certain *cough* sexual fetishes *cough cough cough cough cough*.

I guess this comes from not wanting to feel so alone, and switching from being able to surround yourself with people, to just wanting to be all alone and enjoy the world in peace and quiet. So these communities are usually online. Sometimes I don't even need to socialize with these people, all I need to do is surround myself with them and watch other people be just as passionate about the same things as me.

It's great.

My social life (and also my femininity).

I just downloaded this app called Dayre which is some kind of social media platform but with blogs. Something like tumblr, except your blog's content is your personal life. Idk how to describe it. I'm bad at this. Anyway. I wanted to use it to stalk people I'm not closed to but am still interested in their daily lives. To see what they're up to these days. And because I was an awkward little shit who barely talked to these people, I remained anonymous. I'm sure they should be able to figure it out somehow since I'm following so many people who know each other, but whatevs.

And here's the thing. I just got back from trying to shop at Vivo City, looking at clothes I would probably never wear. Like seriously. I tried on this simple flowery shirt that I thought looked okay, but when I wore it, I looked like a cross-dressing dude. I DO NOT HAVE A DUDE'S BODY. My boobs may be small but there's a reason why I don't identify as a transgender male. But out of pure curiosity and slight suspicion, I looked up 'lesbian fashion' and... Well shit. This is kinda what I want to wear. To be a female but also kinda not. To be a female but also fuck shit up and own it.

Anyway. Back to Dayre. I stalked some people, most of them are girls, and one feminine dude, and damn. Everyone was socializing, having fun, and writing deep, typical teenager quotes. Listen. I would love to have that many friends and have a birthday party and take a bunch of cool photos. I would love to hang out with this many people at one time and be so chill with every single one of them. I would love to dress more feminine. I would love to have more feminine thoughts. But the truth is, that's just not me. As much as I'd love to hang out with that many people all at one go, I don't have the ability to. Maybe it's social anxiety, but I don't want to blame everything on mental illnesses (even though yes it's a thing to be taken seriously but STILL). I would love to become more feminine. That's why I try. But every time I walk into Topshop, Forever 21, or pretty much any clothing store that's very gender-based, I feel like I don't belong. I feel people judging me. Which, then again, is true. I don't belong. I'm not like these people. I just happen to not have that much estrogen in me.

Sigh. I always talk about loving yourself as you are, and I do. But do I want to change myself to become more feminine? I don't know.