Degree transcript received

I am currently typing on this laptop because it is analternative reaction to having my head in my hands. I feel a dry, clenching feeling on my throat as I come to the realisation of what I have just seen/ I suppose that my challenge for now is how to react to what I have just seen. Every few words I type on this post right now is interspersed with a sporatic pause in my typing. I suppose I am pausing, and thus, my actual rhythm of speech and thought is not as flowing as this current prose. I am currently shocked.

My grade for my dissertation.

I nearly failed it. It was just one mark above a pass.

In some respeects, it is a miracle that I have gone so far. I have nearly failed my masters degree by one mark. This is deeply shameful for me.

What happened is in the past,  however, it affects EVERYTHING today.

Now that I am in shock, I need to try and distract myself; here is my ranting/stream

Today I have had a shower, not a shave, however, because the water of the hot shower had fogged up the mirror. I have also tidied up my bed, put in my receipt data to log all my recent transactions, did a bit of the dishes, made a list of what to buy for shopping. I put some food in the microwave that I have forgotten to get back into my room, I need to get it now. I could just procrastinate and think about getting it an actually not get it. I have a resistance to going downstairs, on account of bieng seen by my flatmates, I want to hide from them now that I am not an actual student and I need to pay council tax and shit.

I think it is a good idea that I don't go do my graduation. I think its also a good idea to go to another university. I've had enough of this place. I tried to make things anew and in many ways I have made some improvements. I met Antonia, learned about myself, lost weight, started to be independent, and learned domestic skills and methods of coping with these feelings.

Here's what I'm going to do  now. I'm going to go downstairs and eat that bowl of pasta bake. Then maybe I'll go for a walk and get some snacks or something. I think today I won't do anything in the sense of big decisions or the like. I need to keep busy so that I can ride out what I have just learned today.

Toodles, I'm off to the microwave for some (probably cold) pasta bake

a quick post

I walked five miles and had my very first day of paid employment.

tutoring was good. My tutee is quite smart, but I think there is some work to be had with her. Im not quite in the mood to blog right now but I suppose today is a benchmark day. Its just a little downer that I blew most of my 'payment' on a bus ticket and groceries. The payment is pitiful, but I guess having something on my CV, and engaging in an age-old European artist/intellectual trade as tutoring is quite a quaint pleasure.

Well, she paid for my lambrini and crisps. I must have had a low calorie input today! I hope that 5 miles drained my calories and weight..I don't think I can walk there again, it took 3 hours! I need a bike!

not exactly stellar

At the moment I am about to complete one of my MPhil applications. It is sent online. What I have is to put the list of my available grades down and give it to them.

My MA grades aren't great...

I feel quite ashamed of what I have done. I guess I deserve to hide away.

Now off to complete the final stage of my application...

Sick Irony

I have abandoned my two housemates from my second year in undergrad, who happened to be very good friends at the time. I did it in a not dissimilar way to how Marie abandoned me.

I guess I deserve it, being both the jilted and the jilter.

Now I just need to live with what I have done.

I have finished revising my second sample of work. I am thinking that since I did an alright amount today, I might go for a bit of a jogger to my favourite spot, and then buy some crisps or takeaway.

I am not good at complimenting myself, that doesnn't go too well with depression. I think that my depression is easy to hide now. Perhaps it is so easy that I hide it from myself, every day and almost every night. I think I might be able to live with that. I guess this means I'm getting stronger. I have not time to celebrate, because I need to get into the MPhil degree first.

Okay, procrastination post over.

The hero flaw

This morning I woke up at about 9, then I was on and off to sleep again. I had this weird dream in the space of 45 minutes. While still in a relationship with Antonia, I engaged in intimate closeness with a girl. It happened in dream time, within the space of 40 minutes. I was on a church pew, and Antonia was on the other end, she couldn't sit next to us because other people were coming through (and there was a parade).

Dreams are bizarre and I'm just telling you how it was. There was a parade and my mate from secondary school who is a TA-solider-cum-actor was in a WWI military uniform that he wore for a BBC documentary he did a few months back; and I saluted him as the military part of the parade passed by the church pew and to a hard right, which looked like they were going through a door of an air hangar, or a factory (a big door is what I mean).

Then, for some reason, I saw three friends in a further part of the parade. One of them, well, I am not sure I'd call him a friend; he was the guy who got the PhD studentship that I didn't choose to apply to at my old university, I chose not to acknowledge him in my dream so much. Another thing I did was I greeted two of my friends, I saw one who I identified as gay, and another in a horse costume telling the other guy 'look who's in the horse!' and I remember having a good laugh about it. However, I think that the two of them were the same person.

Okay so most of that dream doesn't make sense so let me focus on the girl I was fixated on.

She had this vulnerability, that she wanted to commit suicide, I felt like I slipped into an old role. This role of a friend that I crave so much, of being the supportive guy to the depressive girl, being the one who saves her and makes everything better. The allusion to Marie is obvious. It is as if, I have this psycho-sexual desire for wanting someone who is in desperate need and to sort things out for them with me as the hero.

It's sick, isn't it, but if I'm honest with myself, I have this deep emotional bond to that archetype. Maybe its just a dream and it means nothing. Or maybe it is something inside me that I do not acknowledge. Marie uncovered a deep need in me, a deep desire. I think perhaps the best reaction to her now is anger. Of her betrayal. I made her promise, we cuddled by the doorway.

I have to cut out that part of my life. I have to move on and just let go.  In other newws I found it horrid to get up this morning, part of that was sleep, another part, is that I need to have a bit of a 'wakeup' before getting to things in the day. I have a lot to do today. I must get it done, this is my challenge.

Oxford fellowship - trawling through an email

I am going through a partiuclar email advertising a fellowship at oxford university whereby one contributes to the research and some teaching for a doctoral student towards their completed degree. They are allowed to have free accomodation in the college and allowance for 2 meals a day. Part of me finds the very concept of a university accomodating for every need as laughable, what next? JCR handjobs? (did I speak too soon?)

On the other hand, I think perhaps that it sounds appealing. I'm not so much in a good way with my own food needs, myself. Well the good thing of the day is that it looks like I won't need to pay for postage for sending off my mphil applications...fuck

Okay, procrastination over, I'm going to wank

Tis the PhD season

6 studentships have been announced at a university that my sister went to at a department that my degree has the same name as (flippancy I state).

I have been trawling through some of the staff at the department, and would you believe I think I have found my female lecturer mirror image. Well, not precisely, but she does have a lot of ocnvergence, a kind of convergence such that she would be quite a good supervisor for me, only question is: will I get a funded place there? I need funding if I am going to live outside of london.

So much I need to do, and I just want to do nothing. I think I'll just lie down for a tickand get back to things in a mo.

p.s. just so you know, this is a procrastination blog post

The heaviness of being loved

A lot of my life story of the past few months has been about trying to get on with my life, but sometimes, the past comes up and haunts me. Anything that is the past, it would seem, upsets me: even if its good or neutral about me.

This weekened has been fairly difficult. I was drunk with Antonia, and she got in trouble with her very annoying landlady, who was, being unfair to her about what she could and could not keep in her shed. Antonia is also being hassled for being persevering and positive by a local shop owner.

I feel angry for her, but I also don't want to add to her distress. Perhaps I was not the best boyfriend in the world this weekend, threatening to defend her honour and all that against the horrible inferior shopkeeper. Excepting my involvement. I trust that she will be okay. I hope she is strong, she has shown an increasingly more vulnerable side to her  recently. Normally she's the strong one. Its up to me to just suck up my own problems and help the world.

In other news, I start my first 'job' tomorrow: I shall be a tutor! I'll let you know how it goes.

How Amusing..

I'm looking through an academic encyclopaedia of an article whihc looks a lot like my dissertation.

That gives me a smile. It's better, though.

I want so much to get a doctorate. I haven't even gotten out of bed yet.

Okay time to get out

About me...

I am just letting you know that, although I'm drunk, I am in need of changing the 'about me' section of my blog. Here it originally reads as thus:

I am the fear of social interactions, I am the lack of confidence in front of girls, I am the hatred of my ugly body, I am the hope for the future, I am the inadequate adult, I am shame incarnate. I am honest, I am conatus; the striving.

Now it shall change:

I guess you could say this blog is my thoughts, or a home away from home. This is the candid secret mental life that I live. Blogging here is  like a catharsis of my secret inner thoughts. Welcome, to the world of the striving

The little things of the day

I kind of have more respect for housewives today.

When I woke up today, I did the dishes, I made some curry, I think it is the first true proud achievement of the while. I handwashed my clothes as well, in a moment of domestic insanity. My pants still smell of piss, shit and cum, but at least they feel clean.

I think my clothes are clean, given the amount of 'dark' water that appeared in the sink after i finished!

Currently, I am snacking on a can of sweetcorn. It's quite nice, it is more the psychological need of having something to put in my mouth, rather than an actual need to eat. I am finding that google calendar is a good way to organise and structure my day, and life.

Other good news things:

1. I got an offer to do a medical trial for £400. Not bad for 5 weeks work.
2. I also got someone interested in being tutored by me (in my masters degree subject). I said that I charge £12 an hour with £10 marking for essays.

I feel like being in the flow of things is like, spinning a wheel. Just yesterday (in Obama's inauguration day), was one day where I didn't get to do very much, or anything at all, due to laziness, I suppose you could say.

if it's too good to be true, it isn't

...therefore; is Barack Obama a robot?

I think it is the most positive sign for a minority to see his inauguration

I always seem to be making life-changing or big decisions around 13:37

weird

Moriarty

When I think about Moriarty, as I look at his facebook profile, and I suppose, evaluate his life; he seems pretty comfortable, and almost likeable. He has nice clothes, a girlfriend (apparently), friends, expensive dinners, government funded phd, a better masters degree than me, an office, teaching, and a hot topic in mathematical physics.... I (except for my lovely girlfriend), don't have those things. I am:

poor,
fat
not in a PhD
living in limbo
unemployed
never had a job
losing hopes for realistically getting into academia

I will have to keep going, I'm not there yet. In a way I feel I never will be there...I must journey on. As my day ends, I feel that my best achievment of the day is overcoming the most anxiety-inducing task I have: emailing my supervisors. You might see my life as pathetic, that I am driven to anxiety and am always battling it. I should be battling governments and saving people, but I can't do that if I'm not a doctor...

I envy you Moriarty, but I think, rather, I hope, one day I shall respect you...

I hope I can forgive, and forget, and get on with my life.

Running

Over the past 3 days, so I guess since Friday, I have started running for about 30-120 mins a day. It clears my head, it makes me embrace my distress, it inflicts physical pain on me, and Antonia says that its good when you feel out of breath from running such that you need to take those dry, painful deep breaths (it feels like shattered glass in your lungs, dry, shattered glass), you are burning fat.

I suppose that is a positive.

I need to do some stomach crunches to end the day...another thing I've been doing for the past 3 days.

closure

I realise it now. My feelings about Marie are without closure, that is why it has this effect on me. I never got to resolve it. It just left me before I had the chance. She left.

I decided not to go to my masters graduation. I have all sorts of reasons, money, reputation, unwilling.

I don't want to see my MA friends with their studentships and PhD places, while I have nothing, I'm happy for them, I try not to be envious, because it is not as if they stole it from me, they earned and deserve where they are. I suppose I deserve what I got. It's my fault. I must change.

Yesterday I went for a jog before it got dark. I think I'll go again, to sort out my despair

Waking up

I think its the first time in very long, that I have felt positive waking up, maybe I'm still drunk.

I must be positive to keep going, to win this.

My dream still lives, burns in me. I must hope.

my secret

today I shall tell you what I have not told a soul, perhaps I shall keep it a secret from everyone, just to feel a sense of power over the world.

I purged just a few minutes ago, I just thought about it, and considered, I ate a lot today, wouldn't it be nice to purge again? I also got a very distressing call from my mum, she is, in essence, chastising me for wanting a PhD.

I forgot how good it felt. The exhilaration and the headrush, the sudden pain that then comes, and lastly, the consequent single feeling of calm.

Well, since this blog is anonymous it doesn't matter telling you. I don't know if this is a start of a pattern, but I did go for a jog today, and I want to lose weight. I was okay with my weight until I started gaining weight again (today I was 195).

Part of me wants to apologise, but I feel morally ambivalent to purging.

Things I have done over tha past 5 days

1 and 2. Emailed my MA Tutors for references
3 and 4. Emailed faculty secretaries for degree transcripts
1-3'. They have replied agreeing to give a reference, the office has aggreed to give one of my degree transcripts
5. I emailed one of the four universities I am applying to to ask about funding and the sample of work I am to submit.

Other things:

Despit gaining more weight, I have tried to put a positive attitude to weight loss. I learned how to do a stomach crunch. It hurts like hell and it feels like a challenge...I forgot just what excercise was!!

My attitude at the time when I was living in those postgraduate halls over the summer was: it hurts anyway, so inflict gym pain on yourself. It was also the beginning of the end of my purging phase...I think. My resolve is that when I feel like purging, I shall do some crunches

I'm trying my best to be positive, it's hard, you know.

Okay back to work.

Oh, I do have some good news!

Earlier this week I was informed (by post, the most personal of media) that I have passed my MA. I officially have 5 letters after my name. That's positive, I guess.

Now for the next few letters...

Weight a minute

I have been gaining weight, I am about 196lbs, or approximately 14st.

I have been trying to eat more reasonably, but I must starve myself more in order to lost that weight.

I think I shall try just not eating.

Today I feel shit, but not terribly shit. As a positive, I have gotten one of my tutors from my MA to consent to being a referee. I'll deal with that in a moment. I'm going to see Antonia Later, and I shall plan to do more paperwork today.

For now, I suppose, I better clean myself up. Hopefully before 1pm

Ta ta.

Somehow I feel better telling you guys about it. It almost seems like my life has a structure. Ah, you shall never know.

Generation Crunch

Not my phrase, but the Guardian's term here, I think I am part of this movement. A whole generation in limbo; not able to find a job, or graduate student place. It's hard to be positive, but I try not to look at things in this wider perspective. I have my own problems and issues unique to me. Today I tried to face them: I asked for a degree transcript (well, four), for my undergraduate degree and my masters. That used up 1C each. After asking my MA tutors to provide a reference for me, I felt drained of 3Cs. That leads to a cumulative use of 8C today.

I think I ate beneath 2000 kcals as well. I'll need to check it on my charts, now.

I am trying to be positive, but there is no guarantee that things will turn out okay.

I saw a friend of mine on facebook the other day, and he is 'releasing' a book, and he has a youtube account where he sings cover songs a capella.

I couldn't help but laugh and think how pathetic he was. That shitty fuck

he was the first president of the ADC, back in the time when my anxiety was really bad

Pissed

Just now I had a philosophical moment. I was crudely masturbating in a plea to try to sleep (insomnia), and I thought to myself how futile my life is How completely in a void I am, that I am lost, struggling in the pitiful way to get out.

But at least I'm trying to get out. Today (well, yesterday), I sent 3 job applications and asked for an MPhil application form. I'm trying to be positive, it's hard, yes, but I'm trying. There are so many negatives, so many causes for concern, so many things to fear. So many regrets, so many envies, and yet, all of these things are calmed, or perhaps culminated by one thought. It is the single thought that drives me, the thought that I forget when I am trying to find motivation to get out of bed, trying to keep going after facing the despair. The thought, the dream is: being a doctor of philosophy. To get that PhD has been my dream for so long.

I think it's a low point when you start drinking on your own. I think it's a low point to drink spirits on your own. I think it's an even lower point when you buy sainsbury's basics scotch whiskey. I guess this is the lowest point I have ever reached in my life; pissing in an empty bottle of sainsbury's basics whiskey as a resort to not putting your clothes on and getting the effort to leave your room, while smelling your own whiskey-stenched piss and ignoring the spray on the carpet that comesfrom the inevitable process of urination into a small hole, is perhaps the lowest I've been in my life

I think I am surprisingly chirp, given my situation, if I were another person from my past, I would have killed myself right now, but, I'm seeing life as an oppurtunity to change, grow, and fight on.

Tomorrow is a new day. I have been listening to the Louise Hay CDs, and the thing she says is that the first thought of the day defines your mood: is the first thought negative (oh, another day!), or positive?

Google calendar, and my determination shall decide my fate.


Note to self; is masturbating over Marie a good idea?

Slow (but steady?)

Slow and steady wins the race.

Okay, so I got up late today, bad. I had a long wank today, bad. I started tinkering on my laptop from 2pm.

So, what did I do today?

2-3 job enquiries, which leads to 2 possible job applications-cv sendings tomorrow

Scoured a graduate job website, saved a few links to explore in a few days

Joined a website and advertised myself as a tutor for 'A' level, GCSE and undergraduate support

Filled the shit out of my Google calendar for the next few days of things I 'should' be doing

Made lunch (I have gained holiday weight, I have discovered)

Now, I think I am going to apply to facebook for a job (yes, you can tell I didn't look very hard or far.

I have also noticed from facebook that two people I very much envy have their birthday on the day that Im trying to sort out my life.

1. Moriarty's birthday: Moriarty is the guy who humiliated me in front of the ADC society, undermined my position with Marie, and made me purge a lot. It's hard to see him as a nice person, but I try sometimes.

2. Chris Croney: Chris Croney is the guy who got into my old department's prestigious studentship, the one I didn't apply to; he also is a notorious sycophant and lazy ass cunt. I shouldn't be jealous of him, maybe he deserve where he got, but it makes me feel like I don't deserve where I am now. I guess that's the essence of jealousy, the question-begging assumption that they didn't earn a position that you in turn are not worthy of your own shit position (suggestive that I deserve better). I shall try not to be resentful to him. I must purge all bad thoughts out of my awareness!

Idolising marie?

As the memories seem to be fading away into some kind of lore, I feel that masturbating over Marie seems, well...unhealthy

I get quite good orgasms from mastuburbating over some seedy pictures I found from her, but I feel that there is an emotional connection that I don't quite understand, as I masturbate to her more I feel more of an emotional security and distance, as if, she never really existed and that she is an image on my screen, a beautiful woman, a Goddess or literary character, like Athene, or Esher Greenwood, beautiful women that I idolise, and yet have no regard or thought concerning their actual existance. Excuse my Cartesian moment, but I feel a weird relationship to those images I just masturbated over, I feel a sense of relief that is well-deserved after my sleepless night of anxiety and despair (regarding PhD failure).

It is nearly 6am in 15 minutes. I guess this is nearly an all-nighter.

Musical tastes

Musical taste for me, is very odd.

Musical taste is defined by where I am at that moment in time, either the very present moment, or the less specific generic moment in time; of maturity.

I like heavy metal, but I almost feel like my taste in it is changing. I feel that the emotional and thematic and stylistic content is becoming less and less relevant. On the other hand, I feel afraid of 'leaving' metal, for fear of exclusion from certain peoples who would call me a philistine or a sellout.

My musical tastes, it would seem, are changing with my mood. The recent news took a turn for the worse, and it would actually seem to change right now. Im just frightened of what I might be led to...blues...pop...rock...jazz?

New things frighten me, I suppose that is why heavy metal fans are often cliquey and isolationist.

Growing down (and another resolution)

One way of considering the deep feeling of despair is like growing down. To feel such overwhelming despair makes one feel as if they are returning to a former infant state, to feel so overwhelmed by feeling, not knowing how to cope is to regress into a child-like state.

I am lost
I don't know where I am going
I cannot improve things

These are thoughts which put ourselves to an uncomfortable vulnerability, it is a child who is vulnerable, and relies on the parent to support them. To be taken by despair, in some occaisions, is to have no defense against it. When I am taken by despair recently, I still have some reserves of fighting determination against it, but I do fear. Fear is when the despair grows, my fears are that I don't know what will happen in the future, my fears are the uncertainties of the now, when all my friends and family are comfortable and secure, both epistemically of their path, and in a metaphysical sense, to actually be secure is a state of living, a thing about a person, like Christian salvation, we are either damned or saved.

I seek salvation from this despair, the Christians will have you believe that it is in Jesus where our situation is relieved, and it is in death where our salvation lies. I seek salvation of any kind, I want to escape this situation. I suppose in my desparation I will pray. I am desperate, I am scared, I dont have emotional defenses to overcome this. Give my soul salvation, and may I find some way to escape this, and in finding it, I will have more knowledge of my situation.

This is my despair. I could react by regressing to a more child-like state, vulnerable, affected by everything, almost to the point of oversimplifying things, making the issue reduce to a more simple issue like 'I don't want to live' or 'I cant get out of bed'.

I was 'improving' over the past few months. This is a personal challenge that I didn't want to undertake, I wanted to get into uni and study, and have my own set of issues of funding and studying. Now my situation has worsened and I am, well, and truly, lost, and scared.

I feel this inexpressible desparation, too persistant to be nothing and yet, too inarticulate to be said, this feeling of a silver lining dying out in my chest, a flickering light that fears extinction. Antonia told me about Louise Hay, a motivtional writer, I suppose you may call her. I think I shall listen to that before I sleep. I'll try to get up bright and early tomorrow.

I'm so scared. The only way to fight the despair is to embrace those fears, meet them head on, and overcome the tendency to regress or 'grow down'. I have to...grow up. Perhaps that's what I needed to do this whole time. I didn't know how to swallow pills until 2005, I don't know how to be independent, even to this day I am dependent on my parents.

I guess that is one resolution I can add to the list...Grow up

New years resolution

Before making my actual post subject I think to myself; given that this blog is entirely about myself, I decide what I want to talk about. In a way, I can focus on many sorts of things, and the very fact that it constituted a post tells us that it is an important issue to me. I could be completely different and talk about something in the day that may need to be talked about, but I don't, or I make the decision to be different and surprise myself, not to be the moaning Michael (to paraphrase Graham Norton's character on Father Ted) all the time.

Alas, here is my thought for today: I have been meaning to write down some resolutions, okay, so maybe its not New Years Eve, or New Years day, but I haven't 'officially' stated them. Okay then, with that, I shall consider my resolutions.

1. Lose weight: I've had bad coments about my recent shape, as such, I shall resolve to diet more, be more conscious about what I eat, and find some way to excercise more. I'm not quite sure how to do this, as my gym pass has expired (another fact that painfully points to my PhD failure)

2. Get into a PhD: this is a very specific, and very scary project. Will I actually get into a PhD, for instance? I do very much hope so, on the other hand, I am scared, still sore from the application failure to my first application.

3. Sort out financial situation: Presently, I live on handouts from my parents, in a rented flat that perhaps I should never have gotten into. I earn no money, I've never had a job and I have no job experience. I will need to be able to put myself into a position of being independent, and one important respect wherewhich I can do this is in terms of money, namely, earning, and having money.

4. Sort out a job/job experience: This is a following point from the former issue. If I am going to be financially stable I suppose the most likely way that will happen is to get a job. I am afraid that the whole job-reasoning will undermine my intention to get a PhD. Is this a rational fear? I'm not sure. Getting into a job, or some position of financial stability will establish independence.

5. Survive through awkwardness: I have the following awkward issues:

a. Telling my Landlord that I may need to move out/will not renew contract
b. Facing my housemates and informing them that I didn't get into the PhD
c. Facing my supervisors/referees to ask them for another letter of reference, in spite of the fact that they both don't think that I am a strong candidate and that they rejected my PhD application (or, the university did anyway)
d. Telling my parents that Antonia has a daughter, and that I am going out with her

As I am writing this post, I am feeling a small sense of ease, that I have officially stated these things.

Let me think of some other things:

6. Personality: I must improve who I am as a person, which is really encapsulated in all of the above. I think some things can be worked on

a. Avoid purging mentality
b. Avoid being rude and angry
c. Avoid hatred and revenge mentality
d. Be more confident
e. Be more assertive
f. Be more respectful
g. Be more humble, I need to put myself down a bit in order to build myself up: I am in no position to be proud or have a superiority complex: I have no money, got rejected from a PhD, and I guess that makes me a failure.
h. Be determined: this is an important one, being determined means to avoid that feeling of hopelessness and accidie. Being determined means having a plan, following it, and avoiding procrastinating. Being determined means to keep going. I guess that is really the important resolution.

Keep moving...
Im going to make that my daily affirmation