Three+ Years Later...

So I've actually been thinking about this space for a long time and how I wanted to reboot using it as both a gaming and personal blog. I've held off for quite awhile since I didn't feel that I could put the time aside to needed to do this space justice in terms of writing. Now that I'm in the midst of another transition, I thought it would be a good time to sit down and start writing again. As mentioned when I wanted to reboot this space over five years ago, I still really want a personalized space on the web to mainly share my gaming life, but also aspects of my personal life. I'm feeling even more inspired lately due to my limited ability to start streaming my own gameplay, Due to my self-imposed career transition/limbo, I think I finally have the time to build some momentum to work on my network that I've slowly been cobbling together over the last few years (Twitter, YouTube/Twitch, and Blog).

As a result, my plans for the future are to create the following series of posts:

1) Gameplay - Twitch Stream/YouTube Videos
2) Gaming - Reviews/Opinions/Impressions
3) Music - Earworms/Playlists
4) Personal - Self-Reflection/Free-Writing

Things will probably be slow until the end of September when I'm finally setup in my new home (I'm relocating from Minnesota back to North Carolina during this time) since I'm still running around trying to tie up loose ends at my current position before I leave. Nonetheless, I thought I'd set up some goals for myself and anyone who was interested. I look forward giving this and streaming a real go of it!

Game Opinion/Review Overview

So hopefully as I get time, I'm going to start reviewing the games I play here and there.  Since I don't really get as much time to play games as I would like nowadays I'm hoping that sharing my experiences may help myself in further identifying games that are satisfying to me at the bare minimum, but hopefully they will resonate with other gamers I interact with.  The squeeze of less time has also caused my interests over time to dangerously narrow further as well, which has caused me more dissatisfaction with the gaming world in general.

While me breaking away from video games probably would sound like a good thing for most... (and limiting/controlling my time with WoW or any MMO is a good thing)  Being a long time hobby of mine, I would argue that losing interest is/was more symptomatic of a greater issue (loss of proper time management, deep depression/anxiety) that played a large part in my close to total collapse in graduate school that I've been recovering from.

Anyways back to reviewing games, haha, I know there are a lot of places reviewing games out there already, so part of my goal is to aggregate the reviews I found most helpful.  "Most helpful" in this case will be defined by looking back at which reviews guided my decision to initially purchase the game and as well as which points of the review I either agree with or disagree with.  My hopes in doing this is that it will help me in pinpointing which sites I tend to rely on for good information as well as cover some of the information gaps that occur because no all games are either not widely reviewed or not reviewed at all.

Floating toward the dreamscape...

Should be falling asleep, but unfortunately my brain and heart aren't having it since they are racing with thoughts and feelings.  As a result, I thought I would post a few recent updates and thoughts on here in hopes of emptying/exhausting my brain...

One of the biggest developments is that I'm defending soon, and hopefully moving on in my career or at least beyond grad school.  This bring me to the main thing I hope to articulate here: Since I got the OK to defend back in the middle of April (just a month ago!), I feel like I'm slowly reawakening from some long dream/nightmare/limbo.  Because of this, I feel like I've been much more sensitive to the coming of the seasons - the coming of summer, end of spring, graduation(s), even show finales.

Between watching the finales for "Once Upon a Time" and "Revenge", I just felt the calling of multiple emotions. It's totally crazy since it's just tv, but also amazing that this medium of expression works well enough to catch that response from me.  It is also refreshing because I'm feeling something/anything.  I've been such a mess for so long, that I was numb to anything other than misery and worthlessness.  Maybe I still deserve to feel that way, but at least for the moment, the possibility of having a new start and at least a future outside of grad school, has woken me up.  The feeling is even starting to reflect on the other elements of my life as I want to wake up in the morning (as least for the time being, haha) and I'm sorting though my junk and cleaning up after myself.  Hell, I finally got my car washed since forever, and I'm actually grocery shopping and planning meals again instead of just grabbing onto whatever junk food I can stuff in my mouth so I can get back to "lab" or stressing out about "lab".  I put "lab" in quotes because, in retrospect, there was so much inefficiency and time wasted, and until recently I was almost completely paralyzed by this stress.  And I don't know whose fault the situation was and I don't care; I just hope I can have my fresh start in science/life to try and apply lessons learned from this period of time and hope I never go back to that place of fear/misery/depression.  This will probably come completely out of left field, but it's echoing in my brain so I'm just going to write it:

"I was never afraid of failing, but I can't act knowing that I'm walking toward failure."

That released from my mind, I guess this post is really just me trying to process everything that is happening as I get ready to transition to the next chapter of my life.  Thoughts of falling in love, or at least settling down and, maybe, eventually children don't feel like this unreachable dream. In addition, the things I like to do outside of playing video games or going out for drinks seem less forbidden in terms of time in the future... All of these topics are strong in my thoughts as I'm acutely aware that I gave up too much of myself for grad school, and I mean this in terms of not protecting or taking care of myself, so I not fully proud of the work I put out at times.  I have no regrets, but I will look back at this time always with the thought that I could have been more focused, efficient, and just better.  Lastly, I never want that fear of failure to paralyze me again, I owe myself that, otherwise I will truly get left behind... Waking up now, that's kind of how I feel, but it doesn't feel as bad as it could have been ultimately, but maybe that's because I'm still alive with a chance to get my Ph.D and move on.


I just need to write this gosh darn dissertation by the deadline, ha ha ha.

Anthem of the Moment: Trying to find strength, motivation... Something to keep going.

So it's been almost seven months since I last posted, and all I have for right now is a link to Demi Lovato's new song "Skyscaper" since it vibes well with my current state of being.  Overall, things are much, much better than they were when I last wrote, but for the past week or so I've felt exhausted and feel like everything I've built up is on the verge of collapse.  As a result, my schedule has started to become more erratic, and I'm just trying to re-center myself to pull everything back together.



There isn't a particular outside force other than the nebulous thing called "grad school" that is tearing me down directly like she sings about, except myself myself.  I still find myself going back and forth with this commitment to my future and the sacrifices it potentially calls for.  In making some of these perceived sacrifices, I find myself feeling someone who is watching everyone live life, while I'm trapped...

I'd really love some guarantees right now in terms of knowing exactly what the rewards will be if I do my best, and I'm honestly scared of my best falling short.  Due to this, I know that ultimately I'm only holding myself back, and I want to let go, but I'm scared; I also realize that there is only one person who can do this, me.

Anyways, more soon about progress since February, and maybe even some science pictures/art to throw up here!

Anthem of the Moment: Looking so, so Good.

So since I have it on repeat, while working around the house; I thought I'd share my current song of the moment, that just makes me feel good to be me.  It's from country-pop artist Jessie James, check it out:




Anyways, while the song is about realizing her personal worth now that she has split from her ex, the song makes me realize that I am doing okay and possibly great, standing on my own instead of trying to rely on pleasing someone else to find satisfaction.

Retraining Myself to be Myself

The Content Monkey Owns Up.
Image from Tim Davis, AllPosters.com

So let's see... I wrote "Refocusing" almost 5 months ago now, and only in the last few weeks have I had some of the mental, emotional breakthroughs/realizations I've been so desperately seeking.  February was definitely a month of hell in various ways, but from the ashes, goals and aspirations have only become clearer and I'm hoping that coming into March, I'm truly starting my new year and a new era in my life.  Maybe I can finally let go of all this self-loathing born from a variety of sources.  With that said, let me list some things I've realized:

1) I truly have people who love me and want me to breakthrough to success.
Fortunately, the majority of people I know want me to be successful, but everyone expresses it differently and I've had to learn what that means in terms of feeling support.  With the last breakdown in work ethic due to sickness, causing severe emotional distress, my family has truly come together to prop me back up and away from the brink of a complete breakdown.  Not that I want to actively continue to test this well of support, but it finally resolved issues in regards to feeling support.  It reminded me that I've taken for granted the support I do have available to me, and that I've been blinded by trying to get that support pleasing people who I can't please, and in the end, felt my energies and self-confidence massively drained.  That said...

2) I'm completely free to decide what path I want to take.  I'm single and independent, and there is vast strength in that.
In trying to please people for their support/friendship, I've held my own wants/needs ransom.  The amount of "me" time I need, what I like to do or not do in my free time.  As a result, the whole thing compromised me as a person, instead of looking disciplined and focused, I've been scattered like dust in the wind.  I hated myself for liking things that other people did, even then I voiced that and then proceeded to deny myself from doing those things to make time to do what they wanted to do.  And after what felt like work, what happened?  I still felt alone and left out even though I was surrounded by people.  Besides, for better or worse, no one, short of the law, seems to be able to give me the clear guidance I need to decide who I should be.

Due to these two central realizations,  I finally have some goals to set in front of me that I've settled on myself.  The right questions were asked that got me here, and I can accept the reality of my situation a little bit better.  With this acceptance, I'm hoping that I can start (slowly) to become more functional.  So here are my goals...


A) Finding a sustainable work schedule.
I'm very excited and motivated to continue my research in grad school, as I think technically I'm finally over the wall that I've been trying to scale for the last 5 years, and I'm getting less timid and scared of the amount of work that lies ahead of me, but I don't want to get shallowed up in the mania that I feel like I'm surrounded by, it is part of why I've self-destructed in the past and burned myself out.  So I need to find my center and focus, finding a schedule that I can stick to without killing myself.  That brings me to the next goal.

B) Finding my discipline so I can turn off my empathy accordingly.
I've always been sensitive to others and their needs/moods and unfortunately, most times it causes me distress.  I need a thicker skin, so I can shut off the majority of this input.  Hopefully, then I can leave myself open to understanding my own needs, and use my empathy as more of a strength, better working to understand the motivations/wants of those who I'm working with to graduate.

C) Expressing myself better.
This one is simple; I need to take out the time to fully release all the emotions and thoughts I build up from day to day.  Since I spend so much time in my head, I tend to have a lot build up that can cause distress when not released.  I use to think the best release was being social, but that's been vastly underwhelming.  Most times, I've just told anyone who would listen without a filter so the whole thing just comes off as venting instead of have an actual discussion with someone, which was what I was looking for.  So I need to write it out, either on here or in my personal journal.  Part of this goal is expressing what I like without feeling scared because someone will judge me accordingly.  I'm utterly done with trying to please anyone outside of those who try to please me in some portion of my life.

D) Getting in better shape.

Now this goal is a little vague, as it is dependent on goal A.  So for now, I'm focusing on trying to make it to gymnastics practice twice a week so I have some physical activity.  As time goes on, I'm hope this with evolve accordingly.

E) Becoming more fiscally responsible.

While I need to come up with a more detailed personal plan of how I will do this, the simple answer is that I need to consolidate and eliminate my credit card debt, build up an emergency fund, and start putting aside money that I can play with so that it can grow faster than just sitting in a savings account.  These three things are the main subgoals of this overall goal, and with my car almost paid off, I think this can be actualized.

These are the five main lines of work I want to embark on, and I'm hoping in further posts to expand on my progress with these ideal goals via cutting them up into smaller short term goals.

Whew, that was a lot and there are no pictures...  need to change that, but I feel a new day on the horizon, and hope has surged back like never before.  Until next time...

Refocusing

So I've spent months trying to figure out how to use this blog effectively to aid me in my life.  Things with grad school haven't been well in a long time.  Hell, things in my life haven't been well since before grad school...  I'm not sure how much I should ever share publicly since I know anything I share on the internet will be forever in the cosmos.  However, I believe in this forum as a place where I can share at least some of my thoughts, so I can maintain my sanity.  As a result, that means I need to be honest with myself and everything I've held in since I graduated undergrad to some extent.  As things stand right now, I'll be the first person to admit that I've been depressed since I left undergrad, and actually I was depressed even before then.  I... thought the only thing missing in my life was love.  In the pursuit of love in these last five years or so, I've completely lost myself and the discipline I was once proud of.  I'm not sure anyone who surrounds me right now can understand the person I once was... The Nathan who actually got up on time in the morning, had breakfast, did homework, and showed up to class on time, but I know there are plenty of friends from the UCD years who do remember those first few years, and then how I let myself go after getting thoroughly confused over the first person I loved.  I've spent the rest of my undergrad until now pretty much asking myself, "What's the point of doing what I was doing?  Being responsible?  Who was I doing that for?", and at the end deciding it wasn't for me.

So what did I do?  I haven't gotten anymore true to myself.  I've over indulged in those things I like to do in my free time as well as just laid around feeling sorry for myself.  In many ways, I've been procrastinating on taking care of myself.  I think I've been just asking myself over and over, "What's the point?"  Even when things were better, I just felt like I was under an enormous burden to be better to be perfect.  I just felt like the situation was unfair:  Why couldn't I make mistakes? And if I did, no matter how minor, why do I feel like I totally get reamed out over it?  Well, I can say now that I have some answers that I believe, even if the majority of isn't all that novel.  The reality wasn't that I couldn't make mistakes, but mistakes are easy to make, and at the end of the day a good life isn't one that is easy.  As far as feeling like any mistake made was anathema to the senses of anyone, and ultimately my fault solely, my thoughts behind this are two-fold.  One, out of everyone that has criticism for me, I'm always the hardest person on myself.  As a result, I've created a massive snowball effect.  In being hard on myself when I was being willfully irresponsible, I've create a horrible feedback loop that has only worked to worsen my depression.  Also, I've felt for a long time that I didn't need criticism from anyone because of how hard I was on myself.  I could go more in-depth regarding that interaction, but overall I realize that someone giving me their opinions shouldn't be the affront to my person that I've believed it was for the majority of my life.  Two, if you are willing to accept responsibility in any situation, unfortunately most people won't argue.  It's like spending cash, most times unless they are a close friend, no one will argue if you offer to pay.  While I definitely don't think one should avoid accepting responsibility, I realize that outside of close friends, I need to be a little less willing to please, but accepting more responsibility than I can swallow.

Right now this has turned into a humongous post... all that text... to get to the main goal which is to state my desire to refocus this blog with my goals and share my progress towards those goals to become the person I know I can be and want to be.  For some reason with everything else mentioned before, I wanted to also believe that someone would come along and accept responsibility to hold me together, but that is completely foolish.  I can't ask someone to rescue me when I was never looking to be rescued anyway.  If they had rescued me, I would have completely resented them.  What I want is someone who can see me for the independent man that I am, and can also be independent in such a way that we are inter-dependent...  We both have our own friends and lives, but our interests and love still ultimately overlap... we can love the differences that the other brings to the table.  Even with that said, I'm not sure that I actually believe in the idea of love anymore..., but I'm looking to restore my faith because it has driven me for so long.

Gay men and faith... it's another topic for another post; I've reminded myself to write about how I feel.  I'm ultimately not looking to judge anyone, but I will hold the ability to disagree venomously with anyone.  I'm not looking to condemn anyone, but I'm tired of feeling alone in the way I think and want to share it.  At the bare minimum, I hope that maybe I can reach out to others who feel the same way.  Saying this includes me, since I don't think I've looked at myself nearly hard enough.  You want to date instead of hooking up?  Then date...

More to come in the next week, it's time for a new beginning...