Optimism/What Is Love (Baby Don't Hurt Me)

From the little bit of psychology that I actually learned in my shortened period of time at Liberty, I've heard of talk about what psychologists call "self-fulfilling prophecy". It's basically when you keep believing something is true about yourself that it comes into fruition because then your mind starts subconsciously finding ways to make it true. It's why something as simple as starting your day with "I am happy" can eventually lead to you being happy because then you will subconsciously start noticing and giving more emphasis to anything that makes you happy throughout the day. Likewise, if you set yourself up for failure or negative emotion, you will bring yourself to that state over time.

Maybe the reason why I am clingy or holding on to the pain and wishing for what could have been so much is because I keep dwelling on it. And as I dwell on it more and more, I find that my brain will come up with ways for me to strengthen those feelings of wanting something different than what has been dealt to me. Maybe I tricked myself into becoming too clingy, too hurt over everything. So perhaps it would be worthwhile for me to try being more positive, looking for the good in all that has occurred and start looking forwards to the next day, the next hour, the next minute.

I don't know how fast I can get this whole self-fulfilling prophecy thing to work, but if psychology is at least somewhat true, it's worth a shot to try to continue to bring myself out of darkness, out of hurt, out of pain. If I choose to just mull in my time of hurt whenever it shows up, of course I will never heal, I will never get better, I will never get over it. But if I choose to not become stagnant in those times and choose to find something greater and more productive for myself, then perhaps I can change for the better.

Now, as for the second title because I'm condensing this into one post (and also this is the last post of the month, merely just so I can have the blog display "69" for the posts in February, so in every state of mind, I am a meme), what is love? Then insert the song reference.

As I seek to become more optimistic in an attempt to try to heal myself and get better as well as get over the pain and the hurt and the feelings, I realize that there is still some good that comes out of it all.

Had I not gotten close to, shall we call her "S", then I would have never really known what it meant to love someone who wasn't family. Previous crushes had just been, well, crushes. An infatuation mostly with their looks and partly because of some aspect of their personality. But then I never really knew any of them that well (save for a few in high school but those don't matter anymore). So it was just an infatuation with their appearance that attracted me.

At that time, I wouldn't have known what it truly meant to be a boyfriend. All I wanted back then was to be in a relationship, because it was something I had not experienced before and pressure from culture made me feel like I needed to have one.

Now I realize some deeper truths to it. That being in a relationship is not just a "oh we're boyfriend/girlfriend" sort of thing. There are multiple levels to it that help make it successful and everything. The committment to one another as you make yourself committed to being there for one another. Then the level of sacrifice. Not to say that sacrifice is bad, but just that not only do you have to care for yourself, you also have to care for your significant other. When they are sick, when they are happy, when they are sad, when they are lonely, when they are whatever emotion you could think of, you need to care for them. You need to give up time, energy, resources, anything to make sure that your significant other is cared for. Although not to say you should worship them and drop everything for them, but there's a level of sacrificing that needs to be done.

Then there's the part of loving the person. Back then, I never would have understood this. But now I understand it better although I probably have plenty to learn still. To love someone you got to love them in their entirety. You can't just love them for their pretty face. You can't just love the parts about them that are good. You have to love their everything. Their highs and their lows, their peaks and their valleys, their pros and their cons. You have to love their personality and the way they behave and treat others. To love someone is a major step and a huge emotional investment and development.

Did I love S? Yes, yes I did. Or at least I think I did based off of how I now understand what it means to love someone outside the family. To love a family member is relatively easy for me. I know that some families don't get along with each other, which is kinda sad, but for me it's easy. To love someone who isn't family is where I have a lot to learn.

Then there's the next part as I motion to move on. Do I regret loving S because of the pain I now have for losing my chance with her? No, I don't regret it. Yes it sucks that I cannot have the more I once hoped for and was so close to having even. But if I hadn't loved her, I wouldn't know these things about love and caring for another who isn't myself nor a sibling. To be ready to spend time sending texts of encouragement, to bringing medicine and food when she's sick. To just care for someone other than myself.

It will definitely take me a lot of time to recuperate and heal my broken heart. It won't be overnight. It might not even been next week or next month. It's getting close to a month since the brokenness had started, but again, if I stick to the negative aspects, then I will always feel sour about it. I will never get better and it might risk me turning sour towards S. I had managed to salvage a friendship, and I cannot risk to throw that away because I chose to not heal. It's a choice now for me to decide if I will wallow in my pain, in my hurt, and not have growth from this. Everything was and is a learning process.

There were so many great things and great feelings about thinking of a future with S, sure. But then there is so much I have learned. She helps me strive closer to God, and she encourages me even with everything that has been said and done. I am thankful for her and I am thankful she is supportive of me, to have shown me grace and forgiveness because the Father has shown us all grace and forgiveness.

So now we move on. I can choose to stay in this hurt state, or I can start a new day. A new dawn. To rise from the ashes. To take up my new name. To shake off my old chains. My best life is up ahead with the Lord Almighty. I can choose to see everything negatively, or I can choose to learn from everything and go forward. Time and quite frankly everyone else is moving forward. Will I stagnate and be left behind in the dust, as everyone else continues to run the race? Or will I persevere and keep on running the race that God has set before me?

"Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us".

Hebrews 12:1 NIV

Will I let myself continue to be hindered, or will I run wild, live free, and love strong?

Lost

I just feel so lost right now.

Earlier today, I felt good about my life. Having a job, so it feels like my days have purpose and that I'm contributing to society (both through taxes and because I get to help serve people their food). Having a consistent aikido training schedule so that I can do something that I sometimes wonder if it's a newfound passion for.

But then sometimes, when I'm left all alone, I get stuck with my thoughts. I was only home alone for maybe 20 minutes, and then that's when I just felt all of this sense of being lost. It's a combination of just wondering what my true purpose on Earth is, and then just still trying to cope with the pains that I've caused myself.

I've not made any progress with anything. I've stumbled once again over the same stumbling blocks I've struggled with so many times. I don't know if that's because of my own perceived loneliness or if it's because I've fallen too far back into my more secular lifestyles. My coping methods for when I find myself sad or lonely are just full of temporary satisfaction, wherever I can get it. Whether productive, unproductive, creative, or destructive. I just have so many problems that I don't bring out into the light to deal with.

I keep on talking about how I've changed, how I've made myself better. In some regards, yes that's true. I've learned from my mistakes and am making strides to better myself, but then there's also areas I've regressed. Like I said, I've been recently stumbling on stumbling blocks that have plagued me for the past 5 1/2, sadly going on 6 years. I struggle so much, but my pride gets in the way of seeking help. The image of myself is getting in the way of seeking healing.

I need help. I need to heal. I'm lingering too much in my past. I can't move on. I'm angry at something, but I don't know what. Is it that I'm angry at myself? Angry at my circumstances? What causes me to not move on?

I find that I hate myself. Hate because I've gone back to where I thought I had grown from; walked away from. Hate because I'm not even close to half the man nor half the Christian I claim to be. I hate myself because on social media like Facebook I post/share the posts by TobyMac about all these different Christian things or sayings to encourage myself and others. To kind of show others I'm not afraid to share posts that exclaim the faith I claim to. To the God I always claim to worship and hold at most high. Yet I don't even listen to half the things I share.

I feel so lost in life. I guess this is sort of a desperation call. I'm broken and I don't know how to pull myself back together. Even if I can bring all my pieces together, it's only a matter of a time before I fall apart again. I have no way of securing my brokenness down so that I can become whole. I cannot move on until I am whole. But I also cannot be waiting until I am whole to move on.

I need help. I need someone to talk to. Someone to reach out and let me know things are going to be okay. To let me know there's still a plan for my life. I already know that these things are true because otherwise the Lord could take me home to heaven whenever He wanted to. But as long as I wake up on earth, there must be something. It's hard. I know I need to trust God, trust His plan and His timing. I need to trust Him entirely to heal me of my pain, my hurt, my suffering. I need to trust He will carry me out of darkness into the light, to carry me when my strength and endurance fails and I cannot bring myself to push onwards.

But I can't find that strength; I can't find that trust. I want something to make sense, but nothing makes sense. I feel so alone, so hopeless. Abandoned with no ray of hope; no ray of sunshine to remind me that the darkness only lasts for so long before the day breaks. No eye of the storm in sight to calm the raging seas and the roaring storm that obscures my vision and my sense of direction. No way to tell what I'm supposed to do, where I'm supposed to go, or why I'm still here on earth.

Please. Someone help me.

I am lost.

I am alone.

I have no more strength.

I can't push on anymore.

Help me.

Please.

I need hope, I need support, but know not where to find either.

I'm so close to giving up.

Is this the end?

Dreams

You know it's really hard to move on and stop yearning for the past when your mind decides to keep the past alive in your literal dreams.

How am I to move on when I have no control over my dreams, and then the dreams end up being somehow related to or including the person you're trying to move on from?

I mean don't take that in the sense that I want to move on or away from the friendship. I mean I should move on from wishing for the relationship and the once upon a time of more than friends. 

For example, last night's dream was of being able to just drive and visit her frequently enough because somehow the distance wasn't that great and then the relationship still worked. Or a few nights ago brought dreams reminiscing of being by her side, hugging her, snuggling up with her, leaning on her, and just enjoying everything about her from her touch to her scent to literally everything. 

I don't know what to do. I don't know why I'm so hung up on her. I mean why can't I get myself to move on and just accept the facts that the most we could be is just friends. Why am I so hurt and unable to heal? It's been nearly a month since the day I wish never happened had happened. 

Am I just being stupidly clingy?

Hard Work Pays Off

It's kinda a shame I only realized how true this statement in the title is. That hard work really does pay off. I don't know why I didn't understand this nor did I try harder in school. I guess I'm still a bit hung up on how different things could have been for me right now if I had just done what I was supposed to do.

Man I'm really taking this too hard. Am I being too hard on myself? Am I not trying my best to heal? Why is it that suddenly I'm having all of these doubts and upsets keep appearing as of late?

Anyways, I guess because I do all my tasks asked of me at work pretty well and right away, both the owners of the Jersey Mike's store I work at and my general manager like me. I had overheard one of the owners say that he hasn't heard anything bad about me. My manager says he likes me. And the owner's wife (I guess a co-owner?) said to not mess with me because she likes me (for context the husband was messing with me trying to prank me, it was almost a believable prank, but then again maybe I'm just too easy to fool).

It's a good feeling to hear that higher up's think well of me. It can only be good for me. I just need to keep up with the work and keep doing everything to the best of my abilities.

Even some of my coworkers say I'm a good learner and that they like that about me. Yet also here I am because I didn't learn how to apply myself and work harder before.

Gosh, I think I really need to address this lingering in my past thing. I don't know who to talk to or where to go, but I have a feeling this is getting unhealthy. Or maybe not "getting" but is unhealthy.

Whatever the case is, I should prioritize fixing my hurt, forgiving myself, and try my best to move on. At the same time, I should also look forward to the future and work on bettering myself for whatever the future may bring.

What Does It Mean To Be The Batman?

The title says it all. What does it mean to be the Batman?

To be intellectually proficient to solve riddles and problems on the fly?

To be physically at peak condition to lift heavy weights and fight with unparalleled vigor?

To have an unrivaled moral compass to protect the helpless and deal justice to the wicked?

What would it take to be Batman? Who even qualifies to be Batman? Do I get to call myself Batman?

I find that my perseverance is typically pretty enduring, but times can challenge that and wear me thin. I find that sometimes my brain can process quicker than others and solve simplistic questions, problems, and riddles with relative ease and decent speed. I find that my physical strength and endurance is just above average and sometimes I can do what others cannot. But in any of these three areas, I'm nowhere near the peak.

My moral compass is pretty good, as I have the idea in my head that I want to be a hero, to be someone's hero. To be a guardian for the weak and those who cannot protect themselves.

But other than that, I don't know nor do I think I get to be Batman or call myself Batman.

Should I scrap the whole Batman thing and bring myself back to reality and focus on what is rather than what was or what could be? To stop daydreaming and go day by day in hopes of finding a greater purpose for myself?

What does it mean to be Batman?

So Many Hats, So Little Time

I wonder if I'm pushing myself too hard. I can't remember but I think I made a post saying how I was getting back on my routine of working out and getting into shape. Anyways, if I didn't make a post, that's what I'm doing.

Monday through Friday, I go to work either 8am to 4pm or 10am to 4pm (depends on what they need me to do). Then shortly after I come home, I go to the basement and use either the treadmill or the rowing machine for 25-30 minutes doing some cardio, followed by a few short weight lifting exercises using whatever we have at home. As if that isn't enough for exercising, I then go to aikido, and most nights I get decent if not good workouts. Otherwise I hopefully learned something.

Then when I come home from that, I either shower right away or have dinner with the family and then go shower. I get maybe an hour or two after that to chill out and then it's time for bed to repeat the cycle the next day.

I don't feel fatigued currently but I do feel drained/exhausted. I wonder if I'm doing too much. I should probably be focusing on trying to figure out where my life is supposed to go, but I also have gotten comfortable with this new schedule and I am not looking at what I could be doing in say a few years or as a bigger career.

Am I pushing myself too hard physically? Being on my feet for the large majority of my shift, then all that exercising, to only settle down by 8-9 o'clock. When will I think about my future if my only free time I use to relax and just chill.

This doesn't even include if I have any family activities to do on the weekends or various weeknights as I know I have coming up.

I feel tired, but maybe that's just exhaustion. Do I keep this up in hopes of getting into shape? Where does my life go? What do I amount to? Should I repurpose my free time at night? So much to do, and there's not enough time in the day for everything.

Who knew that life would get this crazy and so full to the brim?

Why Can I Not Move On?

I have accepted all of what happened and I thought I had been able to finally move on. But then I still get a little hurt or feel a bit of stinging when I hear things that invoke memories of what was.

I know I cannot say that other people cannot say certain things because quite frankly, they are just passerbys to me. I probably won't see them again, or at least not significantly enough for me to have a say on what they can or cannot do. Even if they were consistent, I have no power nor authority to tell them what to do.

The pain started from when a couple came in and then the girl addresses the guy as "my love". Naturally that made me think of the last time, well also the first time, I had referred to a girl as "my love". At first I tried to not pay much mind to it since that's technically a generic term that is used in many circumstances and instances.

The nail in coffin for today was when a young mother referred to her daughter, who phonetically shares the same name as the first girl who liked me back (who is also the same girl I had once called "my love" for those who are unaware and stumbled upon this blog).

I know I need to just move on. I can't be mad at anyone. I can't ask the girl to give it a shot. I can't keep lingering in the pain and the hurt that I cause myself from not properly dealing with the heartbreak. I don't know how else to deal with it. The only heartbreak I've experienced before was rejection. This time is deeper because there was a chance for more and everything.

I don't know what to do. I don't know where to turn to. Where do I go? How do I heal? When and how can I move on?

Rebrand the Knight

As time goes on, and as I still want to run and manage my Batman social media accounts, I have begun a process of renaming the accounts. I'm starting to space away from calling anything of my Batman accounts with Liberty anywhere in the name.

So no longer am I the Liberty Batman. I just might need to rename my URL of this blog since I don't want to associate myself as "libertysdarkknight". I don't know what would be available, but I will see what I can do. To any of my friends who do read the blog, I'll send you the updated link whenever I change things, in case you're still interested in reading the blog, if anything even happens.

For example, on Instagram I was thelibertybatman, and the bio used to say "LU's Batfamily". The bio is now empty and the username is currently _the___batman__

I know all those underscores make it look kinda funny, but there's nothing else I can think of since Batman is a well known character that I'm sure plenty of people wanted to create an account for.

I don't know if any of this was necessary, and I don't know if it will help me move on from lingering in the past. I don't even know I even am lingering in the past still. To some extent I must be if I'm hung up on the usernames/screen names.

Perhaps it's time.

For the thing to start when the end is here.

The Knightfall Protocol.

Confidence

Ever since I started working and just being on my feet more than what I had been doing before I got my job (just sitting around aside from aikido 6 days a week and maybe a couple of group exercise classes and some errand running), I notice my weight has been on a steady decline. That's a good thing because ever since I came home from Liberty (little did I know for the last time returning from there as a student) I had been gaining weight. See the post not too long ago (I think early February this year) titled "Weight Up For Me".

I don't know if that weight loss was muscle loss or fat loss, but it sparked a new interest to get back into making sure I stay more active and try to rebalance my body composition. I've been snacking less and working out more. Not only do I work almost my whole shift every day on my feet, but I started doing push ups again. And then now I'm starting to add short workouts in between the end of work and aikido since I have a 2 hour gap in between. So the extra cardio and the 2 or 3 exercises of strength training that I do with the light weights we have at home add some extra calorie burn and hopefully muscle and strength gain.

I don't exactly have an accurate way to measure my body fat percentage, so it doesn't help me to know what my body is losing to drop my weight. I don't know if it's merely even just water weight loss. Or maybe I'm not eating such a high volume of food. There's a lot of different variables that can lead to weight fluctuations.

Whatever the case is, I have noticed my arms are developing pretty nicely. My deltoids and my triceps have some definition. And now I'm going to slowly rebuild my muscle endurance and maybe do more intense strength training over time.

All in all it leads to heightened confidence. Body image has been something I have struggled with ever since I got bullied in middle school. I know that what or how I look like doesn't define my value, but I guess I have always subconsciously or even consciously idealized the look of having some muscle definition. I never wanted to be super buff and swole so to speak, but I liked the ripped/shredded look. Whether or not it's possible for me (depending on how much I restrict/watch my diet and my genetics since some people have easier times or harder times getting to a certain body type), it's not a terrible goal to shape up.

I digress. My confidence is up, I feel good about how I look, and I feel good about how I feel.

Passions

I feel like as each day passes by and as they come to a close and I go through my nightly routines of aikido, dinner, shower, etc., that I find I am enjoying aikido more and more.

I don't know why it is what it is. Tonight was a great class. We had a guest instructor who is a friend of my sensei for over 20 years. She normally teaches and trains out in San Diego, so naturally I wanted to make every effort to show up. If not for the sole purpose of keeping up with my training and getting a decent exercise session fitted into my day, but then also to learn different things and potentially different styles from a different instructor. I mean you learn a lot by sticking with one instructor, but it's good to get different perspectives and a fresh look on the same things you would normally do every day.

Tonight I learned more about extension of the body to use physics rather than strength. To use the way my body can bend and extend, rather than curl up and lose power and have to resort to using brute force and strength, of which would be the complete opposite to the ideas of aikido. I got a great workout in tonight as well.

I don't know if it's necessarily my calling to teach aikido one day. But if you've been on this blog for awhile, you'd know I have mentioned I want to open my own dojo/school some day. And similar to how my sensei brings zen and Buddhism as a separate yet relatively connected activity, I could try to bring Christianity and Bible studies as a separate yet connected activity. I know I should see if that's what God is calling for my life rather than to just do it to compete or try to be on par with my sensei, but it's an idea.

I don't know how to discover what is a calling on my life and what passions are actually passions that the Lord instills upon me to bring into glorification of His kingdom. I guess my only idea is to pray about it. Other than that, I have no clue and will just keep going on day by day until I either figure things out, or learn by revelation.

I guess something else to note is that I get slightly bummed out when I hear I have another activity or event that will require me to skip out on aikido. I don't know if that's just me missing the workout or the development of my skill and technique. It's an even bigger bummer when I have to skip Friday's since that's the day I teach. I mean I don't get a good workout those nights, but getting to teach is an honor and being allowed to teach (meaning I am approved by my sensei) is a great feeling. Plus teaching can help me develop in different ways since I need to be able to know ideas and techniques inside out to explain and convey those ideas through words and actions.

That's all for now on this. It just might be a passion, for all I know, but there's only one thing I know to do. Pray.

Operation: Knightwatch

So this post is merely more about a project I plan to finally bring into fruition. For those who know me, you'll know I classify myself as a gamer. And if you know me more than that, it's that I play most of my games on PC ever since I switched over back in high school, if not sooner than that. And if you know me even further than that, you'll know that at one point in my life I was decently successful on YouTube, making 4 digits, in which after YouTube had slowed down I explored a bit on Twitch. I would eventually get to Twitch Affiliate status, which I probably lost by now because I haven't streamed in a long time which is the one requirement to maintaining the status.

So naturally either recording "Let's Plays" or streaming gameplay takes a huge toll on the computer. Especially if you're already trying to run a graphic intense game. Most computers ready to use don't have enough power in their gpu (graphic processing unit) nor enough RAM (random access memory) to survive both tasks efficiently. So that leaves me with one option: build my own PC

Now this is an expensive project I am undertaking and I have 0 experience with building computers. It seems pretty straightforward and I've heard it's not that hard, just time consuming to put it together.

Introducing Operation: Knightwatch. This is the project title I've created. The computer, when finished, will be named Knightwatch. Knight because Batman, and watch because kinda like how the Green Arrow has Overwatch. Sure I could've tried to wordshop Oracle into it to make it 100% Batman themed, but I like the sound of Knightwatch. It's almost a play on words too because Batman is the watchful protector.... at night.

The parts list can be found here: https://pcpartpicker.com/user/DragonPupps/saved/yTwYgs

For those who don't want to click on the link and are still curious as to the parts list, here it is:

Intel Core i9-9900K 3.6Ghz 8 core processor

Corsair H100i RGB PLATINUM 75 CFM Liquid CPU cooler

ASUS ROG STRIX Z390-E GAMING ATX LGA1151 Motherboard

Corsair Vengeance RGB Pro 32 GB (2 x 16GB) DDR4-3200 Memory

Seagate Desktop HDD 4 TB 3.5" 5900RPM Internal Hard Drive

Samsung 970 Evo 500 GB M.2-2280 NVME Solid State Drive

MSI GeForce RTX 2080 8 GB GAMING X TRIO Video Card

Corsair Obsidian 500D SE ATX Mid Tower Case

Corsair RM (2019) 750 W 80+ Gold 

Certified Fully Modular ATX Power Supply

Microsoft Windows 10 Home OEM 64-bit

All in all, with current pricing as of writing this post, the build will cost me $2,322.50

So it's not exactly cheap. On the bright side, at least I have the monitors, cables for monitors, and my peripherals already, so it's just buying the computer parts and constructing the rig.

If I did my math correctly, taking home approximately $8.80/hr after an assumed 20% tax, it would take me 264 hours of work to get this build done. These hours would get me enough money to build the PC and theoretically be a no net gain nor loss in cash. Given the way my paycheck is, it would be 8 weeks worth of work since it's a 2 week paycheck. If I were to base the schedule off of this week's planned 36 hours of work, it would be a total of 288 work hours. So I should have enough to be net gain after all is said and done. I also have 54.5 hours in my first paycheck on Wednesday, assuming they counted all the hours for grand opening and all of last week.

The earliest I can get the cash is 6 weeks from now. The latest would be 8 weeks from now. Between April 8th and April 22nd.

It's going to be a long grind, but I intend to finally bring this dream project to life. I also have to clean off my desk and clean my room to have a place to put Knightwatch.

Oh random side note, I do realize that Knightwatch has a lot of RGB and that's not exactly stealthy for Batman, but it's whatever lol.

I don't know why I wrote a whole post about this. Maybe because I am excited for this and maybe I want to use this as a way to maybe help keep me on track to building it finally. I always have planned it, planned the hours I would work, but then never work those hours and always end up spending my money on other things, further delaying the build. Especially since I was in school and didn't work a job. But now that I'm only working and not doing as school, why not?

Expect update posts about this.

One strategy I had originally thought of was to buy some parts as I go, that way I feel like I have to finish the project since I bought some pieces. I don't know if I will do that, but it's an idea for sure.

Money, Greed, Corruption

Perhaps this is a bit drastic, but I found myself tumbling down this path. It's a good thing I realized it and hopefully have put a stop to it before it got too late.

As you may know, I get some decent tips. And naturally it's better when there's either fewer people who are crew members (the people who get tips) or when the tips are great in amount. Naturally only one is sort of in control, and that's having less crew members and more management/corporate people working because they don't get tips since they earn more.

You can probably see where this was going. And I hope I stopped it all before I became too corrupted by greed and money. I mean in reality it's only a few bucks difference and it's all extra money I would be getting, so I should just be grateful for what I get no matter how seemingly small it may be.

The part where I had to remind myself of what the focus should be and when I had to re-align myself was when for just a moment I had thoughts of "darn there's a lot of crew members today so a lot shares to break down for the day's tips". I found myself turning sour and greedy over a few dollars' difference. It's sad that I even had this moment, and it is because of this moment that I am writing this post to expose that moment of dark nature and hopefully be kept accountable to never become ungrateful, to never be selfish and want less crew members so I can get those few cents or few dollars more.

I'm ashamed of myself for even having this moment. I should never have been like this. It's ungodly and it's extremely selfish. I should be grateful I even get tips since workers from other locations say the tips for the whole day could be just over $1 maybe even $2. And I'm griping over not getting $5 or $6. Selfish and lacking perspective. But now I think I can remember where I am and what my mind should be focused on. It should be focused on giving the customer a good experience whether or not they decide to tip us.

To almost add insult to injury, even after I had a moment of "worry" so to speak that I wouldn't get as much, I ended up with $5.22. That's a good enough tip for me. Then because I offered to drive a coworker home since he doesn't have a license and didn't want to pay another $10 to Uber, but he decided to give me some money for time and gas, I ended up with an extra $4 from that.

So all in all, I still got a good amount. Actually an excellent amount. So I hope I never have moments of selfishness, of greed anymore. It can and will corrupt me if I let these moments become frequent. So here I am to be transparent. To be accountable for my thoughts and my actions.

I know I should be able to do this on my own, but to those who have a more personal connection with me (I don't know if there are "random" people who read this and aren't "friends" with me but anyways you get the point) please help me to just be grateful no matter what my tips end up being.

Gratitude and postive attitudes and outlooks in life will get me way farther as a person, as a man, and as a Christian more than wanting those few extra dollars here and there. That money is easily spent so the compromise of sacrificing my character and integrity is not worth a quickly spent dollar or two or whatever extra amount I subconsciously hope for if I am being greedy or whatnot.

Okay, rant over. Please help keep me accountable, friends 😁

The Dark Knight

For the longest while, I had made my phone background this pretty sweet shot of a light shining through a bare tree that was coated in ice from freezing rain. It was a nice picture and had a cool effect. Puns intended. This was a switch I had made from a previous background which was of something that I had once longed for, but let's not open that can of worms right now.

This is said picture of the iced tree. I took this with my phone, so who's to say that phone cameras are bad? And for those who say Android is way inferior to Apple (as part of one of those ongoing and neverending wars similar to console wars) this was shot on a Samsung Galaxy S9. Just figured I'd mention that 😁

Anyways, after having that as my background for say 2 months or so, well just short of 2 months anyhow, I had begun to get a bit tired of that as my background. Not because it's displeasing to the eye or anything, but just that it doesn't really have any weight to it. There's not really a connection to me in some way, no matter how distant, aside from the fact that I took the picture. But I'm no photographer and this was just a lucky shot.

I didn't want to revert back to the picture of my Facebook profile, which should be the same picture you can see on this blog, of me imitating Keanu Reeves doing the "you're breathtaking" pose on my 20th birthday. And since I have a Batman themed phone case (just a RhinoShield SolidSuit customized with the text of "BATMAN", and then have the Liberty Batman batsymbol painted on it by my sister), I figured to pair the background with a nice Batman one.

If for nothing else than matching themes, I like it because I see the phone background all the time. Whether it be my lock screen or my home screen (when I change the background, I change both for some reason but I just like it like that), I will see the Batman. Or in this case the silhouette of the Batman.

Now aside from me just really liking Batman, I paired the symbolic message/idea in my mind of me escaping and breaking free of the prison pits of darkness inside of me. To rise up and become a better person. To be worthy of the mantle of Dark Knight and to climb out of darkness into a new life and into a new day.

As I see the Batman on the daily basis, I am reminded that if I want to call myself the Batman, I need to be heroic in all sorts of manners. Not to say I need to go out and purposely find heroic stunts to do, but more so of the idea to do the right thing, to be better, to not stoop down if someone tries to strike a low blow. To just better myself so as to make myself better. That was redundant but the idea is to rise. Like my post the other day, "Deshi Basara", I need to rise. I don't want to wallow in my pain and in my darkness. I want to rise. I want a chance to reclaim the mantle of the Dark Knight. To be the hero that someone might need. To be the friend that people deserve. To be the man I was designed to be. I know my dark side is not the way I was supposed to be, not forever anyways. So I'll remind myself through my favorite superhero that I have a choice: I can choose to stay in my darkness, where I have been comfortable for so many years. Or I can choose to climb out and become a better person. To become a man. To become the Batman.

All in all, I might be stretching out this idea way too far. I might be obsessing over the Batman again, but as long as I don't idolize the Batman, I don't think it matters how I motivate or gamify the way I improve myself. If it takes the fantastical ideas of becoming a silent guardian then so be it. If it takes the dreams of being a watchful protector, then let me be. If it takes the desire to become a dark knight, then let me journey.

This is my new phone background. Sleek, but menacing with the silhouette. To be imposing upon my darkness. To have a symbol of hope. To have the strength and courage to change the things that I have the opportunity to change. All I need to do is go.

This is day one of the rebirth of the Batman.

Power of God

What amazes me about the God I serve is that His qualities and traits can be passed on to a human level. To see the kindness through fellow Christians, the forgiveness that was inspired by God, as well as the grace extended through God into people.

To know that while actions and words can't always be 100% excused because of the nature of their roots, that there's nothing that can be the end of everything. Obviously don't abuse that ideology lest it eventually be a permanent state of damage, but to know that a patch of mistakes is not the end.

My moment of error and quick temper caused damage, but it wasn't entirely irreparable. What's nice to know is that I was still cared about even after my emotional state attempted to distance myself from everyone. To enter an isolation. I mean I knew I wasn't completely alone since Blogger shows me stats and I saw that someone somewhere was checking my blog. The part that's heartwarming is the fact that it was someone I have cared about and truly valued, but in my anger and poor judgment I had pushed her away. It amazes me what God can do through the people around me, even if they aren't physically around me.

I know that God works in mysterious ways and can speak volumes through seemingly trivial methods. While I know not how God "speaks" to me, I see things that I know or find out was an inspiration from Him. For example, the ability to forgive and show grace is something I saw and found out came from God when I had asked why my friend had even bothered to occasionally check my blog.

What I'm trying to say is that God's power is something we as humans can never fully or truly understand without direct knowledge and wisdom from Him. All I know is that I want to try to understand and comprehend the bits and pieces that I can perceive and register with my limited mind. Limited in the sense that the human brain could never truly understand God's deeper meaning, but we sure can try and if we don't understand something, that's when we draw closer to Him to learn the meaning He wants us to hear.

So what I need to take from all of this is that I need to learn to forgive and show grace to those who have either wronged me or I have mistakenly perceived to have wrong me. I'm not perfect, not by a long shot, and I will never be. So when I see someone who I'm quick to judge as imperfect or as a trespasser, I need to step back and realize that I'm just as imperfect if not more so.

This introspection process is going to be a long process and long work, but it's all going to be worth every ounce of effort.

Great Are You Lord

This morning as we were doing our worship in church, the song "Great Are You Lord" was on the list for us today. For the longest while, I just saw the song as a nice song that didn't really have too much of an application into my life. I mean sure, it always has the implication that God our Father is Great. That we should be pouring out our praise (side note, anyone else notice how the first letters of "pour out our praise spells "poop"?) and to give praise to the Lord Almighty.

As I reflect on the past and the occurrences and changes that have happened in my life as of late, I realize now that there's a new application of this song to my life in specific that allows me to just realize more the greatness of our God.

The lyrics in the beginning go as follows:
You give life, You are love
You bring light to the darkness
You give hope, You restore
Every heart that is broken
Great are You, Lord

So yes, obviously the Lord has given me life. I don't me to sound so ungrateful about it, but common sense would dictate that I indeed have life if I am still writing blog posts. Okay that was a bit cynical to look at it that way. You know what I meant.

He is love, and that is the absolute truth in and of itself. God shows me as well as each and every person on the Earth His love. That He would offer up His son so that we may join Him in heaven one day is the ultimate sacrifice, and such a love that we could never find elsewhere. Sometimes I will admit that it is hard to feel the Lord's love, but I know that no matter how I feel in my heart and in my mind that God loves me the same, no matter what I say or do. It's awe-inspiring and something I hope to get as close to doing as humanly possibly. I wish to try my best to show the Lord's love through my every day actions and the words I say. I know I'll never be perfect at it, but I just got to give it my best.

"You bring light to the darkness" is also an application that is relatively new or at least re-applied to my life. As I've mentioned before, I had my dark side. The crude, vulgar, immature side of me that I will still grapple with for a long while since change doesn't happen overnight. I will have to face my inner darkness but I do not have to embrace that darkness. As the great Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. once said, "Darkness cannot drive out darkness, only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate, only love can do that". In order for me to drive out my darkness, I need light. I need to become light. And the best way to become light is to seek after the One who is Light. The Light of the World who steps down into darkness. Jesus was and is the Light who stepped down into darkness, which is this world. And if Jesus can be brighter than the darkness of the entire world, He can be multitudes brighter than any darkness that could possibly be within me. So I must try to emulate His light and His love in order to fulfill His Great Commission of trying to bring everyone to know Him.

The only way I can change and become a better person is if I become a beacon of the light who is Jesus Christ. While I know that my Christianity is not based off of the things that I do or say because it is all based on what God has done, I still need to try my best to act and show the light of God to everyone I meet. Whether or not I agree or disagree with them, whether they wrong me or not (a perception issue as it would apply to recent events), I must try my best to not let my darkness take over.

God is the ultimate being in who I should be putting my hope into. I need to remember that and enact upon that. I know that I'm guilty of putting my hope in other people and while that may help, it's not the end all location where I should be placing my hope. I need to remember that God is my ultimate hope and that as long as I have faith and do as He calls me to do, my hope will be rewarded. Not to say that I do anything just for the reward, but the ultimate place I should put my hope in is God, and the ultimate reward of eternal life with God is worth every sacrifice I have to give.

God is also the ultimate healer and restorer. As you might be able to tell, I was in a whole world of hurt and pain. Broken heart and everything. I know I brought a lot of that pain and hurt onto myself because of my poor reaction to everything, but it still stung no matter if I brought it to myself or not. It always will because the heart is one of the more sensitive locations as I have learned over my 20 years of life. Because for example if you break your arm, yes it will hurt, but the physical pains will be healed, and you can always take medicine to help nullify the pain. You can't take medicine to nullify a damaged or broken heart. Through time and just giving space where it was needed, or even taking space as I needed, God was able to help work on my broken heart, to bring all my shattered pieces back together. Then it was up to me to get back up and tell my heart to beat again. God can heal me, but I also have to put effort into getting up when I have fallen down. God will extend His hand, but He cannot force me to grasp His hand since He has given me the choice of free will.

I have been restoring and healing my broken heart. It doesn't hurt me anymore, well there are some moments when there's a bit of pain, but it's not like I'm really feeling it as much. I think as long as I don't try to purposely dwell on it, I should be okay. God has also been restoring other things in life, as He has restored one of the friendships I have so carelessly thrown away in my emotional blundering. I am forever grateful for the restoration, and I hope to change myself so that I may never trespass or wrong my friends ever again, whether past friends, present friends, or future friends. I know I also shouldn't only change for someone else, but I know that whatever changes I have to make are good changes for me as a person as a whole.

With all that being said, our God is a Great God. He is the Greatest. He is the Lord Almighty. I'm so blessed to have a God that surpasses any other deity. One who loves me all the time. One who is good all the time.

So now this song has a new meaning for my life. And now I just need to take the breath that He puts into my lungs and pour out my praise to Him.

Friends

I realize now that I've managed to successfully rekindle the flames of friendship that it was the lack of friendship (because again of what I've done to push them away) that led to me writing on this blog so much. That and also the part where I'm pretty active at my job, being on my feet and staying active. Well more active than to sit around at home anyways. Then on top of all that, I still go to aikido, so my days are pretty full of activity.

In my moments of downtime and finding myself in my own thoughts either throughout the day while I do mindless clerical tasks at work, or just reminiscing on good memories, that is when I find something to blog about.

I kind of want to keep blogging at least once per day, for as long as I can go. Naturally if I don't have something I feel is blog worthy to talk about, then I won't. But I guess this is like my new version of a journal. But it's one that I share publicly sort of. Only sort of because I don't advertise everywhere that I have a blog. I once had a journal that I kept all throughout 2016, just writing a new entry everyday on a Google Docs. At the end of the year, I had written way too much and it was so repetitive and not really vastly different in each entry that I never wanted to journal again. I digress.

It's nice to have friends. I don't know why I let myself push them away. No matter if I have 1,000 friends or 1 friend, I should never push them away. Especially if I had once considered them best friends and them to me as their best friend. Part of me wishes for those days of best friendship. Maybe it's possible, maybe not. I don't want to treat this friendship with an agenda. To make sure I'm not only doing this to achieve a status and then to leave it in the dust because I had gotten what I wanted.

I don't care if I have the titles and everything if the value of the relationship is not really that significant. If I'm not really investing time and effort to be a good friend, there's no point to try to be a best friend.

So with that being said, I'm super grateful for having a friendship restored. For a second chance to do things the right way. Whether or not I get to that best friend status again is not up to me. What is up to me is how I treat my friend. How I show that I learn from mistakes. Not just to do things and change for her, but to change and do things for myself. Of course her friendship is worth all of the change because having friends is always nice. Just having someone to talk to is nice, rather than merely just blogging and hoping someone wants to read my thoughts for the day.

Blogging has been relatively fun, but a one way communication is no fun. I like to hear from others and sometimes hate just talking about myself. Of course this blog is all just me talking.

All in all, I just am so happy for how things are turning up for the better. Maybe I can truly change myself. For myself, and for others. Primarily do everything for God and then change myself for my own achievement and not for the praise or laurels from others.

Blogging frequency may drop off, or it may not. We'll see.

Drained Beyond Comprehension

Right now it's 12:07 a.m. on February 22nd, 2020. That's honestly not that late, especially since I've been awake way later and have done crazy things like go to Waffle House at 3 a.m.

But I guess since I'm working full time now, I just feel tired. Mentally tired. Sure I could just go to bed, which is actually for the better probably, but I feel too tired to get up and go to bed. This is an exhaustion I have never known. And this might just get worse as next week I'll be working 8 more hours than I did this past week.

This is going to be an incredibly tough adaptation I am going to have to make. And this will just be life as I go on through the many years I have ahead of me. I hope I can scrounge up the energy to do the things I need to do whenever the occasion arises for me to do something.

I know not where I go as far as my calling for this lifetime, but I just hope that I can trust my God to get me through it all.

Okay, I really need to get to bed, why am I blogging?

Deshi Basara

While I'm not entirely sure what language the title is in, all I know is its translation and where I've heard it from.

To describe it, it comes from the movie Dark Knight Rises and is during the scene in which Bruce Wayne makes the climb out of the prison pit. This would be the third time in the movie that we see him attempt to make the climb, this time unlike the other two times, he does it without the rope to catch him if he falls. To strike the fear of death into him so that he can find the strength to power through every challenge set before him. To not just resort to accepting death and not fearing it for he might just want it all to end so that he can rest.

As he is making the climb to the platform in which any escapee must try to leap a seemingly superhuman distance with not enough ground to get a real running start, a long term prisoner says in his native tongue, "deshi basara". Then Bruce makes the jump. He finds his redemption. The right to the mantle of Batman, to the protector of the city he was raised in.

Okay so you might be wondering, "Geoff, that's great and all but why are you making a post if you're just going to talk about a scene from one of your favorite Batman movies?" Well there's a real-life connection sort of. It might be a reach, but naturally I had to make the connection, to find a parallel between Bruce Wayne and Geoffrey Yee.

A few posts ago, I had mentioned I am stuck in my own pit. While it may not be a physical prison, it is a mental prison. A prison that I've never left before and have just accepted as a fact of life. As something I cannot escape. This prison was what I had often times in the earliest posts of this blog referred to as my dark side. As my inner darkness. As just a part of me that when released, I cannot contain. But in fact I have discovered the contrary. I can indeed contain the darkness, and I can even disspell the darkness if I put enough light into it. Sure as they say more light means more darkness, but then I just gotta keep on striving to be brighter and brighter. To blaze onwards to a new life. A better life.

This dark side is what I had tapped into on the day of the fallout. The day I had cast out everyone I had once called close friends. On the day I had so quickly thrown away the phamily. The same people I had missed and still miss dearly. This is the vulgar side, the side that deals in absolutes. The side that makes everything black and white and no gray areas. This is the side that views the world as against me and I have to fight everything and everyone alone.

As I have had time to mull over my thoughts and my feelings and work through the pain of realization of what I had done once the emotion had dwindled, I realize that that is a lifestyle I no longer want. I don't want to be so quick to anger. I don't want to be so ready to lash out. And most importantly, I don't want to backtrack on promises for that makes my word mean nothing.

If I say I will be there until the end of the line, I have to mean it. If I say I will respect thoughts, feelings, and opinions, I have to do it. I cannot say those things and give false hopes, false promises for people to put their trust in me and then for me to betray them. That's not heroic, and it most certainly is not manly.

There is a lot of soul-searching that I must do. I must discover who I am meant to be, and I must work hard and strive towards being a better person. A better man. A better friend.

I know that sometimes I go too far and find out that the damages I do are irreparable. That once I do it, there's no turning back, that there are no second chances.

But I have been shown grace. Grace similar to the grace that God my Father has shown me. I have been given a second chance. Almost a clean if not clean slate. A new leaf. A new page. A chance to do things the right way. A chance to climb out of my prison of darkness and step out into the light and become who I want to be; who I need to be.

There are greater plans for me in this life. And I know I can do great things. I just need to do things the right way and not compromise on my morals, on my promises, and on my words. Compromise leads to dangerous waters if I'm not careful. I had a shipwreck once, and I've been given a chance to repair and try again. I mustn't wreck again. I must prove my words can mean something. That my promises are true. That I won't make a promise I cannot keep.

I have been given a second chance. I am grateful and blessed to be shown grace after what I have done. I hope to make things right. The friendship is too valuable to throw away, and I shouldn't have even done anything as I have done already. But I mustn't wallow in my regret. I need to learn from my mistakes and never do those same things again. An apology without change is merely manipulation. And I do not intend to manipulate this person as I truly do value her friendship.

So, it's time for me to make the jump. Embrace the fears and what I could lose and take that as a way to strive upwards and onwards.

Deshi basara.

He rises.

Just Did A Good Thing

🎵 I don't regret this thing at alllllll, and if you're wondering what I did, I'll tell you what I did, I did a gooooooooood thing 🎵

So in case you're wondering what I did, I decided to surprise a friend with something she had been looking for for so long. It was probably the best thing I could've done, given the distance, to try to apologize and attempt to make up for the damages I've done. All I can say is that I'm really glad that she still counts me as one of her friends. It's all I wanted, as you probably could've figured out because of the post that I counted out how few friends I actually have no matter what social media says with however many followers I supposedly have.

I'll let this tiktok fully explain: https://vm.tiktok.com/bkNEhE/

By the way, while you're at it, go follow her on tiktok lol.

Anyways, for those who don't have tiktok or didn't follow the link, basically she had been looking for Mini Brands for a long time. Mini Brands are a capsule of 5 randomized items that are miniature collectible versions of real life brands. They were super popular and you could never find them in store. So what I did was I just had 3 capsules sent to her college address and she got them today.

She seems pretty excited from the texts she sent me, as well as the tiktok she made. I know that buying things for people doesn't undo anything and it may or may not win favor or whatever you want to call it. That wasn't my objective with this, it was more, well, as I phrased it in the gift message option "a small token of appreciation". So maybe I can try my best to make myself better and be better as a friend that she deserves to have. I don't know what else I can do except to just never push her away again. To never betray her trust and to just be there for her if she needs me to be.

As a final note, if you don't have tiktok, you might not understand the tiktok reference in the title and the first paragraph of this post 😅😅😅

Thieves Guild

Okay so I know I said I wouldn't make that many posts about the tips I get from my job, but good Lord today was a haul. It almost felt like larceny. The tip was that large.

And I know you could argue, "Geoff your tips aren't really that huge. Waitstaff at restaurants could make the same tip you make or even two or three times your tip from serving one table". And yeah, you're right. But the waitstaff that makes way more in tips than me is also the waitstaff that makes an average of $6.32/hr, according to PayScale. I am paid hourly at I think $11/hr. That's what I heard, so I guess we'll see on pay day on this coming Wednesday.

The way tips work at Jersey Mike's is that only crew members get the tips. Management, corporate, and owners/franchisees do not get tips because they make more money anyways. So since today we only had 5 crew members, and I know that one of the owner's relatives dropped $10 into the tip jar, it was going to be a nice day of tips. If nothing else, my tip was going to be at least $2.

I don't want to sound snobby about this. I mean I don't technically need any of the tips because I'm being supported by my parents still, and I have an hourly rate that would pay me decently. I'm really grateful for any of the extra money I am given. It's nice that people are generous, since really we don't serve them any more than just make the sandwich and maybe have a bit of a conversation with them. It's not like we take their orders, bring them food, refill drinks, etc.

Moving on, for the moment you've all been waiting for (if you care about my tips lol), I made a whopping $11.86. More than an a whole hour's worth of work!!! That's pretty amazing if you ask me. I mean sure I worked 7 hours today, so it's only like getting paid for an 8th hour, but it's still awesome! I also got a bit extra because one of the 5 people who were supposed to split the tip with didn't want to wait the extra couple of minutes to sort out the coins. I'll take 'em if you don't want 'em. Because if I get even $0.05 more per day, over a week is $0.25, every month is $1.00, and then by the end of the year it's an extra $12. Sure $12 doesn't get very far and wouldn't allow me to make or break survival especially over a year, but still. It all adds up.

All in all this was an incredibly nice ending to my first full week of work. Next week I've got a total of 8 more hours than I worked this week, going up to a 40 hour week rather than the 32 I worked this week. And my breaks get lengthened to 30 minutes per day, so I'm not sure if I'd get paid for those 30 minutes, but hey if tips are consistently around even the $5 margin like how the past two days have been, I'll make up for it. It's a win win scenario. Either I get paid for those break time and don't have to work, or the tips I get will effectively be getting paid for that time anyways.

Just look at that nice pile of cash money 😍😍😍

Time Flies Like An Arrow

I suppose it's because I now have a job that fills up a good portion of the time I am awake. Then there's also the time I've been committing to aikido on a near daily basis (Sundays off). Then family dinner and just casually going about the night makes time fly by so quickly.

It's nice to have family time and everything, and it's great to have a job where I can earn money and get life experience. But wow I never felt time slip by so fast. Sure one could argue that as you get older, each increment of time is a smaller and smaller percentage of one's total life, so that could be one explanation. Or just that being busy does this.

This is just adulting and being a contributing member of society. So it's just daily life I'm going to have to get used to. No more breaks, aside from weekends and vacation time. No more 3 month summer breaks, no more 1 month Christmas break, no 1 week Thanksgiving nor 1 week spring break.

Now that I'm away from college, I realize and have a deeper appreciation for the time I had at college. It has been great and so much fun. Life can be fun, but it can't be all fun and no work.

I guess what I'm saying is that I miss the days of being in college. I miss my friends, well assuming they still count me as one of theirs. I miss the fun times and fun memories we had made together. Heck, I even miss just having time to play video games. I haven't played much recently. Sure I could probably take some of the time in the couple of hours in between the end of work and aikido. Sure I could go play instead of just doing nothing on the couch with the tv on. But idk, I just kind of like not really actively doing anything. After long days of work and some exercise, doing nothing is nice.

It's only sad because I had once dreamed of building a PC and playing games with it. I never made the money for it, and now that I can be making money for it, I feel as if I don't have the time nor the will to go take the time to make it worth the effort to build, as well as the investment I have to make to build it. I mean the PC I once planned out was $2,000. That's a story for another time, I don't want to get too sidetracked.

Time just goes through my hand like soup on a fork. I feel like I'm doing good in my life for becoming more responsible in taking a job and stuff, but I also feel like there's more for me somewhere in life and that this isn't my peak. So where do I go? I don't make time to think about the next step. For the time being, I feel comfortable where I'm at. But then I still have so much being provided for me, so I don't know what it's like to scrape by to make ends meet. I don't know what it's like to struggle. I don't know a lot of things. There's so much I don't know and not enough time for me to stay focused on that to try to teach myself those things.

So many hats, so little time.

Tips Are Nice

On a different note since my last post was about my job and my work, there are some benefits to being a crew member. So far, I'm supposed to be getting paid minimum which around here is $11/hr I think. Since I have not yet been paid and I don't know how much state and federal taxes are going to take from me, let's assume a 20% chunk taken out. I'd take home $8.80/hr. Not terrible with all things considered.

I do get a 15 minute break once per day for my shift, in which I can go make lunch for "free" and take a cookie/brownie if I'd like, as well as take a soda cup for water/soda throughout my shift. I should technically be getting paid for those 15 minutes although we will see when the paycheck comes in. It's only because technically those 15 minutes is just a break and not a lunch hour or anything.

Regardless of what the case is, being a crew member means I'm at the bottom. And that means since my pay is lower than management positions, I get to collect an equal share of tips that the customers leave. Sure it's not a guaranteed source and it's not always going to be the same amount since it's an extra thing the customers can give or not, but it's still something.

Yesterday, I left earlier than the rest of the people for my shift since my boss said I can leave 1 hour earlier. So I didn't collect my tip yesterday and figured that it's up to my coworkers to hopefully do the right thing and remember to give me my share. This morning I was able to collect what I didn't yssterday.

I got $6.00 in tips yesterday. That's a solid almost 45 minutes worth of work. So even if I don't get paid for my 15 minute break yesterday, that makes up for it. Then today, I collected my tip at the end of my shift and was surprised to have gotten $5.70. I thought the $6 was a fluke. But I suppose it might not be.

Now sure the tip could theoretically be nonexistant or even just $0.25, but hey every cent I collect is more money for me. Plus it's not officially payroll, so 100% of it I get to keep.

That $11.70 I got over 2 days was a nice surprise. More than an hour's worth of work because it's not taxed. I probably won't be blogging too much about how much the total tips get to, but you know it is very nice to get. I am blessed and grateful to receive it.

All that being said, I have a better understanding of how much tips mean to people in the food industry. Granted I make more per hour than they do (since I heard most places only pay $2-3 per hour and they are mostly tip based), so naturally my tips are going to be less. But hey, if it ends up being consistently $5 a day, and I work 5 days a week, that could add up to some serious money that I otherwise wouldn't have.

A Small Price To Pay

It's kind disheartening, the post I'm about to make.

For both yesterday and today, in the hour before we opened our shop, I was on tomato slicing duty. No big deal, just slice approximately 180 tomatoes in the hour to prep the 2 trays of tomatoes for the day. We have a slicer that operates by hand and makes things easy.

That's not the part that bothers/saddens me. The part that does bother me is the part where because of what the company wants to achieve as perception and optics (how the customer views things), we are asked to throw out the slices of tomatoes that have the stem and any white spots down the middle because of the stem. Then we also throw out the bottom couple of layers because for our subs we give them the nice flowery-shaped parts of the tomato, and the bottom just doesn't make the cut (pun intended).

I eyeball it since I don't stop to weigh each tomato and then weigh the parts we discard, but if I had to say, we throw away at least a quarter if not as much as a third or a half a tomato depending on size and how many white spots we see. Multiply that by the estimated 180 tomatoes per day, and that can be as few as 45 to as many as 90 tomatoes' worth of food we throw away because we want to please the customer's eye.

It sucks because I know it's not my manager nor the owners of the shop that want this. Or at least I would hope they wouldn't want to waste food (especially because any wasted food is wasted money and with capitalism driving this country's economy...). I would have to assume it starts from the head of the company/head of Jersey Mike's and then just trickles its way down since after all franchise locations have to follow a protocol in order to make the experience pretty much the same in every location.

I mean just look at all that wasted tomato from today. The picture doesn't justify how much is actually in there since you can't see the depth.

I don't know what you could use the discarded tomato parts for. Maybe send it to a juice bar that blends tomatoes? I don't know if they do that, but someone somewhere must have a use for this? Maybe make it into food for animals? There just has to be something better than just throwing it out. It feels like such a waste, but I'm not about to challenge authority as a crew member who's pretty much the bottom of the totem pole. Especially since I need this job to help fill out my resume so I can maybe explore other paths in life.

I guess this is just a small price to pay (for salvation) so that the customer has pleasant looking tomatoes on their subs.

Feeling Better

I'm not sure why, but maybe because I had a combination of a bit of strength training (started the day with a total of 100 push ups), then went to work for 6 hours, had a good run on the treadmill for extra exercise (followed by a couple of strength training exercises), and then went to aikido, I somehow just feel really good.

I feel like my life has purpose. I have a job, I am getting into shape and feel better about myself physically, I can still train aikido like I wanted to, and I'm slowly working my way towards feeling better mentally.

I don't know how long this will last but I hope the good feelings continue. I feel like if they do, I will work day by day, step by step closer to being a man and being a better person than I was before.

One drawback is that I'm realizing that I have no time in my days. And as I go on to longer work shifts over these next two days of 7 hour shifts and then 8 hour shifts all the time Monday through Friday starting next week, and 8 hours of aikido in a week, that's 48 hours of 168 total hours in a week. Sure I guess I still got 120, but that doesn't include sleeping and stuff.

Not to really break it down to all the numbers exactly, but it just seems like my days are super quick. Work is typically busy and it goes by quickly, so those hours burn quicker than flash paper in a magic act, at least it almost seems that way. Aikido is usually pretty quick at burning time when activity is high, but even when things are slow it goes pretty quickly.

I suppose that's how life is going to be regardless if I work at Jersey Mike's or anywhere else that offers me 40 hours a week. I'll adapt, as I usually try my best to. And as I work on myself as a person, it's something I will improve on, my ability to adapt that is.

Whatever life throws at me, I want to feel good about myself, so I'm going to try to be more positive and just fight towards a better day, a better self.

It's time to pick myself back up from my fall. I won't let it hold me down forever.

With Great Power...

Okay, I know that the title is Spider-man so it's almost sacrilegious on a blog whose title is about Batman. But I have good reason for it.

Remember how in one of the blog posts about my new job mentioned I have a 30 hour workweek that was then updated to a 31 hour workweek? Well my schedule was changed again. And just like the last post, I have no idea why I was chosen for the schedule change, maybe other people were unavailable to make the change or what. I don't want to assume it's because they like me or think I have the most potential or whatever. That would be narcissistic almost. Well it's kinda the way I hope it is, but since it is nothing but a hope, I will leave it at "they need me so I'll do whatever to make them happy and let me keep my job".

So this week, I was amended to come in at 9 (instead of 10) for not only Friday but now for tomorrow as well. That totals this week out to 32 hours.

And then starting next week and for every recurring week after that, I have been asked to come in at 8 and leave at 4 like usual. That way those 2 hours before store opening I can be of assistance and help set up the shop for the day. I will also be taught how to operate the slicer, and learn all the other tasks and duties that I have not yet learned. My skillset will increase and I will become slightly more responsible at work because now I will have more duties.

I don't mean to write this as "oh I'm being focused on and being taught everything as well as being given a 40 hour workweek in comparison to some coworkers still having the 30 hours". It's more of an observational post. I hope so anyways.

I will take on this challenge. Because it is through challenge and trial by fire that I will be forged into something greater than what I am now. To change me into who I am called to be. To become someone better than he ever was before.

I don't know how much this will actually change me, but I hope it changes me in every positive way possible from these new responsibilities and everything.

We shall see next week how I fare holding up my first 40 hour workweek as well as still hopefully maintaining my aikido training. My days will become long and my weeks will become short. I will be busy and be tested to my wit's end. I hope that my perseverance will last and that I will fight on to every goal and test that is set before me.

Bring it on.

Emulation

So as you can tell from the ending of my last post and from the title of the blog, I like Batman. Okay, maybe I'm a bit obsessed. But hey, he's a great superhero and upholds justice and protects those who cannot protect themselves. That's admirable. Something I wish to do. Maybe not as a vigilante since in real life vigilantism is illegal (okay well in the comics and such it still is illegal, but Batman had a ton of money for the gadgets and tools to help him escape, conceal himself, and eventually turn the law to his side and not go for instant arrests). But just the idea of being someone's protector, a watchful one at that. To be someone's guardian, a silent one at that. To be a knight for someone, a dark one at that.

This is kinda a joke post in the sense that it's kinda nonsensical and doesn't really have any deeper meaning or any life lessons or anything. But basically, for whatever reason, I've been experimenting with facial hair. Yup. That's what the post is about.

So if you know me, you'd know I'm Asian. And what does that have to do with anything? Well, stereotypically, Asians have a much slower rate of growing facial hair. And as we age to a point where we can start growing facial hair, we get patches for a long while. Like most contemporaries at 16 (when I started shaving) could grow a patchy beard. Me? I had a few whiskers in the mustache/upper lip area. 4 long years later and now I can kinda grow a chin strap sort of deal, as well as more in the upper lip and some on the chin below the lip.

All through January, I let it grow out. I shaved it all off February 1st because the whiskers over my lips bothered me since sometimes if I stuck my tongue out, I'd lick the whiskers and I wasn't used to it. After shaving, I kinda regretted shaving everything, so the other day, I only shaved the mustache part. I've still let the sideburns and jawline grow out, as well as the front of my chin.

I don't know what I am expecting to do with the facial hair. I don't know if it will look good or anything. All I know is that it makes me look older. Because after I shaved on the 1st, I looked like a baby. Baby faced and everything. Sure the facial hair isn't that much in comparison to other people my age, but it's more than what teenage Geoff could grow.

Anyways, the title, since I title my posts to have some relevance or appearance in the post (have I become self-aware in my posts?) Emulation of who? Well if you read the first paragraph, the Batman. In my time of healing and working through the fallout of my actions and the pains of heart break and casting out friends immaturely, I have gone into a sort of isolation. This could be my coming of age as my middle school English teacher would talk about. My transformation into the man I'm supposed to be.

Given how I kinda like how Christian Bale looked with the long hair and beard as he was a prisoner in the pit of the Middle East when Bruce was captured by Bane, I kinda want to emulate to an extent that kind of look. I know a full beard isn't possible yet, but just the idea of not shaving clean, kind of working towards a goal. His goal in the movie was the escape the prison. He had some steep falls, but he eventually makes it out. I feel as if I am in my own prison pit now. I need to change aspects of myself, try escaping, maybe fall a couple of times, change some more and then make my way out.

All in the meantime, aside from the top of my head since too long of head hair kinda bothers me (in fact I just got a haircut), I'll let the facial hair grow, keep the mustache region in check, but let the rest just grow and grow. To become my own version of an imprisoned Bruce Wayne as I make my way out of prison and change to become the hero that my friends (or acquaintances now maybe?) deserve. Maybe I won't be the hero that they need nor even the friend they need, but I hope to re-friend them if they are interested in rebuilding burnt bridges and cleaning up nuclear fallout.

So, with that, let's see what happens from here on out. Will I work step by step to change myself? To eventually escape this prison and then rightfully take back my mantle of the Dark Knight? Or will I stay in my past tendencies and behaviors and be imprisoned for life with no improvement and never become the Batman again?

I mean think about it. After Batman loses to Bane in the first fight, he loses his mantle of Batman since Bane imprisons him without his gear and his tech. It is only after he escapes and returns to Gotham that he gets to be the Batman. So will I stay where I am, not bother with changes and never be Batman again? Or will I improve myself and return to my former glories?

Allure

In some continuation from yesterday's post, I suppose that after blogging consistently day after day (or night after night) I find that there's a certain allure that draws me to want to make at least one post per day. Maybe just as a consistency thing, because it will look nice to see each date in reverse order as you scroll down through the blog. I honestly don't really know why I blog so much, much less why I blog every day.

Do I write things to truly do as the blog's original intention was to be: my unfiltered thoughts? Do I write posts to just express daily frustrations, observations, or just a space to vent out my feelings, whether glorious or tragic? Do I have a hope that people who used to be in frequent contact with me and used to check the blog see these new posts? To see my inner thinking? To hope that they can maybe see some sort of growth or some sort of change that might get them to want me again? Is this all just an act out of desperation?

Whatever the reason is, I suppose you can regularly check back on the daily, if I'm worth that much of your time, and then you can see my inner thinking. To go into vengeance, into the night, and into Batman.

Side note: do I really get to claim the mantle of Batman still? I'm officially no longer a Liberty student and most of my Batman mantle I assumed rode on the fact that I was Liberty's Batman. I have nothing else to be the Batman for. Do I become a Batman for my hometown? But then that might draw more competition since people might not be as accepting, or they might want to be the Batman themselves. Do I just train physically like the Batman? Continue my aikido training since it is a martial art, well given not the same art as Batman and not as many as he had, but still something I hold a black belt in. Do I train myself mentally to be like Batman? Work towards a whole ton of problem-solving, perseverance, and willpower and determination to get things done, to deliver justice as it is needed? This is such a long and unnecessary ramble about a fictional character to whom I wish to resemble. And now you know how my mind works. As if you couldn't figure it out from any of the previous posts. Alright, I'm done for now. Check back later for inevitably more posts for today, or come back tomorrow and have at least one or two more posts to catch up on. Or don't come back, because honestly there's nothing that you will really gain out of this blog.

Frequency

I realize that every day lately, I've been posting 2, 3, even 4 posts per day. I don't really know why I post so much. It used to be a lot when the blog first started, as a bunch of nonsensical posts that were short and not very well thought out. Crude posts, full of vulgarity, immaturity, and just whatever else was running through my mind at that moment of composing the post. Sure I could go delete those posts, but I like to keep them as a reminder of where I've been. That way more recent posts can show the growth of where I went since those days. It's in its own way humbling to show growth, maturation (is that a word?), and just development from one stage/phase to the next.

Anyhow, I got sidetracked. Frequency went from so many in the first few months to few times a week at most, to maybe even once every few weeks. And now I am back to writing so many posts. More than what is probably enough. Even if I were to say blog once a day, that's more than plenty.

Maybe it's all because I have more time as I take some time and space from people I was friends with. I need to grow in my own ways, to become better for them if they choose to accept me back into their lives after the way I treated them. So instead of spending my free time texting them, sending Tiktoks, memes, just checking in on their day, I now have time to myself. I still just peruse the interwebs on my phone, but I have less communication and connection with people. Barely anyone to text and talk to, especially now that I work and don't take my phone out until my 15 minute break.

I don't even know if anyone reads these posts. Someone does since the insights view of this blog shows 1 view on most of the posts. I don't get to see who viewed it since they can do it anonymously. Unless they decided to leave a comment on a post and sign in with an account or signed off in some way that I would know who it was. Regardless, whoever it is, thanks for making posts worth some time and effort. And if it's someone who I know then thanks for being consistent. I don't know who you are, but thanks for taking the time out of your day to look into my life.

Rekindle The Flames

About a year ago, well I guess a little short of a year ago, I started a rigorous 4 day per week of lifting weights followed by a short period of cardio (20-30 minutes of running on the treadmill/using the elliptical). It worked for about 6-7 months, give or take for time off due to vacation or other reasons that would lead to an inability to go (whether it be time or lack of motivation for that day). Sometime in late October/early November of 2019, I fell off the workout train since I hadn't been able to work out due to the volume of people in the gym. I didn't feel like waiting 20 minutes to use a bench press. Sure I could start elsewhere, but bench was the pinnacle of my chest days, and I wanted my best performance on it, so I couldn't tire myself out beforehand. Sure that's not a great excuse, but then that day that I dropped off it was also incredibly busy on everything else. Pros and cons of a college gym.

It's been a solid 3-4 months now since I had considered exercising regularly. Well, ever since I came home for Christmas and now indefinitely, I had gotten back to training consistently at aikido, but that's more of a cardio exercise than anything. No strength training, which I would like to incorporate. For the past few weeks leading up to getting a job, I had gone to a group exercise class at the local gym we have a membership to. It started to rebuild some of my presumably lost strength. And these past couple days, well just today and yesterday, before I went to work I did a total of 70 push-ups.

Push-ups are a great exercise. Requires you to lift approximately 70% of your bodyweight, and works the chest, triceps, shoulders, core, and a bit of back if you go low enough. I would get out of bed, do 35, go have breakfast, and as I got changed for work, I do another 35. I also have been making sure I incorporate a solid amount of protein in my breakfast to help fuel my muscles and strength for the day.

Also, I must be getting my body conditioned to standing for hours in a row, because my knees do not hurt me today. Well hurt in the sense of being tired. I don't know if it's because I moved more or if I have figured out tactics to combat the tiredness, but it's good that my knees don't feel tired. With that being said, I remember a few weeks ago, I told a friend I would get back into running. And now that I got my work schedule pretty much solidified and am feeling overall better about myself, I might incorporate a small run on the treadmill in the gap in between the end of work and the start of aikido.

To add to it all, I've been consistently losing a few pounds. Sure weight fluctuates on a day to day basis, but after tracking and logging my weight data into Fitbit, it shows that each week's average is consistently going down a half pound to a pound. Maybe that's because I'm on my feet more and being a bit more active than just milling about at home.

So if I were to start running, I could probably shed a few more pounds and cut my body fat down to a spot that I like. Then I'll have to figure out if I want to get up earlier to go do weight lifting before work or find other bodyweight exercises I can perform for strength training.

I feel good about myself. I feel the fires for working out and taking better care of my physical self starting back up. The forge is running hot now, and now it's time to reforge myself. Trial by fire, and I'm going to shape up my physical as I shape up my mental. I'm going to be a different man physically and mentally. This is good. I am excited.

This Is Life

I know that no matter where I go in life, I will encounter people I do not get along with, who disagree with me, etc. And then there's also the positive aspect of coming across the opposite in which I do get along with them, they agree with me, etc.

It's a challenge, but as I've stated before, challenges lead to change. And as I work towards changing myself to be a better man, to be a better friend and better person, I accept challenges and will have to persevere through challenges that are less favorable.

The important part in discovering people that are hard to get along with is how I react to them. Do I respect them and their ideas before asking if they do the same to me? Am I willing to humble myself, get off my high horse and serve them before asking them to serve me? I'm not saying every scenario is a servant and master sort of deal, but the idea is that am I willing to do things for them before expecting the return of that favor? Respect and trust is a two way street. If I cannot respect or trust someone, how can I expect them to respect or trust me? That would be unfair and setting a double standard.

As I work towards being a leader and fulfilling that title since several people have stated I am a leader, I need to humble myself and become a servant leader. To put others before myself rather than sit in command in a cozy place and make others do the hard work. And I need to work on not exploding on people anymore and ever again. I need to cool my temper and speak with a level head before I commit to an action that leads to damage potentially.

Where am I going with this? Well I discovered today that a coworker is hard to get along with. He treats me as if I've never worked at Jersey Mike's before. Not to say that my 4.5, now 5.5 days is a lot of experience, but he isn't trusting what I've learned nor my ability to learn. He tells customers it's my first day on the job and I'm only learning today. Sure I make mistakes since I'm still relatively new to the tasks of being a Jersey Mike's crew member. I still have yet to cook more, to prep the store before opening, to learn how to operate the slicer, stock things, etc. There's so much for me to learn and while I am typically a quick learner, I also like to have my own time to practice it the way I was initially taught and to not be told I'm doing things wrong. Sure there might be multiple ways to do something, but it also depends on the tone of how the message is delivered to me.

Maybe it's just my quick temper that leads me to disliking this coworker. Maybe it's my prejudice that some people in the world are just out to see my downfall. All of which are bad traits I need to work on removing. I would like to think I try my best to accomodate how veterans of Jersey Mike's do things. I know that one coworker seems tough because of how he initially talks, but then I just tried my best to learn from what he wants me to do and how he wants me to do it. Now he's warmed up to me saying I'm learning a lot of things and have a lot to learn, but he sees my improvement. He sees that given practice I will get to where he needs/wants me to be.

I guess delivery is my main troubling point. I can't be too hard on the coworker I don't like as much because I have a feeling in the back of my mind that he's somehow different. He mumbles various things under his breath, nothing bad, it just seems it's a coping mechanism or something. So maybe interpersonal communication is not his strong suit and I just need to adapt and figure out what works best for communicating with him.

All in all, maybe I just need to stop and think for a moment and just try harder to adapt whenever adaptation is required. We'll see how things go. All I know is that if I resort to old habits of blowing up, it won't gain me any progress and might be detrimental if other coworkers see I get too easily frustrated or upset over small things. A lot of change is necessary, and I know that in the long run it is all for the betterment of myself as a person, as a Christian, and as a man.

i gotta stop going back to places that hurt me

I was going pretty well without writing a blog post of me being hurt. I don't know if this is unhealthy that I am returning yet again with a new blog post that is still on the hurt and heartbrokenness. This is becoming toxic nature of myself to be lingering so long, I think. Is it that I'm actually making progress to heal from my brokenness? To repair my broken heart? To deal with this all head on and to just tank the damage and the pain for whenever my mind wanders back?

Anyways, I was making a Tiktok and I had wanted to use the green screen effect and had some pictures I had in mind that I needed to retrieve in order for it to work (it was for the trend). Not so much of a problem, right? Wrong. So wrong. I shouldn't have forced myself to go digging for those pictures because it invoked pain. How?

Well let's say I had to go through old chat messages, text messages, Facebook messages, etc. Anywhere you can DM or message you, I had to go through it. Okay not that drastic, but I did go through old DM's and texts (to phones). I got carried away and because I was scrolling relatively slowly so as to not miss the image in case I just zoom past it, I re-read messages.

Messages in which I had exchanged very full emotional messages, expressing feelings of love, of appreciation. Complimenting each other. Saying who is the better in whatever compliment (you're the cuter one, you're the sweeter one, etc). I also re-read messages of the first "I love you". The first "🤟", which in case you didn't know since I don't know who reads these, is the ASL sign for "I love you". All of the "I love you so much", "I love you more", "You are so cute", and every other message now hurts.

It once brought joy and warm feelings of happiness. I felt so good when those messages were initially sent and I read them for the first time. And now as I deal with the heart break, the fallout of my actions of pushing people away, I hurt at the sight of those messages. I know I could just delete the messages and never see them ever again. But at the same time I find myself unable to. Not because I can't, but simply because I won't. Why?

Because these are the first tender, emotionally vulnerable, soft sided messages I've ever exchanged with a girl. The first time I ever got to say "I love you" to someone who wasn't family, and have it be reciprocated. Side note, I never said "I love you" to a girl if I didn't know if she felt the same.

The memories these messages bring are bittersweet. I can feel the joy I felt when they were sent. I can remember exactly where I was, when during the day they were sent (also because it was time stamped), and just how good I felt about it all. They are bitter now because of circumstances. Of not being able to have that relationship I once dreamed of. Even though I was ready to do whatever it took despite the consistent long distance. I can't force her to want to have a long distance relationship if she prayed to God and this is what she feels at peace with and at most comfort with. I need to respect her and her decisions. And to tack onto all that of wishing for the relationship, I also pushed her away in my immaturity and anger, as you are probably well aware of if you just go back and read through old posts from February 2020, and go through the past week or two. If you don't want to go back, that's fine, just take me at my word then.

So as I work to regain trust, to rebuild friendship, to repair my heart for getting it broken because I got too excited and too invested too quickly, to just restore things to some level, I am getting hurt at reminders of the past.

What do I do? Should I do like the one post I titled after Kylo Ren's quote? To let go of the past? Do I follow a different but similar quote of "let the past die, kill it if you have to"? What does killing the past look like? What all does it entail? Does it mean I have to destroy the messages I have? To destroy my firsts?

Why am I so emotionally attached to these messages? Well there's just a certain level of love you put into firsts. Not just romantic love I mean. First real backpack I got for high school and still use? I love it. First bokken (wooden katana-like sword for martial arts) that I got to reward myself for a shodan (1st degree black belt) test well done? I love it. First car to drive and call my own (sorta)? I love it. Something about firsts has it's allure and I don't know if I can bring myself to destroy these messages and move on with life. I know that if God calls me to a relationship, I will have similar good feelings and joy and it will all be good, so why do I keep these? Just because they were firsts?

This is just going to rekindle the pain and the hurt if I ever go back and re-read the messages. This isn't the first time I've re-read them, and honestly, it probably won't be the last time I re-read them. December 3rd, 2019 had some of the best messages I ever got on Instagram.

But I need to move on. I need to tell my heart to beat again. To grow. To get back up after I've fallen. Bruce, you've fallen and now it's time to learn to pick yourself back up. Stop lingering in the pain. You cannot heal in the same place you were hurt.

Gosh, I'm so lost. So confused.