Running Out of Reasons

The 20s are all about finding the good in everything. It can be so very easy to become in college. It's hipster this, anti-mainstream that, and down with the government, anarchy rules, young, wild and free everything. Some people say that college is where you unlearn the social indoctrinations we've endured through our K-12 education. All the historical heroes that were once saints turn out to be patriarchy proponents with deep dark unsightly secrets and half the time were just attributed with an accomplishment as opposed to actually having done it. It's the world you've lived in for the entirety of your life is nothing but one big-ass lie. It's no wonder that some of us have trust issues, and yet we still have to go with it. How do we get back to that carefree optimistic outlook? What stops us from being happy? No matter how hard we try, we can't avoid it forever. We're running out of reasons.


There are so many times where I just want to go crazy. I don't know. Sometimes I want to do the random, sometimes reckless, things other people do in college. I want to let my [figurative] hair down (the mini-afro I'm currently rocking is not a good look though) and do something out of the ordinary. At the same damn time, I don't consider myself to be missing out on things just because I'm not partaking in them. I think I'm afraid to even entertain the idea of doing something out of character. I can't even wrap my head around the concept. It takes so much to get me to do something spontaneous, to let loose and to settle comfortably in any setting. What am I so afraid of? Am I scared of what other people will think of me, or maybe of what I will think of myself? Am I afraid I'll lose myself, or maybe discover I'm not the person I thought I was? (This post is already so damn metta, it's actually annoying as hell - please excuse this internal debate; it's actually not that melodramatic). In every social circle I'm totally aware that I'm the "boring" one. The guy who never wants to do anything. The person who stands at the back and observes rather than joining in. I'm the risk assessor and the one who's most reluctant to venture outside their comfort zone. I guess safety and control have something to do with it. I want everything to be planned, calculated and executed without a hitch, and if I didn't have a hand in putting it together, then I'm even less in control. That right there, is absolutely terrifying to me. How do you overcome that? I'm running out of reasons.

Let me start to catch you up on my week (check back for the follow up continuation post of this one). My school is making a "Happy" music video like the one Pharell Williams did and somehow I was in three different shoots getting down with my fellow orientation leader Alex, at the RHA general body meeting, and in true musical fashion around the fountain on central campus with fraternity/sorority life. The whole time though for each one, I was nervous as heck. I had no idea how they would go and I just had to get up and do it. Wednesday after running my second to last RHA general body meeting ever (literally didn't even take time to notice) I went to a student leadership forum and was thrust into another place where I didn't know what to expect. Somehow I ended up facilitating discussion in one of the break-out groups of inclusivity and leadership and made it work. I feel like people just assume I'll rise when a visible leader is needed and that, in and of itself, is overwhelming to come to terms with. I'm just as awkwardly terrified as anyone else, if not more and yet I move past it to take action. If only I could empower myself to do that more often other than just to give direction to groups. It was back to the residential life where my sporadically present friend Mac dropped by for me to quiz him on jazz music. After a couple of hours I fell victim to the late-night discussion trap and soon gargantuan questions like morality, the significance of human life, and so many more classically collegiate useless debates were had. I woke up the next morning, knocked out a 3 page paper in 27 minutes before heading to my classes, and office hours. In physics recitation I received my third exam grade and it was disastrous once again. Getting those things back always shakes me up and absolutely puts a damper on my day, that college pessimism comes out and it's hard to lose. I met up with my frabrovisor (friend, brother, advisor ... patent pending) Lane and talked things out, actually like everything. We just sat on a bench in the science building talking about the most random of things, and slowly but surely, everything was okay. I knew it wasn't the end of the world, and still needed that authentic perspective to move me on in my day. Can I just say that there are very few people who I find myself totally willing to share candidly with and I thoroughly value those who do the same with me. I had considered skipping the next day's awards banquet and our fraternity's formal, but knew I would regret it if I do so. Nothing left to hold me back, running out of reasons.  

My blog post question for the day is ... what reasons do you usually give to not do something or go something? My go to is I'm either tired (which actually is always freaking true; what is sleep) or that I have a meeting (mostly true though too, but definitely could have skipped so many).