journals
Showing posts with label journals. Show all posts
Showing posts with label journals. Show all posts

My Last Post Was March 10, 2016.

And it seemed like I fell off the face of the earth. Or Blogger, at least. What happened?

Well, I've been active on my book blog. If you follow me there, you'd know that my reading life has been thriving. I'm two books away from my 25-book goal. And I'm buying books in such a crazy pace. (I just placed yet another Book Outlet order for another 11 books. Yep.)

So why have I been away from this blog? I guess I'm blaming WonderCon 2016. LOL. I was going to post recaps of several events I attended. But those posts are tedious to do and overwhelming. You know me, I can't do short recaps with 2-3 pictures. And I never got in the right mood to dedicate time and effort to do it back in March. It then affected everything else that followed WonderCon. I went to the Captain America: Civil War premiere, by the way.

That's about it.

I even stopped journaling. I got overwhelmed; having never blogged for years to maintaining three written journals at the same time? What? I got in too deep watching those really creative journal videos that I lost sight of what it was ultimately about: writing down your thoughts at the end of the day on a medium where no one can read it. The truly personal stuff. What I really think about people. I've gone through a rather shattering reality check about some things and people that I come to love and respect and those things are the ones that should be kept out of social media. I don't fully understand it yet myself but I could talk about it to the ground without fully letting go of it. I think I need to write it down, talk about it with myself rather than someone else. I guess when I say that "I have nothing to hide," that is just a load of bull. XD

I really should start blogging here again. July is going to be a BUSY month with three conventions and a food fest. Anime Expo is right around the corner and this year, we'll be doing something different. A J-pop concert! We don't really know anyone on the roster (except Sphere) but we just want to experience being a part of the hikikomori crowd, as people call them. We're going for the very first time to EVO in Las Vegas. I'm so flippin' excited for that. And of course, KCON LA 2016. I had the easier ticket-buying experience for that... using the ever-reliable internet of Manila, Philippines!

Speaking of...


Yep. I just got back from a much-needed vacation. Mom and I did have official business in Manila but really, I just tagged along for the heck of it. I had two weeks of vacation and I wanted to use it. I needed to take a break from work and everything that came with it. And I did it at the right time. I'm happy I did. Now, I do feel a bit energized and seriously, I need the money for July's slew of events.

We also had a 9-hour layover in South Korea, going back to LA. Last time, it was 15 hours. I wasn't so lucky this time. We took the free tours provided by the airport instead of a self-tour and guys, if it were the last resort, fine... but I don't really recommend it. Not if you've been to Korea before. I mean, it wasn't BAD. If it's your first time or not really interested, it's quite good. But it could've been better. More on my trip on the next post, I promise.

(I wanted to post about our Korea self-tour after the fact but it got lost in the mess. Maybe this is the perfect time to revisit that, compare it to the guided tour. Yes?)

How is that for a quick update? Today's my first day back at work so I have a lot of catching up to do. Hopefully, things changed for the better around here while I was gone.

Hopefully.
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DREAM JOURNAL | Raining

I swear; I did not intend my most recent posts to be about journaling. In a row. Sorry. I have other stuff planned but these require less planning and I want them done right away because I might forget about them. I'm amazed that I'm remembering dreams lately. I figured, I should take note.


This time - last night, actually - it was about rain. And Bon Jovi. But we'll deal with one thing at a time. I know... a strange combination. But it's another one of those two dream nights.

The rain dream was just about less than five minutes long. It really was just like a flash. But it was special because my late maternal grandfather was in it. I don't dream about dearly departed relatives that frequently. I don't know if that's a good or bad thing. What do you think?
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DREAM JOURNAL | Smoking and Beavers

How was your Valentine's Day? I spent mine reading Morning Star by Pierce Brown and just lounging on my bed. I'm never much for that occasion anyway.

And I had two dreams last night. At least, two that I could remember. One, I've had many times before and another... rather strange one about taking photos of a certain animal.

Smoking Beaver in the Lowlander

I've dreamt of smoking a few times. I do not and will never ever smoke in real life (although I've tried it and it wasn't for me), I've "experienced" it in dream state. Either I walked out from a situation and pulled out a pack of cigarettes and started smoking, or I step out to a veranda, find a pack there and light one up. This time, I just remember that I was already smoking.
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Gratitude Journals



February welcomes another journal to my life.

Morning Pages didn't really work out that well. I've done my Q&A A Day religiously for the whole month of January. I've journaled for 31 days straight. Lately, I've come across new stresses in my life. It's so easy to lose yourself in the negativity. ONE thing can ruin your whole day that is otherwise filled with happier times. I don't want the bad things to overshadow the many good things that I am thankful for.

On the outside, I'm a pretty positive person. But I get into these funks where I think of the worst-est case scenario for myself. As bad as it sounds, it's easier for me to sink into the black hole of negativity vs thinking of the "bright side". That way, when the good actually happens, I'm surprised and relieved. But then, I'm also stressed as fck while waiting for the final outcome.

On a whim, I decided to start a gratitude journal. Three or more things that I'm thankful for that day. It could be a little thing, it could be something major. This is a positive page. A safe space. I had a rough Sunday. I knew today, Monday, is going to be rough and it is. But yesterday, when I jotted down that first thankful moment, I instantly felt better. It wasn't just writing down just for the sake of writing it down. It reminded me of that moment when I was exploring my new camera and how giddy and excited it made me. Thus, writing down that happy moment made me smile again. If one thing did that, can you imagine how happy five things can make you.
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DREAM JOURNAL | Rats

I guess I do have a dream journal after all. A little more public than a longhand journal though. But that's okay. Consider this therapy. I'm the patient and all of you are my therapists. Fitting that I'm doing this during my downtime at work... considering where I work. ;-)



I slept early last night and woke up early this morning. At around 5am. I stayed up until 6 and then tried sleeping again. That's when the dream happened.
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DREAM JOURNAL | Getting Shot


I didn't get a good sleep last night. I often experience that on Sundays when I'm usually parked on my bed all day doing nothing. Sometimes, I would get a 3-hour nap in the afternoon after sleeping in. I don't get tired. I'd be wide awake by my bedtime.

Normally, I would go to sleep no problem but last night, I had an earworm. Several, actually. I was watching clips of K-On!! Live Event ~Let's Go~ and as you know, the songs are extremely catchy. In my head, I was singing either Fude Pen ~Ballpen~ or Fuwa Fuwa Time. In years passed, I might be slightly embarrassed to be seen singing these kinds of songs but now... I'm actually thinking of mastering one of them for Anime Expo 2016 open mic. Truth.

And then, when I feel the arms of slumber finally enveloping me, I hear a loud snore. Okay, there goes my sleep again. When I do "sleep", it's so shallow that my brain is active. Brain keeps telling Body that, "You are sleeping. You do feel rested. But you're not really asleep because I'm wide awake." I didn't even dare to check the time when I snap awake. I'll just beat myself up.

But I did have a couple of minutes, hours when I was in deep sleep. I dreamed. And I actually remembered said dream. It's a fucking strange one. On par with my Nancy Drew and the Secret of Mirror Bay reenactment, my eavesdropping at the Rivendell scene in LOTR: FOTR right behind where Sam was hiding, and the ridiculous SCUBA class with one of the CSI:Miami character, Eric Delko. But this new one was a bit scary as well.
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No More Morning Pages for Me

At least the written kind.


I should preface this post by saying that I've recently started actively journaling. I currently maintain two: an actual journal and a Q&A A Day journal. I used to have a Morning Pages notebook. I started all three in January 1, 2016. A new year, a new activity. Other than that, I maintain two blogs... and probably one more kept forever private. I'm not sure if I'm keeping that yet. I'll decide by the end of this post. But now... Morning Pages.

It took up too much of my time and really, I didn't have that much to talk about most days. I can bitch about my job, work situations, people here, people at home... I tend to bitch about people a lot. That happens when you're anti-social, I think. But to do it over and over, day after day... it gets tiring. I can bitch about stuff to the ground but that's pretty much the extent of what I can do. Bitch. (Call me a coward but it is what it is.)

I do keep an actual written journal at home. I write in that before going to bed and there, I dump everything that's happened throughout the day and even what I'm concerned with for the morning after. I get 7-8 hours of sleep if I'm lucky and what happens in those sleeping hours other than sleep? I don't remember my dreams if ever I dream.

At first, Morning Pages was a great idea... three WRITTEN pages, brain dump style. It can be about anything at all, could be gibberish even. If you run out of things to say, write "I don't know what to write" over and over until you do three pages of it. It doesn't have to make sense. It honestly did clear my head those first few days when I was incredibly stressed out. It did help me settle down and mellow out; situations became easier to process and accept and then I realized that Morning Pages felt more of a chore than something I "must" do.

Now, no one's told me that I should write Morning Pages everyday. In fact, I don't do it on the weekends. I only do it when I get to work. Work gives me the most stress in my life, go figure. But on the days when I don't have anything to vent about - in either language I speak - I just sit there staring at a blank page of an awesome notebook (which looks like now is going to disuse... again). I try to search my brain if I had stuff to throw out. Often, I either come up with nothing or the same shit over and over again. Some people can do this in 15 minutes, I spend a whole hour or more on it, missing my coffee schedule. (Yes, I'm one of those weirdos who base their coffee drinking times on "science".) It also kind of takes away from the other stuff that I should be doing at the start of the day. I just didn't see the point of writing "I don't know what to write" or some other sentence over and over just to meet the requirements. I don't see nor feel the benefit of that. If you do, more power to you.

So I've decided to make more use out of this blog. It's not only for events and whatnot. It's an "everything else" blog, having been keeping a separate book blog. This right here is kind of like a brain dump. But typed out. I type faster than I write and it gives my left ring finger callous a break. Since my blog is open to public, I may get a conversation out of it also. Feel free to chip in. I need that mental stimulation. Or I need a kick in the butt. Yes, I can be deadly candid about everything in a private notebook but if things seem to cross that line, I have a backup, really private place to dump it all in. Still typing it out though.

I think I just got a bit too excited with this journaling thing. Youtube is a black hole. I found out about Morning Pages through a journaling 'tuber that I watched and it sounded life changing. I was just too desperate to find a way to relieve my stress. Write or I'll shop or eat it out. I haven't extensively written in a while so I chose that. Heck, I even got those adult coloring books (which only served to stress me out even further lmao). But I had to stop somewhere before it overwhelmed me. Right now, two journals and two (well, three depending on the content) blogs are all I can manage. Morning Pages should be written out but if I'm more comfortable doing this as a daily TYPED exercise, so be it.

How about you? Do you keep a journal?
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