On Learning From Your Mistakes (And Why I Am Awful At This)

If there is some sort of omnipresent being that brought our universe into creation on a whim, she/he/it has a cruel and unusual sense of humour. As well as having to suffer through needless atrocities such as damp socks, microwaves that don't heat the centre of frozen pies and Australian politics, our most efficient way to learn is not by observing, but rather by doing... and then completely fucking everything up. These fuck-ups, or "mistakes" if one is in polite company (so, nowhere even close to my presence) are the foundation to our ability to grow and develop. You make the mistake of touching a stove, burn yourself, feel pain and never do it again. You decide it's a good idea to invest in male hoisery, go bankrupt and are laughed all the way to the centrelink queue and the dual sting of embarrassment and financial hardship ensure that you'll never dare foray into men's fashion ever again.

It's a very bitter and confusing place.

For those of you who like to maintain that they are perfect specimens of humanity who never complete flawed actions and perform excretions that smell like a rose garden, you can take your fragrant-smelling fecal products, bag 'em up and fuck right off to the nearest gastroenterologist. Here is a simple truth. Every human being that has ever walked this planet has made a mistake at least once in their short existence, no matter how shockingly insignificant. This is what truly unites humanity- not our comadre, our spirit of brotherhood, our ability to love, but our ability to approach any number of tasks and systematically fuck them up. This ranges from trying to put together furniture from IKEA and somehow instead ended up with one less limb to yet again finding yourself confused and alone because, whoops, you completely misread a situation and accidentally alienated someone important to you. In both cases, loudly yelling swearwords into your pillow can relieve some of your immense emotional distress, but there will still be a considerable amount of time where you'll be thinking "Oh GOD, why did I fuck up THIS badly?". Well, tough luck there champ. It's a life lesson. You'll learn.

Well, in theory, you'll learn. In reality, if you're as thick-skulled as I am, it'll take quite a few mental batterings to force the lesson into your squishy little brain. Let me tell you, while I like to think of myself as a pretty intelligent little human, I can be unbelievably dense when it comes to repeating my mistakes. At least there's comfort taken in acknowledging that I'm conscious of it. There are far too many people in this world who sleep walk their way through existence, unable to stop the trail of destruction left in their wake as their unwillingness to wake up to their own behaviour gradually tears away everything they hold dear. This, I believe, is why so many people end up dying alone and confused... something I am terrified of. When I exit this mortal coil, I would like to be able to say that I not only left at peace with myself, but also feeling like I spent a worthy amount of time connecting with those I hold dear. I truly believe that identifying these faults within myself is one of the steps to getting there.

One of my most frequently committed mistakes I've made in my nineteen years on this planet is never allowing myself the proper time and space needed to heal. If you've been following this blog since its humble, rambling beginnings late last year, you may have come to the realisation that the last six months or so have been a challenging time for me. Probably no more challenging than what the average person experiences in their existence, but because I am a terribly emotional and introspective little creature, the whole ordeal left me completely and utterly drained. By the time I exited my first semester at university, I was genuinely afraid of how exhausted I felt. Even the smallest of actions, such as filling out a form to apply for my academic withdrawal, left me teary, anxious and tired of being alive. This filled me with a deeply unsettling confusion. How on earth could my energy levels and coping resources be this low? I wasn't currently experiencing any trauma. I'd taken a week away from uni when my grandmother died. I'd dropped out of my courses and no longer had to deal with the rigours of exam season. Why did I still feel like I was only centimetres away from plunging over the edge?

Think this, but less cute.

Because, in all fact, I was. For all my sporadic days off, missed lectures and weekends home, I had done fuck all to address the fact that yes, I was emotionally damaged. Instead of taking time to regroup and know myself, instead of realising that because all the pain I was holding inside me, I no longer had any clear picture of who I was, I just kept putting myself in more and more situations that only damaged me further. The first step in overcoming any sort of personal trauma is to begin to know and love yourself again. Sadly, because of years of low self esteem, I had forgotten how to feel anything but utter contempt for myself. Most of the time, it wasn't even conscious. Faced with tasks that would be difficult to people not experiencing extreme distress, I called myself weak and commanded that I toughen up, keep it all inside and get through it. Of course, while some people advocate this approach, I do not. I believe that people need time to grieve, and we often underestimate how long that time will take. Anyway, this approach culminated in a very public mental breakdown and after being persuaded to get help, I realised that my inability to love and cherish myself was perpetuating my cycle of misery.

OR that is what I would have learnt, had I managed to keep this lesson in mind. But of course, I didn't. What I did instead was mistakenly assume that because I temporarily felt a little happier and lighter, all my issues had magically fixed themselves. Woo, look at me, I'm so good at therapy, two sessions later and I'm a brand new human being! This was not a good assumption. While I was definitely doing better than I had in the last four months, my emotional wellbeing was still a mess of scar tissue and scabbed-over wounds. I was healing, but only up to that crucial stage where if I wasn't careful and knocked about the half-healed mass, I would begin to bleed again. But of course, oblivious in my cocoon of new-found joy and interest in life, I paid no heed and went straight back out into the world, my battered heart out on display for everyone to see. Of course, this didn't really work out well for me.

Pretty much me, waiting for the realisation to hit.

Existing in a place of emotional vulnerability while simultaneously being blind to it is a strange experience. There is a definite sense of displacement. You feel like you should be living entirely in the present, without a care in the world... and yet, there's still a strange fluttering sensation in your chest. The nagging thought that all could suddenly go wrong in less time than it takes to blink. You think you're happy, but you still wake yourself up occasionally at 3AM with your own restless murmuring. You still feel lost at times. Everything feels like it should make sense, but it doesn't. It's a state of utter, half-manic confusion.

During this time, I went on a two and half week to Adelaide, which did wonders to address my burnt-out feelings. For that glorious time, I was almost completely free of worry. I had isolated myself from all of my troubles, and boy, did that escapism feel good. I was also lucky enough to be surrounded by a group of patient and kind individuals, who were content to let me work at sorting out my issues and finding myself (although I'm fairly certain they were all sick of my tears by the end of it). However, that these issues were still popping up at the back of my mind should have been a warning sign. I was better, but there was still so much more healing to go. Truthfully, there still is, and all of this became painfully apparent when I returned home.

My first night back in my apartment in Brisbane felt oddly surreal. Here I was, just off a plane, oddly alert despite being awake for almost 32 hours straight and everything just felt wrong. Everything felt too busy and rushed. The very air felt like static biting against my skin. I couldn't shake the sense that everything I had been avoiding was going to crash down upon me like a tidal wave. This feeling continued for a couple of days, until I had a massive anxiety attack in my bedroom about a week later. Fortunately, this was less an indicator of things to come, and more a wake-up-call to my need to properly address my wounded self.

To my credit, I think I handled this latest bout of extreme anxiety well. In the past, I would cry and hiccup my way into a state of exhaustion and then collapse on my bed, forming what a friend of mine likes to call "an anxiety burrito" in my blankets. This time, the crying lasted less than an hour, and instead of dealing with it on my own, I called someone. This is a pretty big deal for me. You see, because I find it incredibly difficult to relate to most people (probably due to my own bitterness), I rarely feel okay with talking to someone about how I feel. There's a few reasons for this. Probably the number one reason is because when I do share my problems with people, I rarely feel like they're understood. This is absolutely no ones fault. I accept that I have some shit in my life that is hard to relate to. I also accept that many people in my life, while they love me to pieces, don't really have a good grasp of what's going on in my head. Again, all of this is fine. I pass no judgement and it does not make me love anyone any less.

So I called someone, and that was a step forward. I may as well mention that it wasn't a close friend. No, on this occasion, I decided to call a crisis helpline. It's not the first time I've done this. And you know what? I'm pretty happy they exist. Having one kind-hearted person willing to listen to you cry and snuffle over the phone when you don't feel like there's anyone else you can turn to is very important, even if they are a stranger. I have had a few heartwarming experiences with helplines and also a few that I don't care to remember (note to anyone looking to comfort someone highly emotional- do not fucking suggest that they check themselves into a psych ward. I have enough to deal with without someone assuming that I'm so crazy that I'm a danger to myself and others, thank you very much. I was just having a bad day and that was hardly an appropriate thing to say to a heartbroken 16 year old girl). Luckily for me, on this occasion, I definitely had an experience that really changed my perception of my life.

Because I come from what people might describe as a "broken home" and also because I was taught to be independent from a very young age, I have never really felt like I've had a nurturing presence in my life. Most of the time this doesn't bother me. Sure, I had my moments in my youth where I burned with envy over people whose mothers still made them packed lunches, or people who could go home after a weekend away and have their uniform washed and dried for them. But that's all in the past now.

That being said, sometimes in my sadder moments, I long for someone to take care of me. This doesn't mean in a romantic sense- no one should ever be that reliant on someone they are in a partnership with- but more a motherly figure. Someone who will sit me down, let me cry, give me sympathy and comfort but also provide advice and force me to see around my own emotions. I was lucky enough to find this mythical matronly figure on the other end of the line.

The counsellor handling my call was called Shelly, and although we were only speaking on the phone, she immediately enveloped me in an abundance of warmth and care. This woman was definitely a mother- you could hear it in her voice- and she knew exactly what to say to calm me down and make me see clearly. She let me know that it was okay to feel upset. Although I wasn't aware of it, I had been trivialising my own problems, unwilling to acknowledge that with all the hurt I experienced, I had a right to feel sad. As Shelly explained, trauma does not suddenly go away because these hurtful events in your life have passed. It lingers, and follows you around like a malevolent shadow. If you aren't incredibly careful, it can poison other aspects of your life, which only increases your suffering.

We talked for about an hour, and she imparted wisdom on me that I will never forget. I would prefer that most of what was said stays between her and I, but there is one thing I would like to share from our conversation. It is a simple piece of advice and has been repeated numerous times, but I know I had overlooked its truth until now.

You cannot love others without first loving yourself.

On the surface, the meaning of this phrase seems pretty obvious. Okay, so, you don't like yourself, right? Well then, how the fuck can you expect to have healthy personal relationships? Obviously your self-loathing will impact on your loved ones, because there's nothing worse than seeing someone you're close to that doesn't love or respect themselves. However, I have taken deeper meaning from it. As well as impacting on your ability to have healthy relationships, putting yourself out there for others is so much more draining when you haven't taken care of yourself first. Before you can nurture the people you love, you need to be in your own place of strength and tranquillity. Only then are you able to give them what they need without damaging yourself further.

Not loving myself is a mistake that I have been repeating for almost a decade now. Its impact has been felt in many aspects of my life- my friendships, my passions, my ability to handle the hurdles of everyday existence, the health of my relationships. Although I wish I could have learnt all this sooner, and saved myself a lot of pain, I am still thankful for the learning experience. Truthfully, I am reaching a new level of security in my self and it's a wonderful feeling. From first working on myself, I am now gaining the capacity to interact with my outside world, one gentle smile at a time.

Taboos (And Why They're Stupid)

I'm going to admit it. Even though I am was doing a law degree, I am not the best at complying with rules. In fact, sometimes if I'm explicitly told not to do something, my inner annoying teenage rebel will rear her spotty head and start screaming for me to do it anyway, because fuck you, I do what I want! You can't control me! Rules are just a societal construct, man!

I'M NOT A PART OF YOUR SYSTEM. 

That obnoxiousness aside, realistically, our society couldn't function without something there to stop us stripping naked and fucking whatever we see. Sadly, there are far too many terrible people in the world to survive in a world without consequences. However, there's a bit of a difference between the law and social niceties. They correspond in some ways- don't get me wrong, some things like murder are not only illegal, but highly frowned upon in a social setting (you can't just murder whoever takes your favorite character in Mariokart, however much they deserve it), but other things just seem plain confusing and dare I say it, borderline archaic.

Because I'm feeling lazy and also really don't have the time to write this.... er, I mean, I'd like to experiment with actually structuring my thoughts rather than progressing on my usual incomprehensible stream of tangents, I'm going to write this up in a fun little list. Yes, that even means proper subheadings. Obviously going to university has at least taught me about the importance of structure, if not anything else... I kid, a little public service announcement to teenagers everywhere: tertiary education is fantastic and a great way to avoid being unemployed (in the future, I mean, if you're like me and do a double degree, you end up very unemployed). All that being said, here are some of my favorite taboos and why they're absolutely fucking ridiculous.

Taboo 1: Sex

You knew this was coming (haha, coming). If there's one point of consistency in this blog, it's that I write a lot about copulation. Fornication. A bit of the old slap and tickle. Knocking boots. Bumping uglies. The horizontal monster mish-mash. Saying howdy-doody to your neighbor. The old mambo-jambo pineapple squash, jubbly-lubby funtimes and banana-rama-ding-dong.

I made at least three of those up and I'm not telling you which ones.

Society's attitude towards sexual activity is something I find utterly perplexing. I mean, really, look at us. With 7 billion people on the planet, odds are that quite a few of us and our ancestors did a fair bit of shagging along the line (ew, not WITH their ancestors, gross). Touching our genitals to other people's genitals is something most people enjoy. We have whole, billion dollar industries dedicated to catering to the sexual fantasies of any and all bizarre niche fetishes, millions of websites simply created to provide us with sexual content, self help books, workshops, even rallies... and yet, it's still socially acceptable to judge someone over how many sexual partners they have? We're all still okay with shaming women who not only acknowledge that they like sex, but that they have a healthy interest in it? It's totally acceptable for a woman to buy a vibrator, but if a guy gets a fleshlight, we act like it's the most weird and perverted thing on earth?

Trust me, I'm from the internet, there are weirder things out there.

I don't know if I'm being a bit of a radical thinker here, but my perspective on sex has always been that as long as no one's getting hurt (unless they're into that), it's pretty much all good. And more importantly, it's no one else's goddamn business anyway. Some people aren't comfortable with having sex outside of monogamous relationships. Some people aren't comfortable with being in monogamous relationships full stop, but are human and desire some sexual contact. Some people (gasp) are a mix of both at any given time, because hey, we're human and our needs change all the fucking time. Ditto with sex toys. Some people would never dream of using them, some have one or two and others have whole dungeons devoted to taking your average sexy time to a whole new level.

Bruce Willis knows what I'm talking about. "Bring out the gimp" indeed.

Like with everything, sex is something we all approach differently. There is no "magic number" of sexual partners. There is also no perfect, universal sex toy because, you guessed it, people have different ways of getting off. There also shouldn't be a stringent set of sexual standards applied to different genders and cultural backgrounds, because honestly, it really limits a person's ability to seek out what they like/want/need and express it. If you don't agree with how someone else expresses their sexuality, there's a simple solution. Don't ask them about it, and better yet, don't have sex with them. The minute you start applying your own standards to other people, you completely ignore their right to be comfortable with their sexuality as an individual. In a nutshell, we're all different, and no one should be punished for that unless what they're doing actively harms themselves or others.

Taboo 2: Drugs

Drugs are always a bit of an edgy subject to bring up in polite conversation. While marijuana is becoming socially acceptable due to Hollywood and massive reforms in the US, mentioning anything harder than that to your average person will probably result in them being more than a little uncomfortable, because, well... drugs are illegal and most people of my generation were brought up to believe they're extremely dangerous. To be honest, that's probably a good thing, because if you want to use any mind-altering substance without a higher risk of really fucking up (including alcohol), it's wise to have a bit of maturity behind that decision.

However, to be brutally honest, I've always thought that the war on drugs is kind of dumb. Don't get me wrong, some illicit drugs are fucking dangerous, not just because of what they do, but the kind of culture it can entrench you into. But to some extent, that's less the problem of the drugs themselves and more due to the fact that they are so heavily illegal. A lot of drug related violence stems from distribution methods (dealers, gangs, come on guys, you've all seen Breaking Bad), and arguably if there was a better and safer way to get them, not as many people would be at risk of being decapitated by a big friendly biker called Cunt Puncher.

Pictured here: not some biker called Cunt Puncher.

The fact of the matter is, because human beings are curious things by nature, they are going to want to put weird substances into their bodies to see what happens. A lot of modern medicine happened this way. If someone hadn't decided that chewing on tree bark seemed like a dandy way to get some pain relief, we wouldn't all be reaching for a packet of aspirin every time our head hurts. However, being harshly punished for this is not something I agree with. There are a lot worse things in the world than turning up at McDonalds at 3AM with red eyes and smelling like the backstage of Woodstock '69. As for the more dangerous stuff... well, isn't it just common sense that something like that should be, oh, I don't know, regulated? Alcohol's arguably extremely dangerous, and not only is it not outlawed, we encourage people to drink it! Having your first (legal) drink is basically celebrated as a right of passage. While I'm not suggesting we start chucking tabs of acid at people on their 18th birthday, it still boggles the mind that something that causes 13% of all deaths of 14-17 year olds is available on store shelves whereas marijuana, a drug that strictly speaking cannot physically kill anyone, is illegal.

Much like sex, drug use is a personal thing. People have different ideas of what is okay and not okay to put into their bodies. Again, I'm going to maintain that everyone is allowed their own opinion on this. However, I don't think anyone that has a strong negative opinion drugs should be allowed to make legislation about them. It's biased, it's unfair and has already made a complete mess on how we handle crime syndicates and addiction. And in the immortal words of Forrest Gump, that's all I have to say about that.

This movie did NOT deserve the critical acclaim it recieved.

Taboo 3: Love

So we've gone through the most generic societal taboos, and you've probably scrolled down to this one, made a face and gone "huh? Sex, drugs... love? Isn't she going to go onto something a bit more edgy, like, I don't know, bestiality, necrophilia or experimental jazz?"

I couldn't find a good enough gif for necrophilia.

My controversial love for wailing saxaphones and off-beat bongos aside, yes, love is something I find to be a massive taboo. Of course, you're probably already dismissed this as ridiculous because in in our society, we're surrounded by reminders of love all the time. The greatest commandment in the world's largest mainstream religion is to love thy neighbor. Most chart-topping hits are spawned from either falling in love or swiftly falling out of it. The entire greeting card industry is based on days specifically allocated to tell someone you love them, whether it's in the "I want to sip wine with you while listening to classical music and then rip your pants off" way or the "you're my mother and you spent 19 years of my life washing my underwear, so the least you deserve is a well-meaning piece of cardboard and some flowers" way. All the movies we watch and the books we read are usually based on someone's love for something. And yet, as a society, we're still not comfortable enough to show people how we really feel.

It's a little weird, isn't it? We celebrate love in the most ostentatious of ways- huge birthday celebrations, spending thousands of dollars on a wedding, diamond studded condoms... and yet usually, we struggle to remind each other of this love on a daily basis. We're not okay with letting the people in our life know that they mean the world to us, and we'd be so devestated to lose them. Most of all, we're terrified of letting new people reach that same level of importance. People percieve the outside world as full of strangers and hostility. That's why we don't make eye contact when we catch the bus, and keep our earphones in on the train. It's why we rarely say thank you to the people serving us, because hey, it's just their job. We are so scared of being hurt by other people that we pre-emptively shut our little lives off from one another like a bed of frightened clams. It's more than a little disheartening, and if anything, makes us more likely to be hurt in the long run. It is far easier to justify doing something shitty to someone else if you feel like you barely know them.

So yes, as a species, we celebrate love, but not where it counts. I don't think letting people know once a year that they're an important fixture in your life is enough. I think love should be a more constant entity, something that is like the tide; although at times it withdraws along the shore, it always comes back. We shouldn't have to trip over words and constantly feel entangled in our emotions. We should just be able to treat those around us with warmth and kindness, no matter what tentative bonds exist between you.

Beliefs, Conflicts and Personal Opinions

Humans are far from my favorite creatures in the world. They're not as cuddly as sloths, nor as hardworking as ants and are definitely a lot less badass than honey badgers. They're often confusing, completely contradictory and have a really awful habit of ruining the things they enjoy. In fact, most of the time, I really do not like being around other people because it's just so damn stressful. We're just too unpredictable. For instance, if I try to make conversation with someone working behind a counter, there's a high chance that they'll be polite and friendly back. However, there's an equally high chance that my charming smile could send them in a gibbering rage and they'll leap over the cash register and throttle me to death with a string of sausages.

Pictured: Exhibit A, the delicious murder weapon.

Okay. Maybe that's a bit drastic. It's more likely that they'll be tired and grumpy from working in one of the shittiest areas of employment ever, so they may just not be very receptive to my friendliness and good cheer. But the point is... people, for whatever reason, can really fucking suck. And most of the time, it's not on an individual scale. No, the reason why a lot of people suck can be traced back to how our beliefs have been shaped by the society around us. Belief is a very dangerous thing. Unfortunately, I'd say most atrocious acts are usually perpetrated by one person who is totally convinced that their beliefs are right.

Like these three crazy characters.  

When you think about it, what conflict doesn't stem from a question of personal opinion? To use an example close to my heart, let's talk feminism (okay, I can hear you groaning already. Just here me out, please. I'm not about go on a rant about how all men are rapists, or how the vagina is the centre of all creative expression. In fact, if your ideas of feminism are strictly confined to a stereotype of man-hating, genital-worshipping she-harpies, I'm going to maybe suggest you expand your horizons, because that is a very limited view). Personally, I really appreciate feminism for what it is and originally was, a major step forward for gender equality. Without the feminist movement, there would have been no way in hell that I would be attending uni right now. I wouldn't have the right to vote, the right to appear in public without a chaperon or pretty much any basic right to independence that males have been enjoying for centuries. Honestly, without feminism, there's a high likelihood I would have been married off to some older man at age fourteen and spent the rest of my miserable existence giving birth on the floor of my kitchen with a wooden spoon between my teeth so I wouldn't disturb the men talking.

And these things are not pleasant to bite down on, especially unwashed.

However, most people in this day and age not only see feminism as something dated and unnecessary, but also as something fundamentally evil. Don't get me wrong, I completely realise that there are feminist out there who are completely and utterly bonkers. These are the ones that blame men for all world problems and who accuse people of being rapists simply because of their gender. These are the ones that make other women feel like shit for wanting to wear make-up, or bake, or do anything traditionally considered feminine because DAMN IT MY FEMALE COMPATRIOTS  YOU ARE PLAYING RIGHT INTO THE HANDS OF THE OPPRESSIVE PATRIARCHY. 

But here's what really gets me down, that these few insane radicals have completely overshadowed decades of positive change! Although I'm going to argue that there's still areas of gender equality that really need to addressed, Western women do have a lot better quality of existence in the modern age. There are so many things we can do now that would have been unheard of only decades earlier, and it's a pretty beautiful thing. I see things like high-profile female columnists and celebrities claiming that they aren't feminist like it's a huge positive, and end up thinking to myself: "Well, that's funny. If it wasn't for feminism, Miss Katy Perry, there's no way you'd be making millions of dollars singing about bicurious experimentation and denim short shorts". Honestly, I don't know when it became cool to be anti-feminist, but I don't like that so many young women are taking their freedom for granted. For a quick comparison, look at the Civil Rights Movement. They had radical organisations such as the Black Panther Party who were all for violently rising up against white people, but not many people walk around saying "oh jeez, the Civil Rights movement was pretty shit, they're all just terrorists that want to kill off all the white people".

I feel like I'm getting too self righteous, so I'm inserting this
 cute gif of a pug to help me to calm down a bit. 

Anyway, excusing the huge tangent I just went on, I have conflicted with a lot of people on issues of feminism and gender equality. I once had a huge argument with someone older than me because we disagreed on whether feminism purely meant equality for women or between the genders (he was a staunch men's rights activist, which I think has its place because there is a lot of sexism geared towards men now, but I wouldn't say that white middle-class males are ever going to experience the same level of oppression as minority groups). Probably none of this conflict would have ever occurred if not for my urge to share my beliefs. In fact, I'm willing to bet that someone will probably take issues with what I've just said, and that's perfectly fine. I don't expect anyone to agree with me and I don't write this to sway people's opinions. Honestly, I just like the sound of my own typing.

Clickity-clack-clack-clack-clickity-clack.

Seriously, if you just take a look around you, every person on the planet is in a constant struggle over whose beliefs are the right ones. Your Mum believes its your turn to do the dishes when you think that rightfully, your brother should do it because he's the one who made the most mess? Conflict. Your professor judges your essay to be mediocre when you know you put your heart and soul into what you were writing? Conflict. Atheists and religious people both believe the other is stupid/wrong/ignorant? Conflict. The Turkish government believe that they should have the power to regulate the freedom of their people to an authoritarian extent? Conflict. It goes on and on and on. Argument upon argument. Needless hate. Bloodshed over the most commonplace, straightforward things, all because someone has to get high and mighty and prove their opinion is the best one. It makes me feel a little sick.

Maybe it's the hippy within me talking (I did just buy a hemp rainbow scarf, so I've definitely got some groovy vibes going on today), but I wish everyone could just take a deep breath, relax and realise that being right is usually subjective anyway. There are certain facts in the world that can be proven which are true. However, at the end of the day, waving these truths in the faces of others isn't going to change their minds. They are human, just like you, and being a conscious, sentient human means that they have a right to think however they want, even if their ideas may be considered completely morally reprehensible. Only when people start acting on these beliefs in a way that hurts their fellow people can we really justify intervening. Otherwise, it's best to just let people think in the way they desire and move on.

I have a fair few beliefs that I know people find controversial, most of which I probably can't even discuss in this blog because there's a likely chance at least one of my parents reads this. However, I've learnt to keep them to myself unless asked, because really, there's nothing that makes me more entitled to being right than anyone else. Besides, our beliefs do change with age. You may spend a decade being completely anti-drugs, and then smoke some pot one day and decide it isn't as harmful as you thought. You may spend years being fair and tolerant towards your fellow man, and then some drunk teenager kills your daughter in an accident and you never trust anyone ever again. The point is, beliefs are a fluid thing, and everyone has their reasons for thinking a certain way. But it shouldn't be a source of conflict.

We should just accept that the very nature of being human is the ability to have these beliefs in the first place... and then use that acceptance to make the world into a bigger and brighter place.

The Long (and Shitty) Road to Feeling Okay

By now, most of you should realise that there are precious few things in my life I won't freely talk about. Although I update this blog sporadically, I have cheerfully thrown the intimate details of my messy personal life at you like a plate of hot spaghetti, hoping that it will one day bond us in a dripping tomato-flavoured camaraderie (and second degree burns). Rather than pretend I'm some sort of otherworldly creature that has no use for embarrassing bodily functions and is always photogenic, I admit that I'm human and I fuck up. There's no shame in that, because there's not one human being that doesn't.

Except this man. This man is perfect.

So everyone knows that I do dumb things more than occasionally. In fact, if you're one of my nearest and dearest, you've probably seen it in person. You know that I drink too much, I don't understand most basic social cues and can't sing to save my life. You've heard my numerous stories about vomiting every colour of the rainbow, and that time everyone saw me naked at my birthday party. If you went to school with me, you've probably seen me cry in class more than once over something as insignificant as a fucking 16 out of 20 for creative writing.

Seriously, fuck you, 15 year old me. Grow some goddamn balls.

I'm establishing all this because despite my proclaimed love of honesty and being genuine, there are still things in my life that make my gut churn when I consider bringing them up. I know it's hard to believe, but behind this huge, hulking testosterone-fueled exterior... I am just as scared of rejection and criticism as I was at age thirteen. I am a human being with stupid, useless emotions and unfortunately, said stupid, useless emotions make it really hard to not care about whether people like me. Sure, I'm not too much of a wimp about it. One of the benefits of getting older is realising that there's no way to please every single person at the same time (unless you're at an orgy and have vibrating dildos strapped all over your body, like some sort of magical super sexual hedgehog. And no, I can't find a gif for that metaphor). However, you also realise that sometimes, it's best to try and limit the damage you may accidentally inflict on your personal relationships by keeping your goddamn mouth shut.

For example, there are certain topics a well-meaning person can bring up in a conversation that will quickly devolve into everyone flinging shit in each other's faces, no matter how innocent the original intention was. Topics like "feminism", "abortion", "refugees", "the environment", "veganism", "politics" and the granddaddy of all argument-starters, "religion" very rarely can be discussed without someone getting offended. Opinions are like assholes, everyone has one, they stink sometimes and no one wants someone else's shoved up in their face (unless they're extremely close and like butt stuff). This is why that unless I'm with people who know me well enough to accept that I have some controversial views on things, I won't discuss these topics. After years of needless conflict, I've learned my lesson- that voicing your personal opinions very rarely enlightens others, it just gives them more reason to think you're a complete douche.

One such topic that I rarely discuss, despite its huge presence in my life, is mental illness. And to be honest, can you blame me? Despite living in a world where there are so many facilities that cater specifically to understanding and spreading awareness about psychological issues, there is still a massive taboo surrounding the mentally ill. Be honest. When I use that phrase, do you think of an average, everyday person or do you think of a urine-stained homeless guy ranting and raving to himself at a bus stop? Or better yet, does your mind immediately go to white padded rooms, grim-faced orderlies and hypodermics filled with opiates? To be honest, I'm guess I'm just making a huge generalisation here, but it astounds me how many people simply do not understand that for a lot of people, mental illness is just another part of their lives. They get up, they go about their daily routine  and the only difference between them and everyone else is a little voice in the back of their head telling them how pathetic they are and convincing them the world would be better off if they just crawled under the house and died.

I'm talking specifically about depression here, because I don't really have enough personal experience with other illnesses to address it in any way other than making some sweeping generalisations. Oh boy. Depression. One in seven Australians experiences depression in their lifetime and yet so many young people haven't the faintest clue about how and why it happens. To be honest, I can kind of see why it's so hard to understand. You're sad, right? Well, then... do something that makes you feel better! Look at you! You're just sitting there, moping. Why don't you get up and do something? Everyone else can do it. Why can't you? It's your own fault you're depressed. You're not even trying to do anything about it.

Thing is... sometimes, you just can't.

Depression has been a presence in my life for as long as I can remember, even before I experienced it myself. To be honest, with a background like mine, it was probably inevitable that it would eventually happen to me. One of my earliest memories of my mother is of her in bed, ashen-faced and tired because one day, everything just got far too hard and she had to stop. And although eventually she got back up again, she never was quite the same. Depression is like that. Whether it makes you weaker or stronger, ultimately something changes within you. 

Just typing this is making me feel a little sick in my stomach. I have a fundamental fear of divulging any information that makes me look weaker, and if there's anything that stops me dead in my tracks, it's realising that my own brain often betrays me. But, to be honest, it shouldn't be a source of stigma. So many people are walking around with the knowledge that something inside them is making them unhappy. So many people find it hard just to place their feet on the floor every morning to get out of bed. Sometimes, it can be damn hard to find a reason to keep being part of the world. It happens.

The first time I ever experienced serious, clinical depression, I was thirteen years old. At this age, most doctors won't even consider diagnosing you with a mental illness unless you do something absolutely batshit insane, because there's always the possibility that you're just whacked out on hormones. I couldn't tell you the countless times I was hauled into a doctor's office from thirteen to fifteen only to be told that all my feelings could be attributed to simply being a teenage girl. To be fair, I see their point. Crying a lot and being moody is pretty much part of the territory for going through puberty. However, waking up every morning and feeling so stressed because I didn't feel like I had the energy to get through a whole day was not, and no amount of prescriptions for various types of hormone-adjusting birth control could change that.

It happened gradually.I remember that all I wanted to do was sleep. The funny thing was, I just couldn't. I'd go to bed utterly exhausted and drained, usually crying over something or other, and my brain just wouldn't shut off. I'd lie there in my bed, completely paralyzed as I replayed every single personal failure I ever had over and over again.  Everything I obsessed over, everything that I saw as so fundamentally bad and wrong about myself I now recognise as meaningless, trivial bullshit, but at the time, it seemed so much bigger. I was slowly convincing myself that not only was I a bad person, I was so awful, pathetic and lowly that the world would be so much better if I just plain didn't exist any more.

And to be honest, not existing sounded like a fucking pleasure cruise compared to what I had to live with every single day. It was like all my senses were gradually fading and all I was left with was this odorless, palette-numbing experience of the world occasionally punctuated by the metallic taste of fear One of the main signs of depression is losing interest and enjoyment in the things that used to give you pleasure. For me, the concepts of "interest" and "enjoyment" ceased to have any meaning.

Oh, I tried. I still blundered around, hoping that if I forced myself through enough activities I used to find enjoyable, I might just be able to trick myself into having some fun. Of course, this didn't work. As soon as I tried to do something remotely distracting, my brain would pipe up with a definite "no, fuck that, you're not getting away that easy" and would proceed to systematically ruin any hope I had of escaping the immense farty cloud of boredom that was slowly enveloping my life.

Reading a book? Fuck you, you'll never be able to write like that. Watch a movie? Fuck you, all those girls are beautiful, thin and perfect, and you will never look like that because you're too fucking lazy. Hanging around with my friends? Fuck you. They only hang around because they feel sorry for you. All you do is hurt people. They'd be so much happier if you just curled up into a ball and died.

Just fuck you, Phoebe. You are shit. You will never be anything other than shit.

Of course, now that I'm a lot older and have self-esteem shooting out of my ass, I can laugh off all the horrible things I used to say to myself. Writing well takes a shitload of practice, not even the girls in movies look that good in real life and if my friends didn't like me, they would have given up on me long ago. I made a huge mistake by being narcissistic enough to think that all my flaws were of utmost significance to the happiness of those around me. Turns out, they aren't. Much like how I don't really give two shits about what other people are doing most of the time, people also don't really give two shits about what's going on in my life. In a way, it's strangely liberating. Sure, I'm probably doomed to live my life in obscurity, but at the same time, no one will be reading about me centuries from now and hear all about how I deliberately put off shaving my legs and armpits until I have to go out.

Oh come on, like any of you shave when that part of your body isn't on show.

That's the really shitty part of depression, the part where you become so self-centred that you forget that people exist outside of their relationships with you. You're so focused on your own inability to feel happiness or pleasure or yearning or fucking ANYTHING that other people become expendable. I found I couldn't listen to anyone's problems any more, or respond to their requests for help, because how on earth could I be any use when I couldn't even help myself? Ultimately, this was a pretty selfish thing for me to do and I let a lot of people down. I expected them to be there for me when I needed them and then refused to offer the same back, because not only did I not have the energy, I was also so scared of being a disappointment. It basically broke down into me being incredibly parasitic in my personal relationships, which would sadly recur numerous times during my teens. And here was the worst part about finally recovering... I had to face up to just how badly I'd treated everyone around me.

It's pretty ridiculous- here I was, finally feeling things other than abject disgust about myself for the first time in years, and I had to come to the realisation that yes, I was a completely selfish, shitty douche. It took a long time to make up for, but luckily I happen to be surrounded by people who somehow overlook my assholish behavior because for whatever reason, they love me. And I'll always be grateful for that, because honestly, I don't know what I'd do if they weren't around.

Here is where I'd tell you guys I love you... but that would be so fucking sappy, I think I'd puke. 

So instead, here is a dog with a duck on their head. 

So basically, the story sort of has a happy ending. I got better. I learned how to be a functioning human being again... mostly. I experienced true love's kiss, rode off into the sunset on my trusty steed with a fair wench and never experienced such dark and dreary misery ever again.

Of course, that's total fucking bullshit. The story never ended. Turns out, depression has this habit of recurring and while I've not experienced anything as intense as that first incident, I know that it still happens to me. It's kind of like watching a horror movie. I saw the monster die, and for a moment, I am so certain in my knowledge that it'll never bother me again. Then, I feel something cold and dead grasp my ankle, and the pit of my stomach drops, because oh fuck, it's happening again. 

I don't really know how this is going to affect the rest of my life. Maybe in a decade, I'll wake up one morning and realise that I can't recall feeling any form of soulless ennui for a good many years. Maybe when I'm dying, I'll look back at my life and wearily note that all along, parts of it withered away into a grey blur. But it is something I have to acknowledge about myself to even have the slightest hope of dealing with it.

I am Phoebe Montgomery. Some mornings, I don't physically feel capable of getting out of bed, but that's okay. I beat myself up over the smallest of failures, but that's okay. I may feel like there's no way forward a lot of the time, but that's okay. Even if it's only in the smallest possible measure, it's okay and one day, I'm going to feel okay again.

My name is Phoebe Montgomery and I'm mostly okay.

I hope you're okay too.

BeyondBlue (the facts)

A Big "Fuck You" To Romance

Honestly, most of the time, the thought of romance gives me the shits. As a perfectly modern woman who's all for things like gender equality and splitting the bill, some of the absolutely ridiculous gender stereotypes that arise from dating seem so illogical that at times, I wonder if all these decades of love songs, poetry, Disney films and saccharine Nicholas Sparks novels have made our race borderline retarded. Now, I'm not saying we're like this all of the time. When human beings are capable of being objective, rational and calm, we can make some fairly decent decisions. However, throw in some fevered glances and the strong desire to touch each others' genitals and we devolve back into the sex-crazed primates from whence we came. Love, lust, desire, infatuation, ill-timed erections or whatever you care to call it, makes us incredibly stupid. I wouldn't really mind this, but often it's a stupidity most of us could really live without. Maybe I'm just bitter because my love life runs about as smoothly as a giraffe with four fractured ankles. Maybe love and sex just turn people into stupid, inconsiderate assholes. All I know is that when I play word association games with my therapist, whenever she says "love", I say "the pain of being fucked in the ass by a massive freshly cut diamond."

I may need a quick drink or five before we continue. 

Consider briefly the whole male-female dichotomy. The way I see it, the reason why we are so divided is purely based on sexual tension. Case in point, when I was a young, slightly overweight lass with acne, braces and no sense of style, I could easily be "just one of the bros" (a phrase I hate, by the way- what, you can't just be friends with someone just because they have a vagina you have the slightest possibility of entering some day?). However, then something happened. I became marginally more attractive and suddenly everyone realized that YES, I am a GIRL with BOOBS and a VAGINA. Funnily enough, this directly coincided with my forays into the world of underage alcohol consumption, and so for years now I have been becoming wearily accustomed to this simple equation:

 Male friends and acquaintances + alcohol  = I'm going to be felt up... a lot.

Every dude I know after a few drinks.

Don't get me wrong, it's not strictly a male thing. In fact, it's a rather human thing. Bring alcohol into the picture and suddenly everyone's a possible conquest. Any magical liquid that makes everyone slightly more attractive and silences that little voice in the back of your head that stops you doing stupid things is going to cause a lot of sexual misadventures. However, from a strictly personal level, sometimes it can be a little disheartening that so few of your friends stick to their boundaries when they drink. It's even more disheartening when the same shit happens when you're sober. Again, I know I'm picking on men, and I apologise- I'm sure that every possible gender and sexual orientation (because fuck, there's so many these days) does it. But I'm speaking from personal experience... and from personal experience, I'm starting to kind of hate it.

Okay. Time for a little personal anecdote of mine, which is kind of hard to share, because honestly, I'm still embarrassed over it. It was kind of a game changer for me, in the sense that it took my massive ego and chiseled it back down into something that would let me function in everyday life, but without being a massive tool. Honestly, that probably needed to happen. Let me try and put it into perspective for you readers who probably have no idea what I'm rambling on about.

From the age of about nine until I turned fourteen, I considered myself to be extremely ugly. Not just plain, not just unattractive, but mirror-shattering, eye-melting, brain-exploding ugly. I realize already that this is probably going to be taken as a way for me to blatantly fish for compliments, but honestly, I can assure you it's not. One, I no longer think of that- while I have my ups and downs, I managed to somehow stitch together some sort of borderline healthy self-image that keeps me well-adjusted most days. Two, I probably wouldn't accept them anyway, because compliments on my looks make me sort of uncomfortable. Actually, any sort of comment on my looks generally makes me uncomfortable. This is probably because I used to have people repeatedly come up to me when I was little and tell me how ugly I was. I'm not really sure why this is, it's just one of those many things from childhood I couldn't explain.

Anyway, predictably enough, this resulted in me having extremely low confidence when it came to attracting dudes. Luckily, it was in the sense that I was actually too scared to approach them least I get rejected, rather than surrendering my vagina to the first semi-interested party and getting knocked up.

This could have been me.

And BOY, did I get rejected a lot. Still do, actually, so I'm hoping it's just one of those facts of life and not because I have some weird birth defect no one thought to tell me about (seriously, guys, if the reason you keep disappearing on me after we hook up is because I have some tiny deformed baby face on the back of my head, I'd like to know). While everyone around me was reveling in their two week long relationships and school social hook ups, I was getting used to hearing the same line over and over again: "I think we're better off as friends". Which, of course, is the polite way of saying "it's really awkward that you like me because I find you less attractive than a small pile of  nutty squirrel poo, so please take your misguided romantic interest elsewhere". I'll admit it, the first few times it hurt quite a lot. I've lost count of the many times I had a big, typical teenage girl melt-down where I lay on my bed and cried my eyes out to bad indie folk songs because I was so certain that no one would ever love me back.

But of course, then something explicitly strange happened. I managed to get myself a boyfriend. I know, I was surprised too. However, it happened, it lasted for a good two years or more and without going into majorly upsetting details, ended. And then my reign of romantic terror finally began. You see, suddenly, for whatever reason, I wasn't being rejected any more. I managed to date a bunch of dudes that I regarded as basically unattainable (and then, while dating them, realised they weren't actually that fantastic after all. Whoops). This had the unfortunate side effect of turning me into a egotistical, overly confident monster. Basically, if I saw a dude I liked, I went after him without fully thinking it through. Trust me, it sounds like an okay way to deal with things, but at the end of the day, you are leaving yourself with a whole airport carousel of emotional baggage. 

All this is just background information. The real story still needs to be told. In truth, part of the reason I'm dawdling so much over this contextual bullshit is probably because this is a story I'd rather not share. Few things in life can make me feel so utterly shamed for me to completely avoid talking about them, but I think this comes close. It's not even just that it makes me feel pretty embarrassed. It also makes me feel pretty sad, because I think the one big consequence of this whole shitty debacle is that I lost the chance of making a good friend. While I won't accept complete responsibility for what happened, because it takes two people to occur anyway, I still regret blowing that friendship because of some hormone-driven drunken fumbling. Who knows, maybe if I'd been smart and held off, everything would be okay.

Okay, Mr Sloth Therapist.

I'm going to be as vague as possible with details because, well, in a nutshell, I think it'd be a lot less awkward for the person I'm talking about and myself if no one has any idea what the fuck I'm talking about. In fact, most of what you're about to read is heavily fictionalized, apart from the very real emotions and the general gist of what was going on. Understood? Okay.

So I was standing in a first class lounge in Abu Dubai, my elegant, slender fingers wrapped around a crystal champagne flute as I pondered my next French undeerwear modelling campaign, when Nicholas Holt shot me a sultry glance from across the bar- too unrealistic? Really? There's not the slightest chance I could somehow get into modelling and end up making love to Nicholas Hoult in an underwater hotel suite? Fine. If you insist, I'll try to aim for a touch more realism.

Sorry Nick, my darling, the story of our love affair will have to wait.

There was this guy. I guess he could really be like any other guy, except for some reason, I happened to get this weird anxious, slightly bubbly feeling from being in the same room as him. Not that it happened very often. Except, then it started to get more frequent, particularly after I moved. We'd be at the same things, and usually pretty drunk, and I'd find it harder and harder to ignore that for some reason, I really wanted to impressed this particular person. The carefully cultivated "fuck everyone, I'll do what I want" attitude that had been my sole achievement of the last few crazed months was suddenly abandoned as I found myself carefully watching what I'd say and do in front of this one person. Why this was, I'm not really sure. Maybe after spending so much time being controlled and repressed, I couldn't help but fall for the first guy who acted like a complete gentlemen towards me. Maybe after all the loneliness experienced from first starting university, I couldn't stop myself from reaching out to a person who I saw as someone very similar. Either way, my emotions got the better of me, and it wasn't smart or logical, and it didn't make sense. When I realized I actually had some weird, complicated feelings for the poor dude, it was like getting hit in the face with an exercise ball.

Okay, honestly, that metaphor wasn't a coincidence, I just really wanted to post this gif.

This is the point where I wish I could have just been content with how things were. There was a person in my life who was actually pretty interesting to talk to, who I could occasionally flirt with and that was the way things should have stayed. But of course, my massive ego wouldn't let that happen. Because I was so caught up in feeling desirable for the first time in my life, I had to push it. So I got drunk (he was drunker), we kissed  (to my credit, he started it), shit happened (but not what you think) and now on the rare occasion that we're in the same room, there's a horrible awkward barrier between us. A barrier that can only be defined as the knowledge that two people did something laughably stupid together and only one of them was dumb enough to wonder if it meant anything later. 

To my credit, my ultimate desire isn't for this person to suddenly turn around, confess their undying love to me and drive us off into the sunset. For one, that's corny as fuck. For another, I know better than to pine after uninterested parties (having spent most of my adolescence doing so). What I want, more than anything else, is to be able to interact normally with this person again. No more stilted attempts at conversation. No more avoiding eye contact. No wondering if it's okay to turn up to the same venues... It'd simply be nice to be able to share a laugh or smile again.

The amount of gay that last statement was.

Anyway, basically, the point of that awkward semi-confessional anecdote was to demonstrate why I'm so bitter about dating, romance, sexual tension and all the rest. I'm sick of it because I'm honestly tired of missing out on good friendships because of it. Sure, dating someone, or even trying to date them, seems like a good idea at the time. You find someone you find cute that you get to potentially snuggle up with, and that feels pretty good. But these things always come to an end somehow, and then you're not only without a person to cuddle, but there's one less person in your life you can connect with. Ditto having sex with them, unless you come up with a really good arrangement. I've said it before, and I'll say it again- sex and love makes us all into gibbering, genital-obsessed idiots.

So, at least for awhile, I quit. I give up. If a nice guy wants to come sweep me off my feet at some stage, he's welcome to try, but I'm not actively looking for anything. After years of having to deal with the shitty complications that come with love, sex, liking someone, not being liked in return, I think it's about time I enjoy being on my own. There are far too many good books to read for me to fritter away time and energy worrying about romantic entanglements. And if worst comes to worst... there's always lesbianism.

"Trying Is The First Step Towards Failure" (And Why I Will Always Love This Quote)

Me when I'm pretending to know what I'm doing. 

As I gradually wade my way out of the kiddie pool that was my pre-university life and get ready to plunge off the high diving board into adulthood, I've been having a surprisingly amount of revelations. While I do pride myself on being more insightful than most (and more egotistical. Seriously, have you counted the amount of times I praise myself throughout these blogs? I'm a piece of shit, guys, but you knew that already), the sheer amount of little but revealing thoughts that have bounced through my brain as I've transitioned from snotty teenage brat that doesn't do anything to handsome, cool adult that knows how to do their own laundry is astounding. Every day makes me feel like I've learnt yet another valuable lesson, and it has nothing to do with my uni attendance (tip: it's non-existent if I'm hungover).

The most recent lesson I've experienced has a lot to do with my observance of the human race. Have you ever tried sitting down and really, truly focusing on the billions of people that pass you by? You notice some lodd things, like mothers keeping their children on leashes, beautiful men with ugly wives and people who still think tribal tattoos are cool (they are not). What's more odd is how we let our perceived judgment by other people rules our entire lives. Take, for example, other university students. Growing up as a little, buck-toothed social outcast, I always saw university as this huge wonderland where I could fa ally find like-minded people and ascend to the level of greatness I was always destined for. I would finally get to learn things I actually found interesting. I wouldn't have to associate with anyone I wouldn't want to. I'd happily find some groups to belong to (okay, just as a side note, I've started visibly wincing every single time I have to utter that godforsaken world. This is what HSC Advanced English does to a person. It destroys the ability to use the term "belonging" without experiencing post traumatic stress). However, this is what I've learned from a grand total of eight weeks at university:

Everyone is just as bitchy. You will feel like just as much of an outcast. It's the same parade of bullshit as high school, except with the added bonus of all the assholes being a lot more intelligent.

I feel your pain, Fozzie.

Take, for example, the UQ confession page. You would think that university students, who have spent a lot of time and money on furthering their education, would be above incessant playground gossip and cat-calling.  However, apparently this assumption is unreasonable and most UQ students are the emotional equivalent of a five year old sticking their fingers in their ears and yelling "NYAH NYAH NYAH". Honestly, while there are a few gems here and there, the contents mainly consist of:
a) copy pastas.
b) failed attempts at green text.
c) engineering students bragging about how much better they are than other degrees, especially Bachelor of Arts.
d) art students complaining about the engineering students.
e) engineering students getting hurt feelings because they're being stereotyped as socially-inept jerks (I wonder why).
f) Rampant objectifying other students as sex objects (but hey, with some of the eye candy around this uni, it's hard not to).
g) The done-to-death mocking and defending of the whole gender studies debacle, which honestly, should have been well and truly over and done with a few weeks ago.

MFW I read anything on UQ Confessions other than a Loch Ness Monster joke.

I was tempted to unsubscribe from the page, as I don't really need that sort of negativity in my life, but it's like watching a train crash in slow motion. You just can't look away. And because it's a university Confessions page, it is so much more intriguing than teenage pages like old, faithful Murbah Goss (with gems like "so and so got their munt licked out by a Labrador", how could one justify not reading it?). But the point is, from this page alone, it is painfully obvious that all the bullshit from high school never really fades away. People still assume their subjects are better than anyone else's. People still get overly self righteous about thinking their subject is better than anyone else's. Everyone's still obsessed with working out, having sex and the quality of faculty toilets. And all this is coupled with the crushing realization that you are no better than anyone else. You may used to think you were some sort of special snowflake, but you are actually as painfully average as everyone else wandering around campus. There will always be someone smarter. Someone thinner. Someone who will repeatedly beat you at Mario Kart. Someone more determined. It's just a fact of life.

And of course, when you try to prove you're good at something to someone, you fuck up.

And this, dear reader, is what brings me back to the quote on the title of this blog. "Trying is the first step towards failure". The single wisest thing I've ever heard Homer Simpson say, and for an idiot, he says a lot of pretty intelligent things. The fact of the matter is, in order to give something your best shot, you have to be prepared  to face a lot of setbacks. For example, going to university- very few people are brilliant at it straight away. I know so many intelligent people who went to university and only got passes their first year, including my own father, who now has a Phd. To be successful, you have to be willing to try different methods, accept that some of them will fail you and find what works. I have never classed myself at successful at anything other than failing. I succeed at failing because instead of giving up when I fail, I know I can try something else. There is no be-all and end-all unless I allow myself to think that way. The world is full of possibility, and most of it walks hand in hand with favor.

So, in short, whatever you do in life, you are courting failure. There will always be someone that is better than you. It's one of those things that just is, and never changes. However, this is not an excuse to put your life aside. While this should make everything seem that more pointless, the fact of the matter is, you make your own point. You decide what the meaning of your own life is by trying things out. And if you try and fail, so what? You at least gave it a go. Only you know what you can and can't do. There's honestly no shame in failure as long as you don't let it defeat you. Fuck failing and fuck listening to all the negativity from the people around you. They live their lives, you live yours and you're the only one that will be dealing with the consequences.

And fuck you, UQConfessions.