word-vomit – untitled atm

104a – i want to be better at making decisions (faster)

It’s 2:30 am and I need to sleep soon. Too many thoughts swirling around in my head though which means I need to journal. Didn’t get to process my day very well so here I am. Today feels like it was a little bit surreal. I made a cool connection and I kind of feel proud of how it happened. I followed my gut over something and it resulted in something real.

I’m talking to someone about a job (internship, really) but it pays next to nothing for a good amount of time.. but I’m still curious about it. Would it make sense to go for it (since I can afford it, yes) or would it be kind of stupid to try it out.. I’m not sure. I need to sleep over it for a couple days. But I also know that if I let this marinate for too long it’ll lose steam. I guess like always it’s worth thinking about what are the fears around it.

Fears:

I don’t end up liking the work (That’s okay, I tried something and found it wasn’t for me)
I regret doing free work (It’s not completely free, maybe I gain something out of it anyway)
I regret “wasting a month” (But really, it wouldn’t be a waste I suppose)

I suppose it makes sense to go ahead and do it. It’s not like they need me for a full 40 hours, so the deal in that way does work for me. It’ll get me out of the house, and I suppose I can also make time for other things while I’m at the place.

The people seemed quite genuine, which seems like a big plus— because one of the big problems of working in the corporate culture is of course that you don’t always get authenticity around you. That could be a major plus in a work environment.

It fits well enough into my story, I think. Maybe I can do it for the plot, maybe that’s okay too. What is a month in the grand scheme of five years? Nothing, I suppose. Or I can ask for a trial period of 2 weeks too, maybe that is something that could work.

I’ll give myself until Friday to decide and then that’s it, no mulling over it.

Family time did end up triggering me a bit today, but it was still kind of nice to see everyone. Whatever, I guess.

I’ve been applying for some technical writing roles too quite extensively, thinking it could be a good fit for me considering I do miss “tech” again a bit and I still do love writing. Plus, I’ve always found a lot of joy in being able to describe “complicated” things/concepts in simpler words ie I’ve always found joy in increasing and widening accessibility of a complex/inaccessible thing. So thinking it’s worth trying out.

Anyway that’s it on September updates. I’ll catch yall on the flippety flip.

100b – this project is complete!

All said and done, things have been pretty decent. I think I am, after all, liking writing a bit more than music right now, even over the last few weeks, maybe a couple months. Maybe it’s just that it’s easier to do, less inertia, but whatever the reasons and the factors, I do end up engaging with this form of outlet/expression more than others.

But the question still remains: what should I write about?

I’ve always told myself I can just write about whatever’s in my head and slowly, steadily, I’ll find things to write about. Like I did, yesterday, wrote a bit about pride. But this “obvious topic formation” only happens once in a few weeks for me. I can write about my thoughts and feelings, which I do, but I imagine this gets boring for the readers. I don’t know. Probably need to keep the judgement out of it.

100K words are done! Feeling super happy about that, no doubt. It only took me 4 years LOL. I kid, I think it’s fine that it took as long as it did. I hadn’t planned to “rush”, anyway.

I’d like to reduce therapy sessions from once a week to once in a couple weeks, I think I’m ready for that. I did some intention setting for June and feeling okay about it. I do feel some sort of a void wrt work and fulfilment, but I don’t think I can address it right now, so not sure what to do about it really.

I just realised that a lot of the stuff I’m talking about, I’ve already talked about in my previous word-vomit too. Oh, well. I guess it just means that it’s not “solved” yet.

I’ve been away from reading for a bit though, maybe I get back to that this month. I imagine that’ll definitely give me some new material to think about and process (consciously and subconsciously).

Overall, I feel content and peaceful, for the most part. I’m about to turn 29 in August but that doesn’t stress me out or worry me either (as it shouldn’t). There’s enough things to be grateful for, and I really am.

Yeah, I think that’s it for now. I’m not really able to get into a reflective zone right now. Will end this post by listing out my intentions for June:

More reading (new reading)
More long-form essays
1 or 2 open-mics
Travel planning finalise
Health (reducing nicotine) (it’s been stable for the last month or so and I think it’s time to cut it out a bit more)
Exploring gender a bit more

Onward! Hope you’re all having a decent summer! Cheers xx

089b – on balancing love and learning

Haven’t word-vomited in a few days. Have many thoughts. Been socially busy, but it’s been nice. But also a bit over-stimulating. Need calmness. I’ve also smoked quite a bit over the last few days and haven’t worked at all and I’m definitely not happy about that. Need to go back to reading Allen Carr.

Giving all of my attentive time to sentient beings feels quite nice, almost a bit addictive, but I’d like to be more careful with it. I noticed a white hair on my head today and although I’m not TOO worried, it definitely is a little uncomfortable. For this and adjacent reasons, I’d like to go back to prioritising health over pleasure.

Lots of people in my universe lately. I’d like to preserve my energy and attention, however. Since sometimes it becomes hard to recover from persistent feelings of being spread too thin.

January is about to end and February first-half is busy with friends but I’d like to plan work-goals for the second half of February so I don’t regret spending all my time on social things. I read a quote (can’t find it right now) which talks about how loving and learning are the two most important things in life. Because they are the two experiences you will likely not regret in life, regardless of how they come to you. I think I’m fairly aligned with this, at least for 2024.

So I just need to balance love (social) and learning (work) for the next few months. In the chase for secure love and attention, I do not want to put myself, my needs, my goals, my ambition behind. My relationship with myself still needs to be the most important relationship in my life.

There’s a quote by Rilke which goes: “And you must be indulgent with the answer, which will perhaps often leave you empty-handed; for ultimately, and precisely in the deepest and most important matters, we are unspeakably alone; and many things must happen, many things must go right, a whole constellation of events must be fulfilled, for one human being to successfully advise or help another.”

I quite like this. Something I’m attempting to do a lot more and live by is to “not put all my eggs in one basket” when it comes to people. I think the urge to find all answers and all peace in singular people has been quite harmful for me in the past. Safety, reliability, having your needs met (through and with other people) are very valid pursuits, but they need to be done mindfully.

Ah, I suppose that’s the theme of this whole word-vomit. How to give, take, love without getting too attached. Or how to practice connected detachment, I suppose.

I am a romantic and that’s okay and that’s great but I’d like to continue to be wary of romanticisation. I think it’s good and healthy.

Pillars have to be multi-fold. A single pillar cannot take the load of my depth. And that’s okay too.

087b – january rambles

I want to write, I need to write. And to do that I need to accept that the only thing I want to write about is you, at the moment. Well not just at the moment. Since a few days actually. And I imagine that will continue for a few more.

In a way, you’re a muse.

And maybe that’s why I’m already attached to you, the idea of you, etc. I don’t want to do this. I want to see you. Not through my image, but through yours.

Anyway, stomach is upset so I can’t get rid of feelings in any other way except by ranting about them on here.

I wonder how we can cultivate a better relationship with our muse(s)? All the people that I’ve liked and loved have always been a source of inspiration for me in terms of art and creative work, and yet.. it’s futile to think of your relationship with different people as something in your control. It’s really not. That’s generally the beauty of it. That they (or your interactions with them)make you feel things you wouldn’t have felt otherwise. And I’m not just talking about romantic feelings, though of course yes, they do generally dominate the muse-world.

I need to figure out the main tasks I want to be working on from next week onwards because essentially I didn’t really get anything done this week. Journaling and music journaling is something I’m automatically finding myself doing a good amount, and that’s great, but I’d like to use these two things as tools for the next few weeks, and not aims. I know that most people swear by the idea of “keeping yourself busy” and I think that’s something I need to follow and be strict about over the next few weeks as well. I think this also means going back to being a bit more routinely with work, etc. The way I’d been able to do back in November. Honestly, it’s the winters that has completely fucked up everything for me. I don’t know why I feel so cold and why this seems to be a bigger problem for me than it is for most other people I know.

I’m hungry, too, but anything I eat makes me feel terrible and I don’t know how to solve this.

Someone once told me I’m very slow with things, and I feel like it’s true, but I don’t know how to be better at this. How does one be faster at things? I think I need to automate food, sleep and chores to the extent that I can. It’s really coming in the way at the moment actually.

I’m also experiencing the need to call onto rationality. I feel like I’ve been spending a lot of time with feelings lately (I also feel like I’ve mentioned this here before) but I’m not sure how to be rational. Or how to access the rationality that I know I have in me.

Rick Rubin says we write to see things we already know. I suppose we can keep writing until we’re able to incorporate the things we need. Hope this makes some sense. That’s it from me for now. Cheers xx

073 – in repair (rambles)

I’ve mostly recovered from the anxiety and panik by now. Back to my apartment and got to hang out with friends today evening. Also had therapy earlier in the morning which of course helped.

I’d been feeling a lot of apathy towards my body over the last 2-3 days (post panik), because obviously it was a little too scary to get int touch with the potentially scary feelings.

I’ve started relying on playing music almost as much as I used to rely on writing, so that’s a nice place to get to. I really think you make the best art when you need to. When you don’t have a choice except to make art. Obviously, it’s difficult to get to places like that and you don’t always want to be going there, maybe there’s a way to approach this a bit proactively. If I write and play everyday, maybe I won’t have to reach rock bottom at all. I don’t know, let’s see.

Anyone who’s been following this blog for a while knows that I believe that combating shame around feelings is the most important thing to do when “coping” with said feelings. So I must admit that a large part of my panic was triggered by some gender incongruence— ie stemming from traditionally feminine roles— ie in this case: the thought of wearing dresses. I’ve never really liked wearing dresses that much (except very selectively) and looks like it’s become a non-negotiable for me now. I also don’t like super feminine makeup and I’m not going to force it on myself anymore. (There’s things I like and that’s all I like, period.)

I’ve also been thinking about why society asks to keep our insecurities to ourselves. This has always been a pretty big question for me and I’ve always voiced this out, regardless of whether I’m going through tough phases or smooth phases. I know that the generic answer is “well because people won’t know how to respond to them and negative feelings can make other people uncomfortable”.. and while yes, there is maybe some appropriateness to keep in mind, I think this advice hurts a lot more than it helps. Some of my deepest connections have formed after sharing troubles. I mean, why ignore one of the only sure things in life? Human existence is painful. Why deny this? I don’t know.

Also, I read something about how love is won through disciplined surrender.

Maybe people focus on the disciplined part of it too much and not the surrender part of it. Who knows. I guess everyone has their own versions of what this looks like. Which is fine, I guess.

Anyway. Anxiety threatens to take over again right now so I must continue to write. I get the feeling that something is deeply wrong though I can’t quite put a finger on it.

Alright, I did some rationalising and took a stoic-thinking-route (which I must keep private to my journals for now) and I’m feeling a little better. Yes, I do acknowledge that maybe I’m not ready to share all my worst fears yet but suffice to say that that they centre around fitting out and the troubles that come with non-conformity.

Feeling like I wanted to go on an art and music journey but I might have to go on a gender exploration journey instead. This somewhat stifled part of me has been throwing tantrums lately. Or I guess everything can happen parallely as well.

Feeling a great need for breaks and recovery after doing mildly stressful things. Like a lesson with a slightly strict drums instructor. Sitting in a cafe now, trying out blueberry bubble tea for the first time. Let’s see how it ends up being. There’s Peach Pit playing here which makes me incredibly happy actually. Can’t find the right seating. Man, that’s like literally the only problem when it comes to working out of cafes. The right table ergonomics, the right amount of people, the right music, the right weather (I hate loud fans or super cold air conditioners). I know how this sounds, I know I probably sound very picky.. but I guess I am. But going home just doesn’t feel nice enough at the moment. Maybe I’ll just reply to texts etc instead.

I’m trying to keep caffeine consumption to lower limits to hopefully reduce the anxiety.

Some loud enthu kids just came and sat very close to where I’m sitting and now I don’t feel like I’ll be able to concentrate. This is what happened last time as well. Maybe I’ll just update my todo lists etc as well. Okay I did this and I feel sufficiently okay but I do need to go home and manage some of my lists again. I wonder if I need more organisations and/or planning wrt the things that I need to get done. Not sure about this.

During the day I was of course attempting to affirm myself by telling myself “it’s enough”. Ie whatever I’m doing is enough and whatever pace I’m doing things at is also enough. But I guess hearing these kids talk about scheduling, batching, task management has currently triggered me as well.

I guess part of everything is also realising that if I do want to prioritise creative projects that are highly personal, it is going to be a little lonely. And of course I am pretty decent at working on projects by myself, it’s still hard to feel like you’re doing life alone, in some ways.

I guess this was a pretty rambly piece. My apologies, dear readers. I’m working on a couple long-form pieces to bring to you as well, hopefully soon.

070 – brain dump

Brain-only mode. I hate it. This is the kind of writing that I don’t want to make public. Primarily because it’s coming from a place of anxiety. And when that’s the case— I don’t end up liking whatever I write. It’s not due to shame or embarrassment, I’ve mostly safely conquered that. I just don’t like the style when it’s anxiety-produced.

I’ve only been “thinking” for the last 3-4 hours and it’s been quite unpleasant. I mean, it wasn’t unpleasant in the regular ways, I wasn’t spiralling, I wasn’t thinking too many negative thoughts. Most of the thoughts were related to ideas etc. But I knew at the back of my mind that I was still ruminating. I knew I was supposed to be sleeping instead.

It’s getting really cold here and part of why I haven’t been able to sleep is because I haven’t been able to figure out a configuration that’s comfortable enough in terms of clothes, fan speed and the number of layers over me. To be honest, I was hit with some thoughts about how I might really have to move again in June / July, which I know is sufficiently far in the future but it was quite upsetting all the same.

Drums practice was super fun today and I really want to buy an acoustic set for my place. But I know that buying an electronic kit will be a more practical and safer choice (primarily because it’s volume adjustable). I’ll do some research on this before I decide what to do. I don’t want to buy an electronic kit and then feel stuck with it either.

Learning more about my sensitivity has been a blessing and a curse. I sometimes like that there’s a potential explanation for the things that bother me and at the same time it doesn’t suffice. This was true for when I discovered more about my anxiety disorder too. Maybe I still need to find better ways to cope and actually solve these problems, not just have explanations for them.

So what does solving some of these problems mean?

I probably (definitely) need to purchase a heater soon.
I need to restart regular meditation.
I need to restart regular physical exercise.
I may want to read and research more about how to balance creative urges and pursuits with healthy habits and routines.
I need to read more of the HSP book because I may find out some more ways of coping.

I think yes, the primary problem is sleep schedule. It’s always been my biggest problem. How do I really go about solving this, and how much do I want to? I really need to take some time out to think about this. There’s often hidden reasons why we don’t solve some of our problems, I need to find those out.

—

I wrote this last night and was finally able to sleep. I’m going to shift to 1000-word posts as much as I can from now on. This one is a bit hacky because I’m combining two pieces of sorts, but maybe that’s okay.

I think yesterday I stumbled onto a melody I’m really excited about fleshing out. That’s my main task for today.

Yesterday at the coffee shop, I met someone a bit confusing. We connected pretty easily, but then he revealed a couple of highly polarised religious views which made me a bit uncomfortable. I also got the feeling he was drunk and that made me uncomfortable too. I didn’t feel too unsafe because it was a pretty crowded place, but then I didn’t want to hang out much longer. He gave me his number and I don’t know if I’ll be texting him. But it definitely made me feel weird because when I got home I had to take some time to regulate.

When I was trying to figure out what I felt, I felt a judgemental voice asking me why I’m always obsessed with “figuring out” my feelings and my experiences. And this has been a question on my mind lately. Even though here, I tell myself I don’t need to be judgemental about this because it’s just part of my nature, I don’t think it works that easy.

I’ve tried to find an explanation for this many many times before. There’s a part of me that thinks of this as a problem. If we forget about the why for a second, what is a reframe that can help me?

It’s just something that makes me curious. Scientists and academicians also care about really specific, deep problems. Sometimes these problems and occurrences are outside of us, sometimes they are within (psychology, biology, etc). Why is that okay and why is my “obsession” with my own nature and workings not as okay? (For the record, obviously this is an internal judgement, nobody else is telling me this is a bad thing). But alright, maybe accepting this reframe now, that this is just something that makes me really curious. Ie how my body, my brain, my heart etc react to external or internal experiences.
Understanding why something makes you feel unpleasant is also not unimportant. How else would you avoid it in the future, or deal with it if you couldn’t avoid it? I shouldn’t be quick to dismiss this as unimportant.

The ONLY problem I can think is that it can be a bit time consuming. But that is also only when I’m ruminating. When I’m quick to start journaling or writing, it doesn’t take that long. I really need to cut out as much rumination as I can. That is the primary solution to many of my problems. (Sleep, time-management, “too much going on”, overstimulation, etc).

Okay, that’s it for now. Really psyched to move to music stuff. Let’s go.

069a – passive writing, intentions for the week

I want to sleep before 4am today. Because I really want to wake up before noon tomorrow. Which means writing a word-vomit now, doing some reading and then literally just switching off the lights by 3:45am. Had some friends over today and realised I really care about them. One of them I was meeting after more than 6 months and he’s been going through a bit of tough time. Him getting me upto speed is when I realised how much I really felt for him.

I’ve been a bit triggered about lacking a romantic relationship over the last couple days so today was a bit of grieving the last person I dated. I thought I was mostly over them but today brought some new (old) inner feelings out, I guess. It’s been over a month since we ended things and I expected this much time to be enough for me to grieve. But maybe I need a few weeks more.

I’ve decided to purchase an electric and a semi-acoustic guitar soon but the research part of the purchases is not very fun.

I think I definitely want to complete 2 more songs before the end of this year. That’s doable, I think.

I haven’t taken a flight in a while. I think I’m missing the feeling. Even though flights and travel give me some anxiety, I think even WITH the anxiety, the overall feeling is nice and interesting. Maybe I’ll go somewhere early December.
I guess I used to think the net feeling in a moment is the “sum” of your positive and negative feelings but I think it’s not really that. It’s not [happiness minus anxiety = less happiness]. It’s just (happiness, anxiety). This is actually quite interesting to me. (#epiphanies)

This word-vomit is slow because I keep getting distracted. I’m really tired today though I don’t know why. I’ve slept enough and I didn’t do much. Maybe it’s just that. I didn’t do anything refreshing.

Do I really not have any thoughts at the moment? How is that possible?

I have many tasks to do this week, most of which I’m not looking forward to. So, then, what am I looking forward to, if not those tasks? How can I make this week a bit nice? There’s an open-mic I could sign up for potentially, but I don’t know what songs I’d want to sing. Okay yes, I think I can do this. It’s a task that’s the right amount of challenging, plus it’ll also be nice to move towards my medium-term goal of doing ten open-mics by the mid of next year. It’s also at this queer/mixer event type thing so it could potentially be nice to meet some new people, and I’ve been meaning to find ways to do that anyway.

I want to get back to 1000-word posts because I think more stuff comes out when you write 1000-word posts as opposed to shorter ones, so yeah– that’s something I’ll probably start doing soon. I’ve also decided I’m not switching to substack until I’ve written 10-long posts/essays that I’m actually satisfied with (where the satisfaction rating is at least a 7/10). Alright, these conclusions feel good.

068b – diwali but this post is barely about diwali

It’s been a busy three days. We’re celebrating Diwali here in India. I posted a bit already on Instagram about how it ended up being a bit too much for me, especially since I’m celebrating in India after six whole years. It’s mostly over, but I’ve been thinking of regret and “fomo” a lot. On Friday, I was sensing increasing anxiety about the festival, the parties, the firecrackers etc and I was wondering why I wasn’t able to surrender to it all. I was also wondering if I would regret it later, whether I would miss not spending enough time with the family and friends around me while I have them.

But I’ve been thinking about the last few years, and while I did miss spending time with family/friends when I wouldn’t get to see them for many months, I don’t think I’ve missed “big” events too much.

But I’ve also been thinking of this all from the sensitivity lens, and I wonder when things got so intense. Like I don’t remember being bothered too much by loud noises, events, overstimulation etc when I was a kid.

I think part of it has to do with our collective lowkey-obsession with our physical forms, which always seems to increase around events etc. Now, I do understand why some people like to dress up, etc, but I think there is a bit of an expectation for everyone to do it, and that is what I’m not too fond of. I specifically remember times in my life where I’ve actually really enjoyed events— and those were times where the people I was hanging with weren’t too form-obsessed, where we were doing a lot more than just clicking pictures, commenting on each other’s outfits, etc.

I did also get a haircut yesterday that I didn’t end up liking (and I miss my longish hair) so maybe that’s got me a bit annoyed as well.

Talking to my sister about everything really helps though. We spoke after almost 4-5 days today and it’s nice that we’re now able to put some gaps between interactions. (Since our phone calls tend to get pretty long and hence time-consuming). We’ve actually been weirdly in sync about life stuff over the last couple months. We were going through what felt like slumps throughout August and September and somehow came out of them together as October came around.

I often wonder what the point of these journal-entries-like word-vomits is (ie is there a point to making them public?)— and I’m going to come back to this question soon. Sometimes I feel like I’m being lazy when I write these. But let’s see, I want to have sufficient reasons to why I’m doing this in public. I know I had reasons when I’d started but lately I can’t remember them. Or be convinced by them. I know they hold value for me— more on that later— but I want to be sure of the reasons why I’m doing this in public. Otherwise it’s just vulnerability for vulnerability’s sake and I don’t necessarily need that in my life at the moment.

I feel better now, though. Man, making space for all the unpleasant thoughts in your brain feels so good.

065a – doubts, fears, inadequacies re: writing

“I thought I wanted to be a writer, turns out I just wanted to write.”

I imagine I’ll be saying this a few months from now. Thinking about money or monetisation from my art makes me anxious. I definitely need to find a day-job. I’m not ready to give up all my time yet, so I plan to start looking in February. I imagine it might take up to 3-4 months for me to be able to find one, because I’ll also have to do some research on the kind of jobs I’m willing to take.

But I want to make 10 complete songs before I start a job, and I’ve only made 2 so far. Will I push my “start looking for jobs” date if February arrives and I haven’t made 10 songs by then? I guess we’ll find out. I’m open to it, but we’ll see.

Why do I want to make songs? I don’t know, I just feel like it’s a very fulfilling achievement.

The college-student I teach on Sundays has been giving me a similar answer when I ask him why he doesn’t like Delhi. I’ve been teaching him English to help him with job interviews. He says “I don’t know but I just don’t like it”.

Personal writing feels like a very selfish pursuit. Or the kind of art that I gravitate towards (ie MY feelings and MY thoughts) feels like a very selfish, self-obsessed activity. Which then re-opens the questions I haven’t taken the time out to think about, yet. Who will my audience be? I imagine I can figure that out on the way.

I am definitely not someone who can quickly adjust to trends and what the world needs “right now” and drop comments on it. I do it sometimes but I can’t do it regularly. There was a time when people were more interested in the music I was putting out (although it was mostly covers) and they kept asking me to share stuff on streaming services but all of it doesn’t get as much engagement anymore.

I do wonder lately if you need to be more “gifted” or “talented” or willing to make more compromises if you want to stand out with all of these things.

But I haven’t really given anything a REAL shot yet. A real shot will have to be more planned, more patient, more sustainable. That’s fine, I can live with that for today.

I am still interested in this problem-space. That is, I want to write, I enjoy the process, are there ways I can be better and find overlaps between the things I want to write about and the things people want to read?

Maybe I need to go out and live more, also.

055a – “morning pages” but it’s just frustration

Mornings get incredibly tough out of the blue these days. I guess it’s just teething issues but I think when you’re not expecting certain things to happen it’s tougher to deal with them. Although of course our true strength is determined by and the maximum growth of course happens with the unexpected. I think I’m used to people only coming around when I know someone is supposed to come around. I was woken up today by a couple of doorbells by random errand workers and it just completely messed my morning up. I’d slept pretty late anyway so this made it quite worse.

I’ve been struggling with the amount of dust in the house, which causes me to be really alert and active when the house-help comes to do the cleaning and stuff. I’m also struggling with how much of mom’s voice keeps echoing whenever house-stuff is happening. Like I think in a vacuum, I wouldn’t even care about half the things, but her voice is so loud (figuratively) that I end up caring about 10 more things than I usually would. House tasks are endless, I haven’t been able to accept this yet.

I think alone time isn’t alone time when it’s being used up by tasks and chores. For it to be really quality alone time, I need to have more brain and body space to do nothing. Or to do things that help me feel more connected with myself. Like this, for example.

I have therapy today after almost two weeks, looking forward to it. I’d been thinking of reducing frequency from weekly to bi-weekly (to save expenses a little bit), but this gap made me realise I’m not ready to do that yet.

Physical activity has taken a hit over the last couple weeks because of the move, which I think is also affecting me quite a bit. Need to get this started again. Food has also taken a bit of a hit simply because I’m finding I feel quite lazy to cook or even assemble food, I might need to just spend the funds and keep a cook for my own sanity. Let’s see how that goes.

Social, dating, creative pursuits are going pretty decently, can’t complain much over there.

I think overall, I definitely don’t feel as much loneliness or isolation here (ie India), and general “big picture” anxiety is lower too, but I do feel more stressed and frustrated by the little things on a daily basis. Jury’s still out on what’s worse. Will be a major determinant for geographical decisions.

I got scammed by some fake caller the other day and I thought I was over it but somebody asked me a question about it just now and it triggered major “self-inadequacy” feelings in me (ie how could I be this stupid etc) which is making me realise I’m not completely over it. Ah, well.

Anyway, that’s it from the last couple days. Hope your day’s going better than mine is!