Tag: friendship

My Perception of Life: Teenage Years

Life for me as a kid I had one focus: making friends. I didn’t realize it then but looking back at it, that really seemed to be the case. The friends I made growing up I had just one feeling every time we would hang out, and that was happiness. Although I didn’t have many friends, my parents did, and their friends had kids of their own. All these other kids were right around the same age as me and we hung out often. This is one of those situations where you would consider them family-friends. Even though we weren’t related, we still considered each other family.

Teenage Years

One of the first major turning points in my life happened during my high school years. But it wasn’t just one specific thing, it was many things that accumulated. New friendships, my love for cars skyrocketed, and of course, my first high school girlfriend. “Snuggly Bear.” I never called her that, just what she referred to herself in the letters we would write each other. Anyone else remember that? Letters! Seriously, when was the last time you wrote a letter to someone? I write maybe one letter a year.

Anyway, a lot of the friends that I also made, we had so much in common. Things like playing sports, video games, and sometimes we would rent a movie that was more horror-esque and pick characters in them who we would claim as ourselves and see who makes it out alive at the end. Also, another thing with horror-type video games, we would rent them and see how far we can get before having to return them. From what I remember, I was typically the one playing the game while my friends would watch. They were more interested in the viewing aspect while giving me options and observing the gameplay, all while I had to make whatever choices that doesn’t lead to death.

Even though I didn’t get my driver’s license until I was 18, that didn’t stop me from being around cars. My older brother was a great example of that. During the weekends, when he would be working on his car in the garage, the moment I heard tools and other mechanical noises, I would pretty much run out to observe. I feel like the reason I did this was to see if I could learn from anything my brother does. I would ask him about what he would be working on or what modifications he would be doing, while still trying not to bother him too much. At least up until the point when I would have my own car to work on. In these early days, we only had 2 Fast & Furious movies out and during this time I could definitely say that I admired Paul Walker’s taste in cars. To this day, I still can’t afford the cars he drove in the movies, which led me to get the next closest thing… affordably.

With all these things that I mentioned and how great they sounded, maybe you’re wondering where the turning point comes in. Because from what we know, turning points are tendencies for conflict. When it came to school, my education was subpar. Bad grades can only lead you so far in life… or so they say. It helps, but a lot of experience with life in general can open up a lot of opportunities. With my grades not doing so great, my relationship with my friends became a bit bumpy as well. At this time, as much as I loved having friends, I never considered what would happen when we all started to get comfortable around each other.

What I mean by this isn’t just about farting in each other’s faces and seeing who beats who to the punch of saying, “doorknob or safety”, followed by running into the wall trying to avoid getting hit, but welcoming one another in like family. And from my experience with family, we do have tendencies to bicker and poke fun, but when it happened to me with my friends, I took it out of context. I thought maybe they were just making fun of me because of how easy I was to make fun of. And maybe that’s at least somewhat true, but my innocence was sort of taken from me. This meant as we got older, we start getting wiser and more mature… I would put an asterisk on both of those. At least when it comes being a teenage boy, we seemed to be incredibly immature.

After only a short time dating my girlfriend, she would break things off with me. Funny thing, she thought that I was going to break up with her which wasn’t true. But it happened and we talked about trying to get back together which we never did. So, no more Snuggly Bear for me. As I tried to move on, I did put myself out there with other girls. At the time, it seemed like it was preferred that as teenagers, you would rather hangout as a group while getting to know each other better before finding yourselves into a one-on-one situation, which was what I was trying to do. The girls that I asked out said yes and agreed to meet with me only to not show up and I would get stood up, multiple times, multiple girls. Since then, I just been afraid to ask anyone else out for the remainder of my high school career. And so, we move on…

My Perspective

Depending on how long ago since you’ve been a teenager, obviously, you’ve changed and have grown from that person you once were. The parts of you that you didn’t like, you no longer did that. Unless you are living in the past and only want to stay that way, but life doesn’t really work like that. Yes, you can keep certain aspects of your younger self with you. But the biggest takeaway from this in my opinion, is any situation that we find ourselves in, despite how we react to it and how it changes us… that defines who we are. Maybe not completely, but easily when it comes to certain aspects about us.

If I was able to go back and give any advice to my younger self, I would tell myself, “Don’t be so emotional. Learn to relax a bit. People are going to talk and you can either shrug it off or just do what you are going to develop later in your 20s: self deprecation. Trust me, it works! I know you wear your emotions on your sleeve but you’re a great kid… also, quit trying to be right all the time! There’s so much greatness in you and you don’t even know it yet, but you have to figure that out on your own. You can’t be afraid to learn something new. And one last thing: education is important. I know you don’t like it and a good amount of this stuff might not be useful in the future. But a lot of it is… that and you could also use it for trivia night. Did you know there are over 1400 different types of cheese in France?! Anyway, I should get going. One last thing, don’t tell anyone about this and the whole thing about time travel stuff.”

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How Saying Yes Changed My Spiritual Journey

Not so long ago, right after Thanksgiving day, I was approached at home by a couple of sisters from the missionary. My nephew was the one that originally answered the door but started saying some silly things which led me to intervene. I was curious, so I introduced myself. They were incredibly nice and asked me where I stand on religion.

Despite my family being Buddhist and when I was much younger, I do remember a friend of my parents offered to take us to church but I was too young to really understand and retain any memory of it. As I got older, I never really saw myself leaning towards any religion. I just did my own thing really and believed in whatever I suppose I wanted to believe in… and of course, that means Santa Claus! Even if he doesn’t believe in me.

So, when I told the sisters I didn’t have any belief, they asked if I was at least spiritual, which I most definitely am. They were more than happy to hear that. Considering Christianity is incredibly broad with many different denominations, they were Mormon, and asked if I was okay with them reading a scripture from the bible. How could I say no? This ended up leading to where they asked for my number and then offered me the book of Mormon, and that eventually led to me being invited to a Christmas party and going to church the Sunday before Christmas. With all this, I also ended up learning quite a bit about the religion.

But why did I agree to any of this in the first place?

As we started approaching the new year, about a week or two prior to the sister missionaries knocking on the door, I was rewatching the movie Yes Man from anywhere to about the tenth to fifteenth time. Overall, in my opinion, it was a great movie with how simple, easygoing, and of course, because it’s Jim Carrey, its’ comedy and his perspective on showcasing two different types of people in one.

But one thing stood out the most to me about this film: its’ relatability. This most recent time that I watched it, something triggered in me that got me reflecting on my past. The countless times I would have friends and family invite me to whatever it would be that they were doing, I would come up with an excuse not to go, causing me to miss out on so many opportunities in my life. And who knows where that would have taken me to this day.

The reason I feel that I am this way often could be because I like sticking to what I’m comfortable with. Getting out of my comfort zone does raise my anxiety and then I start to feel awkward in my surroundings. I am a bit of a homebody.

So, I took a chance and said yes.

On a weekly basis, I met up with the sisters to learn more about the book of Mormon. Now, other than my reasoning to saying yes, in these last few years alone, I became obsessed with learning. Because there’s so much out there in this world alone, it would be a waste to stay couped up in only so many places. That’s why I had to break out of that.

Being older and wiser (sort of), I wanted to understand more about this religion. So, I took it upon myself to be educated by the sisters. I was very much intrigued, although, when I was asked if I knew anything at all about the book of Mormon, my mind went straight to South Park. I didn’t tell them that. Just let them know that I have heard of it. And from there, the education began and the rest was history, as they say.

Something that I missed way back when, when I was still going to classes in grade school, was that feeling of wanting to learn. My much much underdeveloped mind at the time just wanted to make friends and hangout with them as often as I could. And even that was difficult for me. Especially when you’re typically the quiet kid in school. I couldn’t tell ya how I was able to make the friends I did, but hey, it happened and we all got to hangout as much as we could. It did lead me to constantly waiting to do my homework at the last moment before being due. But I’ll always be grateful for the friends that I made and the memories we shared.

The thing is, you don’t have to say yes to everything. As per the movie. But it’s there to just give you that kick start that you may need to the possibility of something wonderful. And if you don’t want to, you could always just say no instead of making an excuse not to. For me, I’m just getting started and already I got to have this story to tell if I didn’t. Do what feels right in your heart… or gut… or wherever. Whichever you prefer. You got this!

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The Untold Story: Perspective

Let’s talk about people. Like our personalities, tendencies, and of course, perspectives. How every little thing that make us who we are shows how we perceive life. Some of us are caring and constantly thinking about others and their wellbeing, while others only care for themselves and will do what’s best for them, even if that means getting ahead or because they need the win, or heck, maybe they just can’t put aside their egos. Join me as we explore the minds of what makes us as individuals, who we are.

The Problem

Now, this is from my point of view. And from my experience, it’s that there are too many people in this world that are just unaware. Unaware of a lot of situations they find themselves in. A great example is how they typically only see things in black and white. Completely forgetting that there are 50 shades of grey. The thing is if you see people that are like this, they tend to believe that everything they say or how they feel is right. It’s unfortunate because it almost feels like anything you tell them they won’t believe you. So, how do you open up their minds to not be so… stubborn? Maybe you don’t. Not because you shouldn’t, but because maybe you can’t. Some people can be so far gone it’s almost impossible to change their perspective. So why bother changing it anyway?

My Story

I was in a situation that looking back on it now, was toxic. A friendship that scarred me possibly for life. Of course, being that I like to spread my joy and positivity around, there were plenty of good memories. But with that came a lot of bad ones. I guess you could say in this relationship I looked up to the person as someone who influenced my life. Back when I was much younger, I had many friends and old colleagues trying to explain to me the situation I was in. Like being teased, but more or less, being made fun of, in front of his friends. I had no idea I was being manipulated and controlled considering the many good things that had happened with us. Unfortunately, I failed to see it so much later in life. Eventually, sometime later, I finally was well aware of my relationship with this individual and ended the friendship. Did not care that it was formal or not, it just needed to end. But that scarring that it left me gave me tendencies from him that rubbed off on me. Before realizing what I became after this, I was doing similar things to people I cared about and that left our relationship vulnerable. It was only until recently that I noticed this about myself that I made changes (hopefully it’s not too late). Best way to put it, like Taylor Swift said, I’m the anti-hero.

Perspective

I believe what it comes down to is it shouldn’t matter who’s right or wrong, everyone has their own story. I personally love knowing what plays out from anyone’s point of view. First of all, it’s eye opening so you have a better understanding from someone else’s perspective. They are the narrative. So long as the story adds up. But also, everyone has a past. From how they were raised and all the people and things they were surrounded by growing up played a role in their lives. Every little detail that makes us all unique in our own different ways. That’s how we look at life. All the good and bad choices that were made, all the lessons learned along the way (assuming you learned from it). Just know that whether you’ve known someone to what feels like your whole life, or a random stranger, you’ll never know the whole story behind their history. You should never judge them or disrespect them. Be kind. But also, pay attention. Not everyone has good intentions, but the one’s that do… treat them well.

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