Will Work for Respect

My therapist challenged me to look back on times when I found self-worth and self-respect, to figure out what exactly made me feel that way. This mostly involves looking back to when I was in a professional career, and perhaps even further to my early years in college. I haven't made lists before, but I think this will work better than the long form. Let's give it a go.

• Positive Aspects
• I worked my ass off (physically & mentally) and wore myself out in a beneficial way.
• I was good at what I did, often without even trying very hard.
• At other times I worked my ass off and was even better at things.
• I tried and worked hard.
• I succeeded, no matter what.
• I was rewarded for my hard work and given favorable treatment.
• I had some small power to make change and get rid of people that brought the department down. 
• I could do things with less second guessing myself and without looking back, and be correct.
• Potentially Negative Aspects
• I was able to be mean and ruthless towards people I thought were worthless.
• At school I was able to chuckle at slackers and watch them fail.
• I even succeeded at times that I thought I didn't deserve it.

This can be a bit to digest, so I am going to pluck out my main themes.

• Distilled Aspects
• working hard and gave effort
• success, power, and confidence
• things were easy and I won
• liked/respected by others

Let's go from there.

Blocked by Gain

I haven't written for a while. It isn't that I've ignored writing or have been avoiding it, but I have been unable to pen anything worthy. This last month has actually been a fairly good one, mentally; and I have an easier time composing when I have issues to vent. Finals were seriously stressful, as to be expected, but I had a pleasant vacation with my wife and then another to California with my daughter. The next semester starts next week and I fully expect the stress to start taking hold again.

Overall this season has been spectacular. Historically I crash during the holiday season, in the dark days of winter. Sooooo, what happened this year? It is probably a combination of a positive bump up in meds and riding off the flow of personal accomplishment in school. This semester I will continue to try and increase my productivity and habits. Ironically, for the first time in, well, months or more I have actually felt bored. My time hasn't been wasted, but in-between tasks I am extremely blase.

In the last month I sat down to write about a single question, again and again. It was a question posed to me by my therapist about why exactly I found so much personal love and acceptance when I was a working professional. I should probably address this, because I have an appointment coming up next week. And that is where I will end this entry, on a cliffhanger for that follow up.