Friendships

Recently, the idea of love and what it means to love and be loved and the fairness of it. When I first came home from uni in June I went through a rough patch where I knew some of my friends were also home and wanted to see them but because no one was trying to reach out to me I wasn't doing anything about it. I felt like, if they wanted to see me, they would try to. Deep down I knew the reason was almost definitely because I have always been the organiser, no one else in my friendship group has been the one to suggest meet ups that aren't birthday parties outside of school. That was okay when we saw each other every day and didn't need to try and talk to each other because we could all the time. When we had to actually try, however, it hurt me that no one else reached out and tried to contact me, let alone try and arrange anything to see me or any of my other friends. Eventually I did end up organising something and it was a fun night, I'm glad I did.

A few weeks ago I saw a post on tumblr that was talking about love. One person had said "don't cross oceans for someone who won't cross a puddle for you" and someone else had replying with a few lines basically saying do, love everyone deeply, do things for people, its worth it. I was conflicted about this post. Part of me, the stubborn part which didn't want to arrange anything for my friends without them doing something for me first, agrees with the first person. However, I also see the validity in loving deeply and being exceptionally kind to people, especially the people you love. Its something I still can't form an opinion on because I still see both sides.

I do, however, think that friendship should involve effort from both (or all) parties involved. I value a text or a message first every time, it means a lot to me. This year of being away from my friends I know that I am usually the first one to get in contact with any of my group from sixth form. Thats the way its always been and I know that that probably doesn't lessen the amount that they care about me but there's a difference between knowing and feeling. I know friendships change as people do and that's the natural progression of relationships, I know that not everyone has the same definition or expectations of friendship. That doesn't stop it hurting though when I realise that none of the people who are meant to be my best friends have started a conversation with me for months or I see them having a lot more contact with each other than they do with me.

As with many things I don't have a good conclusion to my thoughts on this, I'm still figuring a lot of things out. What I do know is that I love my friends deeply and always will, even if I'm not always able to call them friends. People mean the most to me and I got really lucky with my group of friends through the last years of high school and sixth form. I don't think I'll ever get that lucky again and I don't know how my friendships are going to be even a year from now. Its scary and I know there's a big chance that I'll never truly have the exact friendships I wanted once upon a time, I just hope that my current friendships can grow in a positive way throughout the years.

Shades of grey

Recently I've been thinking a lot about the concept of morality, right and wrong and all that complicated stuff that makes my head hurt. What I've really struggled with is knowing that everything, including morality, is one big social construction that has most likely been created by other people. I do believe that it is something that is needed though, we need to have generally agreed principles of what is right and wrong in order to function as a society. However, it needs to be something that can change and be moulded with society. Its dangerous when people aren't able to think about multiple sides of things and consider other people's point of view rather than completely disregarding everything someone says because it doesn't match what you think.

Sometimes I feel like people need to realise that people are immensely complex and have the ability to be both great and terrible throughout their lives. No one can ever know exactly what its like to be someone else and so everyone is inherently self-centred. If someone hurts you it is almost impossible to see that person as anything other than bad and deserving of punishment.. On the flip side, if someone you love and respect does something terrible it takes time and a lot of hard work to adjust your view of them and it might never happen.

Life is a lot easier if you have a set framework where you know that certain behaviour is always wrong and another is always okay. That isn't always the case though, everyone has different reasons for their behaviour and no one other than the person can ever truly know the reasons behind it. Therefore, I think it is important to take into account the complexity of behaviour before completely judging it.

I've come to judge things on how much good they put out in the world rather than in absolutism.

Being around better people

This last weekend I went to visit my best friend at her university in Durham and met all of her friends up there for the first time. Whereas I have had a less than good experience with the people at my university, she has had a great experience and has met great people who I'm sure have become lifelong friends. I really enjoyed the weekend, seeing my best friend for the first time in a few months as well as meeting new people. For the first time in a long time I found myself consistently surrounded by what seemed to be genuinely very good people for an amount of time. On the train home I felt that warm contentedness you feel after you've spent time around people who you feel are just good people and the urge to be better because of that.

I think that weekend has helped me to fully understand why it is so important to surround yourself with great people. I didn't get to know the people especially well but there was just a really good vibe. I've found this with a few people I've met at university. Sometimes, after I meet some people I just get this feeling of peace and contentedness. That feeling is a great feeling and its not one I have been accustomed to recently.  Its a feeling that lasts for a little while and then leaves but is always good, never bad. Its a feeling that makes me want to strive to be better: think more, write more, find more.

So I came away from this last weekend with two main goals: follow that feeling in the people I surround myself with and try to be a person who can give that feeling to others.

What a difference a year makes

One year a go today I was leaving college. I was more excited than sad and had a great last night with all my college friends. It was a good day and an even better night.

Today I'm just finishing my last year at university. I'm polishing off my last assignment and looking forward to going home next Friday. My mental health is not nearly as good as this time last year. I'm very different in a lot of ways but very much the same in other ways.

This year has been huge for me, probably the biggest year I've had so far. I've done some amazing things, had some of the best times of my life this year. But I've also had some of the worst. There is no better way to describe this year than huge. Things have changed in my life so much this year: I've met a lot of new people and had so many new experiences, good and bad. University definitely wasn't what I'd hoped for but I'm coming to terms with that. The most important relationships I had before this year have mostly stayed the same or got stronger. Things that were so incredibly important to me last year aren't as important now but they'll always hold a place in my heart. I've learnt a lot but I now know I have a lot more to learn and I'm looking forward to a lifetime of learning.

Throughout the bad times this year I've always had hope that it will get better. It has, at times, at times its got worse but thats okay. I think the main thing I have learnt this year is that the good times can be so good despite the bad times being very bad. They don't cancel each other out, either. I know I can be very happy some weeks then not so happy the next and thats okay, they don't affect each other that much.

I just needed to get my thoughts on this out there.

Once

Last night I watched Once (the film) on netflix for the second time. I loved it when I watched it before but this time I really loved it. That afternoon I hadn't been feeling too great and after watching it I lay in my bed and cried. For no particular reason. I didn't feel particularly sad about anything. I just cried. Then I looked up everything I possibly could about it. Then I slept.

Today I looked up the documentary about the two musicians in once. I watched it instead of doing some extra uni work. It wasn't what I was expecting. I thought it would tell me all about the process of making Once and how the two of them came to be. I thought it would be about Once more than anything. It wasn't. It was about them on tour and their relationship in that particular time span. It was a snapshot of their lives really. Now I'm writing.

I think what was special to me about both of these movies was the lack of a happy ending. Neither of them end especially sadly. They just don't really have a resolution where things end up in this place and you feel that its going to stay that way. They just show a relationship and a life at one point. Its hard to describe what exactly I think and feel about that.

I know that I fell a little bit in love with Once last night. I also know that its not the kind of love where you immerse yourself in the thing wholly for an extended period of time. I watched it last night after watching in months before and in a few months I might find myself watching it again. I tried to find out about the people behind it. I did what I could and found what I wanted. I'm not now going to go and follow and support everything they do because I don't think its that kind of love.

This is somewhat new to me. I'm so used to liking something and following it. Finding things to make it new every day and letting it become a huge part of my life. I love that kind of love for something, its a special way of loving something that you get to share. This new way of loving something I've found is also very special. I have opened myself up to something new and I will carry it in my heart. I just don't feel the need to carry on my love for it constantly, I don't want to obsess over it or even really think about it every day. I just let it be a part of me for a while.

I think because these films don't have any resolution, they don't wrap themselves up nicely for you, I don't feel the need to carry them on because I know that they are being carried on in their universes. The films mirror life in a way that not much media does: they continue after you leave them. Its like having a friendship for a while, having great times and then just drifting apart. You know that the person is still out there, living their life, you're just not living it together any more but thats okay. These films have helped me be okay with not having closure in my life.

Change

When I think of change I have a tendency to think about one big moment or thing that completely changes you. I tend to think that doing one particular thing will make me a whole new person with different interests and different values almost overnight. Recently I realised that that is just not true at all and I think that might be one of the reasons I found it so hard coming to university. The thing that made me realise this was having my first 'night out' last week with my friends here at uni. Before I went out, I thought about it like I would go out and wake up the next morning a completely different person who somehow thought differently. Then I went out and woke up feeling exactly the same as I have done for as long as I can remember. Things didn't change like I thought they should.

It was then that I realised that change doesn't actually happen all at once, it sneaks up on you. I realised that I'd had a similar view on going to university: I'd gone into it expecting to change so much that I didn't know how to think about the Christmas holidays because I didn't know who I'd be then. When I got here I found that nothing actually changed as I wanted or expected it to, I was still me. I was just in a different place surrounded by different people. I still feel like the same person I was in the summer which I didn't expect at all. I definitely expected to come to university and have a brilliant time and make new friends and change into this new, confident and better person as quickly as over a few months.

I think this might be a result of many things.I think, in the past, I had defined myself very much in terms of the people who I love and I thought that being away from them would change me a lot. It hasn't really. I still speak to the most important people in my life on a daily basis. I also think that I was told so many times that university would be 'the best experience of my life' etc. that I had unrealistically high expectations of what I was coming to. It was scary but I was always more or less optimistic about coming and then it didn't meet my expectations at all. Thats a hard thing to deal with.

Although I haven't had a massive change here at uni so far, I think there have been small changes. I still feel like the person I had become and started to like in recent years but with extra. I'm used to doing things for myself more and I know I can send time alone and not only survive but enjoy myself. Change has happened, just not in the way I thought it would and I am grateful for that because I am becoming stronger at least.

2014

One year ago today I posted this blog post with some thoughts and goals for the coming year and I feel that its time for a review of these goals.

 1. Live in the present more and worry less. 

I think I have managed to improve a lot in this area of my life. I still worry and get paranoid and everything but I think I have gotten better at letting myself think whatever will be will be and just getting on with life in the now.

  2. Be more creative. 

This I haven't been very good at. I really have not become more creative this year. I have begun to think about it more though through my study of creative education and I think this goal can stay with me over the next year.

  3. Read as much as I can.

I have well and truly failed at this. I still find it so hard to sit down and read, even though when I do I really enjoy it. This is something that I want to continue to work on this year as well.

  4. Try to stop the negative thoughts.

I think I have become better at controlling and counteracting these negative thoughts. I still have them but I'm making progress.

  5. Be kind to people.

I really haven't done this consciously. I tend to smile at people in the street and perform little acts of kindness like that but its not central to my being. I don't know whether that's good or bad.

  6. Take responsibility for my feelings.

I believe I have managed to do this more this year. I am more aware of not being reliant on others for happiness, however, I think I do need people who love me in order for me to be happier so I think that this year I need to be more open and honest about my feelings

  7. Voice my opinions more.

For most of the year I think I have succeeded in this and I'm proud of myself for it

  8. Work hard.

I'm still a hard worker and I'm happy with it.

  9. Learn to appreciate the rest time I have.

I feel like I got better at this but then got too used to having a lot of time so this is still something I need to work on

  10. Use music properly.

I honestly don't feel that this resolution was needed. I wanted to use music as a guide but I have realised that I don't need it as a guide. I have people who I admire to guide me and that's all I want.

Looking back on this I think I have actually made a lot of progress this year. I'm feeling more optimistic about what I've achieved now. The start of the new year was not necessarily a good start, I sat in my living room feeling numb and upset about nothing and everything. The last section of 2013 was harder for me than I ever thought it would be and I know I will face some of the same challenges in the next year. Unlike last year, I do not know what this coming year will have in store. 2013 was very much a year of big milestones and movements that were very much set in stone, I knew they were coming and I knew that it would be a year of change. This year I don't know as much. I know I will continue with university and hope things there get better, I have a few events that are going to be happening but not much really. Honestly, I'm so looking forward to letting this year surprise me.