Let's Talk About: Feeling Lost

Hello people! 

Yes, I'm in the middle of my Advanced Subsidiary Level examinations; in fact, I just finished one of my maths papers today, and let's just say it won't do any good to revise back the scene. Yikes. And yes, I do know that I said before that I might not write another post until the end of my exams, which is in mid-November. Note the word "might", I didn't say that I'm sure I won't be writing any posts here. 

I was feeling extra "bloggy" last night while revising my mathematics, and I just quickly jotted down a few points for today's post. As you can see, I'm going to talk about feeling lost today. It's an important issue, as everyone must have feel lost at one point or another in their life. It's completely normal, but that doesn't mean that you'll feel okay during the process, knowing everyone else going through the same confusion. This is because everyone is different, and we're confused about different things and issues, and for most of the time, it's very hard to find someone who can empathize with us. It's easy for someone to sympathize with you than finding someone who can truly understand you. 

So, it's pretty obvious that this post is going to be one of the rare ones where I'm going to be serious instead of fooling around. It's true that most of the time, taking on a sarcastic approach onto the troubles you're facing can be easy, and making it into a joke is definitely easier for you laugh it off like nothing hits you at all. That's what I normally do, put on my sarcastic mask and pretend my problems aren't problems, but jokes that people laugh along with. That's me pretending to be positive, or trying to be positive. But there's some time where I need to be serious and reflective, so that I can grow while learning how to deal with troubles and problems in life. 

Today, is obviously one of the day that I'm reflective instead of being plain sarcastic.

I've been thinking about writing this blog post for quite a long time, as what I touched on before in my various blog posts, were just tips of a huge iceberg. What's holding me back is that, first time in my life, I don't even know how to use words to describe how I feel. Metaphors can't even capture what I feel deep inside. That kind of coldness, from inside out. Those negative thoughts. They're all horrible. I thought that I'm the only one, but realization hits me quite hard recently, that I'm not the only one. 

Recently, I feel like a close friend of mine is quite emotional. Not that I'm psychic and can detect her sadness when we're obviously not living in the same district now, but I can definitely tell through the way how she responds to me in her chats. Maybe it's because I know her for more than half of my life, that I can somehow sensed that something was... wrong. I started to pay extra attention to her posts and her stuffs (not a stalker, just a concerned friend), and the day before yesterday, I saw something that's definitely out of place (which I'm not going to go into the specifics here, since I'm not sure if she'll appreciate it if I betray her privacy this way). Without thinking twice, I immediately went and confronted her. Well, not exactly confronted, but rather asked her what exactly was going on. 

She tried to laugh it off at first, telling me nothing was wrong, but I'm not exactly dumb. Finally, when I kinda forced her to tell me, she told me that she's feeling lost. That was the moment I was kinda shocked by it. Looking from the surface, her life's looking pretty good, and I hardly detect that anything major was wrong. I knew a couple of little things that made her a little bit upset one at a time, like transition from high school to college, and the usual stuffs you'll deal with in college, like finding new friends and trying to fit into a new place. I knew that kind of stuffs, but I never know that she's confused with her life. 

The truth is, I don't think she'll ever tell me if I didn't ask her. I don't blame her, truly, I don't, because I was going through the exact same thing since March, though it's getting a little bit better now. She didn't discuss in detail about her problems, and I'm not going to rush her, but what I can say is, I really can empathize with feeling like you lost control over your life. When I first felt lost, I didn't know what to do. I almost got a panic attack and I was completely freaked out. The truth is, I didn't know how it surfaced. It's like the day before, everything was sunshine and flowers, and after that it's just months and months of endless storms. I was the kind of girl who was very sure about every single decision in life up till college. One day I woke up, and just felt entirely lost. I didn't know what to do with my life, I didn't know what my existence is for, I didn't know what I'm doing, I didn't know if future me will regret everything I do right now. The only thing I'm sure of, and believe deeply, is that I'm ruining my life. I'm doing every single thing wrong, and I'm desperately craving for a new start. 

I can't say I don't feel that way anymore. I still doubt every single action or decision I did and made and torture myself over meaningless things. It's not like I'm irrational, but rather the irrational part of me overpowers the rational part of me. 

People will try to comfort me by saying things like what I'm thinking won't happen in real life, or that my troubles are just little things and I should quit worrying about them. I know they're trying to be kind, by asking me to stop thinking, but how? I tried, trust me, I tried so hard till my pillow is wet with tears every single night. Maybe people think that I'm exaggerating till they feel like just telling me "to look at the bright side of life" and suggesting that "everyone goes through this too", as if that will make me feel any better. I know everyone goes through this, and feeling lost is just a normal part in life, but that doesn't diminish the feeling that I'm feeling like a talentless, useless worm. Comparing your problems, or other problems with me won't make me feel any better, but it'll only make me feel even worse about myself, or triggers me to discover new stuffs to worry about in my life.

I keep telling myself it's normal for me to feel lost, as I'm transitioning from my high school life to college, but the truth is, I've been to college for more than nine months now, and things still aren't getting any better. Every little things can make me scared, and that scares me even more, because I used to be reckless and fearless. I had that IDGAF attitude throughout almost my whole life after being bullied in primary school, so that I won't get hurt over stupid things. But things aren't the same anymore, and I'm not the same person I was before. 

Feeling lost may just be a temporary thing, and I do believe that I will get over with this, somehow. Maybe in a few months, maybe a year, maybe two or maybe more, but I will eventually snap out of this wobbly state, where I don't even know where is my stand. 

Just that, how to cope during the process is a very hard thing, and I thought I might share a couple of suggestions on how I deal with this feeling, as I'm having my head in the clouds right now, but it definitely gets better. This I can assure you. I'm not 100% okay yet, but maybe like 1% of me is recovering. It's a long process, to find out where you stand and who you want to be and who you really are, as a person. I still get sweaty palms 80% of the time (of course I faked it, and pretended to be swag and pulled my the IDGAF face out) and I still freaked out over little things like didn't manage to finish something on time, or can't do one simple question because of the blind spot I have on that. In short, what I feel and worry now are problems that I won't even give a damn during my high school life. Well, you can say thing changes, quite a lot.

Okay, if you are reading this and you feel like you've lost directions in your life, you can try out what I did to see if they work on you, too. These methods may not be useful, or they won't be useful permanently, but you just have to keep trying, like I am.

*note: this is totally different from my denial post last week, as you guys can see I'm being extremely sarcastic there, and being in denial is just an exams thingy*

Personally, I'll feel extremely nervous and the feeling of regret will overwhelm me. Not to mention, for most of my time, I'm wallowing in self-doubt and struggling with very low self-esteem. For you people who hasn't been through this yet, just let me tell you something, when you're feeling lost, you don't feel like you're worth it, and that your whole existence is just a joke, and you're going to be nobody in the end of your life. It's a serious business, let me assure you. Whenever I'm feeling extra nervous, I try to do those deep breathing exercise. It may sounds a little bit stupid, but it definitely helps. Doing deep breaths and focusing on them helps to slow your heart rate, and reduce the nervous feelings you're having. Don't over-tell your brain to stop thinking! That'll only make the over-thinking worse. Trust me, I learnt that in a hard way. 

Also, focusing on something else to keep you from being swallow up by feeling extremely lost and scared. I used to think that it'll only happen at night, where my brain is completely free to think whatever it likes to think and it chose to think about existence, of all topics (that's the reason why I can relate to danisnotonfire with his existential crisis, and like he said, it's better to have it earlier in your life than when you're 50-ish, I guess). I used to watch a lot of pimple-popping videos and now a lot of baking tutorials whenever I feel like the anxious feeling of "I'm such a useless person, what am I doing on earth?". But you need to have the control to not get addicted to it like I do, because it's another thing you need to work on if you have an addiction *laughs*. It can be a book you read, or some quotes you found online, or some random things you can stare at. 

Besides transferring you focus to something else, you can try to write them down one by one. What frightens you? What scares you? What are you afraid of? For example, I'm terrified of not getting into a university that I wanted to get in, I'll write it down on a paper and the problem will then seems so insignificant. I'll tell myself to not worry about tomorrow when today's not even finished yet. Keeping a journal may helps because it helps to put things into perspective. Like if you get a B in your test and all of a sudden you feel so lost (okay.. I've been through this one. I mean, I can't control how I feel, even though I wish so. And I know this sounds so insignificant now, but it doesn't back when the feeling is eating me), you can write it down in your journal and trust me, the problems will look so insignificant on the paper. You don't have to regularly keep up with the journal if you're not an enthusiast in writing, but it will helps you to really look at what you're worrying about. 

Other than writing them down, or after writing them down (whichever), it's essential to carry out actions to improve your mood and to overcome that feeling. You can't give in to the feeling and think that it will haunt you forever (which they won't) nor blaming the universe for what you feel right now. You gotta find a solution to it, and carry it out. That's one useful thing my counselor told me which I found is true. Okay, maybe you don't get what I'm trying to say now. Example time. Like, I always have the thought that I'm not good at maths and I'm going to fail maths and bust my exams and ruin my life (see where my brain goes). Then after much wallowing, I realized it's all just going in my head, and I'm doing nothing to improve it. I didn't take actions to improve my own situation, so how can I blame anything or anyone for putting me into my situation? So I started to do more maths exercises and improved a little by a little. Even though maths is still my worst subject (to prove you that Asians too can be bad in maths), I give in efforts and time (though not much) and try to improve it. Once you starting to do something, you'll feel less guilty and the regretful feeling will slowly creep away. 

This may be a really bad example, but you can apply it to anything else you're going through right now. Find out why are you feeling that way. Why are you lost? Is it because you can't do what you love? Is it because you don't feel like you anymore? Or is it that you feel like your future is in a haze? 

To be completely honest, the future is a haze. Nobody knows how your future is, and worrying about failing it doesn't help it either. What you can do is to do something, because what you only have is now. Something to improve your life now and to take your mind off the future that you're feeling so lost in. Throw all those "be positive" bullshit into the bin because if you can't feel better after listen to it once or twice, you never will, and that doesn't help in any form. Like if you want to go into a decent university later in life, instead of focusing the horrible "what if" you can't get into it, do something that might help you to get into it! Read more books, do more exercises, write down a timetable. Just do something. Don't just sit there and think about it non-stop, it just won't come true and you're going to feel even lost. When you're doing something, it takes your mind off worrying and feeling lost. Really, I can vouch on that. I was feeling lost because I didn't do the same thing I used to do anymore, like writing lots of original songs and read tons of books because of my busy lifestyle. What I do is, I just squeeze out some time for them and when I really get down to work, to do it, I feel a thousand times better than I was. 

And there's that one little thing which I'm not sure if you're going through this or not, but I sure do. I'll punish myself over what I didn't do. Not physical punishments, but mentally torture myself by not letting myself to do what I like to do, aka my hobbies. It's a vicious cycle actually. I feel extremely lost on who I am, and then I started to blank out a whole lot frequently, thinking about life, leading me not finishing my homework or what I'm supposed to do, then I punished myself by not letting myself to read my favorite books and I feel even more depressed and more negative thoughts came along. Maybe it's just me, but I'm not sure. Maybe some of you out there go through the same thing. 

What I do to reduce this is to try to stop punishing myself, but rather spend some time doing what I like, such as singing to my favorite song or read some excerpt from my favorite book. This will help to boost my mood and will keep away the thoughts of feeling lost. I'll then feel more energized and that's the time I have the motivation to carry out actions. Then everything will start to fall back to normal. At least on that day.

What I'm trying to say here is that yes, we all do go through some point in life where we feel lost about our future, our current life, but instead of cursing or immersing in it, we can choose to do something to overcome it. Yes, I know it's extremely difficult, as I'm going through it right now, right at this moment as I'm writing this blog post. It's true that it's very hard to "get over with it" like how other people might have suggested you, but you do have to remember that you are the one who's in charge of your life. You have the ability to change it. Just.. don't give up. It'll be worth it in the long run, that's what I tell myself every day. To keep myself going. 

Also, it couldn't hurt to pop in a few chocolate into your system while you're dealing with stress. Just saying. *wink*

I do hope that whoever is struggling with feeling lost will find a way out. I like to think that after ten or twenty years, I'll look back to this time and be able to laugh at all the insecurities and uncertainties I'm going through. Every stage of life has different problems to solve, so don't feel like you're not worth it. Don't push away people who love you in the midst of fighting it. They may not help a lot, but they're always there for you and they love you. For this, I'm eternally grateful for my family and friends, to listen to me droning on about how insecure I'm when words failed me, and I just rambled on random stuffs. They may not be able to empathize, but they can give you their time and love. 

Wow, this is one heck of a long blog post. If you finish this whole thing, I applaud you. I don't feel like this post really make a lot of sense, but I hope it does help. Feeling lost is a phase in life where you need to overcome, and you can do it. Just endure the process and keep fighting on. Don't feel weak, and don't convince yourself you're weak. You're not weak, you just have the capacity to be even stronger. 

I'm going to end this with some random stuffs I wrote at my tumblr, and yes, I'm still not giving out my username, haha. If you can find it, kudos to you. 

Just know that, you're not the only one who's in the whole wide world that's feeling lost. I am, too, and many others too. This fact may not help, but I'm here to tell you you're not weak. 

You're strong, strong enough to survive when you don't even know where you're at. 

Till next time people.

xx

PS: To my close friend who shall not be named here, I love you and I (think) I know what you're going through. If you read this post, I just want you to know I'll always be here for you, just like you're always there for me. Love ya.