A few weeks ago, I published an article on Tiny Buddha, an online magazine for spiritual enthusiasts. It was an old blog post that I sent in for fun. The editor edited out a few jokes (ugh, I hate when they do that), and put it up. Some people liked it. Some people didn’t. You can’t please everybody.

Those that didn’t like it sure were vociferous though. It was an article on how we learn from every relationship, even ones that end. Some people felt that they knew everything about me from that one article. They thought they had free reign to judge me:

“Sounds like you could use a break from dating. Break free from the codependent loops for a while and gain some perspective. That way on your death bed, if there isn’t a ring on your left ring finger, maybe you won’t feel like a failure.”

“There is a lot of sarcasm here to mask the bitterness that obviously wants to surface.”

“An article like this is more for yourself then any theoretical reader. By putting it ‘on paper’ you’re hoping to rationalize and justify your past failures.”

And my favorite: “You got serious issues.”

Of all the comments, only about ten were harsh. It’s funny that I’ve published things on the Huffington Post, KCET, here, and a in a few other online magazines, and the most judgmental reactions came from a ‘spiritual’ outlet. I would be totally judgmental if I said they were doing spirituality wrong, so I won’t say that.

It wasn’t the specific comments that bothered me. What they said wasn’t based on anything, and I don’t really care what these people hiding behind computer screens may think about my dating life.

But it did make me think: Why am I putting my personal life out there? Why am I being so honest so that other people can see? Why am I making myself so vulnerable? Why am I creating an environment that allows for people to judge my life? WHY AM I DOING THAT?!

That day, my professor of psychology asked me about a project I had chosen to do. She asked, “Are you doing it because you want to or because you feel like you’re supposed to?”

I began asking myself that question about everything. And thus began my existential crisis. Am I writing about my personal life because I feel obligated? Do I secretly feel not creative enough to invent fictional characters? Am I writing jokes about life because I want people to like me?

Then I got scared. We have all seen those Facebook status updates: “I’m doing everything I’ve ever wanted to do with my life. My life is the best.”

Nobody believes those posts. Everyone (well, me, I guess) thinks that those are just for show. Those super positive posts are there to make people think we’re perfect. (This is my way of judging, but since this is my post I allow it.).

Is this blog my way of showing some caricature of myself? Is it really me, or is this space right here just one HUGE annoying Facebook status update? Am I even being honest about myself at all? Was I so mean in high school (yes!) and drunk in my twenties (yes!) that I want to now prove that I SWEARIMNOTLIKETHAT anymore? Or, do I think I’m not a real writer since I haven’t published anything in print, so I have to prove that I’m a writer HERE, where I have the final say?

Is that what I’m doing?

And if this is true, have I been lying to myself since 2008? Have I been thinking that I enjoy writing when really I have been trying to prove myself?

Just then, I started to read a book required for school, Creativity Revealed. The first part talks about Plato’s description of perception: If a group of human beings grow up with their bodies and heads bound to face the back wall of a cave, they can’t see each other or what is behind them. They’ve never experienced life outside, but they see the shadows of people walking by projected onto the cave wall. And for them, that’s what life and humans are: shadows. Because that’s all they see. Their reality is shadows.

Then the book says: Could we, as human beings, be the ones bound and tied, observing the projections and considering them reality? For millennia, sages from all the great traditions have been telling us the answer is: YES!

Great. So, in the first few weeks of 2012, I have not only learned that my favorite thing to do is a lie, but MY WHOLE LIFE IS A LIE. Reality is not real. I am looking at a cave wall. I am a lying hack. I am stuck in a codependent loop. AND I HAVE SERIOUS ISSUES.

Full. Existential. Crisis. Mode.

This is when I stopped doing laundry and brushing my teeth. I have cried more in 2012 already than I did in the entirety of 1986 (and that was the year I rode my tricycle down the stairs and broke my collarbone). With those questions only came more questions: WHAT AM I SUPPOSED TO DO THEN? WHAT IS REAL? ARE HUMANS EVEN REAL? AND IF NOT, CAN THEY BE FUNNY? WHO AM I IF I’M NOT A STRUGGLING WRITER? WHY CAN’T I PAY MY PHONE BILL ON TIME? WHY IS IT SO COLD IN LOS ANGELES? WHERE ARE MY PANTS?

I have ditched many friends lately. I have cried in my car, on my living room floor, and at the beach. I have not been able to stop eating butter. Yes, butter. Sometimes butter JUST HELPS OKAY. And underneath all the questions and anxiety is fear. FEAR. My dad killed himself, and as each day passed with more tears, my anxiety level rose: Will I ever get over this shit? Am I going to wallow in my apartment drinking alone until I die? Fuck. More butter.

And then yesterday I realized something: I haven’t been writing. Yesterday, I felt like I could not go a day longer without writing about these feelings. I’ve talked them out. I’ve scared my mom. I’ve made my friends take me to IHOP (they have good butter). But, it wasn’t enough. When my friend Mike DeStefano died, I HAD to write about it immediately. Writing is just how I think. Writing is how I breathe. Putting this shit on paper is how I figure it all out. And that’s when I realized: I’m not a faker! I am doing this for ME. BECAUSE I WANT TO. I NEED to write every day. Or else. It’s for my sanity. And I put it on here because why? I don’t know. To find people like me? To make others think? To create a community? Or is it because if I don’t, then I won’t write?

That’s what it is. (And I just figured this one out right this second through writing. Hallelujah).

If I don’t feel pressured to get something up here every week, I WONT DO IT. And if I don’t do it, I GO INSANE and eat butter. I’m like a tea kettle that’s screaming, and if I don’t pour out my stories, they boil over back inside me and wash away my organs.

So, there.
Ah.

Fuck, I feel better.

I still don’t know how I feel about the cave. Or the confused reality. Or the EVERYTHING ELSE. But one thing is clear, and that is that I MUST write.

So, that’s good. And also time consuming. But good. This crisis has had me questioning everything, but it has secured a few truths for me too: I don’t like the font ‘Arial.’ Sweatpants can be so comforting, but the moment they start to smell bad they are depressing. The beach feels and smells good. Crying alone in movies is the best. I LOVE CAPITALS. I love my mom. I’m fragile. I like butter better than cheese. Humans are definitely funny (If we are in fact humans. Not sure).

Through this whole thing, I’ve been so supported by so many people. Friends have let me talk their ears off (That’s a metaphor. Don’t worry. No ears actually fell off.). Even strangers on Twitter kept me company when I wasn’t sleeping but just laying in my bed staring out my window and wondering if what I was seeing was real. Relationships are so hard but so rewarding, and I guess if that’s all I get out of life, then I don’t fucking care if anything else is real.

Off to go STOP thinking for a while. And then eat some butter.

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