Barefoot in The City

I slept all day today. ALL day. From like 10:30AM to 11:35PM.

During this sleep I had some of the most intense partially lucid dreams/nightmares I've ever had. Which has been a steadily increasing trend as of late. Each batch is more fierce than the last. During the peak of my lucidity in the dreams the most prevalent thoughts are a combination of, "This cannot be happening." and, "There is no way this is being generated purely by my brain/mind." A form of doubt comes into play. My keen sense of observation and constant watch on myself even extends to the unconscious realm and while there, I cannot, for the life of me, make a decision as to "where" dreams come from. I can only recall snippets now. They are over-saturated, brightly-colored, hyper-kinetic flashes of frenzied activity. Very reminiscent of my DMT trip and prior experience with psychedelics. From the height of my enhanced awareness, I remember being plainly impressed with the amount of detail and clarity in the sights I was seeing. A thought crossed over with me. One that has done so many times before. -- Either dreams come from "somewhere" "out there" or I am in possession of one of the most impressive brains to have ever existed. Possibly THE most. Thanks to my psychedelic training I'm able to recognize subtle differences between "reality" and non-reality. A big portion of what clued me in today was the sense/feeling of the dream being more "real" than reality. Something that greatly hearkens back to DMT. It felt almost like a superreality, a more pure form of the existence we all experience daily. 1080p HD compared to old silent films. Anime to children's drawings.

I've always had an incredible ability to recall with frighteningly accurate clarity the detail of my dreams and it is with the utmost confidence of a scientist steeped in years of intel and research that I can proffer: my dreams were not like this growing up. Something has changed. Perhaps is changing. Maybe doing DMT opened some sort of floodgate, maybe our proximity to 11.11.11 11:11 and 2012 is affecting ALL of reality. Maybe approaching my own personal deadline of 27 is a factor. Perhaps it is all or none of these things. Truth is, I do not know. There is also the factor of you. I have not met you yet, but we're due to meet soon. Time for you only moves forward, but for me I can already feel the ripples of a "coming" event. Too many variables to form a valid hypothesis at this time.

What I do know is that I feel like a teenager again. Unsure. Questioning the validity of the world around me. I have not abandoned the teachings of my training and as such have not lost the feeling of serenity I've fought so hard to earn, and yet still I can watch myself thinking these thoughts and feeling these feelings and my assessment is: huh, this again.

When I was an actual chronological teenager I'd received a slow trickle of media that allowed me to eventually break my own fourth wall. Well before the reality-bending of The Matrix, Dark City and Vanilla Sky there was The Maxx. An animated series on MTV's Liquid Television that, frankly, probably should not have been watched by my young developing mind. The series followed the adventures (and misadventures) of the titular character The Maxx.

A man that sat on the fence between reality and dreams. A very poignant expression of life imitating art in what I have become in my summer years. In reality Maxx is a bum, living in a cardboard box and semi-dependent on a social worker named Julie. In The Outback (the series' name for the Dream Realm) The Maxx is a wild superhero that often protects the alternate version of Julie known as The Jungle Queen. The symmetry between this and my two most recent relationships is not lost on me. The overall thought/feeling I took away from the show at that age, and that has continued into adulthood but since withered, is: the inability to differentiate between what's real and what isn't. Does one assign loyalty to the "real world" or The Outback? Teen years are difficult for all of us and I was no exception. The Maxx came to me at the exact moment I was beginning to call everything into question. Looking back, it's easy to see that it catalyzed the slow process that eventually resulted in "me".

The "two" worlds have since blurred for me and I'm fast losing my ability to separate them. Everything seems hopelessly intertwined and the feeling one is usually granted upon waking, that of being anchored back in reality, has been absent as of late.

I understand why humans are so dedicated to their rigid schedules of day and night, rest and work, youth and age. They're focal points. Breadcrumbs. Basically the whole point to this human experience. Just like when I was younger, when I start careening through space and time, my mindset becomes equally adrift. When I have a steady job, the ability to get to a gym and a girlfriend with whom to attach experience, things seem perfectly normal. Psychedelic experiences are limited to the occasional intense dream and of course actual ingestion of substances understood to create such states. However, amid the chaos I am now experiencing, and have experienced at regular intervals throughout my life, the lack of a discernible timeline throws everything into question. Mundane things take on an additional layer of profundity and simple human interactions become laced with synchronicity and meaning. The feeling of trying to be able to pay attention but not being able to has spilled over from dreams into the world. It's like when you go to a party or an amusement park or anything new and disordered. You have a certain amount of the experience that your brain will let you have in the actual moment funneled into sharp spots of presence and then you have the remainder to be experienced as time wears on and you are fed the overwhelming amount of stimulus you ingested earlier in portions acceptable for integrating interpretations.

My life is in boxes and I'm unsure whether or not to unpack. I've been at this apartment for a little under a week now and not too much is unpacked. An organic existence has developed inside my planned one. All useless possession have fallen by the wayside and just the essentials are being utilized. Kitchen, bathroom, clothing. Everything else remains untouched. I'm reminded of my brief stint in jail, or family vacations, or either of my periods of living away from home subsisting on only the bare essentials.

A question develops: Do I need all this shit?

The clear, immediate answer is no.

But I know better than that. Given enough time, everything would just accumulate again. So my charge becomes not attempting to rid myself of all of it, or even to grow so wealthy as to acquire more, instead I must strive to purify. Keep what is crucial to the existence I've created for myself.

Still though, even knowing this, the visceral visual of everything neatly packed n' stacked is hard to ignore.

A big part of me wants to leave everything be. Just unpack when and where the need for an item arises. Another part desires to request off a string of days and to get everything completely set-up how I see fit. This struggle would have defined stress in my youth, but in my maturity I view it from the third position and pick and choose when and where to ally my support without ever losing my sense of calm.

The lines between "me" and "out there" are starting to blur. I mean even more than they already had. Everything seems a perverted extension of myself. Upon waking, and still reeling from the severe states suffered while sleeping, I was still not fully "here". Reality still felt like a dream. Since showering and sitting down to type this, things have greatly settled down.

*Tangent: typing to me seems to be the very definition of the mode of existence we experience as humans from birth to death. Slow, purposeful, calculated attempts at capturing something that is inherently incapturable. When we are Moon-Faced Buddha, typing/life seems slow, boring and monotonous. When we are Sun-Faced Buddha, typing/life seems an elegant way to progress forward and simultaneously anchor ourselves. When you've had overwhelming dreams/nightmares, you long for waking life. When you've had a string of drawn-out tedious days in the Conscious Realm you pine for sleep and astral adventure. Such is the ebb and flow of life. Such is the expression of the very duality we are here to experience. Yin and Yang. The fundamental balance of opposing forces understood to create unity through perceived separation. /Tangent*

I was fully dressed from this morning, (I had to cover the portions of my anatomy deemed unacceptable for exposure to society in order to politely send off a young lady that had spent the night) and still very much out of it when I first decided to reach for my phone and rejoin the reality game. Motivated by hunger and confused by recent mental escapades I sauntered around my apartment aimlessly until settling in on a bag of baked goods acquired from work last night. I set in on them and leaving my front door wide open, traipsed down the stairs and out onto the double-wide sidewalk partitioning off commercial/residential space from the road.

Something snapped back into place.

"What are you doing?"

I dunno. Eatin' muffins/doughnuts and lookin' around. What are you doing?

"Where are your shoes?"

Uh, upstairs. We never wear shoes, don't act like this is something new.

"True, but typically we endeavor upon shoelessness mindfully. We are AWARE and actively CHOOSING to NOT wear shoes. You just plodded down here barely awake."

*eating, thinking about acquiring more food, wondering where everybody is, questioning the validity of his waking state*

"Go back up stairs, write a blog, title it 'Barefoot in The City' and focus on this ambiguity between wakefulness and dreaming."

*nods, heads up stairs*

The static routine that tends to bore and drive toward altered consciousness was absent and instead the unease and desire for stability was prevalent. It would appear I have achieved that. Sitting here, for the past few hours, typing this, has certainly done its part in anchoring me back to what we humans collectively refer to as reality.

Since quieting my minds investigation, a different focal point has emerged. Cyclical behavior. Days, weeks, months, seasons, years.

Cycles. I've done this before. In California. At 19. A theory is beginning to emerge. Perhaps I am destined to repeat my actions endlessly until developing an awareness that supersedes them and allows me to elicit real change.

While my overall progress has spiraled ever upward, that is only from the perspective of a certain vantage point in space. Rotated and taken top-down, I've been moving in circles.

My nonlocal nature is asserting itself as I simultaneously feel like I did as a young teenager living at home, a young adult in California, a twentysomething in my first apartment, how I will likely feel at my modest Vish mansion and in the property I will own in Japan.

It's a very weird, very hard to describe feeling mired in juxtaposition. I feel independent yet lonely. I feel free yet unsure of where to go. Calm and yet somehow confused. Deep inside I know everything will work out, but just below the surface I am anxious to get the show on the road. Sometimes I am so stereotypically human it disgusts me.

This susceptibility to the fickle flow of my mind serves to remind me why I support my own personal marijuana habit. Regular use of cannabis allows me to compartmentalize more efficiently. To definitively enter things into either reality or nonreality. As it stands, when left sober for long periods of time I veer toward the extremes most aim for with psychedelic use. Put simply: When unable to get high via cannabis, I am high all the time. Cannabis does not cancel out my high it merely allows me to schedule to experience it at times when it is more convenient for me to do so.

It would appear that I'm going to keep gravitating to the depths of this valley until my oscillation chooses a side to commit to. While punctuated by periods of perception wherein my immediate involvement is not necessary and the lack of such does not create unrest, overall I keep coming back to the same place. I am continually confronted with having to make a choice. And that choice is represented by a question. A question that is asked in more direct terms in our youth. -- What do you want to be when you grown up? -- At this point along the graph it has take a more broad scope of inclusion. -- What do you want to do?

While when I was younger this question served to torture me, I've grown enough to understand that if that is the main conflict in your life, deciding what you want to do, you are pretty well off. Then, it was something to "solve" or "fix", now, it's just something to think about. To grant dedicated thought to.

I am sure that I will figure everything out and be okay.

I am not sure I am awake.

The Zen Of Anger

Girls vs. Boys
Crying vs. Yelling/Swearing

If I made you cry, good. You made me angry.

We abuse each other. And take more abuse than we fully consciously realize.

Random Ideas:
Girl that gets paid to have food eaten off of her. "taekwondo body pizza" (how's that for random?) has nightmares that intermingle with sexual fantasies about actually being eaten.

I will never feel guilty for being a man or expressing anger again. Not so long as it is acceptable for women to cry.

It is impossible to speak about the future. Anything we say automatically becomes the past, during the act of talking we experience the present. Thinking about the future is the only way to "talk" about it.

the value of limitation

"god mode" game, gain more and more skills until the "game" becomes boring, starts off as a puzzle, turns into an action-adventure, ends as a littlebigplanet/minecraft-esque create-your-own game, only way to "beat" the "game" is to recreate it inside itself
"infinity" the only thing there is to do when you've reached the end is: to start over. From scratch. "The Journey, not The Destination."

There is an inverse proportion between ability and motivation. The greater your ability to do something, the less your inclination to do it. We only want challenges.

The "meat" of the game is the human realm/level of awareness. Makes players forget they are even playing a game. The parts leading up to and coming after happen in a much shorter span of time. With the latter showing a propensity toward exponential increases in speed.

1 -through the dimensions
2 -single cell
3 -evolution
3a-ecosystem a
4 -consciousness
5 -humans
5a-Christ consciousness
6 -technology
7 -ecosystem b
7a-the singularity a [the direct beginning of the singularity]
8 -planets, solar systems, galaxies, cosmosystem, black holes, spiral power
9 -the singularity b [the near end of the singularity] "waking up"
10-starting over/ [Quantum Unity, Quantum Dispersal]

the "game" of "life"

Sorta like Katamari Damacy and Gurren Lagann rolled into one. (Get it? Rolled? fnar fnar fnar)
Dash of The Matrix.

What do you do once you've rolled everything up? Start over.
Separate it. Willfully disseminate it, then begin anew.


If I'm to be expected to control my anger, why aren't you expected to control your sadness?

I am high off of my anger right now.
I feel incredible.
I am thinking so clearly.

My anger focuses me.

Anger is nothing but misguided passion.

Alan Watts - The Real You

X & Y

X and Y.

X vs. Y

Two symbols typically used to represent something unspecified but understood not to be something else, usually used in mathematics. Our culture uses them to represent two other opposing forces as well. Male and Female. An apt representation, I'd say. At first glance, what jumps out at you about these two letters? If you didn't know which represented which, how would you assign genders to these letters? To me, it's immediately obvious. X is female and Y is male.

I mean just look at them.

X (open legs) Welcoming you in, splitting two decisions down the middle and alleging with neither.

Y (phallic) Plunging forward. Ahead. Taking two scenarios and whittling away one to pursue the other.

[Stereotypically] How we do define women? Emotional, unreasonable, indecisive. Every woman you have ever known has dragged you through a department store unable to choose between this and that. Most women I know do the same thing romantically. They date a man, while pursuing other interests and then leap-frog from one to the other until they find the best match. The grass is always greener.

Men, on the other hand? How do we "shop"? Normally a male knows what he wants before he even begins making moves toward it. We go to the store with one item in mind, acquire it (or a pre-calculated back-up if it is unavailable) and roll. Quick, clean, precise.

Now granted I know that not ALL women fit into the category outlined above and nor do ALL men fit the criteria listed either, but for the sake of argument allow me to cleanly split the two to identify their opposing forces.

This all goes back to my realization that every occupation a person can hold can be distilled down to one thing: decision-making. We pay people to make our decisions for us. Personal Trainers, Chefs, Film Directors, etc. When we give them our money, we are in essence saying, "Here, these options overwhelm me, make my choice for me."

So now, unfortunately with the seemingly negative connotation of suggesting that women or the female half is "wrong" or "evil", I proffer the following: X = the inability to choose and the subsequent downfall of "the system", while Y = the ability to weigh two options, decide on one and stay the course. Y, commitment. X, undecided.

Embark on a thought experiment with me, if you will. Picture an x as it is and then continue the legs for as long as you can. They will never cross paths, and as the distance between them grows, their overall length dwindles. Taken another way, if one were to fractal with the shape of an x, eventually everything would start running into each other and the whole thing would come crashing down.

Y, has one direction. Its line continued forward goes on for infinity. Fractal it, and you have a "tree". Growth. Sustainable growth than can be traced back to a single root.

I used to be known for my decisiveness. Next to my confidence it was one of my most prominent character traits. It defined who I was. While to the outside, that may have still seemed the case, to a select few and myself it was apparent that a few years back I became more X than Y.

Spoiled for choice.

I can trace this time back to when everything in my life started to go wrong. When I lost who I was and what I was doing and what I wanted to do with my life.

Recently I have reclaimed my Y. Self-actualized my Y chromosome.

When LOST first debuted, I identified the most with Jack. Despite holding Locke in high regard. While I see my overall character as more akin to Locke than Jack, I more relate to the circumstances Jack was thrown into when the plane first hit the island. The people chose him as a leader and then ridiculed his decisions. Choosing a leader is a scapegoat. A win/win. If he fucks up, you disagree with him, if he does well, you assert that you were integral in choosing him. I have dealt with this on some scale or another for my entire life.

Take the simple act of going out to eat. You've got four people in a car all going "I dunno, where do you wanna go?" Until someone picks (typically the most decisive member available) a person to choose. That person usually being me it goes something like this,

Person A
"Where do you wanna go?"

Person B
"I dunno, where do you wanna go?"

Person C
*shrugs*

Person A
"Let's ask Josh. Make him choose. Josh, where should we go?"

Josh
"We should go to X."

Person B
"I just went to X, how about Y?"

Person C
"Y is gross and X is lame, why not Z?"

Person A
"Z? haven't been to Z in a while..."

A, B and C in unison:
"Z it is!"

Josh
"WTF?!"

Why even bother asking me if you're just going to turn down my decision?! Because they needed a force to oppose. They couldn't/can't think of anything on their own, so they look to me to draw a line in the sand and then they use that merely as a reference point. To make choices relative to. Not the actual choice.

This conflict can happen inside one's head, and often does. Mine for sure.

I'm done with worrying about what I will miss out on, because doing that isn't getting me anything anyway. If someone puts a serving of pizza and a serving of chinese before you and tells you that you can only have one, you have to make a choice. It's one or the other. Not both. Can't make a choice? Then you go hungry. Sure I may be missing out on chinese, but fuck me running this pizza is delicious...

Have you ever noticed how easy it is to counsel someone's life from the outside? The whole time you are thinking, "Man, I'm like Dr. Phil, I should have my own show...." But your life is a wreck. Why is that? Why is it easier to make others decisions for them versus making your own for yourself? Because when it's for an outsider, you exonerate them of responsibility. They get all of the glory with no possible defeat. Disagree with your decision, and go their own route? They become independent, self-motivated. "I didn't need his stupid advice." *applause* Listen to what you have to say and take it to heart? "I'm so glad I made the decision to go to him in the first place." "Good for you for going, I'm proud." It's safe. Guaranteed.

In your own head however, it's a solo sport. A one man team. You either get all the glory or receive all the defeat. You succeed? You move forward. You revel in your self-reliance. You fuck up? You have no one to blame but yourself.

This used to be a negative for me, but then I realized that it wasn't always that way. I chose the sports reference purposefully. As a kid I hated team sports specifically for those reasons. You win? You do well? It was the team that did well. They chose you. They trained you. They passed you the ball before you put it in the goal. Shared glory. Not my thing. But if you botch that game-winning shot? The loss is all yours. "Thanks, Josh." "Way to go, retard." Win as a team, lose as an individual.

That's what drew me to bodybuilding and martial arts and strongman. Solo. No one to defer glory or defeat to. You shoulder it all yourself. And you know what? I'd rather have it that way. You do you, Umma do me.

People chastise men like James Cameron for being an asshole. But then they thankfully sit down and watch his movies as they makes millions. Do you think Jim is sitting at home losing sleep over some PA's feelings he hurt? Fuck no, he's swimming in his millions and making Avatar 2. He's a decision-maker. A man. Negative portrayals paint him as "self-important" or "egotistical". Fuck that. He is driven and he knows what he wants. If he didn't, his movies would never get made and they wouldn't have made the absurd amount of money that they have. Success requires a certain amount of ego. I used to instinctively understand this.

It's time to get back to my roots.

I've been SUPER-depressed lately, the worst I've ever been. I've almost made it of the hole I'm in but there is still a long way to go. My life is on the edge. Thin ice. Any moment now it could all come crashing down. I mean real shit too. Not teenage emo drama bullshit, I mean like homelessness, possible legal repercussions. REAL SHIT.

On one hand I've never been more focused and driven in my entire life. I've been writing and I'm making real tangible moves toward getting my life back, but on the other I am so ready to throw in the towel. After being told I'd received "time served" meaning that my time spent in jail and on house arrest exonerated me from future fines or probation I somehow apparently owe $500+ in court costs. Money I don't even begin to MAYBE have. To compound that glorious news I have to be out of my current place by the 22nd. Less than two weeks. And I have positively nothing lined up.

X vs. Y

Or,

Two road diverge in a yellow wood...

I've been in PA on my own (more or less) for a few years now, and before I lost my way, the goal was to eventually be a rich and famous filmmaker. An enterprise. A tour-de-force. A household name. A VERB. Writer/Director/Editor/Actor. And more. Simultaneous to those titles I would be a Comedian and Martial Artist and most importantly Father. Josh Vish. Those goals seem so far away now... But at least I've re-realized them. I used to live in LA for obvious reasons and had entertained moving back until the writing bug bit me.

I'm getting older and my looks are fading, I can't (and no longer) expect to be a break-out movie star at 25. I'm not getting down on myself or saying it's an impossibility, I'm just saying that it doesn't look likely. It's a shallow business and appearance matters. What I can do is: write and direct movies and put myself in them. And largely that's what I intend to do. Not because of any ego or thinking that I "deserve to be seen" but because I like acting. It's fun for me, I enjoy the process. And that'll be one less paycheck I have to sign. ;)

So I stayed in Pittsburgh, intent to focus on my writing. But like any good writer, I slacked off. Got distracted. Invested in too many projects at once. And, eventually, lost my way. Along with my ultimate goal. I forgot why I wanted to do such things with my life. I couldn't answer why live life at all. (Honestly something I sill struggle with, but the short answer is: because I want to.) In my defense I've dealt with more bullshit in the past 3 years than most human beings, Americans deal with in their entire lives. Loss of license, job, shelter, girlfriend, spending time in jail and on house arrest. I've had a lot dividing my time away from writing and my long-term goals. And rightfully so. I need to focus on supporting myself in a real-world environment before I can devote myself to my craft again.

And I am trying.

God it feels good to say that.

I am trying.

I have a job interview today and plan to resume my community service tomorrow. Awesome. However, I still don't know where I am going to be living in 2 weeks, and that's where all this X and Y symbolism comes into play. Decisions need to be made. Courses need to be set. Roads need to be paved.

My options (whether realistic or not) are as follows (and neatly divided into categories of Fight vs. Flight):
Flight:
Leave Pittsburgh and or PA in general. Either to New Mexico (where my parents are), Japan (where my heart is) or France (where my lifestyle is). Perhaps even the UK (where a good portion of my mind resides)
Fight:
Find another place in Cory, secure the job I'm interviewing for today (or another one), finish my community service and then move to one of the places listed above.

Flight really isn't an option. Legally I am backed into a corner. The Man (think the law personified as Jason Voorhees, or Michael Myers) is looming over me, and while I could probably squeeze under his legs and run into the woods, he'd eventually get me. He always does. He will inevitably catch up to whomever he is chasing. So my only real option is fight. Here. Now. And with what I have. Sure he is big and carrying a weapon, but creatures do amazing thing when they are forced to. I'm a somewhat larger fellow myself, and mildly aware of some martial arts... perhaps I will wait for him to strike, block the blow, hip-toss him and then dismember him with his own weapon. Or my bare-hands if needed. In non-symbolic terms that translates to:

I can't leave here (here being the Pittsburgh area) until I have paid of the inexplicable $500 I owe and completed the remaining 152 hours of community service I still am court-ordered to do. Seemingly simple tasks, but being licenseless and about to be homeless complicates matters. Greatly.

My ideal itinerary would look like this:
I stay here until I have completed the above requirements and regained my license. And ideally that whole time I'd simultaneously be getting back in shape at the gym job I hopefully secure today. After that I would bounce. I get my license back in August and feel I owe Pittsburgh one last chance at providing me with a nice summer. Instead of one in a cast, or jail. After that, with my ultimate goal of becoming a rich and famous filmmaker father I'd very likely head out west. Probably first to New Mexico. I've researched it a fair bit and in addition to reuniting with my parents (which I love and miss very much) I'd be afforded a great many deal of opportunities. The greatest of which being free school. My parents have offered to put me through school. Wow. Talk about second chances. When you're 19 (and cocky, not just for that age but as an inherent character trait) and interested in creative careers, school seems fruitless. [19 year old Josh]: "The only reason I'd ever go to school for movies, is to network. Other than that, it's pointless. I don't want them ruining my creativity with their retarded rules and guidelines."

While a good portion of me still feels that way, the older and wiser part knows better. School will only destroy my creativity or put it in a box if I let it. And then of course there's that glorious networking, being surrounded by individuals who share my passion. Sure to be inspiring. It always was in the gym. And other people's workouts never seemed to affect my own, or my progress. So why should their schoolwork affect mine? It shan't and won't. Unless I let it. There are people in the world right now who would very likely kill to be in my shoes. Now and meaning with this opportunity. Free school? Only a retard would turn it down. Besides, in addition to cinema, I'd be able to pursue other avenues of my interest as well. Like Japan. Or psychology. Or botany. With school the options are endless. So I'd very much like to go, majoring in Cinema, while learning the Japanese language and as much about their culture and history in a school environment as I can.  After that, I become a global force in media and move to Japan. Not necessarily in that order. Shortly after traveling the globe and seeing my share of sights and interacting with my share of cultures and people I'll decide on a place to live and raise a family. All while comfortably still dominating the movie world. That is the goal that is going to lay my path out for me.

This job I'm going to be interviewing for today is by no means a dream job, but on many levels it is. It is near perfect for where I am in my life right now. And considering my goals. Fitness used to be HUGE part of my life and I'm trying to make it that way again. While I no longer want to personally train people, I still do want to be in peak physical condition. I also plan on owning a gym (or 37) "when I grow up". Just one part of the Vish Empire I plan to create after the millions from my films start rolling in. Not only do I miss being in a gym simply for the effect it has on my body, but also for the one it has on my mind. I miss the symbolism of working out just as much (if not more) than the actual physical process. That's another thing, I don't just enjoy the results, I enjoy the process. Being built is a side-effect of doing something I enjoy, something that makes me feel good. Filmmaking should likely end up being the same way. I miss having physical tangible results day in day out mirroring the effort I put in. Learning to push myself in the gym spilled out into the real world. Goals in life are just the same as goals in the weight room. You define one and then work toward it. And progressive-resistance training is a great symbol for how to achieve in general. You take where you are now, measure it against where you want to be and then take systematic steps toward it. I miss that. I miss watching the numbers increase on the tape measurer, the scale and in my books. My books being where I logged how much I lifted and how many times. There's few feelings in life as great as going all out one day, recording the result and then coming back the next week and pushing beyond it. You feel invincible. Unstoppable. I used to feel that way about everything, not just working out. It's time to regain that. The position I've applied for and am interviewing today is that of Front Desk. Face-Man. The Face of YMCA. I can do that. I can more than do that. I'm a born and bred social creature. Very easy to approach. Very welcoming, very familiar. In most any walk of life you can imagine, people gravitate toward me. Especially in a gym environment. I've had a very similar job before and despite the douchebag management it was one of my favorite jobs I've ever held. A fact I only realized in retrospect, unfortunately. Hindsight being 20/20 and all that. My main duty would be interacting with people. Perfect. In addition to that I'd be afforded a free membership. Something I have been dying for even since before I broke my wrist two years back. The portion of their set-up that I would actually utilize is meager, but it would get the job done. The basics are all there. And besides it's best not to go too crazy right out the gate. After about 5 years of no longer maintaining a regular work-out routine, and this past year of living the absolute definition of a sedentary lifestyle, easing back into the water will likely be for the best.

That's a lot of birds being murdered with not a lot of stones being thrown. Money to support myself. Check. Money to put toward my fines (or court costs or whatever the fuck they are). Check. Gym membership to get my body, mind and soul back in solid health. Check. The only downsides are that it's part-time and downtown. Quite a commute for one without a car. Heck it'd be one even if I did have a car. But I'm not gonna let that stop me. A part time job is better than nothing right now and it being downtown affords me an excuse to walk (lending to my fitness again) and see the sights of the city. And to be exposed to its people. Here's hoping I get it. :D After a few chores around the house here and getting myself ready (hygienically as well as mentally) I'll take the bus down and put my best foot forward. And even if I don't get it, at least I can say I did that.

This Y is forging ahead.