Seeing some people that I know getting married and having children filled me with a weird form of pain in my chest. I feel stuck, unable to process the world that is leaving me behind.

Betrayed that nothing came out the way I probably intended. No matter how much I read books about how things are supposed to be "on time" and not to worry too much about the way others are, I simply can't connect the two concepts in my head.

Pregnancy, Parenthood, and Ages Below Me

I'll admit that I am old. Older than someone normally writing these blogposts should've been. Thus, these people below me are reproducing, having babies, and becoming parents.

Is it hatred, then? Hatred for whom, the innocents? I'm not so vain as to hate an innocent child. I don't even necessarily hate the fact that these people are building families before me.

So what is it then? What is this feeling in my chest every single fucking time I see images of families from subjects below me in the age department?

I can't really categorize it. It's dumb to want to formally categorize and define these things. But it's not hatred.

Hatred, to me, is giving these people shit just because. I know that I'm giving myself shit, not them. I also don't think I hate myself either.

The Way I Was

Maybe it's mostly because I've wasted my youth. The tail end of my bachelor's degree, I snuffed out the length. I became complacent and I woke up late.

I didn't go to campus, I flunked out of writing my thesis. I cared less and less to the point of stagnation. Honestly, I'm beginning to think this is the path I'm falling towards again.

The way I was, the old ways. The ways of someone lost and not wanting to be found. I hated it back then, and I still hate it now.

Maybe this time, maybe this time I have something to grasp onto.

Accountability from these journal attempts.

Unfeeling Mess

I don't want to return to this old, unfeeling mess state. But I am beginning to see myself doing so. My brain would circuit a thought that justifies being stagnant.

Because being stagnant is safe. Who would even want to hammer down a rock that has been there for so long? People would walk by them and give them a glance, if anything. Nobody would know, nobody would care. Being stagnant is the adult version of the shell I wore back in my childhood.

Because I couldn't speak well back then, I can't vocalize my numbness today. I didn't have enough in my arsenal to be someone who knows how to do things. I became a mute in spirit, not knowing and not bothering to ask. Hating every second of vulnerability because it makes me look weak.

I'm trying to kill my feelings because feelings make me open. Open to people entering and either being good or being bad to me. And that in and of itself seems to be a negative to my brain. These justifications are not single entities, I don't think.

What it is, is a bunch of tangled knots I have to address. Each and every one of them.

Promises to Love Myself

I've made a promise, way back when. This year, 2026, will be different. I may have stumbled for the past few months, but no more.

Tomorrow, I want to wake up and fight this head-on. I know what to do, and goddamnit if I don't know I will ask.

I will tell myself that I am enough. That I can be loved. Especially by myself.

That weakness is not something I should be afraid of. And that everything can be okay, and will be okay.

People either don't care that much or they care in a positive light. They're not out there to get you. They're out there to live. You can be a life in their lives.

This Was Never Hatred

These, these feelings in me, these are worry. Deep-seated, unrecognized worry. They are worries about how much I am valued in society. How many metrics my life is worth, and how many sorrows until I'm deemed too dim to be alive.

They are worries that I need to finally look into the eyes of, and be set free. That I needed them then, but no longer now.

Identities change, and these things which were part of my identity must change as well. These were never hatred, because I couldn't care less about the subjects I was supposed to hate.

These are worry. And I have to start letting them go.