Post-Modern Bliss

In retrospect, I think I can actually say I’m glad to have done so much post-modernism at university. Post-modern literary theories, post-modern therapy methods… It can be a bit of a self-defeating philosophy which runs itself into the ground at some points (but there may be a different blog for that whole topic!) Nevertheless, it holds at its heart the notion that reality is subjective, and every person’s perspective is just as valid as the next.

Ever since I kinda diagnosed myself with the OCD, I’ve been consciously trying to distract myself from the obsessive thinkings. For one, I’ve already stopped obsessing over my tattoo. I realised that, essentially, what is on my back is my own version of a design that I liked. My own energy and my own time went into designing a version of a tattoo that can be seen on the back of a member of my all time favourite music group. They’re almost identical, but not quite. And I’m okay with that. I realised that most people really are indifferent to tattoos, so even if I know (and you know) the true stories behind it, most people probably wouldn’t even ask. Come to think of it, I agree. When I see a tattoo on someone I know, I can admire it or hate it, but very rarely do I kick up a fuss about wanting to know its significance and its meanings etc. I Suppose it’s only natural: people are always more interested in their own affairs than the affairs of others. So, for now, it stays where it is! And I’m happy with that.

I decided to clean up my act a bit with the weed. For the whole of next week (being the week of Christmas!!) I am going to be on the coast, and I was entertaining the idea of being high on the beach, lying in the sun and eating ice cream. But then I remembered that, when you want to do something, there’s no time like the present, and I thought about how I keep delaying to stop smoking… I mean, the other day, I took all that I had and put it into a metal box which I locked. I wrapped it in plastic and cellotape and walked all the way to the ravine to hide it under the wheel flap of an old ‘60s truck. I would have to have been desperate to go all the way back to retrieve it: which I did…
So tonight, when mom and dad went out, I smoked my spliffs and made a nice fire to sit by and get high. I decided that it was time to get rid of the stuff, and I watched it all burn away in a plume of bitter-sweet smelling smoke…

I will be the first to admit that I don’t live the way I really want to, and it’s no good getting high and fantasising about the kind of guy I want to be one day. I need to start now, to become the guy that I am! So with the weed out the way, and my eyes looking forward (as opposed to behind to obsess over my tattoo) I’ve decided to get my act together, once and for all. This will hopefully be the last of my overly obsessive blogs, but not the last blog altogether. I’ve just got to think of some other things to write about. But expect great things!

Skin Deep

The story of my tattoo is one that has caused me many an obsession… The story behind it and its meanings for me make it something very much my own. But when people ask me about it, I can’t lie about its origins, and I don’t quite like the truth anymore.
I am a huge fan of t.A.T.u., and a separate blog will be devoted to them. But for now, we’ll keep to the point. I’d always wanted a tattoo, and some of the ideas I originally had for one, in retrospect, were either ridiculously lame or just plain cliché. Dragonflies, stars, celtic crosses… the works. I wanted something I’d never seen before, something that people would be intrigued by. Never really did I think about the subjectivity of intrigue. Nevertheless, I managed to stick with a design that I liked for about 3 months before getting one: the same tattoo that Yulia Volkova has between her shoulder blades. No one really knows what it means. It’s Eastern influence has many convinced that it is the Arabic symbols for peace and love, somewhat twisted and contorted to look like wings. Supposedly to represent freedom? How ironic, as I now find it less than a symbol of freedom than one of incarceration… Arabic fans claim it looks nothing like the aforementioned words, and many say it’s just a fanciful design. That, already, concerns me now, 4 years later. How could I be so willing to have a mark on my skin, without understanding its true meanings?
Nevertheless, I loved it. I believed it was the best thing I’d ever done, and for the longest time, I wasn’t at all bothered by it. How could I be? It’s on my back, so I never actually see it unless I look deliberately in the mirror. Plus, it’s open-to-interpretation design allowed it to go well with whatever mood I was in, or new passions I came across. It has so many elements to it: Eastern mysticism, fantasy, nature… The design suited me so well!
After a while, though, I began to question it, and it’s relevance for me, considering the fact that so many t.A.T.u. fans are likely to have the same tattoo between their shoulder blades! I never did find the template for her tattoo, and I’m not even certain there is one? If there is, has everyone used it? Because if so, that means I’m the only one who drew it from copying what I saw in pictures and videos…

OCD keeps me looking in the mirror, to see if perhaps I’ve changed my mind. Maybe I wanna keep it as is, and am actually happy with it? I don’t think so. I’ve always had insecurities about it. If it isn’t because it’s perhaps a little lower than conventionally seen on peoples’ backs, it’s because it isn’t symmetrical (it’s design allows the proportions to be symmetrical, but each wing has different strokes to it). Always something or another to make me think it’s less than worthy.

So, I find myself at a crossroads in this little love/hate relationship. I can either get an artist to help me add to it – elaborate it, extend it – and make it completely my own, unrecognisable from the one that it was ‘based’ on? Or I can have the whole thing removed? I believe, in a way, that removing it will still leave my obsessive mind hungry for other anomalies in my physical appearance, and the absence of my tattoo will count for nothing. Out of the frying pan, into the fire? Then again, what if I completely hate or grow out of any new changes that are made to it? This is just as likely! Either way, I’m an unemployed student, and don’t have the means to pay for its removal or enhancement. Essentially, I’ve just got to get over it for now and keep my head to the grindstone with the studies so that one day, in a few years time, I can decide properly what I want to do. By that time I’ll hopefully be earning the kind of money to actually pay for whatever decision I decide to go for! In the meantime, I guess the important thing to do is pay attention to the things that really matter. Or, at the end of the day I can just leave my tattoo as is and stop being so self-absorbed about it!? Sometimes I wonder though: so many inspiring people have tattoos. Do they get driven mad like me? Do you have a tattoo? Are you as obsessed about yours as mine?

Mirror, mirror...My, oh my...

Another sleepless night for my restless mind. Obviously that little trip on the motorbike and my little punching bag session were insufficient to tire me out. I’m not sure what else I can do, really, that won’t make me pass out like a pig or take up a significant amount of study time. This whole idea of having to study over the summer months really abhors me. And with such insufficient stimulation, comes that old familiar liminality: a seemingly mysterious place, inhabited both by my rational thoughts and my neuroticism. Here I present you with a tour of the neurotic side. It’s half past 2 in the morning, so be gentle…

Apparently, at some point or another, psychology students inevitably diagnose themselves with this or that disorder, and I could understand this possibility. Never, though, did I think I would eventually come to some sort of psychologically sound explanation for my own haunting obsessions. Everyone knows I’m obsessive, but it’s never really presented itself as anything more than a somewhat irritating personality trait. An inherent part of my individuality, albeit one that usually gets laughed off by anyone and everyone who’s had to put up with endless hours of me seeking justification or validation for some or other ridiculously over-the-top conviction. Of course, the number one recipient of these neuroses is me. So now I have to play the part of the expert and the client. Not an easy task, since everything I’ve come to know and learn needs to be turned inwards, and a rational solution needs to be sought. So medication is available for OCD. Now, I’m no scientologist, but I always said I want to be the kind of therapist who will exhaust every possible psychological treatment before having to resort to medication. So what then?
Personally, I think it boils down to a few things. We’ll leave the whole Body Dysmorphic Disorder out for now. I satisfy all the DSM-IV criteria for that one, but it coincides with OCD, as far as the underlying precipitating factor goes. I don’t have an obsession with locking doors or washing hands. Nor do I obsess about schedules and having all my books at right angles to each other on the desk. That would be Obsessive Compulsive PERSONALITY Disorder, which is a whole other kettle of fish! Instead, I obsess over perceived imperfection, and make mountains out of molehills, as it were, over silly anomalies I see in the mirror. At first I thought it was a form of Covert Narcissism, but I don’t meet the criteria for that one. I did find though, that a correlation apparently exists between narcissism and boredom. That was what initially got me out of my chair and checking my book on Abnormal Psychology. I am bored, here at home. I have studying to do, of course, but I mean, how fun is that!? I ride my motorbike during my breaks, though, and as fun and exciting as that is, one can only really ride the same road to the same places for a time. After that it just becomes, well, boring!
Playstation and the internet, while also favourite past times, don’t really require my utmost attention. (Wandering the misty streets of Silent Hill, do require some heightened senses though!) Essentially, though, I really do have too much time to think…
Apart from the boredom, and I have to get this out, because this is the whole reason I have this blog in the first place – it’s the preoccupation with Mary Jane. That was the one criteria I didn’t quite fit in with the OCD – it shouldn’t be related to drug or substance abuse. Now we won’t go into the semantics or ‘abuse’ and ‘use’ and ‘dependance’, because I am quite sick of that chapter already. I satisfy the criteria for dependence, though, even if Mary Jane is one of the least addictive substances out. This refers to physical addiction, though, not psychological. I’m sure you’re wondering just how many things have respective ‘criteria’? The answer is: almost everything! Now from what I’ve read, MJ tends to reduce the number of compulsions in patients with OCD. Once again, however, a distinction is necessary. OCD doesn’t necessarily have to present with particular compulsions (actions). It’s the obsessive part that grabs me, and nowhere does it say that smoking the herb decreases those annoying and pervasive thoughts and obsessions.
Do I just use the secret? Am I so fixated on my tattoo and the way I feel about it because I constantly obsess about what others think about it? I’m almost absolutely sure most are indifferent to it, but for some reason I have these ideas of being less than worthy, just because I now have what I perceive to be a self induced flaw on my back? Meanwhile, years ago, it was the greatest thing in the world!?
My tattoo and I have something of love/hate relationship. The amount of times I’ve been obsessively distressed over the things is insane. At first, I was obsessed with getting it exactly the same as the one on the back of the girl from one of my favourite bands (who I was ALSO obsessed with, but that’s a whole other blog entry). Then I was concerned about it’s symmetry. Then it was how it was positioned on my back. Funny thing, though, is that these obsessions always stayed separate. When I was tossing and turning about it’s position on my back, I spared no thoughts whatsoever to the previous two perceived imperfections!
I somehow tell myself that, if I get rid of the tattoo, I’ll be happy with myself, and it is the one thing that stands in the way of a better body image. At the same time, I know that’s crap! I find myself projecting all of my anxiety onto one thing. This week it’s the poor tattoo, the week before that it was probably something else. Maybe it was my skin, and how rough it is. Or my pecs, and how one is more muscularly developed than the other. No one else has noticed this, though. Those whom I directly show it to claim to see no difference. This makes me believe, even more, that I have BDD! If it’s not a anomaly that anyone else can see, it’s most likely some kind of delusion! How freaky is that! My skin has, in my opinion, never looked worse. I went to a dermatologist – who rank as the number one professionals that people with BDD seek – and he told me I have a Vitamin A deficiency. This explains a lot, I suppose. But this is where my story culminates. If focussing on the perceived flaw results in its prevalence, then perhaps I’ve been bringing about all of these annoying and almost debilitating problems by my own thought processes. Do I need medication? Or should I quit the weed, get in the sun and get some exercise? I’m sure a preoccupation with something other than myself will give the Vitamin A a chance to work, as well as provide a useful distraction from my obsessions.
I’d love to blame the media and it’s ideas about perfection, physical attractiveness and such, but if its completely to blame, then why doesn’t everyone else I know suffer the way I do? Because I’m a sucker for advertising, and get completely drawn in. I imagine myself on the TV, doing all sorts of things, and having someone watching me and wishing to be in my shoes.

The fact that I’ve written this much really is proof of some problematic reasoning skills – and perhaps a little too much caffeine. But I never wanted this to be a place to vent out silly infatuations with no outcome. So I think I’ll make this a place where I track my progress! I’ll stop this bullshit, once and for all! I told someone once that you can’t complain about the way you look unless you are doing (or have done) everything in your power to treat your body in the best way possible. Cigarettes, Coke, crisps, chocolate, too much sugar, lazing around on the couch or in front of the screen and looking up possible diagnoses for perceived problems is NOT healthy. So now it’s just a matter of finding the way out of this place…

Any advice?