Reflection

I'm not going to write about what you all what to hear. I still owe a post on Stockholm, and another City of Culture event I went to – but now is not the time.

It is hard to know, or decide, how honest or bare or truthful I want to be when I'm writing to you all. Some of you know me better than others and some of you don't know me at all. Writing things here leaves the emotions detached. Is it worth even saying how I'm feeling? Will it be perceived and translated the way I intend?

I'm a little scattered. I have so much on my mind. I am beyond worrying, it's a state of being that I outgrew some years ago (unless it comes to missing buses, but that's a whole bunch of other stories...). At this very point in time I am in a moment of suspension – I choose to take no action.

You learn by failing. I'm still at the bottom of the hill, only just now figuring out how I should tackle it, whilst everyone else is already halfway up. I almost want to opt out of my class now. I want to say, okay, I have learned about the industry, and even more about myself, that was the point of the exercise, to learn, so can I start again? Have a do over?

I really have learned more about myself than anything else. I've learned that I thrive in a creative environment. In fact I don't just thrive, but depend on it. Some one noted that I had a lot of stuff in my room here. Stuff. Now, this can be interpreted in two ways. The usual and immediate thought has connotations of consumerist behaviour – that I like to buy things. Which I don't. I don't need the comfort of stuff – but I kind of do. I need the visual stimuli. A white blank room would strip my soul – I strive to combat monotony. Designing requires you to look at what is being seen and take it apart, put it back together, stick it with something else or turn it upside down. How can you do that if you cannot see it, touch, break it, fix it?

So this creative environment. It's kind of lacking here. Which makes me different. People who don't speak English as a first language have expressed to me that they are a different person in English. In their mother language they are witty, or funny, or clever, but cannot translate this into English. To me this seems painfully sad – personality does not translate. Thinking about it, I think creativity is my strongest language, and with very few people around who speak it, it's difficult to express that side of me. It's like hibernating an aspect of you character – you are not a whole, but a facet of you.

It has been a roller coaster of extroversion and introversion here too. (Does that make sense?) There are nights where you are thrown head long into the open, having to navigate a new field - people and places you don't know. It's quite a self affirming thing to do, a domino effect of confidence ensues. And then there are spells of detached activity. Sitting in my now not too white box, communicating – or not – through a representation of me. Computers, facebook, emails, skype – these blessed curses that we love to love and love to hate. We praise them and shun them, but would be nearly, and in some cases literally, be lost with out them. I don't like being dependant, and the idea that I need a computer, or access to a social forum is dispiriting. I don't think I'm over exaggerating when I say 'need' either. I don't think you'd be attending many of the umpteen ESN events or parties if you did not have access to a facebook, or to some one who did. Spells of not quite loneliness and not quite boredom pass over, broken up by the penning of to do lists that become a measurement of the passing of time.

It's easy to complain, and I try not to. I don't want this to become a place where I rant about how I much don't want to do something, or how unfair something was. (Life isn't fair – my favourite lesson from childhood, because it is true, and you shouldn't try to change the fact.) That's not productive. To be productive you must be able to get something out of it. So look for a way. Find what you need from it. Be objective and reflective to truly learn from something. Don't just state the facts, or your view of the facts, and move on. That's not how it works. It's difficult to view yourself in an objective manner. Surely it's practically impossible? But there is still gain to be had from trying.

Trying. I guess that brings me back to the present. I say I have learned my lesson and want to walk away from it, but again, that's not how it works. Like it said, life isn't fair. (If it was fair some one would be holding my hand and telling me what a pretty picture I'd made. Do I really want that...?) You have to keep trying and pushing, life isn't about speed, but endurance (a cliché, I'm aware, but aren't 'clichés' clichés for a reason?). Coming out the other side 'a better person' (barf) Note. I am not 'putting up' with something here. There is a difference between enduring a struggle and 'putting up' with unnecessary pain or sadness. Learn the difference, you'll see it there.

My task now, aside from all of the obligatory, university related things, is to conjure a creative environment for myself. A little late in the game, I know.