GRG -1: The Sidetracked Intro

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WELCOME ----- 8.02.24

Hello 👋 👋👋🪇

I don't particularly like committing to daily posts of online blogs but this seems fun so I think I'll dabble a bit, maybe come in weekly or bi.

But I'm shooting for four a levels at Hills and my predicted admission score is securely at 81 but I still have anxieties around believing it all to be a fluke.

Nevertheless I do know that I have come a long way this academic year (Y11).

I remember I had horribly low self esteem building up until I came across a less judgmental bunch of people and you know the freaky thing...

Today, I finished my chemistry exercise book today period 1 and first. My first reaction was I must have taken the wrong book - like an old book - because I never saw my exercise book coming to an end, so I flipped back a couple pages, and they were the last lessons' so then I thought I must have been taking the wrong book for a long while right, so I checked the cover and it wrote: YEAR 9, CHEMISTRY.

...on earth?

It was such an ethereal experience (and I missed the do now being so flabbergasted) because it meant I had notes and pages from all the way back from year 9,,, I had so many thoughts.

For one, I was unbelievably neat and it was ridiculous reflecting back on how not self aware I was yet being very self conscious. The absurd thing is that I never realised how amazing my work was and the scariest realisation was that as an observer you would have never known what was going through my head back then -- and I wouldn't have known what I seemed like to you -- which really shines a light on the spotlight effect, that, you know is one of those things that when explained sounds so obvious but you never experience the revelation yourself until a much while later -- which I seem to be doing so often nowadays...

I feel like after detaching from my social anxiety (although not completely but now at least I have actualised my emotional awareness) and overcoming the friction with my family that stuck with me so long out of grudge and spite, I can actually fulfil my potential, which I remember was a dream I desperately wished for. Now I can confidently present my ideas in peer discussion and recognise my own ability and competence when before (and even in fragments, now) I felt like I was chasing a carrot on a stick or running a race on a treadmill.

Now I can go through classes without crying for a reason I was oblivious to and frantically rationalise every social interaction I made and I’ve built a baseline for my familial relations, am no longer the catalyst for my parents altercations, and now act as a middle man to bolster kind words within my household.

I recall I was a whinny child that was drunk on the notion that my feelings were neglected and my aspirations disrespected but part of that was my own hallucination (ahem, mind-forged manacles~) and another my inability , or maybe refusal , to empathise. Perhaps, most probably, I wanted attention from my parents and for them to empower me and my achievements (or what a child could believe to be an achievement).

I should owe some of my social disability and cynicism to my mum’s flip flopping treatment to me but ultimately I thank her for building my back bone and thick skin. She also cooks really good eggs and tomato.

But this was meant to be an introductory post rather than a walk though memory lane ah…hhhhh.

I’ll mark this as GYG -1; GYG 0 will be my actual intro. sighcry.