Feelings I'm Working through...

Being overwhelmed and overworked by what is ultimately the bs of academia makes it difficult to reassert my what my purpose is in being here. I want to do well by others through my work. Yet blow-ups with colleagues that have left festering wounds that make it impossible to make eye-contact, the departure of dear friends who keep me focused on my purpose, and not really knowing the right way to go on top of this make it difficult to know what steps to take. Now I'm taking on too much, making it hard to see clearly about any one thing. I want to be a friend, a good person people want to turn to, yet by asserting myself, have I burned bridges to friendship? I feel more alienated than ever when it comes to what I'm doing academically because I am unsure of the way to go, the way that allows me to go towards love of self and love of others through action. I don't want for anything to be too late when it comes to this but I can't help but wonder. It all feels like too much. And then I heard this song during a hot yoga session, a good articulation of the feelings I'm working through... a longing for all of this to work out...

Until next time...

Forgiveness

i'm not quite there yet. not sure if i ever will be.
i realized this today when talking to sis about the man i dread becoming because he is very much a part of me. what he did still serves as a barrier to any possibility of being able to relate to him as an adult. i still feel like a docile child around him. he did a good job of making sure i was docile, incapable of standing up for myself, my siblings, my mother. he contends he did nothing wrong. still manipulative. twisting truths to suit his vision best. how can i reconcile with such ugliness? pretend to get along with it? i abhor him. i abhor what i am because of how well he shaped me and my anger. the pit of black  that rests deep in my soul, my past and present. how can i avoid bringing it into my future? i want nothing more than to embrace and get along with it (or do i? should i?), with him. but he treats me the way he has for 18 years, and then i'm magically an adult that can relate to him as a friend? not a chance. i could never be real with him, he made sure we knew that. my inability to be myself freely (not that i know who that is) will always be a barrier not just to our relationship, but to my relationship with others. i am a master at walking on eggshells just to appease. i hate that it's either this or being him, which is unacceptable. i just want to be me and happy. but who can teach me these things when all i've learned is anything but?

no i am not ready to forgive him. i do not think this would change if he were to be on his deathbed the next day.

does this make me incapable of practicing what i want to preach? of love and acceptance? of great understanding?

how can i let go? how can i forget? his teachings are forever seared into my psyche and soul...

what am i doing and where is the love?

my thoughts and possible realizations of getting a ph.d. in a "liberatory" field

what can i say?

i’m not so sure of anything anymore. just got out of a “discussion” about neoliberalism and its various impacts on social systems, especially higher education. metaphorically the outcomes of these actions were equated with a “zombie culture” a system of the living dead that preys on the living. we acknowledged how steeped in neoliberalism higher ed was and especially programs like cultural studies. i wondered, how can we know about this but not do anything about it? how can such a program that critiques these systems simultaneously perpetuate them? i spoke about the process of getting a dissertation, especially the preliminary exams and dissertation process. i noted how the experiences reiterated to me were deeply alienating, soul crushing experiences (which oddly enough was done out of love somehow).

i am having trouble signing on to the belief that this process is in any way humanizing given its legacy of being the exact opposite—it makes or breaks you after all right? you must remove yourself from your loved ones, work in isolation with these unreasonable expectations hanging over your head of becoming an expert in your field, an intellectual, that you are cultivating this intellectual capital that puts you above the rest; a perpetuation of these deeply oppressive hierarchies.

 i did not come to this program to learn how to play the game, go off and play the game and teach others how to play the game! same goes for sociology. i idealized this program—and sociology—of being a place where i would acquire the tools needed to enact some kind of change in these types of systems! not simply know what is going on for the sake of understanding it in and of itself and just continue on my way happy with the knowledge i’ve gained. i know the process of becoming and getting a ph.d is hard work and i’m okay with that part. not okay with how dehumanizing that process continues to be, and the implication of higher ed being part of a larger system steeped in neoliberalism is that i shouldn’t expect anything less of any higher ed program, no matter what clothing it wears, what ideals it spouts.

someone used the analogy of the process being one where individuals have to give up and rearrange their thinking about things; that that is what is painful about the process. i responded with what i feel this means i have to give up: the ideals that i came in with, ideals that i am here to not only understand but somehow use what i have learned to enact more just ways of being in whatever situation that is i find myself being of service—to practice the ideals of social justice and wellbeing of myself and others.

i wrote this found poem from transcripts of an interview with a meth addict in which s/he describes her/his experiences with the drug. here is the poem i wrote:

in the beginning?

yes.

ravenously.

it gave me energy

for a while

but...all it does is just deteriorate and break you down

it’s humbling

lies like you wouldn’t believe

changes your brain structure so much

and i thought we had a connection

that’s what i fell in love with

 looking at it made me wonder if i am addicted to education and the idea of it as a liberatory space while having experienced it as the opposite of that? fixated on the feeling that what i come away with is something that allows me the ability to enact social justice when that is nothing more than a fantasy in ‘real’ life? it reminds me of the silly kid i was in thinking i was going to be an astronaut, traveling the galaxies and jumping off the rings of Saturn, or becoming a scientist who discovers the cure for AIDS; a childhood fantasy i had to let go of once my relationships with science became problematic.

academia does the same things this poem about addiction describes and the process of learning these exciting things about structural and systematic oppression—the ability to put a theoretical face to what is happening in society—fills me with the joy of knowing but the anxiousness of wondering what i could do about it. it breaks my heart to think that i was in love with nothing more than an idea; a fantasy and that love doesn’t live here at all—not the kind that propels anyone to meaningful action.

i want a ph.d. so i can teach others about these troubling ways of society but now i feel at a loss. how can i move forward knowing what i do? i want to think that i would do things differently, but after having taught once and knowing the implications of the education system i participate in...i just don’t know how can i be happy where love is not valued, encouraged, accepted or fostered? i don’t want to become a zombie. and is that what moving forward means i’m signing on for?

being at my alma mater  seemed like such a humanizing place in comparison. i didn’t understand a lot but my soul was never desecrated for my lack of understanding nor was i being trained to play some kind of game ...everyone here seems too busy to care about making anything humanizing possible...  

what does it mean to get a ph.d. in a place that does care about humanity and love? that practices what it preaches about social justice?

where do i go from here?