Out with The Group

It’s amazing how incredibly alone on the journey I feel sometimes. Sitting in a room full of people that I don’t know and do care to know but I am ‘out’ with. I’m not sure why I gave into the fear of loneliness tonight. I know that I don’t like going out with the group from the guest house, but I did it anyway. I didn’t want to eat alone. But why… I invariably have a better time in this circumstance than I would have otherwise.

I was bored and I felt out of place. No peers in this group, just young kids searching for things I no longer seek. Discussing topics I no longer entertain. I was bored and somewhat displeased with myself for being so obvious about it. I think that because I felt like an outsider, I decided to try and make them feel insignificant. Like, the older wiser one is bored with you. And I was, but simply because I don’t identify, not something personal.

I saw a shaman today. I’m not really even sure why. I guess because I’ve been looking at spirituality recently, I thought it might be up my alley way. It wasn’t quite. I was just left gripping to information that I’m not quite sure how to use. Left wondering if she was real or if I just want it to be. She told me stuff that I already knew about myself, but hearing it from another person somehow made it real. I just need people to promise me that I will be a successful journalist, then I guess I’ll do it. All kind of silly really. All things I could do for myself. But, like James said ‘maybe it’s worth the 3000 baht if you start to look at yourself in a different way.’

They all went out for Thai massages. I know half of them don’t even want to go but feel the need to do what the group does. I am happy to get away from that, but loneliness is far more startling when in happens in a crowd. When you are not alone but mentally vacant from your company.

I sent a text out to a girl who doesn’t really know me and cares little about what I am feeling tonight. We spent some time together on the weekend so I decided to go out on a limb and text her that I was bored. Text her that I was laughing at my insistence on trying something I was almost 100% likely to not like. I sort of knew she wasn’t going to reply. Still, I decided to go out on a limb. As much I feels the pangs or rejection, of being ignored, because she did not reply, I like the part of me that will keep trying to build bridges and reach out to the people that I like. Amazingly, though diminished, this part of me isn’t all together gone.

It is at times like this I don’t wonder why that one questionable relationship that is there still exists. It is a soft and familiar cushion to fall on when the chair gets pulled out out. What does that mean?

Loneliness is a profound emotion. I run from and hide from it so often that it is a wonder I have any energy left at all. I try to distract myself from it and cover it with all that I do. But it is always there. Sometimes I call it independence. Sometimes I call it depression. I think I may even be confused enough, to sometimes call it happiness. I don’t think I am that different from anyone else in this sense, but I am acutely attuned to it. So aware of it.

Too much loneliness is a condition that creeps into your blood stream and spreads out into the energy that leaves your body. It becomes all you take in and all you exert. Like all emotions, it can be dangerous if you let it.

Music Soothes. So good for this mood. Once soundtrack

Experiments in Independence

There are no restrictions beyond the ones that we give ourselves. So often when I feel that I cannot do something, it is me who is saying I can’t, not circumstance or the universe. If I say that I cannot wear pink because it looks badly on me, so it is. If I decide that I can wear whatever I want I can.

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Last night I decided to go for hotpot and ice-cream because I really felt like it. Initially, I was going to wait around until some other people arrived back at the hostel, but in truth, I didn’t really want to go with them anyway. It can be incredibly wearisome to have to wait on others, especially a large group, in order to make a decision. At 30 years old, I think it may just be safe to step beyond that. Besides, what is the point of taking a solo journey across to the other side of ones planet if time is to be spent pandering to the desires of a group of people I don’t even know? Something about that seems hopelessly dependent and pathetic. I’m almost certain that I would likely have ended up not having hot pot anyway. So many in the group seem to have come to Thailand to experiment with how much they can pay for boring North American food they can easily eat at home but will have here because they are unwilling to open their minds or palettes.

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So even though hotpot is usually a group kind of meal, I decided to go and have it alone. With my book in had of course.

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It was glorious! I ordered the ingredients I wanted and ate greedily all while noting that I got only a few casual looks from other attendees. They were far to focused on their delicious to care too deeply about my little meal. I took my time and savoured my soup reading bits of my book in between. I then sauntered, full and happy, over to the ice-cream shop for a tasty treat.

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It was such a small thing, but I felt stronger for it. After a month of occasionally moonlighting with the group, growing irritable, and then going on my own – I am flying solo the rest of this trip. I am meeting other solo travellers for the occasional respite, and experiencing what I want to experience, selfish in my concern for the needs of others in a group that is like a baby feeder program. What a refreshing feeling that leaves me feeling proud, oddly. It’s just food.

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It’s not like I haven’t done things here alone before. I have done quite a bit of solo trekking. But somehow I had built up a wall around going for hotpot on my own. I will now say on my own instead of alone. The connotation is so different. It was just me telling myself that this was somehow unacceptable. In actuality, it was a welcome change.

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I suspect that there is much more in my life that I unnecessarily say not to, making barriers for myself that don’t really exist. I see others doing it all the time. I guess I am not immune to the folly.