Two years ago I got braces.

I started this blog to catalog the entire experience, because getting braces in my mid-twenties was pretty much the only interesting thing happening to me at the time. I was two months from graduating and I craved for my next adventure. I half jokingly labeled the next chapter of my life as “Social Suicide” (thank you, Tina Fey). I wanted to use comedy as a way to hide the fact that I was actually quite nervous about the entire situation. My smile had always held me back. I was shy because of my teeth, and I never liked being in photos, and whenever I did get photographed I always smiled with a closed mouth. It was a huge insecurity of mine and I wanted to get rid of it.

But the thing about changing yourself is that everyone will eventually find out that you’re trying to change yourself. People begin to look at you more closely, trying to figure out exactly what’s going on and what about you started it all. When I told my friends, some of them were pretty excited for me, and then there were those that never noticed my teeth at all. But I did. I noticed them, and other people noticed them, just like they noticed my skin and my eyes and my body shape. 

And when it comes to changing our bodies, in this world of “self-love” and acceptance, it almost feels like you’re betraying your kin by conforming to the corporate culture of a singular definition of “beauty.” Straight teeth, slim body, perfect hair… I found myself trapped in this pit of narcissism, and it sucked. I needed a way out, I need some sort of direction to calm the frustration that lived under my skin.  

So in hopes of finding a positive, metal-mouthed role model for my life, turned to the one and only, Ugly Betty. Every time Betty Suarez learned a lesson, I learned a lesson. I watched her life unfold before my eyes, hour after hour, and cringed at her optimism; the type that gets you into the most horrible positions, but when it pays off, it pays off. And I loved that about her! I loved how hard she worked and how challenged she was by the world around her! And most importantly I loved how she always failed before she could succeed. 

In one week I will be getting my braces off. 

Looking back to when I started this blog, I remember telling myself, “Kai, you better start doing interesting things.” I needed to find excuses to write because I wanted to be a writer. I wanted to live a life worthy of a blog. I also secretly wanted my biggest insecurity to churn out the best time of my life, to eventually be turned into a mini-series of maybe even a wonderful gay-cult-comedy for Gaysians. I wanted Betty Suarez hilarity with Buffy/Angel angst with a handful of Gossip Girl glam! 

And did that happen? Not so much. 

Because I am not a gritty/glam kindda guy. I do not wake up in random beds every Sunday morning, I do not find myself caught in out-of-context-drag, and I most certainly do not immolate myself with alcohol for shits and giggles and #nothingelsetodo. And so instead, I focused in on the sex and the drama that occurred in my life because I thought it would make me more interesting. I swept away the vulnerability and the vicious cycle of self-pity because I didn’t want to bother with them. I didn’t want to be sad anymore, so I continually sold myself short because I wanted to be sexy and wild. 

But what was most strange was the anxiety I carried around with me whenever I posted an entry. I was scared of having the people in my day-to-day life (the old friends, the new friends, the work friends, the forgotten friends) read about the stories I casually shared with the Interweb. I fretted over whether or not the Kai on paper properly reflect the Kai in real-life. I wondered if friendships changed when consumed through a different medium, and if so, was there a version of Kai that felt more real and honest than the other? At the end of the day, between Facebook, Twitter and Tumblr, it all just seems like one big experiment in narcissism.

Despite all this, I still want to find ways to stop hating myself for being all the things I am and I also want to finally  be able to smile with my teeth. I’m part-way there on the former and I’m almost there on the latter. I’ve learned to give myself some credit by walking away and letting go when I needed to, and I’ve recognized that the only way to be good is to do good, no matter how uncomfortable the choice, act, and fallout may be. Narcissism is a dangerous game. Too many photos of yourself and you begin to loose yourself. 

And now that I’m reflecting on these past two years, I realize now that my story really is changing. It hasn’t been dramatic or epic or climactic, but it has been quiet, thoughtful and full of surprises. Choosing what to let happen and what to force forward, learning when to step back and when to stand down, thinking critically about all the different lines to cross in face of greater and more challenging adversity, all of these tiny little stories make up the narrative of a life I am now beginning to really feel like I can call my own, and that’s a story worth holding onto. 

I lost myself completely in a job that soon meant anything to me. I hadn’t spoken to my parents in weeks. I hadn’t read a book or done laundry or gone to the grocery store in two months. I hadn’t seen the best friends — the ones who had not long before dubbed me their unofficial fifth roommate — in just as long, which meant that I didn’t know one of them had been in an accident. I had disappeared from my own life, was a stranger inside of it, and couldn’t seem to find the time or strength to think of a way out.

Keep Reading…

Last year Bob Dylan compiled a song list for Starbucks’ Artist Choice Series. In addition to offering up a keen selection of country, blues, and jazz, he also supplied notes and commentary as to why he held the songs in such regard. BUT, the best part was the forward.

He wrote, “When I was asked to put together this collection of songs, I wasn’t sure what to do. So I just grabbed a bunch of things I was into recently. Some people have favorite songs, but I’ve got songs of the minute — songs that I’m listening to right now. And if you ask me about one of those songs a year from now, I might not even remember who did it, but at the moment it’s everything to me.”

I bring this up as today’s lesson: Nothing is final. One day you’re high. The next day you’re low. You might have a funky, expressive, or awful haircut today, but soon it will grow into something else, something new and random. Maybe you grew up liking pop music and boy bands, but now you like a specific mash up of Electronic & Classical. You might decide you don’t want to smoke cigarettes anymore; that it’s just not who you are. Maybe you were a staunch republican but now have curiosities about the well-spoken and well-organized Democratic Nominee. Perhaps you were madly in love last week, but woke up today feeling comfort in solitude, without a desire to be held.

Everything is fine. Not finAL.

We tend to instantly identify with “things.” And we believe in so much, when in fact, a belief isn’t known to be true. It’s a hope for the truth. We hold grudges because of what someone said when we were young. We store hurtful words and replay them in our minds until we think it to be true. And some of us believe a TV commercial and think we need a faster computer, a smarter phone, a stronger pill, a more relaxed-fit jean, etc. We think that certain things, thoughts, or actions make us who we are and sometimes we become addicted to those thoughts or behaviors and then become too afraid to let them go.

I write and post a lot therefore many people assume I have every self-published word memorized or that I live these shared thoughts constantly. This is not the case. My brain doesn’t reference myself very well actually, and I’m sure I contradict myself every other day in one way or another. One day I feel like I have all the wisdom of the world and the next day my soul wears thin and I stutter just ordering ice cream.

And everything is fine.

Because I trust in the ever-changing climate of the heart. (At least, today I feel that way.) I think it is necessary to have many experiences for the sake of feeling something; for the sake of being challenged, and for the sake of being expressive, to offer something to someone else, to learn what we are capable of. These meanderings, rants, and blogs for instance, provide a great deal of comfort just sharing it, even though i put a part of myself on the line to be criticized or considered an ass.

Oh well, Courage is triumph of the soul is guess. and an Ass can still be of great service.

So Remember, You have the right to change your mind.

About anything.

Anytime.

This is not the ending.

P.S. – No doesn’t mean forever. It simply means, “Not right now.”

And on the topic of Not right now, whatever happened to you in the past is not happening now.

You will be safe behind your honest decisions and mood swings.

I promise.

-mraz

Berlin

The thing about trying and failing is that once you fail, you can’t help but feel like shit. Picking yourself back up and giving it another go is far too 50’s optimism for me. It seems that these days, when you hit some sort of rock bottom, the unique thing to do is to reinvent yourself. That person that you really wanted to be when you were 17? Maybe you should give him/her a try. 

I’ve recently found myself back at square one. While it’s not rock bottom, I personally feel like a complete loser. 24 years old with nothing really going for me. Never had a boyfriend, which means I obviously am unable to commit/be interesting enough to leave a guy wanting more. What happened to me? The Kai Golden Years of High School has come and gone. My glory days are over. 

(dramatic lighting as I sigh loudly)

So what should I do? 

Reinvent. 

What would that entail?

Drastic changes. 

What are these changes?

I have no idea. But once I figure it out, I will write them on my wall with black permanent marker so that every morning I see those goals in front of me. And when I complete them, I will repaint my room. I will repaint the hideous shade of pastel yellow, left over from the days of my older sister, the paint that I never bothered to change because I figured by 21, I would be out of this house and living on my own.

HA.

thegoodandthegreat:

The tiny wins.

The petty victories.

The lessons learnt.

The love letters you wore ‘round your neck.

The first month of sticking to a workout regimen.

The B pluses.

The hugs people give you.

So many things, so many tiny things make up the whole of who you are.

How beautiful.

It was easy to dream.

Deep down, a part of me refuses to chalk it all up to some idealistic phase of my early twenties. And for a brief period, I envisioned myself, along with my friends, changing the world. Or at least, our corners of the world. 

But somewhere between pre-grad and post-grad, it finally hit me. If for the past six years, my dreams have yet to motivate me towards some concrete goal, perhaps it isn’t meant to be—at least on the scale that I once imagined. It’s difficult to turn dreams into reality, to have the practical sense of making them real. 

One of my greatest fears is not having enough time to do the things I want to do. My mentor told me recently, and I may have brought this up before, that my problem is not that I lack in ideas—it is that I have too many. And so, I need to choose one, make the commitment, follow it through and move on to the next. My fear of commitment and my tendency to run away comes from my parents. I have an inkling that it stems from watching my parents commit to things that have ultimately turned to crap. At the same time, I have to remember two things:

i ) my parents’ marriage is not an indication of all marriages,

and 

ii) their insane hours and lack of free time is not an indication of my future career. 

The sacrifices my parents made were for the benefit of the family. Everything they did, they did for my sister and myself, and my mother will never let me forget that. And whether or not I agree with their choices is of no real value. I can’t change the past and I can’t change my parents. 

So then what is the most practical decision for myself? What will I do to not end up like them? I’m going to make some choices. For a lot of my friends, and maybe even for a lot of you, our parents were forced to do things in order to survive. These days, many of us have the privilege of taking our time—but we have to remember that it is a privilege and not a right, and therefor, at some point, we have to give it up in order to move forward. 

By making a choice and holding onto a commitment, I will be forever changing my life. The ideas that I once held dear to me may lose all relevance, while others will grow to become invaluable assets. I’m scared of losing myself and I’m scared of what the world will make of me. But if I can remember why I made these choices in the first place, perhaps I’ll always be able to find a way back to myself.