me vs. me

Let me start off with a letter I came across the other day. It goes as follows: "

YOU.

You. Yes, you. I am writing this for you.

I know you are reading this. And I want you to know I am writing this for you. No one else will understand. No one else knows. They think that this is for them. But it’s not. I am writing this for you.

I want you to know, life…it’s hard. Every day can be a challenge. It can be a challenge to get up in the morning. To get yourself out of bed. To put on that smile. But I want you to know, that smile is what keeps me going some days. You need to remember, even through the tough times, you are amazing. You really are.

You should be happy. You are gorgeous.

I know that the weather might not be perfect. You might have to turn your back to the wind or feel the cold nipping at your nose. But you know what, at least you are there to feel it. At least you can enjoy the sun’s warm rays on your face. Or that cold February wind biting at your cheeks. You know what that means?

You are alive.

Everything will be okay."

Do i seriously need to add to that? Let me put it this way, let's all be happy and thankful for what we have. Let's learn to love things or learn to change things. Lets not complain. Instead of whining, let's take that energy and create something positive for us to grow into. With that said, adieu.

Rush Hour

We all have that "generic" friend. I don't mean generic in a bad way, I mean that we all have that one friend that blames their relationship problems on the outside world. For example, a close friend usually comes up to me and says, "Clinton* doesn't reciprocate the feelings I feel for him.. Why does this always happen to me?" If you haven't heard a friend complain about the world not being "fair" to them, then I'm sorry to break the news but, you re most probably THAT friend. It's okay, we can fix that. So taking Clinton and my best friend of many years, Martha* and their relationship under the microscope. Martha feels that after 2 dates shes ready to marry Clinton. She is picking out color swatches for their hypothetical child's baby room. (She wanted to pick coral for a boy, is she crazy?!) I think we all know the answer to the problem of why Clinton doesn't feel the same. You can't expect someone to be madly in love with you after 2 dates. Even if those dates are the two most amazing dates of your life, that still doesn't mean you are ready for marriage yet. I thin Martha needs to slow down. From the time that Martha told me this issue she had with Clinton, I began to wonder why we always rush things. Two days ago I took a walk with a good friend of mine. I'm usually so busy and I never have the time to slow things down. (I'm even typing this extremely fast). That was truly the first time I didn't feel rushed. Maybe it was just the good company? But ever since then, I just took things at a steadier pace. To my shock, I got all the things I wanted to do, done, and my body wasn't panicking like it usually does at the end of the day. My philosophy of this entry? Calm down. Go slow. Don't rush things. Life is too good to speed through it. Take life day by day.

"Sometimes it's important to work for that pot of gold.  But other times it's essential to take time off and to make sure that your most important decision in the day simply consists of choosing which color to slide down on the rainbow."


Till next time, THEbathtubphilosopher.

*Indicates name change to protect my friends and loved ones from social embarrassment, or to lessen the pain for when they try to physically abuse me from using their relationships and secrets in my blog entry. (You know who you are, winky face.)

All-You-Can-Defeat

I've been really busy lately. I know I say that a lot but many things have changed for me in the past months. I'm a recent graduate, for starters. I got a new job a month ago, and I'm involved in many outside projects. Take those factors, my new relationships mixed with my old and we have a hell of a chaos theory going on. I'm overwhelmed, and even though I do my best to accomplish things everyday, I feel like more is piling up on my plate. My life (and really anyone) can be somewhat compared to an All-You-Can-Eat Buffet. You look around and you see what you think looks good. You get strategic and figure out with foods will mesh nicely with your taste pallet. Sometimes you might actually take a small sample to the side, just to test how it is. You're one on one with the buffet. You have a small (or fairly large- Come on we're in AMERICA) plate and you want to try it all but you know you won't have room. You have to choose. My life is like the plate or a stomach. If you didn't follow through with my whole analogy, it's okay. Let me sum it up for you: I want to try to do everything but i know there isn't enough time or energy to spread on all endeavors. I know everyone can relate to this. Either you feel the world is expecting something from you, or someone significant is expecting everything from you. We all feel like our lives are pulling us in different directions. When obligations, responsibilities, tasks, bills, and all forms of non-relaxing activities pull us, we are bound to snap. What's important is that we have the power of resilience. We need to mold back into our original characters. I heard a quote recently that said, "Once you start working on something, don't be afraid of failure and don't abandon it. People who work sincerely are the happiest". That quote inspired me to mold back into shape as fast as I can. No one accomplishes their dreams and goals by sitting down on a sofa. Defeat the urge to just give up. Don't be afraid to accomplish great things. Live life and love. 

More Than A Helping Wallet

Well, for some this is normal, and for some this isn't. I live with my parents. The circumstance fit. Well, I am going away for the year and both my parents are healthy and able to travel, and enjoy life. During my year away they decided that they would go to Haiti and volunteer for two months together. When they first told me about their plans, I was shocked. We donated to the Red Cross by sending a few texts, we helped out in food drives, but I couldn't help but think- that's not enough. My parents' unselfish motives has made me re-think a lot of what I'm doing lately. With Japan's devastating natural disasters, Haiti's earthquake, and so many more horrible things that don't even make the news I cant help but think maybe a helping wallet isn't enough. Over the past 3 years I looked into ways to help my own community, and to make life in New York City a little more comfortable. After surprisingly little research( #TGFG Thank God For Google) i found websites that connected me with local volunteer companies. I've found cool projects such as painting a the walls in an orphanage and creating a better feeling for the kids who live in the home. There are so many people out there that we can all help. Please lend more than a helping wallet. Get inspired.
(PS- I'd love to hear feedback from all my posts! What do you think? Feel? Notice? Rebuttals? Send me a holler at THEbathtubphilosopher@gmail.com )

Being my own Pheonix

I took a short break from my hectic blogger lifestyle. It's been hard to write and keep up with a blog. Some may think that it takes 5 minutes a day, and that's all but in reality its so much more than that. You must make sure your readers keep coming back, do much research, and have interesting topics. I had a few posts in mind but nothing worth putting on the blog. I've found one. Lately, there has been a few problems in my life which I thought I couldn't bear, I couldn't withstand the challenge, and there were indeed some mornings that I just wanted to lay in bed all day. I'm not saying that this is only me, surely every single person goes through hardships and struggles in their lives. Everyone handles stress and barriers in their lives in different ways. I had an epiphany one day. It was Sunday, and like my usual neat-freak self, i went to organize my DVD collection. There were some from about 10 years ago. One DVD in particular happened to catch my eye. What was it? Harry Potter. So? She saw Harry Potter DVD? Shall we celebrate? (That's what you're probably thinking) But my connection between my problems and Harry Potter goes deeper. One of my most memorable scenes is when Harry goes into Dumbledore's (the headmaster of Hogwarts) office, and when Dumbledore shows him The Pheonix. This is where I say my oohs and aahs. The Pheonix, my favorite mythological creature. A little background information: The Pheonix is a bird that can live 500 - 1000 years old. When the great bird dies, it disintegrates into ashes and when you're leas expecting it 2 minutes later it is re-born from its own ashes into a new Pheonix. Maybe now you start to see my light at the end of the tunnel. Some people say movies can't teach you anything but I learned that when you're at that moment when you feel like the world couldn't be more unreasonable, and when you're about to give in that towel, you rise from your own ashes. With my problems under my metaphoric wings, I'll have to learn to be my own Pheonix, and rise again.

Innovation: Blogger style

I took a breather from blogging for about two weeks to get my chaotic life in order. It was great. I got to see some new things, be with people I haven't seen for a while, and most of all explore. My next few blog posts will be about things and people I have learned about in the last two weeks. So, what do I do in the mornings? I wake up, eat breakfast, get on that damn blackberry and ooze off into the web, searching and reading my favorite blogs. Between Gawker, Sartorialist, Justjared, NYT, and Omiru I found something I like a lot. The blog is called ablogaboutmedia.wordpress.com. I heard it through the grapevine. Although its recent but up and coming, I enjoyed the short mini reviews about recent television shows, and movies. He (or she) (It?) had a grasp for writing short, amusing, but concise stories. With a new post everyday it was refreshing and was effective in helping me plan what to do with my free time. Give it a look. Give me your feedback. Maybe I can score an interview? We'll see.
THEbathtubphilosopher@blogspot.com

Socially Stealing

In one of the many classes I take, we learn about business ethics. Now, in order to know business ethics we studied the common ethics or morals which are taught in societies around the world. We all know the commandment, "Thou shalt not steal" and most of us abide by the commandment. We know stealing is wrong, and it shouldn't be done (in an Utopia society). When my professor brought up the different types of stealing I was puzzled. There are different types of stealing? What's so difficult to understand? Turns out there is a stealing category of stealing knowledge. Example: In a given high school, three students are applying to a select ivy league college. Only two out of three students from that particular high school can get accepted. They all maintain the same extra circulars with the same GPA, and come from the same ethnicity. There is nothing setting them apart from one another besides the SAT. Comes down to SAT time and the three applicants take the SAT together. One of the three cheat off someone else's paper, and get a much higher mark ergo getting one of the two spots in the college. That is considered stealing knowledge. "Cheater" clearly stole another one of the applicants spots. Think about it: this is wrong, plain and simple. It sounds like clear cheating. Now take it in retrospect: if you were a bystander in this SAT and you clearly saw the cheater "stealing" answers. Would you say something? After all, if you don't say something you are just as guilty as the cheater. If you say something, you are considered a rat and in social settings today, a rat is not a great association and an adjective people want adjacent to their names. What would you do? Would you resist your urges and your morals and shut up? Would you speak out on behalf of the person the cheater is cheating off of? Do you not consider this cheating? I want to hear from you. Don't be shy. THEbathtubphilosopher@gmail.com